The New Instagram: Casual Posting
Written by Trinity Duong
Recently there has been a surge of creators and social media users reverting back to the early days of Instagram through the act of casual posting and messy grids. Many users yearn for the freedoms that Instagram circa 2012 provided as the rise of the app had taken on a beta form that did not have a standard during this timeline. Many would simply capture and upload photographs and videos onto their profile without a second thought or even post images that were not their own, for example, memes derived from the internet. Our selfies did not need to be retouched or refined because the quality and level of posting back then gave us the simple pleasures and liberties of being our authentic selves.
Moving into 2021 everything has changed. Every photo has become filtered, photoshopped, and curated so their profile grid can impress all that pass by it. Instagram is unrecognisable. The once-revolutionary photo-sharing app has become a platform that expresses the only perfect parts of our lives. It is now a place to boast, a place to grow your small business and a place that is so far from its initial development. But this isn’t always a bad thing as long as we are remaining true to ourselves however this is really difficult with our current societal standards.
It seems though that we are going backward. With the rise of Generation Z trends, they begin to disrupt societal culture and reject the normalities that so many have adapted to now. They have begun “casual posting” on Instagram. By utilizing TikTok, they have spread the message around about the refreshing freedoms of diminishing curated feeds.
So how do we casual post?
It refers to posting on a whim. By refusing to fall into the social media pressures that trap our minds and bodies into a cookie-cutter shadow. You simply post whatever you want without over filtering or over perfecting your images and videos. You post what you perceive to be cool without the lurking thoughts of what other people will think of you, you have no need to impress anyone or fit a polished look or formula. A simple tip to posting casually is to start over. Deleting all your content that consumed an ideology of following the “norm” will give you the privilege of having a clean slate and no longer looking at yourself through the lens of others. Instagram should be fun and about sharing memories with the people you love. When you begin over caring about how many likes, comments, or reactions you could receive and begin loving the feeling of just a few friends appreciating your content you move away from a chaotic way of thinking. When you curate a feed you are not showing many angles to yourself. A lot of people have learned that being authentic and having a following because of their personality rather than their perfected content will garner them a platform as well as a clear individualistic mindset.
However, this isn’t to say that curated feeds can’t encapsulate your personality. If you truly feel that this is who you are and that you aren’t pretending to be constantly perfect you unlock a certain level of casual posting. Because you produce content that is self-aware and true in nature the over-editing can be excused and even appreciated.
Personality is undeniably what people are looking for on social media these days. It is incredibly difficult to find raw, and genuine authenticity, and once people do they will latch onto it because you provide what not many do.
There has been a sense of content overload on social media that many users have become aware of. There’s no longer an exclusiveness to curation because everyone has begun to understand the process of getting the “perfect” post. Becoming the outcast of all curated feeds will make you realize that you’re not the outcast at all. There is a real backlash happening against influencer culture and the feeds that boast luxury and glamour are no longer the rage. With all that is happening in the political, societal, and economic world no one can be bothered to take a perfect picture let alone admire a perfect picture.
