This post was originally published on Substack
Since March, I’ve been working as the social media manager (and editorial assistant, but wow is that job title currently a mouthful) for Porchlight Book Company.
I first got into social media as a job back in 2015, at my first job out of college with the ACLU of Wisconsin. I was working in the fundraising department, and the communications department had been slashed for budgetary reasons, so one day my boss was like, “Hey, you’re a millennial—you know Facebook, right?” And because I did, the keys to the company’s social media were all mine.
2015 was such a different time! There were no TikToks or Reels! I’m pretty sure you could still put those ugly frames on your Instagram pictures! Your Facebook feed actually showed you your friends’ status updates and not a bunch of ads and algorithmically-incorrect suggestions for conspiracy theory podcasts! Twitter was a frenetic and breathtaking new frontier!
For the vast majority of my time as comms girl in the nonprofit world, running social media was a creative venture. My voice could stand in for the organization’s voice, and that worked out just fine, because people were on these platforms to hear from real people. We didn’t have to learn how to cater to a new algorithm—or to an entirely new medium—every month, so we could focus on pushing out our messaging.
I love my job at Porchlight—I’m eternally grateful for it. I get to spend my workday reading new books and, to an increasing degree(!!), writing about them. But the “social media manager” aspect of my job isn’t what it used to be. Most of my time is spent in Excel spreadsheets and Buffer, our scheduling tool. I’ve got a consistent rhythm of getting our content out—content that is very, very good!—but I’m rarely on our channels being… well, social. Partly because, by the time I swim back to the surface from the depths of my spreadsheets, I’m too tired to want to go in and interact with anyone as “Porchlight.” But also, there’s not much organic interaction awaiting my response anyway. Posting on social media feels like screaming into a void—you get a few likes, some retweets, maybe an emoji in the comments, but for the most part, no one is there to hear you anymore.
In the movie Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, the eponymous Marcel (the Shell) enlists his human friend and documentarian, Dean, to ask for the internet’s help in finding his missing shell family. The internet flocks to Marcel immediately—look at his little shoes, how adorable!—and after TikTok sleuths deduce the location of Marcel’s home, they arrive in droves to take videos and selfies in front of the house. Everyone wants the social clout that comes with having some kind of link to this online character, but notably, no one steps up to offer much help.
“It’s an audience,” Marcel says, his singular eye glazing over the barrage of social posts. “It’s not a community.”
Having to be on social media for work has, unexpectedly, served as a kind of exposure therapy for me—by the time I clock out for the day, I’m so tired of all the little bells and whistles and algorithms and all the whiplash moments of what the fuck is this suggested post and who is this influencer trying to sell me diet tea and where are the mundane posts from my friends posting their lunchtime sandwiches that I now miss so much that the absolute last thing I want is to spend any more time on social media anymore.
And so I haven’t.
Seriously.
My Facebook is deactivated again, although I keep Messenger open because that’s where I can still talk to my friends directly. I changed the bio on my public Instagram to hint at the fact that it’s mostly defunct now. I logged out of my private Instagram, too—I’m sure friends might still be sending me messages there on occasion, but I haven’t felt the desire to check, and if it’s truly that important, they’ll find other ways to reach me.
It’s weird because, after years of being so deeply tied to these platforms, I now find myself having to rewire how I connect with other people. Staying off social media has opened up the mental clarity to get more writing done, but when that writing is complete, where do I share it?
Not that sharing my work on social media was all that satisfying. I’ve been immensely proud of my recent work (which, oh hey, just gonna be shameless and let you know that here it is), but when I would put it up on Facebook and get a tiny smattering of likes and no tangible human interaction, that pride would inevitably sour. I realize now that this raises two questions:
- What is the point of social media when social connection is absent?
- What is the purpose of my writing?
I love writing. It is also draining, heart-wrenching work. That’s not a bad thing—the effort it takes to create a finished piece make the accomplishment all the more sweeter. Every week I think to myself, why am I putting myself through this painful process? And every week, when the cycle is complete, I think, I can’t wait to do this again. It’s deep soul work.
That’s why I had to step back and reconsider what in the actual fuck I was doing, taking the work I was so proud of and cashing it in for… what, a couple of digital blue thumbs on Mark Zuckerberg’s cash cow?
It’s weird to have grown up so intertwined with the rise of the internet. I’m almost 30 now—I signed up for my first real social media account (MySpace!) around the age of 15. That’s half a life lived in an open arena. Who are we outside of the perception of others? Do we still exist? I mean shit, here I am filling the void of Meta with an email newsletter. Is this any better? Worse? Is there an innate part of being human that will always draw us together? As we find ourselves logging off and disconnecting from the all the lights and sounds of the internet slot machines, will we actually find each other again?
What fascinates me about post-apocalyptic media is how green everything is in these fantastical, hypothetical settings—manmade structures, now abandoned, overrun with plants. Animals roaming free. Nature returning to its balance. I’d like to think that this will happen to me, too. As the internet persona falls away, something else will fill its place. Something more verdant and alive. I’m still questioning who I am outside the shine of blue lights—maybe soon, I’ll simply know.