My Life Should Look Better on Facebook

Alexus Rozelle & Marissa Cuccaro

English 121

11 September 2018

My Life Should Look Better On Facebook

Many people in the world feel as if though they are not as happy as they want to be with themselves or their lives. They are always wanting more, or to be as happy as everyone else seems to be. In The Defining Decade, specifically “My Life Should Look Better on Facebook,” Meg Jay uses the Toulmin Structure to create an argumentative chapter which uses claim, warrant, facts, backing, and qualifiers connected to a rebuttal, to convince the reader of her claim.

The biggest argument in this chapter would be living our own lives, and making ourselves happy. Jay argues to not always go with the new trends to what everyone else is doing. Do not live like someone else because they might seem happier. The chapter  quotes “If we only wanted to be happy, it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is almost as difficult, since we think them happier than they are.” (Jay 41). Many people may seem happy on the outside when they may have the most sadness on the inside. We should live our lives to the fullest and in our own way.

Scrolling through Facebook, seeing friends and others’ lives more fascinating and successful can really take a toll on a person. Jay’s example of a warrant is how her clients compare themselves to others via Facebook, which is a very unhealthy way to cope with the way their lives turned out to be. “But look at Facebook! These are supposed to be my glory days!” (Jay 44). In this chapter, Jay mentions how most of the time when others post on their timeline, its only when they’ve experienced or been apart of something worth sharing the world how delightful their lives. The author though argues the fact that these so-called advantageous posts online are ways for people to disguise the negativity within their everyday movement.