For some reason, I filmed the entire speech in Instagram story-length clips. After, as pundits debated the implications of Macron’s words, I looked down at my lap. What had compelled me to capture his every word?
Truth is, I probably filmed Macron because I’ve developed a strange compulsion to share anything I come across that means anything to me. This probably started around the 10k follower mark, although perhaps it could be more responsibly traced back to a childhood urge to be heard around the dinner table. My need to share can range from political commentary to a new outfit, to a painting I saw or to a nice hotel at which I feel privileged to be lodged. Privileged. The word felt weightier than usual once the specifics of our confinement were made clear by the President: we had 24 hours to choose our place of indefinite confinement. If we wanted to go someplace else, the time was now.
Normally I can brush this specific form of guilt aside. When it comes to social media, that fear of looking like a smug, self-satisfied show-off can be easily justified with a flippant “Instagram is all about beauty and voyeurism isn’t it?” Surely the whole point of fashion’s favourite app – and the fashion industry itself, for that matter – is to inspire and be inspired, by everything that comes your way?
But now the dreaded guilt-rock was firmly in my tummy. How might one justify scenes of ostensible enjoyment placed within a square and brightened with a filter when so many others have been chased back into lonely studios and basement flats with no end in sight? How might one inspire others through personal experience when the injustices of the human experience have just been so violently magnified?
I considered pressing pause on my Instagram account entirely. I had first joined the platform in 2011 while working as an editorial assistant at a fashion brand. For its first three-or-so years of existence, my account was mainly geared towards people I actually knew offline – a more aesthetically pleasing version of Facebook, if you will. When I went freelance, in 2016, and launched my podcast Fashion: No Filter, I began weighing up the potential value of an outward-facing account. I had some experience in the matter, having created social media content for companies I’d worked for, and knew the benefits arguably outweighed the loss of privacy. A year later, my follower count rose steadily thanks to the internet’s insatiable urge for a fashion-girl selfie and, I hoped, a witty caption or two. Brands began to request collaborations. Someone suggested I get an agent. People began referring to me as “an influencer”, which is by definition a status elected by a jury of one’s online peers. So I was one.
Grateful as I still felt for the recognition, maybe now, four years later, it was time for a break. Surely, my curated choices had no place amidst daily realities of unbearable claustrophobia, or supermarkets cleaned out by hoarders. But then, even in old photos of her wartime WRENs uniform, Gran had been the picture of elegance. “Those gorgeous stockings always cheered us up when there was nothing but bad news,” she once recalled. Could I provide my followers with the same cheer?
It was sunny the next morning and I went for a (several-metres-apart) walk up a Savoyard mountain with my husband – handwritten justifications for venturing out of the house in pocket, as per the French government’s new rules (supermarkets, pharmacies and brief bouts of outdoor exercise were permitted, albeit only with signed and dated attestations) – and felt the sheer, unabated elation of freedom in nature. A sort of Kantian sublime. I may have even meditated, though this remains unconfirmed.
Spirits lifted by my hour of self-discovery, I was moved to post a photo of myself in a meditative stance, with mountains in the background. In the caption I wondered aloud, Carrie Bradshaw-style, whether this seclusion might be an opportunity for us all to find our inner zen. Silver linings, I thought, positive thinking.
People liked the image, but it performed below average. Then came the messages, calling me a “spoilt brat, happy to rub it in others’ faces”. One person accused me of fleeing my adoptive and beloved France for my native Canada (I had not). Others quipped sarcastically that I clearly did not have children (I don’t). But I also wasn’t trapped in a 20-square metre apartment watching some chick brag about hiking in the sun. I felt genuinely ashamed. My husband, whose general attitude towards Instagram is an elusive blend of passive interest and blasé Parisian scepticism, told me I should consider locking my phone in a drawer for the duration of the quarantine.
The next day I noticed my pilates teacher, Julie Pujols Benoit, was giving a free live class at 6pm. Aha! Endorphins we could all access. I posted a very basic photo of myself in a pilates pose (same mountain as the day before in the background), and invited everyone to join. Lots of likes. Great engagement. I felt vaguely less like a moron. Over 600 people were present in the live class that evening – Julie is something of an Instagram fitness guru – and she promised to give more live classes from her apartment as the quarantine continued.
Enthused by the exercise, encouraged if still vaguely perplexed by the warmer reception, I called Sophie Fontanel, the French novelist, journalist, influencer, and general fountain of cultural wisdom. It turned out she’d also been grappling with how to communicate with her highly engaged following from her own lockdown situation on the coast of Normandy. “I’m staying with my brother who has severe melancholic tendencies, I couldn’t bear to leave him alone for 45 days,” she told me.
She had worried about appearing to have taken advantage of the situation for a beach vacation. But she was a woman with a plan. “As soon as the order came, I asked myself how my ‘influence’ could be of any service to others. It seemed to me that the best way of making myself useful was to hang onto my sense of humour. I write and publish fables daily on my feed. I show myself rarely, because it doesn’t seem like the priority right now.” I thought of my mountain photo and shuddered a little, but Sophie reassured me. “What feels inappropriate to me is the people who continue to tag their clothing brands as usual. It begs the question: What is influence really? Is it just about items of clothing or is it something bigger than that… something more noble?”
