Identity Performance for the Algorithm

The other day I was making a sponsored video.

My sponsor, this month, wanted “lifestyle content” – which I took to mean that they wanted a video of me walking around, going about my day.

In the middle of the video I’d work in a mention of the sponsor and their offer. Later I’d upload the whole thing to YouTube, and (40 days after that) cash my big, fat influencer paycheck.

Except as soon as I started filming, I had doubts. At 6:57 AM, as I clinked a couple of ice cubes into my glass, I thought, “If I add cream to this iced coffee, people are going to lecture me about cholesterol in the comments”.

Half an hour later, standing in front of the butcher at the municipal market, I thought, “What kind of meat is on-brand? Does this entrecote express my unique values and personality?”

In other words, I was barely out of bed, but I was already performing for an audience.

Eventually I made the video, but there was something inauthentic about it. I’m not used to turning my life into “sponsored content” of that sort, and I felt a bit strange about the whole thing.

Social Media and Identity Performance

Social media, generally, has become a venue for identity performance.

Perhaps you value compassion, but you find it hard to practice compassion in real life. So you share a quote about compassion on Instagram, and call it a day.

“Every day”, for example “thousands of squirrels are massacred in our local forests and parks, while governments and corporations do nothing. Those who remain silent are complicit in this squirrelly genocide. Save the squirrels!”

Now your friends – plus a certain number of total strangers – all have a reminder that you value compassion. You know because you’ve been getting likes all morning. And best of all, you haven’t had to do anything.

You’ve gotten the dopamine, but you haven’t saved a single squirrel.

Again: I’m sure the feeling is genuine. But really, do you know any squirrels?

Or is this just the cause du jour – or, as we’re now calling it, The Current Thing?

Also, please note that when I say “I’m sure the feeling is genuine”, what mean is that feelings are necessarily subjective and yours could be total bullshit.

You could genuinely feel it. But maybe the whole thing is based on false information. Maybe you’re listening to people who have an agenda and are working under different incentives.

Maybe you just feel that way about a long list of things, and it has nothing to do with the squirrels.

Maybe, in other words, you were going to get worked up into a tizzy of compassionate self-congratulation anyway, and squirrels just happened to pop up in your feed. You see where I’m going with this.

What is a belief, exactly?

It’s hard to talk about identity performance without talking about beliefs.

But I have a couple of problems with beliefs.

One: beliefs are not actions. In fact, many people “believe” things that they’re otherwise unwilling to take action on. A lot of beliefs don’t even have an obvious action step. So what does it even mean to “believe” them?

And also… if it’s not an action, then what is a belief?

It’s obviously not a fact. If it were a fact, it would just be true, and you wouldn’t have to believe it.

Tomorrow is Wednesday, and sunrise is at 6:45 here in Barcelona.

Is that a belief? Is it a belief if I phrase it as “I believe that the sun will come up at around 6:45”? I don’t really think so. Seems like it’s just a fact – it’ll happen whether or not you believe it.

How about something more opiniony? “I believe that the rich should pay more taxes?” That’s a different proposition. Also, if we’re going to take that statement seriously we first need to define almost every part of it.

Who are the rich? How much more should they pay?

And what, exactly, does “should” mean?

Again, it’s not actionable. Should is a desire, not a fact.

But a lot of people just live their lives in giant puddles of should. They should all over themselves, repeatedly. And in the end nothing changes – because should is largely meaningless. Nothing is easier than sitting around talking about what other people should do.

Still, people act as if their beliefs and “shoulds” were facts, and become offended when anyone questions them.

True beliefs and false beliefs

Perhaps it would be better to just admit that there are true beliefs and false beliefs.

True beliefs help us get things done. I believe that I need to drink water every day. Therefore, I make time for water, and I don’t die. This belief works for me, mostly because it’s true.

But false beliefs do something just as important: they allow us to signal group membership.

Anyone can believe something that’s merely true. But believing something that’s false (or at least very implausible) in public – that lets people know you’re on their team.

Any actual examples of this I give are guaranteed to deeply offend someone. (And some people are just perpetually offended anyway.) So let’s talk about a group that’s well-known for their sense of humor: vegans.

One of the articles of faith for vegans is that humans are natually herbivores. They call this science: our teeth aren’t big enough to take down prey like wolves do, they say, and our intestines are longer than those of carnivores. Therefore, we’re biologically herbivores. The organization PETA has a whole article about this on their website.

Of course, it’s bullshit. But if you go around your college campus telling people that humans are herbivores, you signal (to certain folks) that you’re on the right team.

Elon Musk is a Nazi

Here’s another example.

I don’t know if anyone still cares about this one, but there was a brief period earlier this year (in January 2025, to be exact) in which people were practically leaping onto their social media accounts to answer a question nobody had asked: Is Elon Musk a Nazi?

