Catfishing

In today's day and age, it is not at all uncommon for a young person's identity to be tied almost entirely to how they portray themselves online. In fact, for many in this generation, instagram likes and twitter followers are used as a way to easily quantify their self worth. While social media and the internet have benefited mankind tremendously, it is important to be aware of the possible risks of being too wrapped up in your internet persona (or other people's).
Along with the rise of the internet age and all that comes with it, people are increasingly using the internet as a means of attracting a romantic partner. However, the rise of online dating brought with it the rise of a new threat: catfishing. Catfishing is defined as the act of lying online in order to portray yourself in a more positive light. As the article I read this week cleverly points out, we are all in a sense "catfish" online. We have all at some point edited a picture, or cropped someone out to make ourselves look as favorable as possible. It is no surprise, then, that this has lead to some people taking it to the absolute extreme. People go so far as to making entirely fake profiles just for the sake of keeping a relationship with someone. While many have heard stories of people being catfished, a friend of mine had an experience on the other end of the spectrum when she discovered a fake Twitter profile that had been using her photos in order to catfish people. This was very disturbing to her and the profile removed from the website, but the shock over the thought that someone would actually do something like that still lingers to this day. The important questions to address at this point are "what exactly causes this bizarre behavior?" and "how could we make sure we are not getting catfished?"
As pointed out before, in today's day and age much of our identity is tied to what we do on the internet. It has become our main means of communication, and how we portray ourselves online is how we want others to view us. However, it is an unfortunate truth that many people out there are simply not happy with themselves and would rather hide who they really are from the world. It is these people who use the internet as a way to craft a persona any way they choose so that they could lure "victims" in to try and build a relationship. It is not a surprise that many will choose to use pictures of attractive young people in order to get their victims interested. It is clear that it takes an extremely lonely and insecure person to hide behind the internet. For this reason, while it is certainly inexcusable, I believe showing sympathy for those who catfish is important to getting to the root of the problem. If those people had a higher sense of self worth, they probably would never have resorted to something so low.
As far as avoiding being catfished, you should always meet someone in person before you start to talk to them online, and never meet with someone until you are 100% sure they are real. If they refuse to Skype, and talking on the phone is fairly difficult, you should be wary of a catfish. All of this is fairly obvious, but in a generation so wrapped up in social media, it can be all too easy to trust everything you read.