#Why?

With the emergence of hashtags, the way that social media is being used, has changed.  Previous to the invention of the use of hashtags, I believe that social media had a slightly different purpose.  Currently, I feel like hashtags group people into clans/tribes based on what the name of the hashtag one uses is.  For example, according to medium.com,  the most popular hashtags of this year are "#love" being at number one and other hashtags like: "#instagood", "#happy", "#cute", and "#followme" following in the top ten.  The words used in these hashtags, although they may seem insignificant at a glance, can show an individual many things about the people that use them in their posts.  For example, hashtags like: "#happy", "#cute", or "#love" can be attributes or feelings that posters want others to associate with their life.  If you're constantly using these hashtags in pictures or videos of your life, you're constantly giving off a vibe to your followers or friends that your life is perfect according to society's standards, even though we all know that no one's life can be perfect.  However, if an individual is always trying to make their lifestyle look perfect, they create an image that people expect them to uphold, making it monumentally tragic when they fail to uphold that standard of perfection in life or on social media.  This leads to my next point about social media and hashtags which is an aspect of jealousy that drives many people to post in the first place.  I feel like so many people on social media post things to make other people jealous.  For example, posting a picture of a luxurious place that you may be staying at or visiting may serve the purpose of informing people of where you're at and if you're having any fun, but there's also a facet of jealousy that you want others to feel when they see your post.  Also, I think there's a reason why so many people don't post any pictures or videos that may create negative feelings on their main account on social media.  They feel the need to make separate accounts called "finstas" or "spam accounts"  where they think they have the freedom to post whatever they want to a small base of followers that they trust.  Also, I think that it's important that none of the hashtags in the top sixty hashtags of the year were negative and only one of the hashtags used a word with a negative connotation and that hashtag was "#foodporn".  Although a word with a negative connotation is used, the overall meaning of the hashtag is positive, adding to the fact that on social media, people only look for things that reinforce feelings of comfort and positivity.  If we only look at things that keep us in our comfort zone, we will continue to stay happy, but, in some aspects, ignorant, because we don't want to deal with feelings that will change the way we look at things.
Although hashtags are used to create the image of a perfect life for the majority of people, hashtags are also used by advertisers to advertise their products and company name.  For example, hashtags like: "#ShareACoke" and "#MyCalvins" have become increasingly popular in the last year.  The question is: why have these hashtags caught the attention of so many people?  I believe that it's because of the images that these companies have used in posts where they use the hashtag.  For example, "#MyCalvins" was started by Justin Bieber when he posted a picture of himself in his Calvin Klein underwear, using the hashtag.  This caused an explosion on social media, leading thousands of people trying to recreate this picture or similar ones, where men and women, posted pictures of themselves in their "calvins".  However, pictures using these hashtags only included people who were physically in shape that could consider themselves, by society's standards, as "sexy" or "hot".  However, I see a major issue in this hashtag, even though Calvin Klein, may feel like the only effect it has is a positive one.  I see that because only physically fit people posted using this hashtag, it created a barrier between people that weren't in the best shape and those that were.  This barrier, creates feelings of self-doubt and judgement that can lead to anxiety and stress within people that feel like they can't fit the image of someone that wears Calvin Klein, as much as they may want to.  Although this is what Calvin Klein may have wanted, it separated people, putting them into groups to satisfy a need of belonging and affiliation causing people who didn't "belong" in these groups feel like outcasts.  Although hashtags may not seem like it, they give off an air of perfection that cause jealousy within others and unrealistically group people into factions that further separate our current society.  If unity is something that we truly value today, hashtags and social media are things that must change to be inclusive of all or to not exist at all.