Sophia Lussier’s Journey With Social Media
“Ding!” A notification pops up on Sophia’s phone, specifically a ‘like’ from a trendy post she had created minutes earlier; perhaps the high from receiving likes and comments is where it all started.
Sophia was 11 years old when she made her first Twitter account and her world opened up. At first it was about the trends, the new opinions, and the new information she was seeing that drew her in- but eventually she came across the BLM (Black Lives Matter) movement where she “. . .felt like I had the opportunity to learn something valuable from an app.” She learned that posting and reposting content was not making even a mere change in the world but taking time to understand the personal stories or information presented was what really mattered. However, she claims that some of the things people come across “. . . has caused people to have false impressions of what the world is really like and in that way it prevents ones literacy from growing or evolving past that point because of how hard the internet can be on imprinting an ideology into ones head.”
With her phone at hand, the internet quickly became Sophia’s sponsor, showing her the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything in between. With such broad access of information and parents respectful of her privacy, she states she is grateful for “. . . the way I was able to explore my interests without explanation.” She read about opinions and news her environment would never have given her access to. She claims reading these real world writings have impacted her as a writer, as her writing is more of this style.
Along with her writing style, her personality had also become influenced by the internet. Her ‘internet personality’ was formed, which she defines and describes that “. . .there are people who have internet personalities, like their personality that comes out most of the time is compiled of trendy things from the internet, you see it on TikTok all the time- they start weird funny things and then people repeat it and do it so much that it, unfortunately, becomes a part of them and their everyday lives.” She says she is not safe from that and I myself can say the same- it starts as irony but ends up sticking.
“My friend and I used to send “depression quizzes” to each other and brag about how low our scores… It was really bad, and I think things like that made something like psychology interesting to help other people vent in healthy ways.’’
Social media showed what the world around her really was like and that helped her write in true manner as well, but with many things in our lives there are good and bad sides to everything; where social media helped her it also allowed her to make mistakes. Social media affects our minds when we are so impressionable when we are young, she had such an experience when being cool involved mental illnesses, “My friend and I used to send “depression quizzes” to each other and brag about how low our scores. . . It was really bad, and I think things like that made something like psychology interesting to help other people vent in healthy ways.’’ Though this wasn’t the best for her she found interest in helping people with these problems and allowing her literacy to be “real” and learn from her mistakes which is something everyone in this world ends up doing.
Although it was humbling to her to be exposed to so much and to have free range to do anything, she says she wouldn’t want her own kids to have access this early; however she still would have done it again when asked what she would do if she could go back. She also said she wished she had the energy to do more research instead of looking at news clips on social media.
Many problems arise from use of social media just because there are so many different people talking, but because of that you can also grow to be a better person by understanding other people’s struggles that you wouldn’t normally notice which will teach many lessons that sometimes won’t come from other outlets which have their own agendas to promote. These experiences gave her knowledge she can use for her future and it will continue giving such info though she is still undecided, an interest in psychology could help others with their problems and hopefully grow for the betterment of everyone, which social media can be both good and bad for that type of ideal.
Through all of these experiences with social media and others who guided her literacy she has been able to write in meaningful ways about real world problems that she can connect to and become a better person through it all. Everyone has been helped by moments in their past to become what they want to be and that allows them to hopefully reach up to their goals and ideals in life, through social media Sophia has gained so much that wasn’t really available to her through other sources which is unique to her and from this she can live up to whatever she ends up deciding to be.
