It's your scrolling time, be selfish.
Disregard social media etiquette for the New Year, forever.
Another year, another round of questions about the value of resolutions. If I make them at all, I make them half-heartedly, so if I achieve them I can be pleasantly surprised and if I don’t, I won’t be too disappointed. What I’m seeing instead of resolutions is what people are going to do more and less in the new year. I like that so much more. It’s realistic and more achievable.
One thing I’m seeing a lot on the ‘less’ side of these lists is social media. That’s not surprising. Since the beginning of social media, we’ve been aware of its damaging effects and being more active in what we can do to limit them.
Common problems with social media lie in the amount of time we spend on it and the quality of the content that we consume in that large amount of time. Our social media experience is determined primarily in our following. Altering our following will fix those problems.
By altering, of course, I mean reducing. Unfollowing people. And because of how ubiquitous social media is in our lives, in our society, unfollowing someone is like the IRL equivalent of spitting in their face. Of course when you don’t know that person it’s not nearly as damning. Or as gross.
However, it means an alarming amount to a lot of people. In fact, it’s now got a name. To have a ‘skinny ratio’ on social media is when your following is significantly less than your followers. People who have ‘skinny ratios’ are thought to believe themselves better than everyone else.
What chronically online people don’t realise is that obsessing over how many people another person follows in relation to the number of followers they have, says way more about you than it does about them. The fact we’ve come to the point where we name what someone else does with their following shows how much unnecessary value we place on these numbers.
Not only do ‘skinny ratios’ say nothing of note about a person because they’re none of your business, they’re also really beneficial to your social media experience. With a smaller following, you’re more likely to spend less time scrolling and consuming longer, more quality content outside of social media. It’s no secret that the influx of short form content of little substance is not good for our brains. According to IAB UK, Gen Z has an attention span of just 8 seconds, one second less than a goldfish. The world offers so much knowledge and entertainment outside social media. When you’re scrolling for minutes instead of hours, courtesy of your ‘skinny ratio’, discover your new favourite author, video essayist or director.
However many times we’ve heard the sentiment ‘quality not quantity’, it doesn’t ring any less true. With a smaller following, you can be more mindful of what you’re consuming on social media. You can be more diligent with deciding whether the content inspires you, it entertains you, it educates you. Whether it makes you laugh, it introduces you to things you’ll like and enforces the value of things you adore. If an account on your feed frequently brings you any negative emotions, even if it’s boredom or indifference, they probably need to go. That way even with your time on social media being shortened, it brings something valuable to your day.
While unfollowing people will definitely come at the expense of some people’s egos because again, the value we’ve placed on numbers on social media and how we’re perceived by strangers is far too much, it’s your time at the end of the day. That is invaluable. Social media should be a fun little snippet of our lives, not consume them. So do what you need to do for your social media experience. Cut and curate. It’s your time, your happiness and your mind.