Since how we all affect each other by the kind of feelings we display, it behooves us to imagine someone is always watching us, and to act with that cool impartial observer’s likely reactions in mind. Smith thought we develop in our minds the image of a constant observer who embodies our ideal (presumably modeled on the sort of person society most praises — the privileged person with all the manners of polite society). Imagining this person’s judgment keeps our behavior in line. Now, of course, we can dispense with the imaginary observer and subject our behavior to an actual chorus of judges through social media. We can also dispense with the arduous process that such imagining imposes on us, of actually putting ourselves in another’s shoes. In that sense, social media denatures sympathy, makes it less a moral encounter and more a convenient consumerist experience.