Twitter, Facebook, Yik Yak, Pinterest, Tumblr. If you usually follow normal patterns of thought in this country you would believe that these platforms are providing a place where the morals and values that have so long ran our society can be decomposed. To many these sites and apps are allowing our youth to bury their face in their phones and laptops, to disconnect from society, and become more and more dysfunctional in society. Depending on who you ask social media and networking have led to a generation addicted to cyberspace and technology. They have devalued human connection and interpersonal communication.
This couldn't be further from the truth. With social media and social networking comes the ability to connect with others on a scale unprecedented in human history, to create online communities that transcend space and geographical boundaries, and to democratize speech all over the world. The first advantage of social media sites is the ability to create a massive amount of connections with people. Some of these connections are bilateral, such as with Facebook. It takes two people to mutually agree to be friends. What Facebook allows is for us to maintain ties that may otherwise become dormant. If you leave town for whatever reason you don't have to sacrifice contact with people from back home, and when you do go back home you can maintain the ties that you made in a way that wasn't possible before. This allows people to diversify the ideas, thoughts, and opportunities that they are exposed to. The second advantage of Social Media is that it allows people to become parts of online communities that may have otherwise been impossible. For example if a person is having trouble with their sexuality but grows up in a traditionally conservative area they might have trouble finding support. Social Networking allows that person to find an online community that is open and accepting of his or her situation. That person can open up online on a Social Networking site or message board where people in the same situation go. This can give him or her the type of support that they couldn't find in their physical community. In a broader sense social media makes it important for people to connect with people who share the same values, beliefs, and ideas when it might not have been possible elsewhere. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Social Media democratizes speech. Take twitter for example. Anybody can tweet information or opinions about any given subject. This decentralizes power from the traditional news institutions. Before social media it was very difficult for the voice of an everyday citizen could be heard. During the 2012 presidential debates you could view a plethora of tweets about the debate and everybody, nobody where they lived, what race they were, how much money they made, could voice their opinion and those tweets, if searched, were open to the 232 million active users on twitter. Too often change is confused with digression. Just because we don't connect in the ways we used to doesn't mean that society is decaying. Everyday we are moving forward, Social Media is yet another frontier for progress. -515
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October 2018
Matt BruceViva DSM!! |