3 Causes of Identity

1. Sincerity - sincerity to commit to a certain role you have in a group, typically in the family, military, religion. Sincerity demands commitment to roles. The outside is real, and the inside must back it up honestly, otherwise it is considered a dishonest fake.
2. Authenticity - under these socially constructed roles there is a true self you discover/create. In other words: through the removal of the social mask you will find your true self. Committing to the (traditional) roles society has imposed on you is seen as bad, you shouldn't be conforming to these roles. By not conforming to societal roles you discover or create (which is contradictory) your true authentic self. Authenticity implies originality, uniqueness, creativity. The leading ideology of the west, individualism, is grounded in this identity model.

Authenticty demands the pursuit of originality. The inside is real, and the outside must be an accurate representation of it, otherwise it is considered a hypocritical facade. 3. Profilicity (profile) - pre-dating modernity, represented through the aesthetics of the "picturesque". You observe something, and measure it by how it compares to what's already depicted by others, through paintings, photographs, etc. The reversal of traditional identity → you build up an identity by building up a profile that is an image of ourselves, as it is seen by others. We build up an identity by seeing how much we are capable of living up to that profile.

Profilicity demands the curation of profiles. The outside is real, and the inside must be truly invested in it, otherwise it is considered a deceptive fraud.

"We look at the present through a rear view mirror. We march backwards into the future" -McLuhan

What we love/care about is influenced by the identity technologies we use:

Sincerity → family/religion Authenticity → soulmate/

Profilicity → profile based relationships

Sources of anxiety

Sincerity → not living up to social roles (family)

Authenticity → not living up to your "true self"

Profilicity → not living up to the profiles you put out to represent you

First-order observation → observation as you see directly (through your own eyes)

Second-order observation → observation through someone or something else / mimetic observation. e.g. comments, likes, ranking, ratings, popularity. You construct your observations based on what others observe. We judge what we see in terms of what values others have prescribed to it. We not only observe the world through these terms, we also observe ourselves through these terms. We produce ourselves with regard to second-order observations.

Who are our models?

With sincerity & authenticity we develop our identity through feedback from our real life peers. Under conditions of profilicity this changes, our peers are usually people who we don't know, they are abstract profiles that interact with our abstract profiles. Our identity is not judged by who we really are, but purely by how we represent ourselves through our profiles. There are no particular individuals that validate our identity under profilicity, our validation is determined through abstract metrics such as likes and comments. The validation comes from the general, impersonal, peer.

Social validation feedback loops