By Dylan Huber

For much of time, through all the various philosophical idiosyncrasies (and excluding the most ascetic of traditions), a common understanding of what true capital-R “Reality” is has continually been maintained: it is something truly lived. From this, it is surmised that it must be something residing in the “real,” physical world; something that is encountered only in the truest of face-to-face conversations, material experiences, all the like; nowhere else, it is unfailingly assumed, can one actually live. Consequently, social media is considered unreal. It is rejected roundly as an inauthentic facsimile of life; even on social media, one sees ‘accounts’  asserting the necessity of experiencing “real life” – as if their own words are not real. 

Truthfully, there is hardly a proposition in the world I more wholeheartedly disagree with. Much of my existence has taken place online, on both social media and other online locales (i.e. online games), through which I have met some of the greatest people I’ve ever known, people who I’ve truly, truly loved; I have had countless laughs, genuine conversations, and experiences; I have made memories to last a lifetime…I have, for all intents and purposes, seemingly lived. 

Seemingly! This is all merely personal; one could quite easily deign to call me an unrepresentative oddity and be done with the matter. But I bluntly do not believe that to be the case. Rather, I believe it a fundamentally fallacious leap to assume that social media is inherently unreal; incapable of being authentic. 

But I am getting quite ahead of myself! What we must first consider is the primordial genesis of ‘normal’ reality. Yes, before first answering whether social media is true Reality, we must first ask: how does reality itself come into being? The answer is quite simple: you, the human reading this. Or, in my case, me. 

Experience, the Other, all material objects and creations, every single act of thinking, speaking, confessing – none of these venerated things, which make up the whole of the time-honored notion of reality, would exist without the human ability to first perceive them, an ability arisen from human life. Humanity is still the core of reality, for without it, perhaps it is best to blithely conclude, there would be none to perceive reality as an existent idea anyway. 

Thus far, we have reviewed a basic line of thought, drawing somewhat from Nietzschean perspectivism: from human life comes perspective and from perspective the notion of reality; without the base, the latter is naught. But, intertwined with life and perspective, is an equally important element of existence: the individual. The vehicle in which the lens of perspective is attached, as one might reductively say – but it is far more than that; it is from this “individual” that, perspective in flux, one begins to live, and not merely be, as it were, alive. Human life and perspective are necessary conditions for reality to merely exist, in an observable manner; the individual, and the truly lived life through such, is a necessary condition for it to be true Reality.

Now, this triarchic understanding in tow, it is high time to begin comprehending the origin of “social media” – this unreal, counterfeit, and bastard thing! How terrible must its primordial nature be! No, quite unfortunate for those who may wish it otherwise, the origin of social media is the same as the origin of reality. Humanity is alone the foundation of social media; all else is extraneous. The population of social media, “accounts,” as they’re so called, are human life. It is their perception that then fulfills the aforementioned conditions for reality. Everything that takes place on social media – every conversation, every claim, every single miniscule occurrence – can be traced back here, back to human life, back to the subsequent perception; from this shared birth, reality, and social media are one.

But, the well-traveled critic might here object, what of the plague of bots found within so much of modern social media? Indeed, it is no secret that many social media sites, such as the platform formerly known as Twitter, are currently infected to the brim with bot accounts. Recognizing this virulent infestation of inhumanity, how could social media still be categorically human? Simple: such is an illness, not representative of the healthy condition! Obviously, the social media ideal is a complete absence of bots. The core of social media still remains human; bots are no more than a peripheral, and admittedly perennial, annoyance. 

One may now begin to notice the conspicuous absence of the third part of the triarchy, the individual, in this hitherto short discussion of social media itself. True, I have yet to mention it, but not without good reason! For one may begrudgingly, with gritted teeth, accept the premise that social media is reality, at least in some sense; I imagine it far more difficult to accept the idea that it is possible to truly live as an individual on social media, the final condition for it to be considered true Reality. Still, any apprehensive excitement should be tempered: before we can dive headfirst into such an argument, we must first recount what it is like to live as an individual.