Wondering how my friends across the Channel were handling the situation, I decided to annoy – for the umpteenth time – the journalist Pandora Sykes during her maternity leave. “In all honesty, I think it’s hard to get Instagram right when it comes to a global crisis,” she said. “It’s easy to get on your soapbox, but it can often seem disingenuous if your content is typically escapist. I winced during the Australian bush fires when people wrote captions about how devastated they were – illustrated with a picture of not Australia, but themselves. I understand why: Instagram is individualistic and visual. But inserting your image into a global tragedy can make for uneasy viewing.” I shoved away another mountain flashback. “This,” Pandora continued, “is not the time to post a TBT to your last beach holiday – and it’s certainly not the time for paid partnerships. I think the answer, unsatisfactory as it is, is to post less – and more purposefully. Don’t feel like you have to have the answers just because you have a big following – you’re (likely) not an epidemiologist.”
Next, I texted fashion writer and influencer Camille Charrière, who was in Mexico, where she’d headed for some rest and recovery before things got out of hand. She, too, was having trouble deciphering what was appropriate to post. “We work in luxury. Our industry is about promoting luxury…beautiful, non-essential things, so it’s very hard to position yourself at a time like this,” she wrote. “Of course, entertainment is important. But entertainment and consumerism aren’t the same thing, are they?” Had she seen anyone get it right since the crisis began? “Chiara Ferragni has definitely used her platform for the greater good, raising over three million euros for hospitals, and even calling out Kendall Jenner for posting incorrect facts in an attempt to minimise the crisis.” Here, Charrière noted, we’re reminded how useful social media can be. “This is also where strong leadership comes in,” she added, “and I feel our leaders in Britain aren’t being clear enough. Give us clear facts, face the music!” Perhaps Boris Johnson could learn something from Ferragni too.
Other influential friends confirmed they were just trying to go with the flow. “I’m a dreamer,” said LA-based influencer Tylynn Nguyen, “and a voice inside is telling me to keep posting for the people looking to dream, too, at a scary time like this.” Influencer Guido Milani confirmed he had had the same instinct from his Milan apartment, where he’d been confined for over three weeks. Milani told me his priority was to strike the right balance between entertainment and vital info. He was posting cool outfits, guitar practice, French lessons, solo dance videos, and a sprinkling of news. “I’ve chosen to spread positivity insofar as I can, whilst occasionally throwing in news people shouldn’t miss.”
As I began to have separation anxiety from my own digital pals, I decided my next post would continue on the theme of collective self-improvement. “No make-up quarantine, who’s with me?” I captioned a mirror selfie. I suggested to my followers that we’d all have the best skin of our lives when we got out. My nakedness seemed to resonate. “YUP,” wrote one follower, “by the end of this thing we gonna be glowin’!” “Totally with you”, wrote another. Others enthusiastically discussed the benefits of their favourite lip balms, face creams, hair masks and sunscreens. This was more engagement than I could count on in normal times. I decided not to delete my account after all.
On day four, the news heralded economic disaster. I called Rosh Mahtani, the founder of Alighieri Jewellery, to hear her plan. “This week we were meant to launch new pieces but it felt wrong and insensitive to push product,” Mahtani explained. “At first, I wished I could use my business to make protective clothing or masks, but we’re a jewellery brand, and it occurred to me that all we can really do right now is make people feel like they’re not alone.” Mahtani decided to donate 20% of all her e-commerce orders, (still healthy, despite the crisis) to a network of food banks. She’s also converted her Instagram account into a sharing platform for friends of the brand, calling for quotes, poems, or any other handwritten bits of inspiration she might repost. Lou Doillon shared her favourite poetry lines, GQ Style Editor Luke Jefferson chose a comforting quote by Prince. “I’m using creativity as catharsis. Once it’s all over, everyone’s going to post me their letters and I’m going to create a time capsule and bury them. Then I’ll dig it up in five or ten years. We need to remember this moment and learn from it.”
French tailoring designer and founder of Admise Paris, Zoe Leboucher, took a different approach with a similar community-building aim. “I am sharing and reposting information and encouragement about all the other businesses on my road,” said Leboucher, whose brand has its flagship boutique in rue de La Folie Mericourt, in Paris’ 11th arrondissement. “There’s a real village feel in our street and I’m trying to foster that solidarity online as much as possible.”
I thought back to Gran. Despite the other obvious circumstantial differences between her experience and mine, the most clear cut is the instant access to the outside world. We’re all able to gather in a virtual room of our choosing. Loved ones, colleagues, social media followers – wherever, whenever. Perhaps then, it prevails upon us to share our own little contributions to a global, virtual time capsule, that we might dig them up when humanity looks back at this moment. That each of us should contribute our little something intentional, creative, uplifting, to stand the test of time.
No comments:
Post a Comment