The Semi-Parasocial Sphere
There is a paradox in social media usage. The more you get know people online, the more likely you are to feel alienated. By contrast, there is a comfort in an environment where you know little to nothing about certain people, beyond having certain shared interests and commonalities. It is similar to being in an older tavern or pub, the atmosphere often feels comfortable even if you do not know anyone. It wouldn’t feel out of place to talk to a stranger, because it’s not something you would be invested in the outcome of, or care about them liking you. This is not unrelated to the phenomenon of people feeling isolated from a lot social media usage, but it isn’t necessarily the same as becoming jealous because of the lives of strangers or acquaintances, although that can be part of it as well. The longer you are in such social media environments, you become disposed towards constructing semi-parasocial relationships, which is furthered by mutually interacting with them on some level. This makes a relationship not be entirely superficial or fake, but is still not anything particularly meaningful. It is entirely logical that people do this, as most humans who are not socially or mentally abnormal in that regard, are made to create relationships from socializing.
To my knowledge, these “semi-parasocial” relationships have not been studied much. As I mentioned, it is not unrelated to the phenomenon of seeing someone you know presenting an image of their life that you become envious of. But as far as I am aware, not much of it is explored beyond the feelings themselves said phenomenon may leave a person with like envy, jealousy or loneliness; the relationship one might construct in their head with the other person online is seldom explored. I personally am rarely envious, and when I am, it’s not envy concerning material things. I know there is more to it than that for most other individuals however, as most people are materially covetous to some degree. You have some sort of a connection with the person, therefore you feel like they ought to be including you in some way. The person may not necessarily be trying to spite you with – occasionally they are just that petty though – even though it may feel like they are because of some sort of connection that you have constructed that has as level of mutuality to it, however weak it may be, exists.
However, the medium of the internet does not accurately translate all of the things that would normally be pertinent in real life. It distorts how people see each other by its very nature; it doesn’t exist in the physical world, which is what humans have adapted for through genetic and cultural selection. If it was a complete stranger whom you have had no interaction with, you probably wouldn’t care too much about how they act beyond an initial gut reaction. Just as you would likely not become envious of some random person showing you a photo they took of some place you wish to go to but cannot, but if a person you know did the same, it’s more likely that you would be. If you have met each other in real life in the first place, it’s doubtful you have a parasocial relationship with someone in the first place, as that takes effort on the part of both parties in the context of taking it online into the real world. Thus, if you still have that sort of feeling towards that person, it almost certainly would not stem from online alone. And, if you have not met each other in real life, you do not really know the other person and they do not really know you.
Unless you are being completely fake and disingenuous about your real personality online, and to be fair there are more than a few of these kinds of people who enjoy doing this, you’re projecting sort of a video of yourself online whenever you interact with someone. And like with videos, some of the quality is lost when it is uploaded online due to compression. In other words you’re more or less just avatars talking to each other, like in VRChat, or Second Life and IMVU if you’re older and don’t get the reference. There isn’t always the same sort of gimmicky or roleplay stuff going with every online interaction of course, but fundamentally you represent an image of yourself that you manipulate.
There are consequences of your average person failing to understand this relationship beyond mere loneliness and isolation from other people, even if that has been exacerbated by COVID restrictions. If they are not careful, certain groups or people may take advantage of those who are lonely and vulnerable online, especially likely if they are very young. They want to feel liked and a sense of belonging, and may put themselves in situations where they can be easily manipulated and not realize it, until they are in a difficult situation. Many of those fake and disingenuous people who I mentioned do such things. Manipulation of vulnerable people can and does happen in real life as well, but there are more barriers to that happening in real life compared to the internet. Anonymity and the more open environment of the internet lower many of these barriers.
To have a decent time on the internet, you need a healthy level of skepticism and distrust towards others by default. If you’re a very young person, say, under the age of 16, it is prudent to take this distrust even further to protect yourself. Be very selective about who you tell your age to, if at all, do not reveal things like your “politics”, disabilities or mental illnesses, where you live beyond a very general area, again if at all, descriptive details about your family, and so on. If you’re a female, you’re often better off not telling people you are. Lie about being older if you’re backed into it, but it is best to not broach that topic if you don’t need to. There are people out there who look for these sorts of things and want to “get to know you better” and manipulate and use you. You lose far more than you would gain by exposing your life to anonymous people on the internet when you are of a young age. If you’re an older individual, I encourage you to tell younger people to do these things, as many people who ought to be responsible for this have neglected to do so.
Others would tell you to stay away from the internet entirely before a certain age. It would be hypocritical for me to say this, as I used the internet at a younger age and enjoyed it, albeit there are many things worse about it now than when I was a pre-teen and teenager. And because I know it is difficult to be a young person these days, cutting off your connections online entirely, which it may be the only thing you have for friendship, could hurt you. I did take the kinds of precautions I mentioned previously when I was younger, however. Many youth seem to be much more open about this sort of thing nowadays, because others have enabled them. There is an evident pattern in how many of them parrot the same ridiculous things and behaviours from each other, as they merely imitate what they think will make them fit in, in the semi-parasocial sphere.