Social media has too much power.
Social media has too much power.
Hugo A. Arciniegas D.
Enero 2019.
Universidad Surcolombiana
Neiva – Huila
Critical & Creative Thinking
Copyright
© 2019 by Hugo A. Arciniegas D. All
rights reserved.
Abstract
This essay you will see the issue of how
social media influence the decision that the society made, taking into account
themes like, ideology, culture, politics and education. The principal objective
of this work is inform and aware about; what is the impact that social media
does to our society? In addition, talk about the importance of being a critical
thinker.
Content
Essay…………………………………………………………………………………………5
List of Reference…………………………………………………………………………...11
Social media influence people’s behavior;
ideology, culture, politics and education ways. It is because nowadays, they
have many users and spectators. Large part of the population has a TV, computer
or smartphone in their house, which makes it easy to create a trend in the
society. Some people say that they had not been influenced by social media, some
people say that they have changed their opinion once or twice because of the
social media. Then, it need to be limited in order to let the society be
critical for themselves and not be influenced by status quo, to think and to do
what they want. What is the impact of
social media on human behavior?
Firstly,
according to a study carried out in 2013 by Tom Butts, 55% of the world's
households have digital television in their house. In addition, according to a
study carried out by Susana Galeano (2019) “Its report of 2018 the study
indicated a number of Internet users of 4.021 million, i.e. 53% of the world
population, the report 2019 assures that so far the world has 4.388 million of
surfers, a penetration of 57%.” What do these number mean? Well, Internet,
television, smartphones had been increasing as a technology that is easy to
get, until the point that almost every single person in the world has one or,
has access to them. The important thing to note is that the penetration of this
technologies is impressive.
Social media is easy to get access and the
best of all is that it is in real time, if we talk about in Cultural Terms, the
way we communicate has changed over the year. Nowadays, is easier to talk with
family and friends no matter the place they are. Also, is easier to share your
opinion with other, with just one click on your smartphone, you can comment,
give your opinion and share post. It is the necessity to be connected. How can
we know that social media has power over us? According to the investigation
made in Guatemala by Marcelo Colussi (2018), young users, with ages of between
17 and 25 years that use social media were asked if while they are doing the
love, they receive a call to their Cell phone, what would they do? Many of them
(about 75%) responded that, without hesitation, they would reply it. There is
no doubt that we are facing a major change in attitudes. People prefer to be
connected with social media instead of be with their family and friends!
In addition, some people say that they have changed their
opinion once or twice because of the n’s influence. According to the experience
of Sebastian Mosquera a guy from Colombia, he changed his opinion about
clothing brand. He said he never cared about what brand of clothes to wear. But
after watch some television commercials, videos and advertisements on the
internet, he felt influenced to buy a certain clothing brand. He began to care
about the way he dressed and his opinion on fashion. As a result, now he
follows certain social networks where he is informed about what he should buy.
Secondly,
if we talk about Political term, social media is specialized in connect people.
How social media does? Easy, they make it more attractive in order to get the
attention of people, social media take into account the interests of each
person, lately, they started to create a community. According to the research
“Social networks as instruments of power: their influence on decision-making”
by Maria Garita (2016) planted that the way social media use is, the way you
connect with other, if there are more user you will be more interested to sign
there, E.g. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Therefore,
that is where the politics comes in, one of the keys in the politics is, how
many people can you get, how can you convince them to be part of your political
party. Politics use social media in order to politics uses these social media
to attract people, attract people with attractive and striking publicity.
Just last
year in Colombia (my country) was going through the presidential election, the
national television, newspaper and radios of the country was evidenced that
they just support one of the candidates for the presidency, Ivan Duque. During
that week the television had been showing some commercials of his political
party, but they do not show the others one. How they expect that people take a
position for the presidential campaigns if they only inform the one that is
convenient for them? It is bad, television is opaque the capacity of being
critical. In addition, during that week the candidate Ivan Duque was
controversy by possible death threats to a cartoonist called "Matador".
