I know that we have not finished
the film “Catfish,” yet, but as someone who watches the television show
religiously, I felt that I could make some speculations about the show. If you
do not wish to be spoiled on what the term “Catfish” means, then I would not
read any further. This is not a spoiler for the movie, though.
I first heard about Catfish through
social media, of course. I thought that it seemed like a very interesting show,
and it definitely has been. One very common moral dilemma that I have seen in
the television shows is someone lying about their appearance to entice someone
to begin conversing with the person. This, of course, is extremely wrong no
matter what the situation is, but a common theme I have found in the show is
this: Quite often if the person is a girl and is lying about her appearance, she
is also overweight. I have noticed this time and time again in the shows. Does
this excuse her lying about her appearance? NO. Does this make what she did
right? NO. But I feel like this does pose a really tough question: Why do
people lie about saying that looks, “don’t matter,” and then get extremely
angry when the girl in question turns out to be overweight. I feel like both
people in this situation are doing something that is morally wrong. In this
case the Catfish is lying about her looks, but the guy (in this situation) is
lying about his true feelings and preferences about a woman.
This also brings up another thing I
find really disturbing. Why do so many
girls feel the need to lie about their appearance so that someone will talk to
them? Like I said above, it is not right to lie about your appearance so that
someone will talk to you; however, would this girl have to lie if it weren’t for
the lack of female body positivity in our society? I just think it’s so
upsetting that a girl feels the need to lie JUST to have a friend/boyfriend
online, and it’s just really messed up that a guy’s biggest fear is fat when a
girl’s biggest fear is being completely ignored because of her weight.
I do agree that catfishing is a double-edge sword as far as the morality of it goes. I think that your view toward the subject is a bit linear though, because catfishing is not gender specific. Your question, "why do so many girls feel the need to lie about their appearance so that someone will talk to them?" can be posed to ask the same thing about boys.
ReplyDeleteI think catfishing is just a sort of new phenomenon that occurred as we progressed (and continue to progress) in this technology age where people can hide behind a monitor and essentially be whoever they want to be. Reasons for this are obviously different from person to person-- maybe someone is lonely and wants to make a friend, or curious to see if they can impress others, or have low self-esteem and need an outlet online, etc. Either way though, it's definitely morally incorrect to trick others into believing you're something you're not.
To answer your question of "Why do people lie about saying that looks, “don’t matter,” and then get extremely angry when the girl in question turns out to be overweight," I would assume that the anger stems from being lied to and as a result destroys any trust of that person (if a person lies about that, who knows what else they're hiding?). As we saw in the movie Catfish so far, when the Nev found out something was fishy, he found singing clips on YouTube that the Megan stole and passed off as her own, and also found out that Abby didn't actually purchase the building for her gallery. He seemed visibly upset about this even without meeting the family, because he had been talking to the family for months about his personal life while they could have been lying the entire time. I'm interested in seeing how it ends up on Monday.
i agree with and ts is extremely that people that would go to that extreme height just to have an oppotunity to speak to an individual who perhap dont could have any interest them. Its also sad that people would lie about their appearance to please people or to have that sense of satisfaction of being accepted.
ReplyDeleteI feel like the first thing men are drawn to is a woman's appearance, which isn't necessarily their fault. They have nothing else to go on, but at the same time men do the same thing. Women are not the only ones who change their appearance on the show, and I remember one episode where the "woman" was actually a gay man. Everyone in society seems to have this stigma about what they should look like, but if someone truly cares for you, it shouldn't matter. That's a hard philosophy to go by when you meet someone online. You can't go off of someone's personality when you don't even know them. You literally may have no interest until you see their profile picture.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mark, cat fishing is not gender specific. Just because the movie focused on a female does not mean every case is the same. People will always want to be loved. It's part of Maslow's hierarchy of needs and I completely agree with it. People just want to be loved. For some, they are in unfortunate positions where they can not find love. For the sad woman in catfish, her way for love was to find it online and make an alter ego. Someone more attractive and personable than herself.
ReplyDeleteAfter talking to Dr. Johnson, i realized that no one on social media is real. Social media is just what the person behind the screen wants you to see. We don't post pictures of the embarrassing personal things that we encounter in life. Instead, we take selfies and put a ton of filters on to make us look good. THATS NOT US THOUGH. My conclusion is that everyone Catfishes in a sense.