Plainly, there are only two available manners of existence for the individual: the authentic and the inauthentic. The former involves an answerable recognition of one’s own freedom, in order to act utterly freely in both forming and acting according to one’s lucid and genuinely understood individual existence. This comprises, for our purposes, the individual’s role in the truly lived life. The latter absconds from the beginning: it involves a simple refusal to act on, or even recognize, one’s own freedom, thus dooming one to a palpable falsity of existence. It can alternatively be described, as Sartre writes, “living in bad faith.” One must never forget the exigent seriousness of this matter; an individual only gets one existence, after all, and it ought to be lived authentically before it ends. 

But how could social media (hereafter referred to as the “online world”) have any capacity for authenticity? Is it not a place infamous for an unceasing torrent of people doing things purely for the purpose of achieving fame, or to obtain monetary gains or some other extrinsic reward, or simply because they feel they “have to” due to outside pressures? All true! The online world is an undeniable hub of inauthenticity – and so is the physical world (hereafter referred to as the “offline” world). Just as one sees an online person post something merely to “get famous,” so too can one see an offline person do something merely to “gain social standing.” Most are inauthentic in their day-to-day lives- that is the whole point; authenticity is not a status to be effortlessly maintained. But people are so quick to condemn the online world entirely as inauthentic that they, in effect, ignore the exact same perpetual inauthenticity present in the offline world!

Alright, people both online and offline can be inauthentic, sure; that doesn’t prove that people online can be authentic. I realize this. To rectify such a clearly disastrous, catastrophic issue, I will show how someone online can be more authentic than in the offline world. 

Specifically, in some cases, the offline world may directly preclude one’s authentic identity in ways the online world simply does not. This can be due to cultural norms, political inhibitions, familial rules, etc.; though one’s freedom is absolute, their ability to actually exercise it may not necessarily be shielded. In these cases, it is the online world that allows them to safely be their authentic identity. 

Let us imagine a scenario: one knows something, most certainly, lucidly, and truly, about themselves, but they cannot safely live openly in regard to this something; as such, they are left instead to exist in the strongest of possible depressions – that depression solely created by the inauthentic life. Only online, free from the daily oppressions of offline existence, can they live authentically – that is, live truly. Many need not imagine: that “something” is gender, and this is the reality for so many transgender and non-binary people. 

Needless to say, the ability to live authentically online and not offline does not mean that trans liberation in the offline world should not be strived for; in the case that the binds malevolently restraining trans and non-binary people’s existential right to live authentically in the offline world are finally lifted, they will thus be able to live authentically in both worlds. Until then, however, I have known a number of trans and non-binary people unfairly condemned to this condition of half-life; I know that, however small, the ability to live authentically online does bring a semblance of comfort to a survival so constantly without any. Clearly, this is not something to be undervalued; we have established, after all, the utmost importance of authentic existence. 

Still, one might be quick to call this act of living authentically online mere “escapism” and nothing more; as this criticism might well seek to destroy my entire argument, it is of paramount importance to address it here. In many ways, true, it could be classified as an “escape” – but from what? Certainly not from reality itself, for how absurd an idea would it be to escape from reality to reality! It would be borderline laughable, were it not so widely, implicitly held. No, no; at most, if one so desperately wants to use the term, it would be rightly classified as an escape within reality, a traversal between worlds. Given that, would it be such a terrible thing? Many, namely others concerned with human existence, feel the unquenchable thirst to always attach the negative value to escaping; of course, this is not always wrong: see those who escape into inauthenticity. But what of escaping into authenticity? Is that truly so wrong? I do not believe so. But, for now, we shall return here later. 

In looking at authenticity, one should not be concerned with just the authenticity of the sole individual; rather, one ought to also look at the authenticity of friendships – those bonds between individuals, indestructibly fragile connections…indestructible, for they can never truly be severed, and fragile, for they are never not at risk of yet falling apart. After all, what good is it if man can only live authentically alone online; what reason would one have to truly live online if they could not truly live with others? Indeed, with an undeniable finality this shall conclude the matter – it need only be proven. 

But what is an authentic friendship? Perhaps no substance is more difficult to judge! But yet we must, and perhaps what we’re searching for lies within the phenomenon itself; that is to say, let us answer: what is involved in the normal condition of offline friendship? I believe there are four qualities normally found throughout various friendships: conversation, shared experiences, love for one another, and a personal understanding of one another. Taken together, and held with fitting seriousness, I think few would dissent from the assertion that these four together would sufficiently comprise an authentic friendship. Conversely, if a relationship had only one quality – namely, only conversation – it would hardly be called a friendship, much less an authentic one. 

