How Does Social Media Impact Society?

 HELLOOO EVERYBODY!!!! I am back to bring you one last blog post for this semester!! While I am glad that this is the last time I have to write a blog post for this class, I am going to miss talking to you guys every unit. What I am going to talk to you guys about today is a little harder to talk about. A lot of people would probably call it a little controversial, too. So, at this time, you are probably wondering what this topic is and how bad it could be. Well, I am going to be talking about politics and social media. More specifically, how social media impacts democracy. So for this blog post, I will be mainly talking about how Facebook has impacted modern democracy and if democracy is now broken, then can it be fixed again?

From the discussions we have had in my class, nobody could really explain if they thought social media did have an impact. When we began unpacking why we could not give an answer, we  discovered that a majority of my classmates did not really keep up with the political world. Even though it is a big thing that we should be keeping up with, nobody really cared or kept up with it on social media. One person specifically said that they would not participate or take action on anything political (not including voting). When I was listening to the conversations and heard the answers that everybody was giving, I became very surprised. Based off of everything I have seen on just about every social media platform, I thought that people my age were more politically active than they have been in a long time. But maybe that is another part of democracy that social media has affected.

As the years have passed, I would say that political parties have become more polarized . Or they have become more publicly polarized than before. It has been argued that the political parties have always been this level of polarized, but the circumstances of the time have made it seem like the two parties could get along. Ever since the creation of American democracy, people have been split on how America should be run. At that time, things also got really heated. I mean, there were a bunch of wars that were started because all parties were so opposed to the way the other parties wanted to run the country. The country comes together when some major tragedy happens. There have been multiple instances where the United States has gone into war. In that time, the country came together in a way it was not during the time period before. Then things slowly returned to the way things were before. But with the creation and development of social media, I believe that, at this point, no matter what happens, the parties will not ever get along. Things about politicians are constantly revealed on social media and so many rumors are spread, it does not matter if there is any truth to anything, if something gains traction online, anybody could believe it.

Facebook has been a major instigator in polarizing the parties. In class, we read Social Media: How Facebook Disconnects Us and Undermines Democracy by Siva Vaidhyanathan. Vaidhyanathan believes that Facebook is one of the reasons why democracy is the way that it is today. In the book, she describes the reasons why she believes Facebook has been further separating political parties. The main reason why Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook was to connect with family and friends. He also said that he wanted to connect the whole world. While I do think he was able to connect friends, family, and the world, I think Facebook has evolved its usage into something else. The way Facebook's algorithm works, it relies on your likes, comments, and posts to suggest advertisements. Those ads have become more political and are pushing it on users' pages hard. It wouldn't matter if the advertisements were correct or fact-checked, if it was something Facebook knows you would be interested in, it would be recommended to you. Because of all of the incorrect information that is being pushed onto people's pages, people will believe it and it will warp their idea of what they think is correct.

To conclude this blog post, I want to talk about whether I think democracy is broken or not. I personally believe that democracy is broken. Not a lot of people have faith in the system anymore. Because of how much false information is online and how many people have seen it, they believe that democracy is working against them, as well as the opposing political party. People are so stuck in their beliefs that I believe they become hostile toward other people from the opposing political party. Social media is a big part of our everyday life; it's not going anywhere. Social media, specifically Facebook, has broken democracy. As long as people can access social media and incorrect information is still prominent, I don't think democracy can be fixed.

And that concludes my final blog post for this class. It's such a bittersweet feeling. I have enjoyed writing to all of you while I have been in this class.

I hope this has been an educational experience for all of you too!

Democracy is Dead, but was it Ever Truly Alive?

Democracy is Dead, but was it Ever Truly Alive? 

         The ways in which we think about politics in the age of social media have been greatly altered and have changed the dynamics of the political landscape. It is no secret that there has been growing polarization between the left and right in the United States (US). Both sides feel as though they are correct in their views, and cannot seem to agree on what to do about anything. While it has been historically evident that democrats and republicans have been on opposing sides, this sentiment seems to have grown and festered into the shitshow of incompetence we see before us. In addition, now people who align themselves with either side have widely accessible and numerous amounts of platforms to share the propaganda fed to them and contribute to the political polarization. Some would argue that nothing has changed, and we are merely becoming more aware of the vast political differences and viewpoints that exist because of social media. With more information and resources becoming available, it is no surprise that people on either side of the political spectrum will engage in confirmation bias and reinforce their beliefs, further cementing them and making them less receptive to criticism and differing belief systems. 

