The digital world has caused everyone to curate a frontstage of themselves. This is displayed in a structure that is “appropriate conduct, coherent, embellished, and well-articulated” (Goffman, 1959;75). The BeReal app has created a wave in the digital culture by challenging the highly curated nature of traditional social media. Encouraging a more “authentic” presentation of the self. Launching a simple platform in which the user needs to post a picture simultaneously once a day, without any prior planning. BeReal has reshaped how media users construct their online identities by leaning towards an unplanned, spontaneous opportunity to create.
BeReal emphasizes on unfiltered authenticity through their core design. This involves the user to post a picture of themselves and their surroundings at a random time each day. The setup breaks from the concept of ‘highlight reels and aesthetic’ styles we come across on apps such as Instagram, where people share only the most photogenic and best moments. However, with BeReal, there is no time to find the perfect lighting, location or fixing your appearance. Providing a much more unfiltered glimpse into the users’ lives. This real-time spontaneity has caused a shift where users tend to feel more comfortable posting photos that capture the imperfect and mundane moments, destroying the societal pressure to appear in the most perfect form online. Identity on BeReal feels closer to an honest reflection of a day-to-day life, diving into someone’s backstage rather than seeing an aspirational, polished frontstage that oneself puts on.
Social media comes with the traditional aspect of significant anxiety and social pressures around engagement, likes and comments. BeReal has these metrics minimized, this allows the user to simply share an authentic moment. There is no follower count or any competitive stats, BeReal strongly discourages the performative data as this is what defines the construction of identity in digital media. This simply allows the user to not feel as if they are ‘on stage’ as it reduces performance pressure. Due to this, digital self-expression feels safer to users with less anxiety being induced. Especially considering those who find traditional social platforms overwhelming.
The popularity that BeReal achieved influenced other platforms, subtly encouraging a turn towards unfiltered content. This shift illustrates a huge pivot in the digital culture from a polished front stage, of influencer-driven digital identities towards the normal backstage of the user. The app provided many a break from the exhausting standards they needed to reach on digital platforms to ‘fit in’ and play a certain identity which they aren’t. However, it has not fully eliminated the performative tendencies completely but has redefined what it means to have a ‘real’ identity online. Resulting is a broader digital shift that reminds everyone that authenticity is imperfect, mundane and rather messy. This is increasingly being reached for in this digital age.“Identity is the essential core of who we are as individuals, the conscious experience of the self-inside,” (Anzaldúa, G.. 2004).
What are your thoughts on the possibility of users on digital platforms to show their complete identity or ‘backstage’, will this ever be achieved?
References:
Ytreberg, E., Erving Goffman (1959) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. In Classics in Media Theory (pp. 84-95). Routledge.
Anzaldúa, G., 2004. Borderlands/La Frontera. na.
