Why Do Men Follow Instagram Models
Why Do Men Follow Instagram Models
Source: Mark Groves Podcast | Dr. Laura McNally (Listen: 1hr, 48 min)
Contributor: Selena Garcia
“It’s not as simple as ‘just be more confident, just get over it, just don’t be jealous.’ This is a real problem for all people, not just women. It’s really affecting people’s relationships very significantly.” – Laura McNally
There's much more to this than the title. So much more. Mark Groves shares that one of the most popular videos he's ever recorded was “Why Do Men Follow Instagram Models?” Having answered phones for the National Suicide Prevention Crisis Lines myself, I can confirm the critical need for this conversation.
Description: "This week I introduce my good friend Dr. Laura McNally who is a psychologist that has been writing on this topic for some years. We discuss the entire life cycle — how children are socialized and shaped by their environments, how this impacts young adults and their ideas about beauty and sex, how sexual arousal changes the way we think and how monitoring our body image shifts our cognitive function. Why is it that sex and porn addiction most often impact men, while body image and eating disorders almost exclusively impact women? It turns out this isn't a coincidence. Importantly, this is not a discussion that aims to tell anyone what they should or shouldn’t do with their Instagram or social media, it is an exploration of the research that will hopefully leave you feeling better informed about what works for you.“
Whether you've struggled with this first-hand or not, you'll gain awareness and understanding around your relationships, including potential cycles you may have fallen into that have you subconsciously "upgrading" your relationships. If you are a parent raising a young adult on social media, this is also for you. Knowledge is power.
“It's an important conversation. A lot of the way that we're harmed as women or men, happen in relationship to other people. And the way we heal it is in relationship to other people.” - Laura McNally
(13:49) LAURA: "Often when women want to raise the conversation of what's going on with men following Instagram models, and why is there this explosion of Instagram modeling in and of itself, there's often this immediate kick-back of women who raise these questions of 'well, you're just jealous. You're jealous, you're insecure, and if you were confident in yourself, you wouldn't even ask this question cause if you loved your body, you wouldn't care if there were Instagram models.’ And again, I think that's another way that we over-simplify, and we don't give credit that people are way more complex than just jealous, or just insecure… It's not that simple."
(15:42): MARK: "It really just dismisses and puts it back on the other person. How do we have this conversation in a way that we're not just dismissing the other person's side and really getting curious?
(1:11:45) LAURA: "When we go down this pass, we can think well you know it's all in men's favor it's all set up to help men, and it's all set up to position women as lesser, and in some regards that's true, but I also think we can get stuck in not understanding that no one wins. Men lose too."
(1:37:26) MARK: "Men in those scenario's don't even know, they don't realize how much it's getting in the way of intimacy and how much it's actually in a way giving them small hits or large hits of dopamine that allow them to not have to sit in negative feelings, or sit in the fact that their partner's upset with them because they're doing this thing that they don't agree with or is impacting their partner. And as you said, this also has a negative impact on men, and I think for us as men, to be able to turn towards the shame we're likely going to feel when this is brought up and to say 'ok, well why do I do that? Why am I willing to double-tap this picture at the cost of my relationship?"
(1:43:41) LAURA: "It's an important conversation. A lot of the way that we're harmed as women or men––the way we feel judged, the way we feel mistreated, all of those things happen in relation to other people. And the way we heal it is in relationship to other people. If we're having this challenge right now in our relationship, this is the opportunity to heal it, is in this space. Your relationship can be the container that holds all of these things. It's not that we have to throw the whole thing away. The relationship can grow and expand to hold the way you've been hurt by this, and the way your partner's been hurt by this, and we can come together and heal. There can be space for both of these things."
LISTEN TO THE FULL PODCAST, HERE. (1hr, 48min)
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