In recent decades, with the dizzying speed of technological advancement and the growth of communication tools, people’s lives and their social relations have inevitably come under the influence of media. Social media platforms—especially image-based ones like Instagram, which entered the scene promising to eliminate distances—have, in practice, turned into the main stage for displaying social inequalities. Through the constant sharing of images of happiness, luxury, and affluent lifestyles, social media vividly lays bare these disparities. With a simple swipe, any user can peek into the luxurious home of someone at the top of the social ladder. This visibility of inequality means that poverty is no longer just “the feeling of lacking,” but rather “the feeling of being seen lacking” in the face of the constant performance of having.

In this visual world, wealth is not only visible but becomes a personal virtue and marker of merit. Conversely, not having is seen as a personal failure—a sign of insufficient effort.

This article explores this phenomenon from a sociological perspective and shows how “performing luxury” has become a tool for reproducing inequality, intensifying individual anxiety, and eroding social cohesion.

Performing the Ideal Self

Canadian sociologist Erving Goffman likens social life to a grand theater. In his view, we are all constantly engaged in impression management, performing roles we want others to see. Goffman distinguishes between “front stage” and “back stage.” The front stage is where we present our best version—polished, successful, flawless. The back stage is our private space—the place of fatigue, anxiety, failure, and the unpleasant realities of life.

Social media platforms provide the perfect setting for this curated self-representation. In these spaces, the backstage is almost entirely erased. We only encounter others’ flawless front stage: constant smiles, luxury trips, perfect homes, and unending success.

The result of this one-sided performance is a deeply unequal comparison. People compare their real, backstage lives—full of challenges—to others’ edited, front-stage presentations. This process plants the seeds of inadequacy and failure in their sense of self.

Conspicuous Consumption and Envious Competition

What is deemed “worthy of display” is defined by socially accepted values. Thorstein Veblen, economist and sociologist, in his book The Theory of the Leisure Class, introduced the concept of conspicuous consumption.

According to Veblen, in modern societies where class boundaries are blurred, individuals must demonstrate that they possess more than average wealth in order to prove their merit and gain social status—and this must be done by openly displaying that wealth.

Today, this performance is no longer exclusive to the leisure class; it has become a widespread social norm. In this context, members of every social layer strive to imitate the lifestyle, fashion, and grooming of the upper classes, attempting to recreate, even in miniature, an upper-class lifestyle. Lacking the honor and respect reserved for elite groups, they at least try to appear in alignment with accepted norms. Thus, conspicuous consumption gradually becomes embedded in everyday life.

Veblen also coined the term invidious comparison—a process where people continually compare themselves to others in order to feel satisfied. Social media has turned this into a constant phenomenon. The competition never ends and leads to chronic dissatisfaction—a feeling that does not necessarily stem from real poverty, but from repeated exposure to seemingly better lives.

This psychological pressure affects everyone. The upper classes must continually upgrade their displays of wealth (new cars, exotic vacations) to maintain their prestige. In lower classes, this pressure manifests in superficial imitation—buying expensive goods on installment or using counterfeit brands.

Distinction Through Taste

French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu argues that social competition is not only about economic capital (wealth) but also about cultural capital (taste). Bourdieu sees taste not as an innate trait but as a socially learned category and a primary tool of class distinction. He introduced the concept of habitus—an internalized structure of dispositions and preferences formed through one’s social position and life experiences. Habitus determines what is considered classy, beautiful, or desirable. On social media, the competition over taste intensifies. The upper classes do not merely display wealth—they display legitimate taste.

Others, in seeking status, try to imitate this taste. On the surface, this appears as mimicry of lifestyle, but beneath it lies the reproduction of class dominance at a cultural level. The wealthy possess not only material wealth but also the authority to define legitimate taste—and social media algorithms amplify this taste.

Thus, consumption (e.g., using a specific phone or clothing brand) becomes a tool for distinction and positioning in the social hierarchy.

Anthony Giddens’ Perspective

British sociologist Anthony Giddens, in his theory of modernity and self-identity, explores the psychological dimensions of this phenomenon. He argues that in the modern world, identity is no longer predetermined; each individual must actively construct and continually reconstruct their identity.

This constant identity project is inherently anxiety-inducing, as individuals need ongoing external validation to feel secure in their self-worth. In this context, social media becomes the main tool for measuring personal value. Likes, followers, and comments become the external signs of approval, respect, and validation.

Consumer capitalism feeds off this anxiety. Media and brands construct images of the ideal life and encourage us to buy and consume more to approximate that image and earn more validation. The result is an endless cycle of comparison, consumption, and seeking approval—one that drains the psyche and ties inequality to identity itself.

Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann’s “Spiral of Silence”

In such a landscape, Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann’s Spiral of Silence theory helps explain the function of social media. The theory posits that people are generally reluctant to express opinions they believe to be in the minority.

When the dominant discourse on social media revolves around displays of happiness, success, and wealth, sharing experiences of poverty, failure, or suffering becomes taboo and socially undesirable. As a result, painful narratives are rarely heard, and those who experience failure remain silent. The wider this silence spreads, the stronger the false impression becomes that “everyone is happy, and I alone am left behind.”

Here, algorithms play the role of directors. By boosting popular luxury content and hiding undesirable narratives, they intensify the spiral of silence and serve as tools for reinforcing the dominant discourse—individual happiness in an unequal society.

Social media platforms are not merely mirrors reflecting existing inequalities; they actively redefine social values. In this process, wealth and luxury are elevated from class markers to symbols of personal merit and moral virtue.

The most dangerous outcome of this shift is the transformation of systemic inequality into personal failure. In a world where the performance of success is the dominant narrative, those who lack are not only economically behind but also feel existentially insufficient—and they begin to hide their own stories of hardship and deprivation.

Consequently, society becomes a collection of isolated individuals who, rather than building solidarity to change structural conditions, are caught in an endless race for virtual validation by mimicking the tastes of the elite.

Thus, the challenge ahead is not merely a matter of “media literacy” to distinguish reality from performance—it is a much deeper crisis of meaning and value. To move beyond this condition, we must, as a society, find the courage to question the performance of virtue and redefine concepts like success, happiness, and a worthy life in more humane and just terms—before digital media devours the last remnants of our social cohesion.