This seemed a bit odd. It’s quite far-fetched that a major public figure would decide to give a Nazi salute during a press conference – knowing that Nazis are rather unpopular these days. But also, the people making the claim had nothing to do with Doge, nothing to do with Tesla, nothing to do with the US government, and nothing to do with Musk.

But they apparently assumed that it was important to jump on the bandwagon of denouncing ol’ Elon as a Nazi without delay. And a lot of people made clear in their statements that not only was Elon a Nazi, but that anyone defending him was also a Nazi (or at the very least, complicit with them).

My usual response to these things is to wish people would read a history book. But it is an interesting group dynamic. Nazism itself is a collection of beliefs – a pseudo-religion, really – and ways of signalling those beliefs.

Modern wokeism, Conservatism, Marxism, – most “isms”, in fact – can be thought of as elaborate pseudo-religions made up of beliefs and in-group signals. IYKYK.

And most people just take a side, and assume that their team’s beliefs are based on reality while everyone else is just dumb. So it goes. Tribal primates, but with instant global communication.

Viral beatings and algorithmic race riots

In the recent story about the events in Torre Pacheco (three young Moroccans beat up an old Spanish man, some far right hooligans turned out to “hunt” immigrants, etc) the part that most sticks out at me is that the young men who started the whole thing were allegedly doing it for TikTok content.

If performing for the algorithm is getting to the point that it’s starting race riots, I’m a bit worried about what the next few years are going to bring here in Spain – and the West in general.

(Maybe if, instead of blaming immigrants, we deported all the TikTokkers, society as a whole could benefit. But that’s probably even more controversial than whatever Vox has in mind.)

Michael Easter points out that social media is (in theory) a space for discussion. But attaching numbers of likes and reshares to content creates incentives that are wildly different than a simple “search for the truth”.

In other words, if the goal is going viral with your content, the truth probably won’t get you there. Because the truth is often rather boring.

On the other hand, outlandish and extreme opinions – rage bait, as the kids are calling it – has a better chance of making you famous online. And we’re living in a time where money, attention and fame are the only values that aren’t publicly mocked.

This could get weirder. And it probably will.

TikTok Politics

The most recent corruption scandal in the Spanish government (we go through at least three every week, these days) involved 33-year-old Noelia Núñez, who resigned as Member of Parliament and vice-secretary of the Partido Popular after it was discovered that she made up a few college degrees to put on her official CV.

Nothing shocking or new about that.

(Other MPs have quietly been changing their résumés in the days since, removing dubious qualifications.)

What strikes me about her story, though, is that she came up as a TikTokker as well.

With about 180,000 followers there, and a similar number on Instagram, she’s good-looking, charismatic and comfortable making 30-second soundbites. According to El País, this is what launched her career.

Looks like a new generation of politicians is on its way up.

(Núñez got a job on a TV gossip show within hours of leaving politics, so I’m sure she’ll be fine.)

Meanwhile, over in the US, we’ve got Zohran Mamdani, the nepo-baby TikTok influencer, champagne socialist, and probable future mayor of New York city.

The current political climate is probably pushing a lot of smart, reasonable people out of politics. Who wants their every hand-gesture scrutinized as a potential Nazi dog whistle?

Who’s ready for their family to get death threats? Or to be shot at by some lunatic over their campaign promises?

Most sane people would rather stay out of the whole thing.

The only people, in fact, who do want that kind of scrutiny are those whose lives are already dedicated to maximal attention-seeking behaviour. And you’ll find them by the thousands on social media.

Are we ready for a society ruled by TikTok influencers?

I’m not. But I’m worried that we’re going to get one anyway.

The Nancy Pelosis and Alberto Núnez Feijóos of the world aren’t going to be around forever. And the next generation of politicians will probably be more influenced by Mr Beast than by JFK.

Yours,

Daniel AKA Mr Chorizo.

P.S. David Pinsof, over at the blog Everything is Bullshit, has a lot to say about opinions, beliefs and preferences. He’s a philosopher of some sort, and suggests that opinions are really just a status game – we want to force our opinions on others, but can’t actually say so, because we have to pretend that we’re not playing status games. Meanwhile, Rob Kurzban at The Living Fossils points out that people will go to protests and chant “From the River to the Sea” without having the faintest idea of what they’re saying. What river do they mean, and what sea? What is that chant actually calling for? They don’t know, and haven’t even thought about it – they’re just out at the march to be part of the group. That article is called Mostly Mindless Protests and it’s definitely worth a read.

P.P.S. I recently wrote an article called Is Spain Overrated? about the fact that people now get their ideas about life abroad from curated Instagram videos, which are not exactly accurate about the daily grind of getting your bills paid as an expat (or immigrant) far from home. About the grind, I’ve got another article which you might like: My Immigrant Life – two decades in Spain. Enjoy!