The Algorithm Wears No Clothes

The other day one of my girlfriends who is about twenty years older than me called in full panic mode. “Penni,” she said, “my Facebook is full of naked men. What on earth happened to it?”

I nearly spit out my coffee. Then I explained gently, “Sweetheart, Facebook didn’t suddenly turn into a nudist colony. Your algorithm just thinks that’s what you want.”

Silence. Then, “My what?”

Ah yes, the mysterious algorithm. Our invisible stylist, curating our digital wardrobes, playlists, and apparently, shirtless men. It listens, it learns, it lurks. Every click, every search, every pause is like whispering, more of this please.

And just like that, what we see online isn’t the world. It’s a reflection of us.

Our curiosity, our cravings, our conversations all stitched into a perfectly tailored feed.

So maybe the real question isn’t why Facebook shows what it does.

Maybe it’s what are we showing it?Because in the end, the algorithm isn’t judging us.

It’s just holding up a mirror, one we built ourselves.

Because in the end, the algorithm doesn’t define us.

It simply reflects the stories we choose to tell it.

So maybe the real question is this: what story are you feeding it today?