Social Media Unfiltered: Image, Influence, and Real Connections

In this episode of SafeTalk, teens and young adults dive into the real impact of social media—on self-image, relationships, and reputation. The SafeZone crew gets honest about the highs and lows of living online: from chasing likes and dealing with trends, to the pressure of building an image and the risks of going viral.

The group opens up about how social media shapes confidence, influences friendships, and sometimes makes it harder to trust what’s real. They talk about the challenges of dating online, the drama that plays out in public, and the creative ways young people are using streaming and content to connect. With stories about jealousy, reputation, and the struggle to balance privacy and mental health, this episode is a must-listen for anyone navigating the digital world.

This work is funded in part by MHC with money from the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund that was created with the vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4, 2008.

Created by Youth Advocate and Recording Arts Specialist Tek Burch, the Face to Face SafeTalk Podcast opener blends music and spoken word to spotlight youth truth, justice, and hope. It sets the stage for honest conversations, celebrating strength, breaking barriers, and amplifying youth voices in a space where every story matters.

Transcript

2:39

(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Welcome to Safe Talk, where the conversations lead to real solutions. This is a space where teens and young adults come together to unpack conflict, build understanding, grow stronger through communication. Whether it's beef with a friend, drama online, or attention at home, we're here to explore what it takes to resolve it in a healthy way. Right here in the heart of Safe Zone, your community, your voice, your peace. Let's talk about it now. Today's topic, we're going to be talking about social media and the way it affects young people in their lives. But before we start, I'm going to go around, I'm going to have you guys introduce yourselves, say your name, say where you're from, and then say one thing that you enjoy to do. My name is 19, I'm from St. Paul, and I enjoy sleep. My name is Mani, I'm from St. Louis, and I like doing it. My name is Justin, I go by Cap, I'm 22, and I'm from St. Paul. John, I'm from Minnesota, and what I like to do is I like to run. I'm Asher from St. Paul, and I like to sleep too. I'm David, I go by Dede, I like to play space. This is Benny, also known as Rath from Chicago, and I like making music. Okay, shout out to all of you. I wanted to touch on this topic for a while with you guys, because I feel like social media impacts your lives more than you guys might understand. They call this the social media era. So I think it's important that you guys, while we're navigating through social media, we have a better understanding of what you can get from it and some of the things that might be more toxic and more dangerous when you're navigating social media. I'm just going to ask you guys a couple questions about different aspects of social media. Give us the truthful answer, your truthful response, and your feelings about these topics dealing with social media. Right off the top, when I think of social media, I think of how people want to be perceived. Your image, your self-perception, the things that you share with social media are usually the things that you want people to notice about you that are good, that are positive, that are uplifting. So your image on social media is always going to be driven by how good you want to look and how well you want to be perceived by your public. With that, I just want to ask, what's one way social media has made you feel worse about how you look and who you are? I'd say the pictures, and then the likes, and being able to comment on it. I'm glad that you brought up likes, because I feel like likes are really important in this day and age when it comes to anything that you're posting. I feel like sometimes it's driven by how many likes you can get. Explain a little bit how that might make you feel worse, though. What's the part about that makes you feel like you're not doing something right? Just being able to like stuff that I like shows that what I like, not everybody else likes, and I go by it. So it can be quality, image quality, or comments, views, how many views you have. Now, when you say image quality, do you mean like you see somebody's picture and it looks was shot in a studio with the perfect camera, with the perfect lighting, as opposed to you being limited to your camera phone and your pictures just not turning out the way you want? Is that what you mean by that? Because I think that's important to note, too. I feel like every time someone gets that really good picture of themselves, they want it so that they can post it so that people can see that part of them, right? Almost like 4K resolution to 360 resolution. How important how important is that to any of the rest of you guys? Is that really an important thing, like the actual image quality? I love it. I mean, my iPhone camera is different from Android cameras. That's