Cost per Like!

[Boganvillia]

Please tell me there is more self-awareness going on here than my casual reading can pick up on ...

https://www.elle.com/fashion/a23282632/cost-per-like-is-the-new-cost-per-wear/

[Montecarlo]

Nope, just plain old narcissistic wastefulness

[jaylbail]

Does anyone else read articles like this and feel like an alien on their own planet? These people look like me and talk like me, but have an alien way of thinking that I don't comprehend, and I don't particularly want to. This article weirds me out more than half the sci-fi "aliens" I've seen in TV and books.

[Metalcat]

Does anyone else read articles like this and feel like an alien on their own planet? These people look like me and talk like me, but have an alien way of thinking that I don't comprehend, and I don't particularly want to. This article weirds me out more than half the sci-fi "aliens" I've seen in TV and books.

Agreed. It reads so alien to me.

However, I used to be exactly like them. I'm just grateful that instagram wasn't the thing back when I was a raging narcissistic glamazon teetering around on ungodly tall stilleto-matchstick-shoes, paying hundreds of dollars to have someone glue teeny, tiny, individual lashes to my eyes for several hours every 2 weeks, paying additional hundreds to sit for additional hours while someone else coated my head in caustic chemicals that literally burnt my scalp every 4 weeks, and thinking that attention equalled respect, and that the pain of beauty was somehow admirable.

Facebook existed at the tail end of my image-obsessed youth, and that was bad enough, but people posting hadn't become sophisticated yet in their looking-glass-self identities.

So, it seems so alien to me now, despite being not very long ago, but I also see the image of my former self starkly in that article and it makes me deeply embarrassed and also rather proud to no longer be so entrenched in that awful, awful mindset.

ETA: also do not mistake their motivations to be frivolous, to a lot of these women, they truly do believe that what they are doing is attaining genuine respect and value. You can't underestimate the motivation for attention and praise, especially early in life when you haven't yet accomplished anything significantly attention or praise worthy.

[MonkeyJenga]

I know this isn't the point, but... These people are living for insta and only getting a couple hundred likes! That's so low level, whyyyyy, why are you bothering??? I'm embarrassed for them. It would be cheaper to actually buy likes from bots.

The part about how this is increasing fast fashion trends and waste is infuriating.

[jinga nation]

Does anyone else read articles like this and feel like an alien on their own planet? These people look like me and talk like me, but have an alien way of thinking that I don't comprehend, and I don't particularly want to. This article weirds me out more than half the sci-fi "aliens" I've seen in TV and books.

Yes.
I prefer to converse with intelligent extra-terrestrial life.

[RFAAOATB]

I know this isn't the point, but... These people are living for insta and only getting a couple hundred likes! That's so low level, whyyyyy, why are you bothering??? I'm embarrassed for them. It would be cheaper to actually buy likes from bots.

The part about how this is increasing fast fashion trends and waste is infuriating.

Is this in the same league as playing YMCA basketball? You know you’re not going to get into the NBA but it’s still fun.

[Metalcat]

I know this isn't the point, but... These people are living for insta and only getting a couple hundred likes! That's so low level, whyyyyy, why are you bothering??? I'm embarrassed for them. It would be cheaper to actually buy likes from bots.

The part about how this is increasing fast fashion trends and waste is infuriating.

Both the waste and the outcome magnitude were frustrating to read. Perpetuating a culture of waste, a toxic looking-glass-self identity culture, and all for what? A few hundred obligatory likes from other people who are probably just liking so that you will return the favour?

We're not talking significant affect here, and yet they have their self worth tier up in it.

[ketchup]

Does anyone else read articles like this and feel like an alien on their own planet? These people look like me and talk like me, but have an alien way of thinking that I don't comprehend, and I don't particularly want to. This article weirds me out more than half the sci-fi "aliens" I've seen in TV and books.

Yeah, 100%.  It's just not how I think.

This made me laugh too:

$200 for a pair of pants might seem like a lot. But if you wear them to work one day a week for a year, that's $4 each wear—a bargain

If any of my everyday clothes ended up at $4/wear, I'd consider that a massive failure.  Fuck.  That's $1,460/yr for pants.

[six-car-habit]

 It looks like most of the people featured in the article are "publicists" , a stylist ,  a person who works for a watch company, etc.

What baffles me, is my local grocery stores have a row of magazines, maybe 100+ titles , down one aisle, of all sorts of hobbies + interests, fitness, cars, etc.

 But at the register itself, where you often have to wait a bit for the customer in front to get there groceries checked, the magazines are ALL Elle style, fashion and/or gossip oriented, with maybe an exception of one lonely Time magazine photo special, or Nat Geo special , or fancy architecture+house style- the non-fashion magazines costing about $12.

 And my town is far from being a bastion of high fashion or glamour.

[Caroline PF]

Does anyone else read articles like this and feel like an alien on their own planet? These people look like me and talk like me, but have an alien way of thinking that I don't comprehend, and I don't particularly want to. This article weirds me out more than half the sci-fi "aliens" I've seen in TV and books.

Yeah, 100%.  It's just not how I think.

This made me laugh too:

$200 for a pair of pants might seem like a lot. But if you wear them to work one day a week for a year, that's $4 each wear—a bargain

If any of my everyday clothes ended up at $4/wear, I'd consider that a massive failure.  Fuck.  That's $1,460/yr for pants.

Yeah, when I read that about the pants, I had to read it like 5 times just to make sense of it.

Wait. She only keeps her pants for a year? And then replaces them? And no way they're worn out, she's only wearing them one day a week. They should last a decade. And of course you only spend that much money on a pair of pants if they are high quality, and a classic that will never go out of style. Right?

Right??!


But I honestly don't know if she's the alien, or I am.

[MonkeyJenga]

Classic pants are BORING and don't get you LIKES, Caroline.

[KathrinS]

I know this isn't the point, but... These people are living for insta and only getting a couple hundred likes! That's so low level, whyyyyy, why are you bothering??? I'm embarrassed for them. It would be cheaper to actually buy likes from bots.

The part about how this is increasing fast fashion trends and waste is infuriating.

Both the waste and the outcome magnitude were frustrating to read. Perpetuating a culture of waste, a toxic looking-glass-self identity culture, and all for what? A few hundred obligatory likes from other people who are probably just liking so that you will return the favour?

We're not talking significant affect here, and yet they have their self worth tier up in it.

This is what I thought, too. Do these people ever even think about the impact of fast fashion?
It did strike me as sad that she gets so stressed out figuring out what clothes she‘ll wear on her holiday. It must feel quite limiting.

[Montecarlo]

I dated a girl who wanted to buy a $2000 laptop to help her Instagram career.  I managed to talk her out of it, but there are a lot of people in the horserace to be the next influencer.  It's kind of a pyramid scheme when you really think about it.

[ketchup]

I dated a girl who wanted to buy a $2000 laptop to help her Instagram career.  I managed to talk her out of it, but there are a lot of people in the horserace to be the next influencer.  It's kind of a pyramid scheme when you really think about it.

Ugh.  That makes about as much sense as buying a $3000 wristwatch to help your racecar driving career.