We are who we present and, therefore, we become who we choose to
present. We only ever see the world from our own eyes and our own perspective,
and conversely, the world around us (or, at least, the inhabitants of it that
have the ability to perceive) only ever sees us from their eyes and their
perspective. Even if we attempt to present the exact person we feel we are deep
down, it’s fundamentally impossible, because our multifaceted personalities can
never be fully represented in the superficiality that is our physical and
social presence. Even if we wrote an autobiography on ourselves, printed the
full text on a dress, and forced everyone we interacted with to read it on our
first encounter, that would still be our own interpretation and representation
and would still only just be scratching the surface of who we “really” are.
Fashion is just another way of writing our representative “autobiography”,
arguably in a more powerful way than words ever could, because in an
increasingly image-based culture, visual semiotics are more easily understood
than linguistics ("a pictures worth a thousand words").
Hyperreality. It’s not real but merely a representation of the real, a
world where the boundaries between reality and representation have become
blurred. “A world where the fictional dramas on TV are used as teaching
aids, or where a company promotes itself by advertising an imaginary product”
(Nicholas Perry).
The only definite, unchangeable reality we have is the reality of who
we truly are deep down, as it’s perceived by ourselves, anything else is a
simulation, a fabricated representation. This is because of the simple fact
that we live life permanently through our own eyes, not from the collective
eyes of wider society. What is deemed ‘real’ and ‘irreal’ can only ever be
judged from our perspective, and anyone else’s opinion is merely their
interpretation from their perspective. A clichéd and all-too-common example of
this point is that of a closeted homosexual, someone who lives their life as a
“straight man” but is quite obviously (to themselves) living a simulated life.
Underneath it all, the reality of their existence is that they’re attracted to
men, but because for whatever reason they don’t want this to be their reality
or they feel that this cannot acceptably be their reality, they simulate
another reality, a hyperreality, something which is a (false) representation of
themselves and not their actual self, but which is presented as their actual
self (their “real” self) and comes to constitute their “identity” in social
contexts. To live a completely real life (at least, from your own perspective)
is to live life exactly how you wish it could be lived, no matter how the wider
society would perceive you.
With the increasingly universal adoption of Internet usage and the
ability to live almost permanently “online”, the cyberworld has become another
place where hyperreality is clearly visible, especially within the parameters
of social networking websites. “Facebook itself is an exercise in
hyperreality – users create ‘profiles’ which are supposed to encapsulate their
‘person’ and communicate with others, ‘friends’, through its interface.” (Jordan
Kinder)
It’s quite clear that rather than an accurate
portrayal of an individual (assuming it is possible in the first place to
create such a portrayal), a Facebook profile is a users interpretation of who
they believe they are or who they want to be presented within the confines of
Facebooks own parameters as to what constitutes an individual and what
constitutes an “identity”. Facebook, then, is arguably doubly hyperreal. Jean
Baudrillard (20th century social theorist), when questioned as to who he is,
famously replied by stating, “I am the simulacrum of myself” (Jean
Baudrillard). If we are, as Baudrillard suggests, a simulacrum of
ourselves, then a Facebook profile arguably functions as a simulation of that
simulacrum, a representation of another representation. The impossible question
here is that, if we’re now given the freedom to represent something which isn’t
even definably real to begin with, where will this cycle end?