a big difference. Because I've literally seen people be like, girl, take this on your phone because you got a better camera on your iPhone than I do. And like that you literally have your camera in your hand, but you're asking somebody else to take your picture. I feel like it just be like, it really depends on like you would like from iPhone or from like Android or even iPhone versus camera. For some people in now like in our day and age, I feel like yeah, it's important because they feel like they use the internet as like a trophy system in there. Like you know how when you used to like get rewarded for like doing chores you would get allowances or whatever. Yeah, it's been there like that almost to me in my in my perspective. And I feel like it kind of messed us up in a way nowadays because it's just like everybody want to be somebody or want to be the person that's winning at the top. So I feel like it all depends like what it is like when the bottle flips was coming out. For example, just little things like that, you know. So I feel like it's all just feel like whatever is hot at that very moment in time, that's what people are about. Have you noticed like the trends that happen when you see one person doing one thing, it becomes a trend, everybody starts doing the same thing like these little whatever the trend might be. And it's almost like if you don't do it, you're not keeping up. But also, when it comes to bad, there's always a little bit of good that goes along with it. So I'm also curious to know, have you seen a post or a person online that post the kind of content that makes you feel inspired or confident in your own skin? And what type of what type of social media sites or apps do you usually see that type of Instagram and TikTok? Yeah, Snapchat. Snapchat. Yeah. Ready? X. I need live chat now. People don't know. Twitter is a dangerous app now, man. It's dangerous. But like you gotta know what you're looking for. You can't just look for the negatives. You gotta look for the positives. What are you into? Like sports, music. You go ahead, go follow your favorite artists. What do we know about algorithms in here? What do we know about the algorithm? It's kind of like the marketing. It's kind of like, I would say, think about crypto. It's like a streamline where it goes up and down. And it can also, yeah, it can go in a steady pace. And it refers to your ad revenue, how many people have watched. And when I'm speaking to algorithm too, I'm thinking about now, when I think of the algorithm of social media, it's basically the AI part of social media that brings content onto your timeline based on the things that you've clicked on, the posts that you've liked, things that you've searched. So have you ever noticed, I feel like everyone has noticed this. You might even just be thinking about where they want a piece of pizza. And then like you scroll your social media out of nowhere, you see pizza ads. I think your phone reads your mind. Me and my girl was just talking about this yesterday. Once you think about something, as soon as you scroll down, it pops up on my phone. But see, here's one thing we might not notice. You might think that you thought that, but you might not have. It might be on your mind because you're seeing it already on your timeline. You might've liked the picture, but I don't even think about it. And then that's what got you thinking like, you know what? I really do want a piece of pizza. Next thing you know, boom, your timeline's full of pizza. I keep seeing the Popeye's. So I asked about the algorithm to ask you guys this. What does your algorithm look like right now? Is it full of videos of music? Is it full of dating apps and sites? Is it full of toxic fight videos? What does your algorithm look like? Because that basically is built based on the things that the social media assumes you're interested in. For me, it's concerts and places to travel and then places to go to. So traveling events and music. And that's just, that's like basically built around the personality that you have and the things that you show interest in. I really don't got one. I just post whatever. Right. So you feel like your algorithm is kind of open to just like whatever people that you follow are posting. Yeah. That's how mine's is. Mine's is just random and it could be like basketball. It could be cooking. It could be like me looking for cars or any like little stuff like that. Have you ever got caught up in something that is not your business, but it's just right there on social media. It's right on your timeline. You're like, Ooh, who's this person? And why don't they like this person? Let me go investigate. Let me see the comments. Just by being in the comments that has got me caught up just for the simple fact is because like say you can know both of the people too. That's the crazy, like, let's say that first. And when you know both the people and you just happen to see that they're feuding about this, like this, what's the word? A disbate. A debate. Yeah. Yeah. About some little, like a misfit. You know what I'm trying to get at. So, and you just happen to see, you go look through the comments and see, they were