        Now all this is just the surface-level issues at hand. In order to adequately discuss the root causes of these issues, how they came to be, and how they can be fixed, it would take a lot more than a relatively short blog post. That being said, we can begin to understand the growing divide between political parties by revealing the truth of their existence and their historical purpose in the US. Howard Zinn wrote a terrific book, A Young People's History of the United States. This book generalizes American history and looks at it through a more objective lens than what is commonly taught in American history books. Truly, it is a book that everyone should probably read to better understand how our country was built and what the true motivations were for some of America's infamous decisions. Around the time of Andrew Jackson's presidency, political parties started to arise and garner attention, but this was not by accident. Andrew Jackson campaigned on the idea that he would be the "voice" of the working class, those who were not a part of the elite wealthy. This gave people an illusion of choice by offering two political parties to choose from, all while knowing they will choose the seemingly more democratic side. This was done to control the masses and garner support from the lower classes when necessary. Leaders of the parties, the wealthy elite, understood that they could keep control and power in the government if they gave people occasional reforms that would grant some of the wishes of the general public, but not everything (Zinn & Stefoff, 2007). To anyone, that is not democracy. When people are given an illusion of choice, and their choices are limited, true democracy, one in which the voices of many are heard and considered, never existed. 

        Just from that short excerpt of the book, we can begin to understand that democrats and republicans, historically, have never had the best interest of the working class and general public in mind. Yet, as we see in the current political landscape, people are eager to idolize elected officials of either party and support their motives without any deeper knowledge. In social media and people's use of it politically, it is evident that people are eager to pick a side and lean heavily into it, even if they do not understand what they are aligning themselves with. For instance, a lot of people have and continue blindly vote for elected officials who are a part of the political party they align with, often neglecting to go out and look for the official's policies and beliefs. There is a concerning amount of blind trust in people for their political party, and it is likely part of the reason we are where we are now. 

        Going further, the idea of compromise and mutual understanding of desired goals between political parties is a joke. People still believe that "each party cares about the same issues, we just have different solutions" and it is almost baffling. There are evil, wealthy, powerful people in elected office or otherwise influencing American politics through their money and lobbying, and they do not care about serving the general public and working class. The two-party system is likely taking advantage of the current political polarization within the public in order to further divide and control the lower classes and reduce any chance of genuine revolution or reform, disguising their incompetence in favor of blaming each other to give people the impression that "oh, the other side is so stubborn, that is why nothing is getting done and things are still bad."  

        This all sounds like a conspiracy when it is said aloud, I mean after all, who would want to believe that the government does not serve them. However, it could be argued that there is enough evidence to suggest there could be some truth in all of this. Furthermore, there is still so much more to be discussed and touched on to have a better understanding of this topic. Fortunately, in this age of social media, hope is not lost. With the resources and technology we have now, we can better educate ourselves and detach from the constant propaganda and talking points pushed by the left and right. We can conduct our own research into the issues, spread that information to others, and create an online environment dedicated to cultivating more informed minds. Hopefully, then, the steps toward progressive reform and getting the government to work for the American people will be taken. 

Facebook and its effects upon democracy

facebook | Credit www.shopcatalog.com with an active link re… | Flickr

Whether you are a part of the Facebook community or not you likely know someone who is an avid Facebook user, or you at least are familiar with the popular social media platform. It’s the app where you can find recent news, articles, videos, and where your family posts embarrassing childhood photos of you. Since Facebook's start in February of 2004, it has become one of the most commonly used social media apps offered to internet users. 

With Facebook being around for as long as it has, I believe it’s safe to say that we’ve grown accustomed to its presence in our day-to-day society. It seems that Facebook will remain a place to share, post, and like until we find ourselves sick of it. Just as many apps before it and many apps that will come after it.

However, perhaps we are underestimating the amount of power Facebook has as a social media app. Although we have labeled Facebook as this app as one for our parents and grandparents, this app can impact a lot more than we give it credit for.

As of recently, we have considered how social media has impacted American democracy. We’ve grown up learning that our system of government was built upon the procedure that eligible voters in the US could vote for elected officials to represent them. That’s how it’s been and continues to be.

In his book titled Antisocial Media, author Siva Vaidhyanathan explores how Facebook can be a problem to American democracy. 

“The Idea of bringing the world closer together has animated and driven Zuckerberg from the beginning,” Vaidhyanathan stated. This desire to connect people has been the driving force that has resulted in what Facebook has evolved into over the years. Facebook has now become a means of virtually interacting with friends and family, online dating, and receiving news from various regions of the world. Needless to say, Facebook has definitely fulfilled the goal of connecting others. Zuckerberg even went as far as to think that the connectedness that his app offers even helps the democratic process.

