The Instagram Statement

The pictures you post aren’t the only statements you make on Instagram. People also judge you by how many people you follow, who you follow, and how many followers you have. Some celebrities like Beyoncé follow nobody. And I seriously doubt that she follows nobody because she doesn’t find anyone’s pictures interesting, but she follows nobody because she has to make a statement as the Queen B, and nobody can blame her for that.

If a regular person followed nobody, then they would be judged and laughed at as if they’re trying to act like they’re somebody important.

Most people try to keep a follow/followers ratio balanced, which is having more followers than people you follow. This happens to some people naturally, but some people deliberately watch their following/follower ratio to make themselves look more popular than they really are.

If you’re like me then you’re someone who unfollows everyone who doesn’t follow you back. It might be petty but I feel like if you don’t find my photos interesting then why should I take time out of my day to care about yours. There are only a few celebrities who I follow and I don’t expect them to follow me back.

Although, I shouldn’t take Instagram so seriously and just follow as many people as I want and not care if they follow back or not. I mean the whole point of Instagram is to look at people’s photos, and share your photos with the people who care about you, which should be the majority of your followers.

Some people treat Instagram as a game to see how many followers they can get. And if you’re not careful you can really get your confidence all caught up in likes and followers. Some girls I know post nothing but thirst traps. Like, every photo is an obvious cry out for attention.

If you’re a regular person there are a few ways to get followers. 1. You’re popular in real life. 2. You’re attractive and photogenic. 3. You’re a photographer. The majority of my followers are people I know, know of, or I randomly followed them and they followed me back.

Because I consistently unfollow people who don’t follow me back, my followers are at 500-something and I follow 300-something. I really shouldn’t care. Its just an app to share photos. It’s a huge insecurity for people who play the followers game, and I know I play it too. But, I also unfollow people who I no longer find interesting or people who haven’t posted in forever even if they are following me.

But, that’s what we all should look out for. Its important to ask ourselves why are we on this social media platform. For many people social media has turned into a numbers game for Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, etc.

I’m not saying that social media should only be about interacting with people you know. All my social media apps would be boring if I only friended real friends. But, from now on I’m going to follow whoever I find interesting even if they don’t follow me back.