all, you were in a comment. You wasn't in a, see, like I tell people. You got dragged into it. You got dragged into it because you were just having to comment on both sides or just having to see that would get you into some mess. So me personally, I tell any of the people that I know, like if you have beef with another person that I know, don't put me in there because I both, I like you both. But as soon as you evolve yourself, as soon as you evolve yourself in that, you become a part of that too. I feel like social media already like commenting on both pages and stuff like that, that kind of already stereo, precise. Have y'all noted, have you ever seen a feud or something on social media with like, somebody may have got caught cheating and now all of a sudden, you know, every detail because let's maybe one of the partners in that relationship. He got doodled on his drawers. Just out of being vindictive, out of being hurt. You want, you want that person to feel a little bit of the hurt that you're feeling. So now you involve strangers into your relationship and you're, you're, you're showing, you might even screenshot text messages. And now all of this real private information is leaked on the internet for just complete strangers to be a part of. And that's what everybody don't understand. They, anybody turn to Facebook or like Instagram or Snapchat just after they go through something like, why is it very serious and traumatic to why you're going through a problem? Why bring it to everywhere instead of trying to deal with yourself? Nobody's not going to care. Not only do they not care though, it's very judgmental place. It's like giving people the right, because it's not no longer private, right. You're giving people the right to judge a situation that it's, that's nothing to do with them. And it's kind of like making a mockery of yourself and all that type of stuff should be private. I feel like it's just because they feel like it's easier to go to Facebook or go to someone else and talk to someone else rather than your partner. That validation you get from people to be like, Oh, he ain't in any way or just to put something in your head. So you, cause it's just like, all right, so you know, your girl's cheating You go to your homies and your homies making fun at you. So you really don't want to talk to them. Put something in here and be like, okay, let me go remove myself. Let me go tell her it's over with. Let me try to break it off. Just because my homeboy put that bug in your head and said, Oh bro, well, she's already cheating on you. You might as well just break up with it. This is perfect to bring me into my next question that I have for you guys, because it involves dating. And I feel like this dating aspect of social media is, it's nothing like it was in the past where a lot of people can honestly say that their partner now, and maybe the last few partners they may have had in relationships they've met on social media before they had a chance to even see them in person. And I can say, I can add on to that. Most of these people that date on social media don't even know the girl they dated. They just be dating. So my question, my question is how, how has social media messed with dating or made it harder to trust people nowadays? A lot. Cause you can't trust dating sites either or dating apps because they be AIs or bots. Preach. Check the reviews. Not even just, you can't check reviews don't even work. Preach. Like there's so many apps that I've like looked at and I looked at the star view. It'll give me like four or five, four out of five. And I instantly know, okay, let me test this app out. But if I look in a review, sometimes it's like, Oh no, this wasn't right. I'll have good ones at the top of the review, but that was a question. But that's, are you saying just because what you see of this person, that's your reason I'm not talking to that person instead of getting to know for yourself how On the contrary, I'm saying that the app itself can literally have someone from YouTube, a model from YouTube, but then you go on there and you don't find no models on YouTube like that. And then you even look back at the reviews and it's like, well, this app was great. And it had some people on here that were real, but then you got to pay for some extra feature in the app, which makes you not even want to get it. So here's the serious question. I'll let you get to what you're going to say, but here's a serious question when it comes to dating and not even just dating, but getting to know people authentically online, is it possible to do so? Because here's what dating apps are dating apps. Here's how the little bios read. Sometimes I'm good at this. I'm great at that. I enjoy this. I enjoy that. Here's another good thing about me. Here's another good thing about me. Here's the greatest picture I could find in myself. That's all I'm saying. That's your first impression of a person. See, what are they leaving out? Watch out for catfish. They're they're leaving out things like I'm suffering from depression. I'm stressed out. I'm coming from a toxic relationship. So I have I have issues about trust. I have five kids. I yeah, I have so and