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Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

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Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#31

Post by Animats »

kaitai wrote: post #14
oldmanjay wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, so like modelling, which is not exactly an obscure occupation. That she did it using instagram doesn't make much difference there. I think it's important to point out that I am an old man, not a teenager, so overdramatizing things doesn't boost my engagement.

Modeling is not an obsession, it's a job. You do it when you're young, smoke a lot of cigarettes etc, and then you move on. It's like grad school but with even more skeezy old guys. (Now, math modeling may become an obsession...) edit: just to be clear, oldmanjay, I am not making any comments about old guys in general! some of my best friends are old guys!

"Modeling is not an obsession, it's a job."

Becoming a model is an obsession for some young women. For models, it's a gig job, and getting gigs is hard. Only the top 100 or so models worldwide make real money. If you're in LA, you probably know some actress/model/waitress types. I had a friend whose career peak, after years of work, was one McDonalds' commercial that got nationwide distribution.

Below the top tier, the work is not that great. There's trade show work as a booth babe. There's catalog modeling ("OK, the next one is the blue sweater, #6522, and hurry it up, we have 20 more to do before lunch").

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#32

Post by ChuckMcM »

I think perhaps the most relevant bit is that celebrity can feed a hunger you didn't know existed, and drive you off balance unexpectedly. She isn't the first, nor the last, young women to get sucked in. What is perhaps unique here is that she didn't have a sleezy promoter or other manipulative type who suckered her into the life, instead she did it to herself by putting herself out there on Instagram. All the angst and none of the side benefits of being this week's hot fashion model.

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#33

Post by lambdapie »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #22
lambdapie wrote: post #3

Some people are more attractive, cooler, more interesting, than others. It's not some evil plot by the corporations to make us feel bad about ourselves. These people are really out there. The left wing narrative that all bad things that happen to us stem from some structural power imbalance in our society, is blind to this fact of nature. So they need strange stories like this to explain away the apparent differences…

I like how you're ignoring the testimony of an actual attractive/cool/popular person to make your point about attractive/cool/popular people.

I know plenty of attractive/cool/popular people, who get hundreds of likes, and don't claim to fit this victim narrative.

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#34

Post by lambdapie »

AlexEatsKittens wrote: post #19
lambdapie wrote: post #3

Some people are more attractive, cooler, more interesting, than others. It's not some evil plot by the corporations to make us feel bad about ourselves. These people are really out there. The left wing narrative that all bad things that happen to us stem from some structural power imbalance in our society, is blind to this fact of nature. So they need strange stories like this to explain away the apparent differences…

You'd don't think corporations use marketing to intentionally make people feel bad about themselves?

Maybe some do, but there is a distinction between intentionally making people feel bad about themselves, and advertisements that simply holding up some look or personality as attractive/cool. Some people might interpret the latter as an attempt to make people feel bad about themselves, but I respectfully disagree.

When it comes to intentionally making people feel bad about themselves, I don't see much of this, since negative advertising is not very popular. Most advertising I see is motivational/aspirational, i.e. showing people an image that people believe they can attain.

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#35

Post by chris_wot »

This is a total ploy. There is a link to "cool products".

This is the ULTIMATE in viral marketing. By removing herself from Instagram, she has done a humble-brag to get attention. By highlighting the issues she has with her quite attractive photos, she actually gets more attention, and can become a thought-leader and thus product pusher for marketing firms.

The difference is that the marketing firms will now be new-age companies. From her info page [1]:

"I wish to create a platform that acts to spread new age messages of conscious living, addition to technology, minimise the celebrity culture, promote veganism, plant based nutrition, environmental awareness, social issues, gender equality, controversial art etc."

Look, I'm probably just cynical, but this seems to be a self-promotion vehicle by an attractive teenage girl.

1. http://www.letsbegamechangers.com/info/

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#36

Post by cooper12 »

oldmanjay wrote: post #6
CapitalistCartr wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently it took over her life, became an obsession. Social media made it easy to collect acclaim and popularity on a massive scale. Massive compared to what physical, real life offered.

Right, so like modelling, which is not exactly an obscure occupation. That she did it using instagram doesn't make much difference there. I think it's important to point out that I am an old man, not a teenager, so overdramatizing things doesn't boost my engagement.

Yeah it's similar to modeling, but social media completely changes the dynamics. Models usually work in controlled environments with professional photographers and have their pictures airbrushed to perfection. The final result is published in some magazine and any enquiries are handled by some middleman. As you can see there are many layers insulating a model from her fans. Social media completely tears that down and you get metrics like "likes" and you read comments from people from all over, and suddenly there's a pressure on you from all these people. They also don't really have the support network like other models or photographers or editors or managers. They're usually doing it all on their own on their phones with light editing to get that "natural" look. Lastly at her age she's a high-school senior, old, but hardly what I'd consider responsible enough to handle her personal life professionally, especially when her whole image was embedded in social media.

I recommend you check out this article about why the creator of Flappy Bird took his game down. [0] Some might say he was just doing game development too.

[0]: http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/the-flight-of-the-b...

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#37

Post by chris_wot »

cbd1984 wrote: post #28
oldmanjay wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, so like modelling, which is not exactly an obscure occupation. That she did it using instagram doesn't make much difference there. I think it's important to point out that I am an old man, not a teenager, so overdramatizing things doesn't boost my engagement.

Life-work balance is important until you retire.

Yes, and black is the absence of or complete absorption of light. Not sure that is very helpful, given once you retire you aren't working any more.

Re: Instagram-Famous Teen Shows the Dark Backstory of Her Perfect Selfies

#40

Post by hugh4 »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #24
oldmanjay wrote: post #2

She had to pose is what I'm getting from this. Granted, I'm not one of those people who thinks modelling is simple, but I'm not following what is severely dark about that.

Because the overwhelming narrative for attractive people on camera is "I woke up like this." Candid-looking pics like these lie brazenly about how much effort goes into making the perfect shot, and self-conscious kids burn themselves out trying to live up to a standard that is literally impossible in real life.

We're not talking high levels of reality-manipulation here, we're talking careful poses and taking lots of shots to pick out the best one.

The reason that most girls will never look that good in photos isn't because they don't take enough shots to get a good one, it's because they're not as good-looking as that girl is to start with.

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