WINE CHATS: What kind of social media user are you?

Do you post your every move on social media or are you more of a mindless scroller?

Welcome to Wine Chats Podcast here at our home at The Nightly! This week, we’re celebrating the school holidays by not leaving our day pyjamas, sharing a Wine Not the Brand wine pouch and chatting about the way we use social media.

When you open your eyes in the morning, what’s the first thing you do?

Billi: Let us start with this - all of the world says that if you’re one of those people that before you even say a word to your partner in bed in the morning, you grab your phone and you start scrolling, that’s like the devil. You’re not allowed. You shouldn’t do that. That’s so bad.

Lyndsey: I didn’t know that’s where we’re going. What? Oh my God.

Billi: This is what people say, that it’s like we’re losing this human touch aspect to life because we’re just like not even opening our eyes and saying good morning to the person next to us. We’re straight away on our phones.

Seriously, which one of us does not do that? Surely the first thing you do in the morning - sometimes my eyes are still closed while I’m looking for my phone.

Lyndsey: Same!

Billi: And I don’t know what I’m looking for (on my phone). It’s not like oh, I wonder how many likes I got overnight on Instagram. I mean, sure, there’s a portion of that, but like… look, we’re obviously so addicted.

Lyndsey: I think for me, it’s just to check to see what’s happened in the world while I was sleeping.

Billi: Totally, yes!

Lyndsey: Right?

Billi: Linny, you have never been more eloquent. I don’t know what the school holidays have done to you.

Lyndsey: I have a tracksuit on. Look what happens. The magic.

Billi: Genius, you’re so right.

Lyndsey: I just need to catch up. I need to see what notifications I got, especially being Canadian, to see who’s messaged me through the night because of the time difference. Anything that’s happened on social media from back home.

I always check my bank as well in case somebody magically wants to transfer me. Just to make sure the bills are coming out, I don’t know.

Billi: That’s adorable. I obviously check our social media, check our emails. And then occasionally I might, while I’m scrolling with one hand, reach over to Henry and find his face and be like, oh, hey. I won’t even speak.

I’ll just kind of give him a bit of a scratch to be like, yep, you’re alive. I’m alive. And he’s probably already on his phone scrolling.

So look, if you’re one of those people that was feeling bad about waking up in the morning and the first thing you do is grab your phone, don’t. We’re all doing it. Don’t, worry about those articles.

Don’t be so CRINGE!

Lyndsey: Can I say what you should be mad about? Can I just take over? My biggest vent about social media — people posting. I’m going to offend the people who do this and it’s only just my opinion, obviously, everyone’s a bit different. So don’t come at me…

Billi: Come at her, please.

Lyndsey: I always tend to roll my eyes at the posts of parents and spouses. They post happy birthday messages to their loved ones, not like a normal “happy birthday, baby, love you.”

Those are cute. Those are fine. Whatever.

But the ones that go on about, we’re so lucky to have you. I love you to the moon and back. Thank you for choosing me to be your parent. First of all, science chose you, not the baby. Just have to say that.

Billi: I disagree with that, but that’s okay.

Lyndsey: You do.

Billi: I think that we’re all like spirits floating around until we find the parents that we want and then we swoosh in.

Lyndsey: That’s fine. Don’t post that stuff. I roll my eyes and I know it makes me sound like a cold-hearted, you know what, that’s fine. I just roll my eyes. Do we need to post those posts for the whole world to see? Because I feel like those posts are kind of showing off bragging posts. Just tell your husband that he’s great if you think he’s great.

Billi: I find those posts hilarious. I find them so cheesy. And it’s also because I had a bit of a reality check a few years back, my husband’s not really on social media, he’ll maybe check it once a year.

Anyway, I did, a few years back, bring up the courage to say to him like, hey, I actually posted on your wall for your happy birthday and you didn’t even like it. And he was just like, are you serious? Like you’re right next to me. You can just speak to me, we live in the same house.

That was the moment where I was like, I mean, I knew he was right anyway, but that idea of why do I need to splash this across social media? Who am I doing this for? Because if it’s for the person who I’m saying happy birthday to — he’s literally right next to me. I could just say, Oh babe, happy birthday. I love you. You are the love of my life, the light of my world. I’m so lucky you chose me as your wife.

And then he’s going to be like, are you drunk again? What’s happening? I just feel if you can’t say this sort of stuff to the person, to their face, you really shouldn’t be saying it on social media.

Lyndsey: For sure. I just think it’s too showy. That is not real life, you know what I mean? It’s all to brag or to make it look better. To talk about how great your husband is... who are you saying that to and why?

Billi: I do find that weird. It’s interesting the way people post on social media.

I think since we’ve done Wine Chats, I’ve really only ever posted about Wine Chats stuff, right? So I cannot be bothered being on social media for more than that, to share my entire life. Do you even care what happens in my life? Honestly, it’s all just a messy house and me watching TV.

There’s not a lot for me to share on social media that I think people would be dying to see. You know what I mean? I just find that the stuff that people post is interesting to me. Like, who are you, what for? What are you posting this for?

Lyndsey: For me, what I like to see is just normal everyday stuff. It doesn’t have to be this big, crazy dramatic post. Just everyday stuff. Just post a picture. Just post what you’re doing. I think people do actually want to see that. I think that’s what people enjoy the most.

Posting kids on social media

Billi: I feel weird about posting my kids on social media. I’ve always had this thing since they were babies. I open my social media up to the public. It’s not like a locked-down one.

I had a bad experience once on Twitter where I had posted something and I was trying to be a bit controversial. You know, just trying to get a bit of clout. And then this person had gone onto my profile and started replying back, oh, so you call yourself a mother and this and that, like fully all the stuff that she could find privately about me.

And I was like, okay, I’m no longer a person on Twitter and I’m not trying to get controversial comments. So I stopped that, but then I was like, it’s so easy to find out information about us. If somebody did have some sort of bone to pick with us.

So I kind of stopped posting. It just freaks me out. I don’t know who’s out there. It freaks me out.

Lyndsey: See, and I’ve never worried about posting anything about my kids. Obviously I don’t put my address, but I’ve never put the little flower over their face or over their school shirt crest. Because I figure nowadays if somebody wants to find stuff about you, they’re going to find stuff about you.

Billi: Yeah, but I don’t need to spoon-feed it to them.

Look out, we’re creeping on you

We wrap it up by Billi admitting that she prefers to be the stalk-y type of social media user, the kind that scrolls every day but doesn’t really engage much, which creeped Lyndsey out, rightfully so. We’re just saying that we’re always watching, okay?

Thanks again for joining us this week and we’ll see you out there, on internet land. In the meantime, make sure you tune back in next Friday, here on The Nightly!