So many people report him for it, and the internet exploded in criticism
against him and his political party. As a result, the national channels of
Colombia that support him and the political party came to defend him. They even
called Ivan Duque to an interview to defend against the false accusation, in
order to look good in front of the country. Which is not bad, the problem is
when the other candidates are controversy in the country, they do not call the
others. Television should be transparent and impartial.
"Sovereignty
resides exclusively in the people, from which the public power emanates. The
people exert it directly or through their representatives, in the terms that
the Constitution establishes. "
(Constitución
política de Colombia. (1991), Título 1 - De los principios fundamentales. Artículo 3)
A problem like
this makes a multiplication of opinions, in which the one who has many
supporting people wins. It takes great force in the society and politicians know
it they have respect, even fear about what is published in social media,
because they know that an opinion, can create a massive wave of positive or
negative responses. That is the power of social media, you can convince, you
can persuade, you can lie, even create a war, you can control people.
On the
other hand, if we take place in United states, and according to The New York
Times “the election of Donald J. Trump is perhaps the starkest illustration yet
that across the planet, social networks are helping to fundamentally rewire
human society. They have subsumed and gutted mainstream media. They have undone
traditional political advantages like fund-raising and access to advertising.
And they are destabilizing and replacing old-line institutions and established
ways of doing things, including political parties, transnational organizations
and longstanding, unspoken social prohibitions against blatant expressions of
racism and xenophobia”. (Farhad Manjoo, 2016)
The multiplier
effect also knows as “the union makes the Force”. E.g. “If a specific political
party has many people is because they are the good one”. Even though, people
had not reading or pain attention on improvement proposals that politicians had.
Therefore, social media take place at the moment of thinking, thinking what is
correct, true or benefit for them. The power that has social media especially if
they are controlled by private companies is too much and this is bad, it is because
most of the time they want that you think in the same way they do.
According
to Manuel Castells (2001), “no one now comes to the presidency, without the
Internet”. Politicians knows how to take advantage of all emerging technologies
to make their Electoral campaign.
Thirdly,
if we talk about education, social media has too much advantages, it is because
social media bring many tools like; sharing, interaction, see virtual classes,
educational platforms. Students can get benefit
from online tutorials and resources that are shared through social media. As a
result, it affords students and institutions with multiple opportunities to
improve learning methods. According to Raynne Danny (2017), social media has
three major benefits: First one, Web Rendezvous; in which she explains that
being connected to social media they get engaged with each other instantly,
making it easier and faster to interact with peers or teachers about
class-related topics. Second one, Sharing Information; in which she explains
that information is a lot more than just hilarious videos or vacation
snapshots. People share views, opinions, tips, projects, study material and
other such useful stuff with each other. As a result, they will exchange
helpful information for their partners. Last one, Social Media Marketing; she
said that social media as a marketing is seen upon as a skill which is an
emerging career option. As a result, social media prepares young workers to
become successful marketers.
It is good
if it is controlled! Otherwise it can be really bad for students, one the worst
of this is the misinformation, which can create wrong ideas about a certain
topic, lately, they will grow up with wrong ideas, ideas that they would
defend, just because they grow up believing that it is true, even though it was
false. Here is where the teachers roll comes in, by giving good, reliability
and credibility web pages, in which the students can find proper information
that can be useful. E.g. Are the pages that ends in; www…….gov, www…… .org, www……. .net, www……. Edu.
It is knowing that a teacher has to be a guide for children and one of the
principal objectives in teach children how to use property the social medias as
a tool for learning.
Some people know this and do not believe
at all in what they see on social media, it is because most of the cases what
they transmit is controlled and manipulated by people or private companies that
only want their own benefit. Is good that they know it, because they are being
critical thinkers. However, worst of all, people who do not have a critical
mind, will believe it. Then, it is the easy way to influence and control the
behavior of people, and that is creating a new movement, better call as
hegemony.
