Authenticity: when truth becomes a brand and identity a commodity

Source: Authenticity as a commodity: when the self becomes a brand

"Within contemporary consumer culture we take it for granted that authenticity, like anything else, can be branded… the individual is a flexible commodity that can be packaged, made, and remade—a commodity that gains value through self-empowerment."

Sarah Banet-Weiser, Authentic™: The Politics of Ambivalence in a Brand Culture (2012); AI-generated cartoon

Explanation: The paradox of self-branding: why "being real" became a performance

Banet-Weiser, a media scholar (now a dean at USC), makes a radical claim: in the neoliberal era, authenticity has stopped being an inner quality of "truth" and has become a marketing strategy. When we post a "real story" without makeup or share a vulnerability, we aren't just expressing an emotion—we are engaging in an act of "self-branding." We build our value as a commodity in the job market and in society by proving that we are "real." The paradox she describes is that the moment authenticity becomes a brand, it requires management, planning, and labor—and therefore, by definition, turns into a performance rather than the natural thing it is supposed to be.

Perspective: The double lie: everyone is looking for authenticity, no one knows what it is

The irony of the twenty-first century is that everyone is striving to be "authentic," but no one knows what that means anymore. Instagram is full of candid photos taken after twenty attempts. Influencers sell us "authenticity" as a product: "Just be yourself!" they say, while staging every frame and composition. This isn't just a marketing cliché—it's an entire culture built on a double lie: we lie to ourselves that we aren't lying. The question is whether authenticity even exists. Can one really be original and unique, given that being original and unique must happen within a society that watches, applauds, or scoffs? Every authentic person wants to be imitated, and in turn, imitates others. Maybe we should just give up and accept that all the world's a stage, and we are merely players.

Going Deeper: Identity paralysis: the psychological toll of authenticity culture

A study published in Social Media + Society (2019) showed that youth exposed to the culture of "authenticity" on Instagram reported higher levels of depression and social anxiety than previous generations; authenticity becomes strange, loud, tasteless, and often dangerous. The reason: they experience the paradox of choice—every decision, every post, every photo is an identity choice. They have no "default identity" to fall back on. In social psychology, this is called "identity paralysis."

Culture: Inventing Anna: when creating an identity becomes fraud—or success

The series Inventing Anna (2022)

Anna Sorokin arrives in New York as a penniless Russian-German immigrant and crafts an entire identity as a wealthy heiress and social media icon. She believes in the persona she created so deeply that she convinces banks, hotels, and high society to believe in her too. Sorokin's life story was turned into a television series. The question the show raises is unsettling: Was Anna a con artist, or was she simply "inventing herself" in the most neoliberal way possible? She didn't "find herself"—she created who she wanted to be, and acted out that identity with absolute consistency. In an era where everyone is "selling themselves," Anna just went all the way. The line between "self-marketing" and fraud turned out to be terrifyingly thin. Anna served a relatively short prison sentence, and from the royalties she received for the series, books, and interviews, she seems to be living quite well.