However, Vaidhyanathan argues otherwise. He suggests that Facebook as a social platform contributes more negative effects to our democracy than anything. And in addition to that, Facebook has grown far too big for us to try and control these negative effects. 

One negative attribute of Facebook is that it provides an easy means of spreading false information. Anyone with a Facebook account can post just about any material as long as it falls in line with general guidelines that Facebook has implemented for users. Which is not very limiting when you really look at the specifics of the guidelines themselves. Afterall, Facebook still manages to spread material that spikes rises in discrimination, bigotry, and violence. 

These posts that propose misleading narratives on a variety of subjects often generate strong reactions from users. Which can also result in a confrontational divide between people. People with opposing views and interpretations that stem from these posts often will bicker amongst each other. Vaidhyanathan points out that due to this common occurrence, Facebook offers no means of having a constructive, productive conversation. 

Vaidhyanathan also notes that Facebook takes the data that it has collected on your interactions (likes, comments, shares) and uses that to present you with similar content. Vaidhyanathan describes this as Facebook rewarding users with more of what they tell the companies they want. 

Let’s look at my own Facebook for a minute. I’ll admit that I don’t use Facebook that often. I mainly use it to stay updated with family members. But I’ve interacted with content just enough to where Facebook has gathered some understanding of the material that I'm interested in seeing. Just by scrolling through my Facebook feed for about five minutes, here are a few of the post that it suggested to me:

If you can’t tell by that alone, I’m a major nerd. So Facebook has used its algorithm to suggest to me posts that relate to fandoms such as Avatar the Last Airbender, Star Wars, and the Marvel cinematic universe. I don’t know when I first interacted with the initial post that taught Facebook that I’m interested in nerd material, but all it took was me doing so in order for Facebook to keep showing me things related to these topics. Now this isn’t related to politics, but you can by now understand how Facebook can do the same with people who interact with political material. All it takes is for a user to like one post related to a specific side of the political spectrum for it to filter more material related to that kind of political view.

Another negative aspect about Facebook is that it contributes to the dwindling faith in American democracy. There are some people that believe that democracy doesn't exist. That it is instead a false narrative that we have been fed from the beginning of our lives. According to Vaidhyanathan, those that don’t believe in democracy don’t care about the truth. They will just choose to believe what they wish to believe. 

This lack of truth and trust has been made apparent on Facebook. It appears that some have placed their trust in Facebook and Google rather than news outlets and original sources. Instead of lending their ears to those that dedicate their professions to revealing the truth to the public, they would rather just dismiss it all together. 

Which lends the question: If we can’t have trust in anything, can we have trust that our own democratic system will be okay?

In addition to this question, we should also recap that Facebook is contributing towards the deteriorating faith in American democracy, encouraging confrontations amongst users over disagreements, and is spreading hate. With that recapped, should Facebook be continued to be allowed to operate in the current state that it’s in? 

Facebook has clearly shown that through its mission of connectedness, it has managed to grow to an extreme that no one considered it ever would. And through this growth we are beginning to acknowledge the negative effects that Facebook offers. 

Is there hope for American democracy with Facebook being a present factor? Or should we reevaluate how we utilize this app in order to minimize the concerning effects that it has demonstrated in regards to maintaining democracy?

Are You Really Addicted to Your Phone??

Hello to everyone who is currently reading this blog post!! It has felt like forever! NOT! I am back again to share the newest things I have been learning in class. If you have read my last post, you will see that we talked about how addicted people are to their phones and discussed Zomorodi's view on why it is their fault. We also talked about Williams' thoughts on why he believes tech companies are responsible for people becoming addicted. But this time around, we discussed Rob Walker's views, which are exactly the same as Manoush Zomorodi's views. To understand his perspective, I completed one last challenge. Then, my whole class had to create a social media/phone challenge that pushes people to think more like James Williams and less like Zomorodi and Walker.

For the last challenge I had to complete, I had to choose between five different challenges. The five challenges came from Walker's book, The Art of Noticing. The first challenge from this selection is creating an auditory inventory. The instructions for this were to note all the sounds you heard at a certain time and write them down. The second challenge was to sketch a room we were just in. We were to survey the room we were currently in, walk into a different room, and sketch the room with as much detail as we could remember. The third challenge was to look out a window for ten minutes. You find a window you normally don't take time to look out of and look for three things you have not noticed before or describe what you are seeing. The fourth challenge was to repeat your point of view. You would find somewhere to sit and would sit there everyday for fifteen minutes and watch the people who passed by. This challenge was made for people to realize that not everything is the "same view" after all. The final challenge that my class could choose from was the take a color walk challenge. For this test, you had to take an hour-long walk and answer five questions. The five questions that you were asked are:

1. What are the colors that you become aware of first?
2. What are the colors that reveal themselves more slowly?
3. What colors do you observe that you did not expect?
4. What color relationships do you notice?
5.  Do colors appear to change over time?    

