Stop Hiding Behind an Electronic Mask

Your face is bathed in a white-blue glow. This is the mask of the 21st century.

“are you allowing your children to grow up this way?” photo by Ludovic Toinel on Unsplash

Who are you? Are you the same person that is represented on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Snapchat? Are you the same person when you are face-to-face?

Or are you hiding behind an electronic mask, where the online-personality presents someone who is different than what you portray in the real world?

“Guy Fawkes mask” by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash

This is a world where many of us seem to present ourselves differently online, using electronic anonymity. Is it because we are unhappy with who we are when we are at work? Or are we afraid? Is the online persona a different person when you are home? Why?

Has the chameleon effect taken over when you are online with your “friends?” Is it healthy that we all have multiple faces, but the one in public is someone else?

Too often we have seen someone post some conflagratory (conflagration + inflammatory) remark to one of the social media sites that is immediately disclaimed. Depending on the person, it is a message or notice that garners major media attention. Then it is attempted to be deleted before it becomes a major public outcry, yet some netizens have taken a snapshot of it. Why was that message or notification posted to begin with?

If someone posted, yet immediately retracted the statement, why? Are they afraid to say the same thing in the real world? But the brain fails to kick in until after the action, by then it is too late. Running in the wild. Maybe we should have taken time away from the keyboard.

There is a negative benefit when posting something inflammatory to a social media site. It must be the lack of control when wearing an electronic mask.

No constraints. No one looking.

Freedom.

Although social media has its opportunities, unfortunately, the Luddite in me fails to see the full purpose. I am certainly blind to it.

I have yet to pick a plumber based on his Instagram. I have never picked a roofer based on his Twitter account. Maybe someone has selected a doctor based on their Facebook account, not me.

Yes, true, not all social media is negative, and I am not against these sites but I do not allow them to rule my life. I have discovered a wild amount of awesome material out there. It has forever changed multimedia greater than any media generation before it. There are social aspects of sharing in the online community. We are humans, we are social. We collect and connect with others like us. The electronic online medium allows this on a tremendous scale.

It has given voice to many people that would never speak up in a public setting. They are using the mask to be someone else. To not have fear of rejection in a “public” setting is liberating. It allows them to save face.

Yet, when humans hide behind these systems and start using social media to push ugly objectives to influence or change things for their benefit, it has lost its purpose. It is time to disengage.

“trust who she is?” photo by Asif Aman on Unsplash

Can we accept the ugly online persona as that is really who they are? That online face may be honest. The person in the cube next to you may be wearing a mask now.

Be careful with who you are — online and in the “real” world. Especially as you begin to search for the next role. Your postings may actually affect your chances at the next job. Your tweets can haunt you years later. Your digital stomping can derail your career faster than you believe it can.

Re-learn how to be physically social. In the present, in the great wide open. Push away the electronic tether. Detoxify. Re-introduce yourself to your real friends and family. Relationships matter.

Go forth and be brilliant.