Chapter 2 “Seeing Ourselves Through Technology” Reflection

After reading chapter two of Jill Rettberg’s book. Seeing Ourselves Through Technology, I have gotten a more detailed grasp on the concept of filtering. At first, I had never really paid attention to the social media aspects of filtering. The first thing that came into my head when I read the title of the chapter was about the human body and the kidneys, filtering the blood and waste. But now, my mindset has slightly changed. With filtering in terms of media, there comes several layers that we mask. Though it may show one’s individual creativeness or talent, we lose the authentic purpose of the original context. What is so wrong with the original photo or concept? Why do we filter things? We want the imperfections and flaws to be unrecognizable. We want to enhance its beauty. Why though? As little kids, we’ve been taught to accept everyone for who they are. Parents and adults emphasize the need to be yourself, but since technology has devoured much of our world, we have kept that advice in the the back of our heads and buried away. Now we have become “obsessed over what other users think” (Shearer). Most of the time we do not consciously think about it though. We have always been mindlessly seeking the approval of others. It follows through our entire life. When we were little kids, we seek the approval of our parents, trying to get their attention. Growing up, we seek for peers to like us. This younger generation will only come to know that beauty is making an alternate self with filters. Our doings are going to negatively influence the young. We created this horrible fantasy of perfect on the web. The celebrities and artists that we look up to also filter themselves. Their company or themselves may add filters onto their selfies or photos, and with that we are eager to be just like them—to be perfect. We see kids in elementary school that already have smartphones. They do not know much about it, but they’ll quickly learn how to apply filters onto their photos. As they age, they’ll be consumed with the technological expectations. They will have to live in a world that expects them to be perfect. It’s not just the filters and edits we put online, but also the “filters” we do to ourselves in the real world. We may on put on makeup or certain types of clothing. Though some of the motives may be because a particular individual enjoys fashion and makeup, but most of us, without knowing, are hiding our insecurities. We do not like being judged by anyone. With response to avoid pain, we mindlessly put on a mask that covers our inner beauty. Are we true to ourselves?