The challenge I chose to attempt was the sketch a room challenge. I thought this challenge would be fun to attempt compared to the other ones. If I am being honest, I felt like this challenge was more of a memory challenge instead of an attention challenge. I feel like I was just testing how well I could remember details about my own room that I stay in everyday and how well I could draw. (Which is not very good because I still can not draw to save my life.) So basically, I think I did very well in this challenge because I was able to draw all the major details of my room and include a lot more little details than I thought I was going to be able to include.

After a week of discussing the three theorists, talking about all the different challenges my classmates completed and the results of those challenges, we started to discuss our next presentation. Like I have mentioned before, our goal was to create our own social media challenge that would push people to think more in terms of James Williams and his thoughts about how companies are forcing us to become addicted to our technology, instead of Manoush Zomorodi and Rob Walker's belief that people become addicted because of themselves. So I created a challenge that combined being active on your phone while noticing the differences around you. This challenge is inspired by when I was hanging out with my friend. We were sitting in my car, scrolling through TikTok. When we looked up from our scrolling, we saw two things that we thought were hilarious. We saw two guys come up to an art installation and one of them started climbing up the art installation. The guy on top of the installation started posing in different ways while his friend took pictures of him at the top. When we shifted our gaze, we saw a staff member walking across the grass with a plastic bag and cardboard box of food. As we kept watching, we saw him start to run.  We then noticed that a hawk was following him pretty closely. That's when we realized that there was a hawks nest in one of the trees and that the hawk was probably feeling a little territorial. So the challenge I created works like this:

1. Find a place you can "people watch" (ex. park or a parking lot)
2. Note what is happening and what you can see 
3. Find something you can do on your phone
4. Look down at your phone for about five minutes, then look back up
5. Note what has changed from the last time you looked up

I think this challenge helps people think in terms of Williams' because it's not making people feel bad about being on their phone. I think that you can learn a lot from being on your phone. You can learn new recipes to try, about what's going on in the world around us, or what's happening in the lives of your friends you haven't seen in a while. By being on your phone and looking up every once in a while, you can learn new things.

That's all I have for you this time! I'll see you next time for my last blog post on here! See you next time!

why are influencers so special?

 Have you ever wondered why social media influencers are a thing? From famous Youtubers, Tiktokers and instagrammers to all media platforms, what makes people drawn to these influencers? 

To start us off, what is an influencer ?

An influencer is defined as a person with the ability to influence potential buyers of a product or service by promoting or recommending the items on social media.

So how does that relate to us and how we use social media?

Social media can be used as many things but it is being transformed into a marketing dream. Every post is really just an ad for some type of product or service, with its users being the consumers/buyers. 

This brings us into influencers. They are a tool for these platforms to be able to sell us things. By using people to show their products we feel like there is a more personable approach to buying things than if we were to see an ad on Tv. These influencers connect with their audiences by sharing details about their everyday lives with us. Im sure you’ve heard the clever line of “you guys aren’t just my followers but my friends”, this is just another way for followers to feel important which can lead to us buying more products. 

Even though influencers are really just another tool to market products/services there is a strange connection we hold with them. Because they are everyday people we put a level of trust onto them, we believe them when they talk about products they actually love. Influencers are also important because they are able to voice things and create a community of like minded people. “To capitalize on engaged social media audiences, it’s important for brands to realize that social media platforms and digital influencers are not simply vehicles to distribute a brand’s message – they are actual communities with special sets of norms, values, and ways of communicating. Campaigns are most successful when companies recognize what makes every social community’s unique culture and niche interests”. 

Social media influencers may seem like they have the easiest job in the world, but when you really look at it they are the bridge from buyers to companies and creating a unique space for everyone to be heard and seen when going online. 

sources 

https://mediakix.com/blog/why-we-love-social-media-stars/

My Strange Addiction: A Cellular Device

A really clear depiction of a cellular device being in control of a person through a charger

    When is the last time you grabbed your phone? If it's been more than an hour since you've touched your phone then you are either busy doing something, or you have a stronghold on your will to keep you from something taking your focus. If it's been around 30 minutes then you are working toward that full control of your life instead of the phone. If you are like me however, it has been less than 10 minutes and there is no chance it goes on a minute longer without staring at your phone for another second. 

