Ghost Hip wrote:You are a complex human being and your reasons for remaining private are valid, just the same there are real complex human beings on the other end of these accounts who could have any myriad of reasons to be mindful of who they allow follow them. There are many reasons to want a private account. Such as to avoid employers from seeing your memes/content. I don't personally condone jumping to blaming women for complaining about being hit on/propositioned, but wouldn't an account with no face or posts be more suspicious than an account that appears more 'transparent'? (using transparent loosely since we're talking social media) Someone with no face or posts is more difficult to know and hold accountable and some people don't want to take that risk. You can say you are an observer all you want but you're asking people to give you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't a creep, a potential employer, a family member snoopin', or just a bot/spam account.
I didn't really think about the employer/employee dynamic, because that's not a daily concern for me.
Here's some more details that summarize a fairly typical experience:
I'll get recommended an account (design studio for example). On the the page, they'll mention the founder of the company & provide an @rebeccaWarhol, so I'll click the link. My thought process is: This is an interesting company, maybe the founder has an interesting background. I'll click the provided link and send a request.
The founder could have 500 followers. The founder could have 12,000 followers. Whether you have 500 or 12,000 followers, you can't possibly have a close and intimate friendship with that many people. Nor could the argument be solidified that anyone did deep vetting on those 12,000 people.
If someone doesn't want their personal page advertised, perhaps they shouldn't put in in the company's header.
FTR, I don't have a zero post account. I'm not a blank screen, but I'm not putting in hours of my time toward learning the hippest hashtags either, with the goal of harvesting tens of thousands of e-admirers.
For the most part, my time on IG is spent rapidly jumping around through virtual galleries and art streams---archiving inspirational sketches and renderings for film projects. I seldom attempt to engage with strangers, but on the rare occasion that I do, I find most people to be quite forgettable. Also, FTR, I'm not emotionally invested in engaging with strangers. It's a casual, rapidfire indulgence---like speed pitching or something.