so. So you're saying they're telling us a false story. No, they're not. They're not giving us the full story. That's what it is. It can be a letter. It can be typed out. It can be a typo. Yeah, it's just is it really possible to get to know a person in a well-rounded aspect when social media is low key built on the way you want people to perceive you rather than being like no one wakes up unless they're a comedian and says, God, I'm dealing with terrible diarrhea today. I mean, unless you're that type of person, you know, yeah, if you know that about that person, because, of course, there's people out there on social media that do that type of stuff. But usually it's for a reaction, a laugh, a joke. But they're not seriously saying that because that is something someone can read right away and be like, I'm not about to deal with the person that has terrible diarrhea. Billie Eilish kind of probably lost followers for saying that her favorite thing to do was actually go to the bathroom and defecate. So I don't know. I just defecate. You know, I do fancy for sure. Yeah. So outside of the diarrhea part, let's not focus too much on that. But that was an example of that's an example of a turn off. That's something that someone can consider a turn off. That's usually the stuff that we don't see on social media about people, like people, like actual people, like females talking about another girl that I don't know at all. And they want me to put my input in it. You know, it's a trap. But yeah. But along with that, though, because it has happened and it's happened to me. Another question. Have you ever made a real connection through social media and turned out to be healthy and supportive? Yes. Because that's also very possible in 1985. There's no there's honestly people that I've met online just through, you know, social media networking that have been really supportive of my journey or whatever it is I'm doing. I met them and now we're really, really good friends that are connected in a genuine way. And we met through social media. Do you guys feel like that's possible with you guys? Have you ever that happened to anyone in here? I mean, yeah, but like all my friends that I met, like I met them through school. Yeah, I was talking strictly through social media. When I don't talk to them, like my close friends that I grew up with, when I don't talk to them, I always talk to them and they'd be calling me like, yeah, you're doing good at music. You should keep doing this. You should keep doing that. Like keep promoting yourself to do better. Like I get some homies that be doing that on social media, too. I read a question today. And the question would be, what is it difficult to find in a friend? And this can relate to social media by how do you feel about your friends being on social media and then they're doing something, they're out having fun, but then you're in and you don't get to go out and go have fun. Is there a part of social media that kind of gives you a feel like it's OK to feel this way? Genuinely, it's frowned upon to be jealous or envious. But is there an aspect of social media that in a subconscious way makes you sit and be like insecure? I'm yeah, I'm wishing that I could do that. I'm wishing I was in this place that this person is taking pictures. Yeah, I wish I had this car. Is that a part? Yeah, it does, because I feel like it opened up my mind that it's like a show. It's like a play almost. The play starts, you sit there, you're oh, ah, amazing. Wow. And when the curtains shut and it's all done, you sit there with like a face. You're wondering you're almost pondering like, what's going on? Like, was it was it was it really for real or was it for I don't know, but I know I want to be that person who was just in front of my face. Exactly. And we sometimes don't realize it. And even down to the oh, that's a nice sweatshirt. Now you're you're searching social media, you're searching, you're searching apps, trying to find that sweatshirt. You're influenced by what you're seeing on social media. That brings me it brings me to a question about, like, the reputation that people try to uphold on social media. Everybody wants that star next to their name. They want that rep. They want to be. I see a lot of people putting on a front on social media for their reputation. What's the worst thing you've seen happen to someone's reputation online, even if it wasn't true? Have you seen somebody go from a hero to a villain? Yeah, but she didn't really necessarily go from like to a villain. She just fell off. I'm back at the bottom of you completely. One thing about social media I've noticed is consistency. If you're trying to build your network and if you're trying to actually be someone on social media that has followers and like a following because of something that you do, like music or fashion, whatever consistency, if you're not posting in everybody's face all day, every day is going to be a point where you become irrelevant to the next person that is consistent, right? And so I guess that is part of reputation. Once you build that, once you get there, you have to maintain it or else people are going to question like, dang, what