That is where the debate starts – for who sees online friendship as anything more than conversation? Can even online conversation itself, lacking any physical backing, ever be genuine in the first place? 

In the journal article “Real Friends: How the Internet Can Foster Friendship,” found in Ethics and Information Technology, professor Adam Briggle takes a close look at the nature of online conversation, finding it to have, at its best, two powerful, intra-related qualities: distance and deliberateness. Distance creates openness, vulnerability; it necessarily allows one safety to choose their conversational words – in other words, to be deliberate. Deliberation allows the conversationalist to reflect, think deeply, search for authenticity within their infinite list of linguistic choices; with that, they can find the words. Anywhere on social media these conversations can be had, whether in the safer, personal haven of Instagram or Discord DMs, or even across Twitter replies between two people – as long as the messages are truly deliberated, they will bear authentic significance. This opposed to the general offline relationship which, Briggle writes, is often too caught-up within the speedy immediacy of daily life: “Our physical proximity – bound together in a world of trifling matters – dooms us to spiritual separation.”

In a singular conversation with an online friend, I can write to them exactly how I really want to talk with them – and them back to me. In my most authentic of conversations, each message I received was like a flame to my very being, lighting up every part of my mind with ideas, thoughts, feelings – things which I could then carefully organize into a message of my own, the truest reflection of my being onto them, and theirs onto me. Our very existences collide, mesh together, and dance through only words; every conversation becomes a medium of the highest authenticity. In this simplest of acts, this personal comprehension and reply, I am freer than I’ve ever been before – freer to choose, freer to be, freer to live. 

Of course, we still have 3 other qualities left; this proves little at this point. So let us move onto the second, that thing which encompasses so much of our life: experience. In this case, experience with another.

Now, technically, “experience” is a word difficult to define, having an almost insipid broadness; it can even refer to memorable conversations – but I imagine one is seeking something more than that by now. Still, experiences can really be, in the most basic sense, defined as anything lived by one or more individuals; offline, these can be attending parties, going to restaurants, so on and so forth. Each of these experiences, if authentically enjoyed by both parties, will strengthen the bond between them.

Online experiences are, to many, ostensibly rudimentary – anything outside of the physical must be so, right? Yet what counts more in a shared experience: its mere physical element, or the fact that one still knows they are with someone else – that someone else experienced it? Indeed, it is all-too clear that some physical experiences may hinder or immobilize the bond between two people if inauthentic; it is not a free-pass to friendship.

But it is easy to say, even if you’re technically experiencing something with someone else, that you’re not actually with them…you’re alone. Lonely, still; there is nothing beyond that screen. Yet I know, in the deepest reaches of my heart, that I am not alone. In the simplest of experiences, whether it be sharing a story on Instagram, playing games via Discord, or anything else – I still perceive someone else; I know that they also perceive me

Even seeing that someone else, someone I know purely online, experienced something without me, that is enough to make my heart react with incomparable feeling. When I see that they have experienced something sad, so too do I feel a drowning in my heart; when I see that they have experienced something happy, my very being flutters with joy. There is an essential vicariousness within the online relationship, and yet it is a vicariousness powerful enough to strengthen relationships by its own merit. 

Nevertheless, greater than any other part of my argument, I feel I am at a loss for words here; the cold logic, the sequential reason that has carried me here – I cannot find it. Much of the time trying to write this part was spent desperately thinking, searching for any sort of perfectly impenetrable through-line to fully explain the lucid authenticity of online experiences, but perhaps it is like everything else in the world: I merely perceive them as real. Does that not make them real, then? What is this feeling pushing me, haunting me, residing at my very core? Is it not…love?

Conversations, experiences; are these not the seeds from which love springs? When one truly converses with anyone long enough, or has enough genuine, even if rudimentary, experiences with them – is love not certain to eventually grow? So many questions, and yet the answers remain locked up within me, impossible to ever adequately express with words. But that is the nature of love! Something immutable, indescribable; a thing which cannot ever be fully transferred or elucidated across individuals, yet is always known between them. Yes, all I can say with certainty is that I have loved. But then, I suppose, the question has one last layer to it, that aforementioned fourth quality: can I ever understand the people I love online – or do I merely understand the fact that I love?

