Micro Trends: The Death of Individuality and Mother Earth

Micro trends can be defined as short-lived fashion crazes that suddenly become popular across the internet, only to die out in a few weeks time. More traditional trend cycles typically follow a seasonal timeline, shifting depending on what time a year it is. For Summer, tankinis might be “in” (as if), or for Winter, Burberry scarfs could become a sudden “must have.” However, micro-trends operate extremely differently, shifting on an almost weekly basis. 

Social media, whether we want to admit it or not, influences all of us. The videos, pictures, and content we consume, can so easily, subconsciously change what we believe and desire. When a young girl sees a video on her feed of a beautiful woman, one she would like to resemble, claiming that, “Mini-skirts are SO in for January,” she is going to want to purchase one, only to hate it in a week when it’s not in style anymore. To follow micro-trends is to conform. The constant pressure young individuals on the internet face to participate in such short-lived fads harms their personal self expression, as they feel a need to be in on what is popular, no matter how quickly that popularity might die out. 

Micro-trends not only cause identity crises, but also devastate our Earth’s environment in catastrophic ways. Micro-trends support an industry known as fast fashion. Fast fashion, defined by Britannica, refers to, “Rapid production of inexpensive, low-quality clothing that often mimics popular styles of fashion labels, big-name brands, and independent designers.” This type of production allows companies to rapidly produce clothing that is currently trending across social media. Because micro-trends begin and end so suddenly, the products people need to keep up with such fads are made cheaply, without much care for quality. Naturally, this method of production has environmental consequences due to how suddenly trend cycles change. After a fad or craze dies, as is the way of internet trends, clothes purchased when the trend was at its peak popularity, are often thrown away. The way these clothing items are made using cheap material, which when then thrown away irresponsibly, pollute the environment with toxic plastics and cut-rate materials. Micro-trends are not some innocent way of the internet, but rather a phenomenon that has real horrific effects on both vulnerable individuals online and our environment.