happened to him? He fell off. Did he really fall off or did he step back from social media? You think social media can help people redeem themselves or tell their side of the story when something like that happens, like a fall off or something? Definitely. When people go to court, they sometimes even use what they've said in a music video or the references in a text message just to kind of prove their point. So I definitely could say it's a tool to express yourself in a very logical or in a very inspirational way. I want to shift gears a little bit, though, because we're having a good conversation, but we're about to we're about to wrap things up. And one of the one of the really important aspects of social media, at least in this newest, the newest generation of social media, something that I've noticed that's just blowing up out of control is streaming. How many of you guys are familiar with streaming Twitch, Twitch, Steam, Kick, Steam, like all these other platforms outside of just my YouTube, YouTube, any any place you can stream now. Are they taking off because of how much money are you guys notice how much money is coming into streaming right now? Yeah, it depends on how many followers you get. You make it like at least make a fan every every thousand, every I would say, no, I don't know. That's what we use on the platform. That's on YouTube. I'm talking about Twitch, Twitch, and you make you can make a you can make a bet if you got more than like five thousand. Yeah, because a person could they got to chip in like 19 cents of way more than that. But OK, that's why I know you make more of my life. You make at least 10. But OK, how do you get to that point? You got to keep promoting yourself on that platform. It takes years. It does. It can. It can take years. It can take months. I'm glad you don't put your mind to it. You can do that. Like I say in a whole, if you look, I say six months, six months or 12, like in a whole year. Yeah, it's always it always depends on the situation, the person, the platform, all that. It's all dependent. My question to you guys is what pressure or risk do you think come along with trying to go viral or stream? You got to do something stupid outside. You can literally risk your entire you know, household situation. You can risk when when it do was would go to like malls and go to like a jewelry store. He's talking about content. I remember that. You know, it's not like I see this. I'm not trying this on all this. Look, I'm booking in here right now. Oh, OK. And that's why he was in jail. Look at him now. Yeah. He saved his life. He turned to Jesus. Now I'm not going to lie. I was a little bit that way. But you see, this is this is all something that you guys follow through his social media and streaming, right? Like this is you've noticed him. You've seen him go from viral, from robbing and stealing people, from going viral to changing his life around. Remember the people who gave all I get? What are some what are some creative and positive ways that you are someone, you know, in do live content or stream? Like what are what are the ways like if you were to go into streaming right now, what would you do? I would do gaming, gaming, music studio. I hope for them is actually nice. Yeah. Both of them is real smart. Me too. That's not actually if you do go outside and start doing outside streams and stuff like a wall. Right. So like show it, show everybody what you're doing on your platform like this, this the nightlife. This is what happens at night. It might sound like a streamer that he shows off his powers, like he got actual powers, like he can move like with his head. He'll move this piece of paper. Like I'm so perfect. I'm not like do perfect or like, oh, Chris Angel. So I'm telling you, he got power. That's what you want. You mean, you know, I was sad. Oh, I got a really bad thing. I believe in unicorns. It's all great. It's off electricity. And what he said is just being high, high frequent. Are you talking about this? Were you? Yeah, I guess he could. He could. He's just that you hold a bottle in your hand. He could Bringing it to him Okay, we got oh we started overlapping A little bit Maybe like one more question. I really want to ask you guys It's still involved in streaming like how can young people balance streaming with privacy safety and mental health, okay? So I actually want to go in on this one full like full-fledged I started on a little app called anime M&O and that's where I started posting like my youtube video editing Content and then it was actually like a mental health thing as well because there was other people that were known as weirdos that were on the app and Me posting content also helped out with other people being cool in the industry of the media Okay guys, we'll wrap it right there. I appreciate everybody's Opinions and everyone that spoke up on they feel about social media. I want to thank everybody that's listening for tuning in to safe talk Remember these Conflicts don't have to break you could build you if you choose to face it with courage and care Until next time keep showing up keep listening and keep growing y'all give yourselves a round of applause Media man