ONE Nafisi, describing two photographs of her and her students, conveys that "In the first [photograph] there are seven women...They are, according to the law of the land, dressed in black robes and head scarves, covered except for the oval of their faces and their hands" (Nafisi 418). Nafisi describes the women in the first photograph as those who conform to the regime's strict rules on clothing. This is the first identity that the women posses, their "public" identity they put on to stay safe from the harsh repercussions of breaking dress code in the Islamic Republic.

THREE Multiple situational identities can also be observed in Bell's Hard to Get. Bell, describing Jayanthi's good girl and bad girl personalities, says that "While being a good girl, Jayanthi remained both physically and emotionally removed from men. And while being a bad girl, Jayanthi was physically close to but emotionally distant from men" (Bell 32). Here, Jayanthi's two situational identities are exhibited—the "good girl" and the "bad girl". Jayanthi's "public" identity—the bad girl—is most representative of her true behavior. However she embraced the good girl identity in response to the of anxiety losing her true identity while being in a long-term relationship. Whenever Jaythani employs the good girl identity, she shallowly submits to her traditional parent's offers to arrange a suitable Indian partner for her in order to find stability in the midst of the chaos her Jayanthi's bad girl identity can create. Therefore, the good girl identity helps Jayanthi to perceive a higher level of control in response to the long-term uncertainty of the bad girl identity. Similarly, Nafisi's students embrace their true, "private" identity in response to external restrictions that prevent them from revealing their true identity in public. Both Nafisi's students' and Jayanthi's multiple identities serve to help them better adapt to their present external conditions in order to mitigate potential clashes with external conditions.

ONE As previously mentioned, in Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran, Nafisi describes two pictures of her students. In one picture, all the women are shown in the same traditional clothing, meshing their identities into one. In the other picture, all the women are shown as individuals, wearing whatever they desire. The second picture is supposed to represent the women embracing their own, differentiated identities. However, the identities the women display in the second picture is not as unique as it seems. These "true" identities only exist because of an equal and opposite reaction that originated from avoiding the external identity imposed on them by the regime (as depicted in the first picture). Since the trait of not conforming to the external identity of the regime defines the common basis of their "true" identities, their true identities would lose meaning if the external identity was never present to begin with. Therefore, external forces still restrict the women, even if they perceive some level of freedom by creating multiple identities to preserve their "true" identity.

ONE Foer, arguing that Facebook is not the democratic platform it paints itself to be, states that "Facebook is always surveilling users, always auditing them, using them as lab rats in its behavioral experiments" (Foer 57). Foer affirms that Facebook is more representative of an authoritarian government than it is a democratic platform where one has the freedom to express their true selves. Facebook surveils their users, uses their personal data in behavioral marketing experiments, and filters the information that its users see. This reality shows that the amount of freedom that Facebook users percieve does not neatly correlate to the amount of freedom they actually have, thus making complete freedom impossible to attain since external forces that are invisible to the users control them.

TWO Foer continues by adding that "While it [Facebook] creates the impression that it offers choice, Facebook paternalistically nudges users in the direction it deems best for them, which also happens to be the direction that thoroughly addicts them" (Foer 57). Here, it is confirmed that Facebook's algorithms filter the content a user sees in an attempt to give them content that relates to what they are interested in. While this may sound good on paper, it enables Facebook to have a stranglehold on the direction one's identity takes. If Facebook keeps pushing astrology advertisements and content to users who are hooked on astrology, Facebook becomes largely responsible for the development of those user's identities since it creates an echo chamber where mainly astrology-related content is fed to the user, indirectly "forcing" astrology to be a defining characteristic of their identity. This inhibits them from being exposed to other things they may not even know they are interested in that may otherwise have been a large part of their identity.

THREE This goes to show that even though someone may feel as if their environment, in this case, Facebook, allows for them to be free, there is always some external force at work that influences the formulation of the defining traits of one's identity.

Bell, in Hard to Get, reveals that "Alicia didn't have sex until after college, and then protected herself from unplanned pregnancies" (Bell 36). Here it is seen that Alicia's ideal identity consisted of abstaining from copious sex early on in order to have a healthy and sustainable relationship in the future. However, Bell proceeds to reveal that this was not the case. Bell continues that "when she [Alicia] finally did have sex, in committed relationships, being a good girl didn't protect Alicia from STDs—she contracted gonorrhea from one partner and genital warts from another. Nor did being a good girl ensure that Alicia had satisfying and committed relationships" (Bell 36). Here, it clearly is seen that Alicia's efforts to build up an identity that reflects her as a good girl to have a safe and happy relationship in the long run did not go as planned. Instead, she got what she wanted to avoid in the first place—STDs and unsatisfying relationships. This scenario solidifies the fact that nobody has complete control over their external environment to the point where they can completely free themselves from it. If they did, people like Alicia would have been guaranteed to live according to what they define as their identity. Similarly, if Facebook users had complete control over their external environment, they would be able to escape from the "invisible hand" of Facebook's controlling algorithms. Rather, external forces always retain varying levels of control over the identities of individuals in both cases.

TWO Nafisi continues to delineate the second photograph, describing that "In the second photograph, the same group, in the same position, stands against the same wall. Only they have taken off their coverings...Each [woman] has become distinct through the color and style of her clothes, the color and length of her hair" (Nafisi 418). Now, Nafisi reveals the women's second identity, their "private" identity. This identity is the one they put on when their environment allows them to be a more truer version of themselves. The women, rather than dressing in mandatory clothing, now express themselves with any clothing they see fit. Therefore these multiple identities help enable the women keep a high level of autonomy in the face of a punitive and oppressive regime.

TWO Bell, describing Jayanthi's good girl–bad girl identities, communicates that Jayanthi was "Tired of being a good girl who met all her parent's and community's expectations" and that "Jayanthi began casually hooking up with men after college, often meeting several in one night" (Bell 33). This quote shows how Jayanthi embraced the bad girl identity (her "true" identity) primarily in response to not wanting to be a bad girl. Jayanthi added that "it was like the Virgin Mary or the ho. And I was going to the other side" (Bell 33). This confirms that Jayanthi was very aware that the only reason she considers the bad girl identity as her true identity, is because she wanted to avoid being a poster good girl. Just like how Jayanthi's "true" bad girl identity is solely defined by an equal and opposite reaction to the more restrictive identity of being a poster good girl, Nafisi's students' "true" private identity is solely defined by an equal and opposite reaction to the more restrictive identity imposed by the Islamic Republic. In either case, the individuals' "true" identity is not defined directly by them, but by external forces. If the external forces were not present, their "true" identities would have nothing to define themselves against.

Freedom is percieved as a separation of the individual from any source of restriction that may impede the development of their identity. Though, this is ofter contrary to the situation in reality. Pushing for complete freedom is futile since achieving total freedom is next to impossible with omnipresent external forces. In spite of these omnipresent forces, individuals can find some sense of freedom by developing multiple identities to counter the varying levels of restriction in different scenarios of their lives. However, these situational identities can never truly reflect an individual's true identity, since their very existence depends on an external force being present.

To conclude, no individual can ever be absolutely freed from the influence of external forces. Since everyone is restricted by external influences to varying levels of severity, nobody is truly free. To adapt to a common lack of freedom, individuals can take up multiple situational identities to better adapt to restrictions and still possess a more true version of their identity. Despite this, all situational identities are products of a response to external forces, making their existence dependent on the existence of external forces.