The Great Acting Blog: “The Superficiality Of Social Media”

The Great Acting Blog: “The Superficiality Of Social Media”

I’ve always thought that the best way to serve yourself is by serving your community, by delivering something of true value to it. The wellbeing of the individual is bound up in the wellbeing of the group. When this is in balance, everyone benefits, at least to some extent.

Remember then – you’re only helping someone if you do something for them which they value. Doing something for someone which they don’t value, is not helping them, on the contrary in fact, it’s adding to their burden.

Which brings us to social media – transient, superficial and free of charge. Occasionally meaningful.

Clearly actors now see social media as a key platform for “networking”. This has had a positive effect in some respects, for instance; like minds are now able to connect like never before. However, this is only a small part of social media. In the main, we are all too often the witness to and victim of the tedious, mendacious, time-wasting self-promotion of others. It’s just really boring and uninspiring.

Instead of being fleeting and superficial, instead of coming only to self-promote, instead being smarmy and false, would it not be more fun, more rewarding, and finally more effective, if the actor (or whomever) actually turned himself into a person of substance? A person notable not because of the quantities of slime they produce, not because of their breath-taking falsity, but because of their accomplishments, their commitment to their work over the long term, and because they genuinely cared for the community they purport to be a member of.

Smearing yourself all over social media networks,  promiscuously pretending to be everybody’s friend, trying to get something for nothing, riding on the backs of the hard workers. If that’s you, I say grow up. I say knuckle down and start giving something of value, something meaningful, something that costs you. We’ve got loads of people who only want to take, far too many in fact, but we have a deficit of those who want to give something of value. Perhaps it’s time to switch sides?

Bring something of value to the community, otherwise you’re just adding to it’s burden.

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