Born Frees: Social Media, Narcissism, and a Vision for Change

Who are the born frees? They are those born post 1994 into a democratic South Africa. They were not part of the struggle, but reap the fruits of those who bled and fought for their freedom. It is you- the youth of today! What difference are you making? What sets you part from the older generation? Looking at the three aspects of social media and technology, the Narcissistic attitude and thinking ahead, along with my research, I will tell you what I think you guys will do in the next 10 years.

Social media and technology are a great advancement that has helped made life a little easier.

But every good thing has its downfalls. For instance, Skype is a great way to be able to talk to someone overseas while being able to look at their face. But with that we have lost a sense of Ubuntu and human interaction. Twitter is an amazing tool to have as a news feed, finding missing people and as well as making friends.

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One becomes very busy with updating profiles and shuffling through peoples pictures, that they become addicted, have no time for others and therefore become self-orientated. This brings me to my next point of Narcissism.

The born frees have been labeled as the me,me,me generation. Basically you’re self obsessed. Its always about how I have this item of clothing, I just got the latest iPhone, and about how many followers I can get on Twitter and Instagram and how many friends I have on Facebook.

From that sentence, the most common letter is I. without even noticing; you seek the approval of others by trying to always better yourself on social media according to what others think is the perfect person. Having said that, you’re also branding yourself.

Social media allows you to give substance to your narcissistic dreams, being self-reliant and adapting to the world of endless choices. Nowadays you can put off your life decisions, like when you want to get married and have children with the means of birth control. This attitude instills confidence, having control of your own life choices and builds self esteem. You are then thinking ahead. Born frees know what they want, when they want it. You question authority because you don’t want to lower your levels of expected standards.

You cautiousness to life decisions gives you that freedom to not be Yes-Men. This is a positive in which you can change the country for the better. I see this generation making great changes but beyond the next 10 years. Our country is only 19 years into a democracy. And as the saying goes, you can’t build Rome in one day. The country is still new to the idea of freedom and democracy, and cannot make a drastic change when most government positions are still occupied by those given them as means of compensation for devastation of apartheid, which don’t have qualifications.

Once the turnover of the older generation has been make to make way for the Born frees, then through their creative and innovative ways of thinking, they can better this country, and make the whole country look like Cape Town. This new quick way of thinking, challenging the systems and the status quo, being optimistic and open minded and having a holistic view of others across all races, are some of the qualities the older generation don’t possess.

Because social media is what the born frees know as well as this Narcissistic attitude, they can use that as their starting tools. You guys obviously want better education for those privileged and those less privileged because the standard of education is pretty low. I mean have who seen what is in those LO papers in government schools? How to wash your hands? Seriously? You’re not shackled by the mistakes of yesterday and you have great potential and focus. Right on Born Frees.