FAKE: Pressured by social media standards, teenagers have created a new form of expressing their true selves.
By Michelle Boulos, Editor
A family vacation album. A cute video of someone’s cat. A lavish post flaunting a person’s outfit from the weekend. All of these are common things one may see scrolling through their Instagram, or any social media platform.
To any teenager, social media has become an avenue to show off the finer aspects of life. People frantically filter and alter their pictures to match their previous posts, too afraid that their life will be judged as uninteresting or imperfect compared to their fellow users. This was the accepted norm in any form of social media–until recently. With little warning, the antithesis to the conventional Instagram account appeared: finstas.
Finstas, a portmanteau of “fake” and “Instagram,” are, in essence, a blogger or parent’s worst nightmare. Replace that picturesque family photo album with a rant about the awful thing one’s parents did today. Post an ugly selfie with absolutely no editing and vent about your day. Wallow in pain about the amount of homework you have. All of these are perfectly acceptable things to post on a finsta— perhaps, even what it is made for.
Rule number one of finstas: no one talks about the finsta. Like a secret club, no one advertises their finsta or wishes they had more followers, as would be common with other forms of social media. In fact, less is seen as more. The anonymity and secrecy of the entire process makes finstas all the more mysterious.
Teenagers are attracted to this unique perversion of social media because it gives them the liberty to say and speak how they feel, with the safety of hiding behind a pseudonym. Additionally, finstas give a paradoxical freedom in the social media realm: privacy. One must be very selective of who gets to see their profile, with every follow request scrutinized before a user is allowed into a portion of their personal lives.
“Finstas are a way to express or purge how you’re feeling at any given moment and almost like an online diary where only your closest friends can see,” one anonymous user expressed, pointing out how finstas can act as a go-to therapy, where only your circle of people can help you through a situation.
Ironically, the “fake” Instagram can be seen as more real than their “real” counterparts. “Sometimes when we follow people [on Instagram], it turns out we aren’t really following THEM. [sic] More like we are getting to know the shallower, less controversial/opinionated and least personal person,” another finsta user said. Finstas are like having a blank poster board where every individual can splatter their true colors, and no one would mind the mess. Through finstas, people are free to express their true opinions and connect with people on a deeper level.
“It gets tiresome thinking about how you want to be portrayed and whether or not the people you are getting to know are really that person. Because social media is how we communicate, it’s nice to finally have an outlet where we can show people who we really are,” the same user said.
The idea of having a real and honest form of social media sounds paradoxical in theory. But in reality, this raw form of expression through technology, exclusive to your own circle of friends, is what social media should be meant for. So ditch the Insta for a finsta.