    What is it about these devices that keep us hooked on to them? The culture within this day and age has become heavily reliant on these devices. From alarm clocks and calendar reminders, to the pinnacle of keeping in touch with everyone and anyone through social media. We have become interlocked with the use of our phones daily. How much are we really missing out on from our phones? 

    Rob Walker wrote a book entitled, "The Art Of Noticing", which is a book filled with 131 challenges for creativity and inspiration. For the sake of this blog, this book helps with opening up a person to focusing on the actual world over the world our phones have created for us to crave. Within these challenges, My professor, Dr. Vrooman, has given us a few to focus on through our social media class at TLU. 

    Surfing through the options I found one that stuck out to me since I live on the 3rd floor of my apartment building: Look Out A Window. 

    The results of this were more radical than I imagined. The idea of this challenge was to simply identify three objects I don't usually notice from first glance. I came across some crazy discoveries. Shingles indeed are the roof protection to any housing was my first observation. It was the second observation that began my discoveries. Grass is green. How in the world does it decipher itself as green? Yes science is a huge role in that of course I am aware of all that good stuff. However, isn't it crazy how objects and the things of this earth are just the color that they are? I began to even question how our brain is able to make things function on its own without pressing buttons to create actions like a video game. I ditched the challenge at this point but you get the idea. 

    How does this connect to the original idea behind this post? I am not sure. What if we are missing the whole concept behind the use of phones? 

    Every time we see challenges like the one I used, it is all surrounded on the idea that we are the problem with an addiction to a device that is without fault. The problem seems to be forced on to the user and their innate need for social interaction, and that interaction has been filled with the capabilities of social media through phones. 

    I feel like there is another way to prepose the idea of getting more blame on the phone over a person. I prepose people mimic the concept of window shopping!

    When someone states they are window shopping, they are simply looking and not buying. In the same way, the challenge will focus on people looking without interacting, but at the time that they CHOOSE to. How does one do this? Turn off your notifications to every social media application. Our phones become a distraction from the buzz it gives in our pocket. Taking away that distraction may get us to look up more and not be pulled away from what we are focused on within that certain time frame. 

Give it a try! This isn't the absolute answer of course, but it is worth a try! 

Look Up!

Last week, we learned about James Williams' Stand Out of Our Light. We took his discussion about the way that our phones distract us from our reality and pull us into an unknowing world in which we are consumed. Over the past couple of weeks, we practiced that. We took the concepts we learned with Williams and applied them to some of Manoush Zomorodi's Broad and Brilliant and Rob Walker's Art of Noticing.

For the purpose of this blog, we are going to focus on the challenges in Rob Walker's book. Our professor provided a list of five short challenges for us to take on. Simple enough, we could choose to sit and listen to some things around us for a bit, sketch a room from memory, look out a window, sit by a window or in a room you may not normally sit in, or take a color walk.

Seems kinda dumb, huh? (I'm just saying what we all thought so if you see this, Vroomen, don't be mad).

actual representation of me people-watching at 11:30pm

I started my challenge late one night after work and chose to look out the living room window for a few minutes. At first, I had the urge to be bored and check my phone but after a while, it went away and I started noticing the number of people walking on the side of my dorm building at 11:30 at night (weirdos), I noticed a line of small trees behind the large one I had never noticed before, I noticed the number of cars in the parking, a broken light at a building across the street, and other little things.

Once I noticed the number of things I hadn't noticed before my mind began drifting further into thought:

"Where are these people going? Can they see me staring at them from the second floor? If they looked up here would I be scared? Would they? Why have I never seen anyone in the other windows when I'm walking around campus? I don't recognize them..."

A guy in my class actually did the same challenge and he went into a similar spiral. After looking out of the window for a few minutes, he somehow began thinking a lot about why we have fingers, how they move, how our brain can just tell our bodies to do something and we do.

(Now there are two types of people reading this right now: the first will completely understand because we have these thoughts on a regular basis; the other will think it is crazy because they haven't ever thought like this.)

Regardless of the reader you are, the point of the discussion we got out of class that day was about our attention. it was about how our minds have changed and stopped noticing things that aren't necessarily right in front of our faces anymore. The theory of the 3 men we have learned from and discussed recently is that our phones (and technology in general) have taken away our ability to be detailed oriented. We forget to notice the little things around us and enjoy the moments without a screen 2 inches from our bodies.

The challenges take 5 minutes of your time but they are worth it. They gave me a refreshing start to my days. They reminded me of why I go do the things I do and it's not for me to record for later, it is for me to live in the moment. Whether we are alone or with people, we need to remind ourselves to step outside of the hold technology has on us and come up for air every once in a while. 

Look up and enjoy what is around you.

Try one of these challenges and let me know...