But the more aware I become of the scaffolding beneath the facade, the more disoriented I feel.
Jenn im nordstrom how to#
Watching someone else live their life is easier than living my own, and it gives me ideas on how to optimize my existence. People record themselves grocery shopping and brushing their teeth, but aesthetically, with soothing background music and voice-overs of the influencer’s thoughts. Lifestyle vlogs romanticize the most mundane parts of daily existence in a way that can feel nonsensical to the uninitiated. Read: The influencer industry is having an existential crisis Like, it should be in addition to your life, not a replacement.” I sat there watching her talk about parasocial relationships while absorbing the irony of being in one with her. “ This relationship does not replace existing friendships, existing relationships,” she emphasizes.
She’s pro–parasocial relationships, she explains to the camera, but only if we remain aware that we’re in one. Jenn is dressed to the nines in her California kitchen, wearing a pair of diamond knocker earrings from 8 Other Reasons she fluidly carries out an Estée Lauder ad in a Parachute robe before the first two minutes are over. I first noticed Jenn’s social-media critiques in a video Q&A, where she discussed parasocial relationships. “This is how I pay my bills this is how I support my family,” she said. “And, you know, I do play a role in this.” Jenn makes money through aspirational advertising, after all-a familiar part of any influencer’s job. Social-media platforms are “preying on your insecurities they’re preying on your temptations,” Jenn explained to me in an interview that shifted our parasocial connection, at least for an hour, to a mere relationship. (Her other book recommendations included Stolen Focus, by Johann Hari, and Recapture the Rapture, by Jamie Wheal.) She recently spoke about disengaging from it for her well-being she also posted an Instagram Story about the risks of ChatGPT and, in none other than a YouTube video, recommended Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death, a seminal piece of media critique from 1985 that denounces television’s reduction of life to entertainment. Jenn, however, has complicated things by adding an unexpected topic to her repertoire: the dangers of social media. Her videos have become a salve for my brain, allowing me to relax by watching someone else’s productive, aesthetic life. I discovered her in a vlog titled “Meet My Boyfriend” and have, along with more than 3 million other subscribers, kept up with what she eats in a day and her monthly beauty favorites ever since. My longest parasocial relationship, with a popular beauty influencer named Jenn Im, is going eight years strong.
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