Imagine the person writing this article is a 23 year old, dark skinned girl from the West Indies residing on the twin-island of Trinidad and Tobago. Most people outside of the Caribbean would have no idea where that is; so allow me to give a brief background. Trinidad and Tobago is an island in the Caribbean that was first discovered by the Amerindians and thereafter was inhabited by people from various strides of life, and perhaps this is what you may see at surface level; a very diverse country. However, spend a few days and you’d witness how Americanized it has become. Why do you think that is? The answer is simple… Social Media!
This girl, being a part of the Gen Z community, would like to discuss how she has lived and continues to live through and witness the revolution of social media from a few years ago to now. Growing up, it was almost impossible to see girls that resemble herself on the tv screen. Her favorite actresses and singers looked nothing like her. However, she wanted to look like them. Social media made her believe that beauty was a different type of face, a different type of hair, a different type of shape, or a different type of skin complexion. There was a time she was even eager to get older so she can do whatever she wanted without the obstruction of her parents telling her no! She wanted to reach that age where she was able to wear makeup and dress up like the celebrities on our tv screens. She wanted to eat less so she can be skinny and perm her hair so she can have straighter and longer hair. I bet this sounds familiar, right? It does because we all know someone who had this same mentality and we’re all very familiar with this prejudiced ideology of “beauty”. Therefore, it is evident that social media plays a pivotal role in our identity formation. Who we are and who we aspire to be has a lot to do with what we see on social media
Clinical Psychologist Sherry Ann Turton asserts that persons around the same age as this girl submit to this fabricated ideology of beauty and try to emulate just that. She contends that their physical attributes become their primary focus which results in feelings of inadequacy because of the unrealistic desire to meet a standard that does not actually exist. Thus, many girls are left with low self-esteem issues that stem from their disappointment of not looking like the superstar who is masked by loads of makeup and all the different bodily enhancements.
This dreary outcome has led to the birth of “Embracing You”. Embracing you is a campaign that promotes self-love, self-assurance, self-awareness, self-respect and everything that revolves around “self” as your identity should only be based on a true representation of yourself and not anyone else’s. Managers of this Campaign are Danielle Raymah- an Employee of Industrial Court of Trinidad ad Tobago and Post-Graduate student at the University of Bedfordshire, Tamkeka Heath-Harding- a Subject Matter Expert and Supervisor’s Assistant, Alicia Nicholson- a former Banking Professional and Promising Entrepreneur and Marian Lewis- a Customer Service Representative and Student at the University of the West Indies. To promote this campaign a social media page on Instagram has been created and can be found using the handle @em.bracingyou. To further promote this campaign each campaign manager will publish a media release, a public service announcement and engage with their targeted audience through the channels of innovative and interactive activities. This would aid in breaking the ice with the targeted audience and enabling them to feel more comfortable to participate in all the things in store that essentially are aimed at embracing you!
Based on the visual of this young Trinidadian girl’s life, it is clear that social media was not sensitive to the impact it can have on persons, especially at such an impressionable age. There is this old Trinidadian proverb “children pick up what they see”. This means that at a young age, we learn by observation and because social media was most prominent at a time of the identity development of persons between the ages 18-25, it has immensely impacted them.
In recent years, however, social media has tremendously evolved. We see an improvement with social media and identity sensitivity. If you scroll through social media, you are guaranteed to see posts about body positivity and more representation of brown and black people. There is also the hashtag #naturalhairjourney trend which praises girls for rocking their natural hair. Girls are now embracing their curls, their curves and their blackness, hashtag #blackgirlmagic. This new social media era is now more aligned with the campaign “Embracing You” as it encourages everyone to embrace themselves and their uniqueness. This young Trinidadian girl is now a witness of popular Caribbean superstars like Rihanna from Barbados and Nicki Minaj from Trinidad and Tobago dominating the music industry. She now witnesses people like Canadian Rapper/Singer Drake singing about the “Tropics” and talking with a Caribbean accent, because now being from the the “Islands” is cool. People are now proud to be from the Caribbean and you can bet your bottom dollar that you are going to see “Island gal” in someone’s Instagram bio. Interestingly, this is because social media has found a way to include everyone. It is a platform that reaches the entire world so it is only right that it’s a platform that the entire world can feel accepted and included. This is, Embracing You!
