Nathan Forest
nforest@uwyo.edu
If your childhood was anything like mine, you were taught not to judge books by their covers. This was likely because people can’t change how they look and it has no bearing on what they are like as people.
However, this maxim doesn’t apply to the fairly new frontier of social media. You are totally justified in judging the hell out of people based on their social media accounts and profiles.
The reason that judging people based on their social media accounts is completely acceptable is because they have the ability to choose every single thing that appears on their account. Even those embarrassing tagged photos on Facebook can be hidden so that no one else can see them.
If judgment-worthy material makes its appearance on someone’s social media, they put it there for a reason. That means they are conveying something about themselves- whether they mean to or not.
If someone is consistently and incessantly posting uplifting and inspirational quotes superimposed on scenic nature photos, it’s a pretty solid guess that they probably need to get their lives together. I’ve never seen one of my successful friends post those kinds of photos.
But outside of content, judging people on how frequently and what they post can be a major indicator of the kind of person you are dealing with. If someone posts more than a single selfie a day, they’re probably at least a little bit vain.
There’s another major problem person on social media: the over-sharer. There are people to help you through whatever tough times or crises you’re going through- they’re called close friends. Telling every single person that you know or are friends with on social media the incredibly personal problems you’re going through is definitely an act worthy of judgement. How you judge that person is entirely up to you, but you should probably judge that person.
Photos can also be a big indicator of what a person is like. Photos that are chosen to appear on a person’s profile is basically a slideshow of their life, so judge accordingly.
Social media is beginning to become and integral part of our day-to-day lives. You can select everything that appears on your profile, so every single choice tells you something about that person. In the end, you should judge every single thing that you see on someone’s social media, and not feel bad about it at all.
