Estimacy, Making Public What Is Private

In the reality we live in, what is private is often manifested in the public sphere. Almost without realizing it, we have become voyeurs who spy on the life of others every day, the one that is intentionally posted on social media. Extimacy, understood as the act in which the private becomes public, is completely transforming the way we see the world.

Let’s face it, publishing a thought, our breakfast or the music we’re listening to is always easier. If everyone does it, why don’t we? New technologies have created a common and shared environment where we are all innocent voyeurs and discreet exhibitionists.

Disclosing, sharing or publishing private information is not just a way of making community with those who do it in turn. Making public what is private makes us visible, present within a technological and digital scenario in which often what transpires is that if you don’t appear, you don’t exist.

Estimacy is now a daily reality. So let’s try to understand what this concept consists of, which, however curious it may seem, is not exactly new.

Estimacy, what is it and how does it manifest itself?

The word “esteem” was coined by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. For him, this concept represented a condition in which man is the holder of private areas that acquire meaning only in the external world. The unconscious, for example, is an internal psychic state, which however does not end up expressing itself externally.

French psychiatrist Serge Tisseron borrowed this Lacaian term a few years ago to apply it to the modern world. Today’s estimity is not a condition, it is a mechanism by which new technologies push us to show a part of our private and psychic life to the public and, in particular, in the digital world. Does this mean that we have suddenly become exhibitionists?

Not exactly. In broad terms we are not, because each of us chooses what he wants to show and often what we publish does not even correspond to reality. We are selective, in fact; on average we choose very well what to show, how and when. We are not what we see on social media, we are what we decide others see.

Estimacy, a resource for establishing authentic bonds

We like to watch, it’s true. We are interested in observing the lives of others to discover, see, understand, desire, admire, learn and even envy. Let’s not forget, however, that we also like to get excited. Estimacy is an ideal resource for creating an emotional impact on those who observe us, on those who put their eyes through the peephole of their screens to enter otherness, the world of others.

Big brands, social media gurus and Instagram influencers know that one way to attract followers is to glimpse small moments of private life. When they reveal facts from their lives, the moment they give us access to their carefully selected moments of privacy, they suddenly seem closer to us. Suddenly, we identify with these strangers, feel empathy for them, and can’t wait for them to post something.

However, remember that this characteristic approach of estimacy absolutely does not mean that we are seeing a person for who he is with authenticity and sincerity, rather we see what he wishes to represent.

Sharing the private to make ourselves visible and reinterpret ourselves

The digital scene, social media, the media and everything behind the screen form another reality, parallel to ours. Cell phones, e-mails, chats, messaging programs, social networks… Everything creates a scenario in which we too want to be present and for this we must project ourselves, practice estimity.

Making the private public places us in that alternative world where a new self can be created, where we can be present like almost everyone else. Because not being present in that context is equivalent to not existing, and who more or less wants to be part of this new culture, of this environment that acquires more importance every day.

Estimacy and fixation with immediacy

Nowadays, estimity is characterized by a very particular element: immediacy. “At breakfast with my him”, “Already on the train to go to work”, “Meditation“. When a person unlocks their cell phone, estimity is revealed through what happens here and now. Is the most important thing. What happened yesterday or the day before yesterday is irrelevant. Most of us want to “consume” or see what is happening right now.

The private data that we disclose without knowing it

Most of us post new photos, videos, ideas and thoughts of our own free will. This means making small scraps of the private universe public in a conscious but constantly filtered way. We neglect, however, that there is a hidden esteem.

Electronic devices have a camera and a microphone. The applications we use and the social networks we join have algorithms and bots that record everything we do within these digital worlds. We are observed, listened to and analyzed.

Our privacy is made public due to the inherent danger of a technology aimed at gathering the maximum information about us and then being able to sell it to large companies. The private is not only made public, but becomes a bargaining chip.

We have reached a point where private and public are increasingly amalgamating, and this puts us at risk. Let’s keep this in mind, let’s ask ourselves whether estimity benefits us or harms us and to what extent.