Essay Sample on My Online Persona: A Stranger I Could Not Recognize

I looked at my Facebook page, and I could not recognize a thing I saw. It was my profile on this account, yes, but the content being uploaded was all wrong. This contradicted every aspect of my values, mantra, and personality. The photo was mine, the most recent on that matter, and I quite loved it. The name was also mine, but I could not recognize the person I was gradually becoming in this online world, a world that never forgets. The notifications were beeping in one after another, streaming in the reactions that my wonderful world had towards this turn that they had seen lately. Some even wrote me personal messages, other unfriended me with an impulse, and for those who remained, the reactions were mixed, with some impressed that I had finally kicked the glass ceiling and metamorphosed to the grown-up they saw in me since. At the same time, others were too shocked, and let the emoticons, emojis, and stickers to speak for them. This was when I died in the social media world.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

December 4, 2009. I remember this day the very same way Americans recall and commemorate July 4. This was when I finally got that freedom to navigate in this new world, a world where everyone was present, interacting, looking for love and companionship, and others seeking to sell their businesses and ideas. At about noon, I had my Facebook account set successfully, and a profile set by one of my friends who were already in the business. Gradually, my world grew, from three friends to 50 to 1000. Every single day that I posted an idea, a photo, or an event, the love I received was enormous, the kind I had never felt in the real world. Well, in the real world, I was the bullied student in the class even with straight As in algebra. I was the introvert who could barely interact and make friends, more so in the new school, I had just enrolled in. But in the virtual world, I had made it. I had friends, a following, and I was more willing to pass my philosophies of the things around me to the world. And they loved it. Well, until this encounter.

After a terrifying day in school one evening, I went to my room, took my computer, and attempted to sign into my Facebook account. The server was troubleshooting some issues I could barely understand, but after numerous attempts, I was in. And alas! There it was. My page was dominated with ex-rated content, photos of young women in the bathing suits, and some completely nude, as well as tones of other politically incorrect comments that painted me as a racist, a male chauvinist, and a possible suspect of child pornography. This was the darkest that this world ever got. I sat down, scrolled from page to page, and all of my initial posts were minimized into shreds of pretenses that masked the monster I really was. I use the word monster because this seems to have dominated most of the comments I received. It was all over. The respect I had finally earned in the online world was gone, just like that. The account then started posting my vulnerabilities, my photos when I was struggling with my weight, and content that exposed the loser I was in the real world, with no functional relationship even at home. The posts went on for a week, and each day I logged in to see whether my world had stabilized. It had not. This tore me apart from artery to vein, and at this point, all I could think about was how I could end it. End it, I thought. This was one thing I could do.

The next thing I knew, I was lying and starring on a white ceiling, with some beeping sound in the distance and several blurry images of people around me. The pain in my through and to my stomach was unbearable. I learned that I had attempted suicide. A few of my family members were there, and I was so embarrassed even to look them in the eye.

I spent the next two weeks in recovery thinking of how easy it was for someone to flip my reality into a nightmare by a click of a button. As it turned out, a group of computer majors in my school had planned to prank me by hacking into my account and posting the content. This was next-level cyberbullying. I came out worse than I ever was before the account. I could not trust anyone, and more importantly, there was no way to undo the damage they had caused on my spirit, self-esteem, self-perception, and personality. The videos and photos they shared had gone viral, and I was sought of popular in the school but not for the right reasons. I recently own another Facebook account and numerous other accounts on different social media platforms.

However, I learned that social media is not a world for the meek. That it is not a compliment for the real-life experiences and situations, we ought to have. After the ordeal, I went offline for two months and attempted to make friends within the school before I could transfer them to the virtual world. Cyberbullying might sound like a non-problem, but to those who suffer under its ferocious fangs, it is a life-changing experience that I would not wish on anyone.