When Others Must Confirm My Ego

"In the book The Years, the French writer Annie Ernaux describes a subtle but decisive shift that took shape in the 1990s. Political struggle, once centered on collective responsibility and shared well-being, gradually gave way to a culture of individual rights-rights increasingly framed in terms of consumption and personal recognition. What mattered less was how we lived together, and more how we were seen. As Ernaux puts it, life became oriented toward the demand that "others must confirm this ego"-an ego easily offended."

"The tendency described by Ernaux helps explain a paradox of contemporary life: the more attention we demand, the less attentive we become. Long before social media, Western societies were already moving toward a more individualistic, self-referential way of life. But digital platforms accelerated this development by transforming egoism into something closer to narcissism-not a love of oneself as such, but a fixation on one's image. The self becomes a project to be displayed, curated, and validated."

Political struggle centered on collective responsibility and shared well-being gave way in the 1990s to a culture of individual rights framed by consumption and personal recognition. Life became oriented toward demands that others confirm the ego, redirecting attention from shared reality to self-affirmation. Digital platforms accelerated the inward turn by converting egoism into a fixation on image, making the self a curated project dependent on external validation. Failed validation produces frustration, resentment, and performative moral outrage. As attention is claimed rather than shared, the capacity to truly see others diminishes and moral life thins, with ethical action replaced by identity signaling.

Read at Psychology Today