This is the point where the harshest of criticisms begin to thrash, for this is where we return to that previous point left unfinished: the ability to escape into authenticity online. In the journal article “Plural Selves and Relational Identity: Intimacy and Privacy Online,” found in Information Technology and Moral Philosophy, professor Dean Cocking criticizes the ability to form friends online on the basis that, online, man has too much control over what they present: “For, while online contexts would seem to present a barrier to the development of intimacy, they also, at once, seem to facilitate the maintaining of a private self, insulated from the observations, judgments, and related interpretive interaction of others.”

Cocking views this “private self” as the ultimate preclusion against genuine intimacy. In his view, it is the uncontrollable aspects of the individual, things which they do not intend yet nevertheless get noticed by a friend, that define authentic friendship. I frankly disagree. I believe, rather, that the most authentic understanding within friendship comes from a union between idealized existences turned into authentic actuality. 

What is it we perceive about the person beyond our screen? Cocking is right: we are aware of only what they present, what they paint upon the freeing canvas of the online world; but through that, we understand who they truly want to be – who they have now chosen to be. 

I have known many who, having realized the absolute freedom entrusted by the nature of the online world, enacted the realization of their truest existence; I myself have as well. Through that, I only understood them better; with a penetrating authenticity, I recognized their very heart, no longer guarded by the mendacity of daily existence. I believe I can say the same for them unto me.

 It bears repeating: there is similar freedom within the physical world; there always will be, man cannot ever truly lose the capacity for freedom – he can only be lost without realizing it. But freedom there will always err at the prospect of the truest ideal; the very nature of facticity requires it so. The two worlds will be ever connected within the whole of reality; the greatest feature of man, in this modern age, is the ability to traverse them. To “escape” between them, if, again, one so doggedly wishes to describe it.  

In truth, I have only once met someone I previously only knew online in the physical world. In the interest of further truth, it was also someone I had a crush on – though the nature of online romantic love, that most interesting and blasphemous thing, is a topic for perhaps another time. This was someone I had known for multiple years, purely online; there was a clear friendship which existed between us. And due to chance, we were able to meet. 

What was that meeting like? One would think that I shall now describe it in the most wonderfully absurd of details, as if it was like heaven on Earth; finally, a physical meeting between online friends! No, no; it was simple. It was comfortable. It was nice. Of course, there was some awkwardness; one can hardly traverse worlds without a little jet lag. 

Though, in the physical world, the person I met was obviously not exactly how they were online, but that is the whole point, isn’t it? We were in a very different world. And yet, I still knew, understood, the heart of the person; I still knew the feeling of love; I still knew the conversations and experiences that we had long had. All of these were still real; the fact we were now in a physical world changed nothing, did not make them lesser – they were, as they had always been, the foundation of our friendship. In the end, we simply said goodbye, possibly never to see each other again; only that is not true…we still would know each other, in the online world. 

At this time, there are still so many others that I love online; this much I have mentioned quite enough. My life as an individual has been defined, if it must be defined, by the making of these friends. Yes, “my life” – for I do believe I can now say, with absolute certainty, that I have truly lived online. But that is once more merely me: I assume one is seeking a better conclusion than that.

Let us return, for the final time, to this concept of true Reality. We have gone over its origin in human life, its foundation of perspective, and its completion through the individual, all encompassing social media. We have discussed the authenticity of friendship – this, too, clearly existent within social media. We have thus proven that social media is a part of true Reality. But I may hazard a guess that one may think it is hardly a satisfying conclusion to restate what has already been made clear. In this case, there is one last thing to discuss: how should social media be used by you – the person reading this?

There is an opportunity here for me to relinquish all that I have said, return to the normal and well-trod example of saying: “All that’s well and good, but the physical world will always be more meaningful – that’s where your focus should be!” I will not. I know there are those reading this whose life may be inescapably drowned in inauthenticity. Whether due to elements of facticity or other things out of your control, it might seem that they are eternally condemned to exist with unlimited freedom and harshly limited choice. Indeed, to them I say: There is a world out there for you. It is up to you to decide whether you want to traverse it – whether you wish to truly live.