Fourthly, why the power of social media is
turning on a hegemony? Well, it is because the uncontrolled and impartial way
to regulate the posts that you can see on the Internet, reduce the rigor, reliability
and credibility of those networks. If let the social media take the controlled
in us (as he is doing according to Susana Galeano), just a post can generalize
behaviors that can become in habit, type of conduct that characterizes the
operative jobs, like those of the kitchen departments, floors and to a lesser
extent the gastronomic and informative services. E.g. If you see a post in a
group or page that you are sign and said something like “The food of Hugo’s
restaurant is the worst” and you see many comments that said; “I agree”, “Yes,
I went yesterday and it is really ugly”. You will think that it is true because
you follow that group or page, although you had not given a chance to taste
their food. Other example, is at the moment of buy stuffs, it can be shoes,
chains, clothes, etc. You see positive comments you buy it; you see negative
comments you do not buy it. This are just
an example about how hegemony works, contributing to ideological control by a
few. Is how a group of people can persuade you to do things that you would not
do.
According to Sharon Choi
(2017), “Social platforms such as Instagram and Twitter are able to influence
our perception of reality. In this day in age, we are constantly bombarded with
images of what the "ideal" body type, relationship, and even life are
supposed to be”. In addition, the Italian Marxist theorist and politician, Antonio
Gramsci's theory of ideological “hegemony states that mass media can be used by
the “ruling elite” to “perpetuate their power, wealth and status [by
popularizing] their own philosophy, culture, and morality.” (Antonio Gamsci’s,
1971, 1973, 1978).
Another good example is, the
capacity to create standards; as we globalize some words, until the point that
we make them part of our language and transform into nouns and actions. E.g.
Chat / chateando, Google / googleando, etc.
How can we fight against
hegemony? Easy, education is the key, to address these realities, the people
need to develop a critical mind and attitude to analyze through good basics in
schools, it has to started to in primary schools, what they see and read on
social media is not true at all, education has to encourage active
participation to prevent hegemony in social networks.
Finally, your
opinion has an influent and it can be important, as for yourself as for those
around you, and why you should develop a critical mind, I am not trying to say
that social media is bad, only that it has advantages and disadvantages. It had
been increasing very fast during the last years until the point that they practically
take choices for us, social media try to convince you, but you are the only one
that has the last opinion. Read, think, be critical, do an investigation, do
not believe everything they say, because they just want to control you. They
have the power to do it, now ask to you this question, I am going to let me
control?
REFERENCES:
1.
Butts Tom. (2013, Dec, 06). The State Of Television,
Worldwide. TVTechnology.
2.
(Constitución política de Colombia.
(1991), Título 1 - De los principios
fundamentales. Artículo 3)
3.
Colussi Marcelo.
(2018, Feb, 23). Redes sociales e ideología. La haine.org.
4.
Castell Manuel. (2001, Feb) Internet y la Sociedad Red. La factoria.
5.
Choi Sharon. (2017, Feb 05). ARE SOCIAL MEDIA
HEGEMONIC?.
6.
Galeano Susana. (2019,
Jan 31th). El número de usuarios de Internet en el mundo
crece un 9,1% y alcanza los 4.388 millones. MARKETING4ECOMMERC.
7.
Garita Maria. (2016). Las redes sociales como
instrumentos de poder: su influencia
en la toma de
decisiones. Visit: http://www.kerwa.ucr.ac.cr/bitstream/handle/10669/73325/Art%C3%ADculo-Las%20redes%20socialessu%20poder%20influenciador%20en%20la%20toma%20de%20desiciones%20.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
8.
Gramsci A. (1971). Selection from the prison notebook.
New York: International.
9.
Gramsci A. (1973). Letter from Prison. New York:
Harper and Row
10.
Gramsci A. (1978). Selection from Cultural Writing.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press
11.
Lull James. (1995). Social media, comunication,
culture: a Global Aprochach.
New york, UK; Culimbia University
Press. Visit: https://ic.arc.losrios.edu/~hijazin/files/Hegemony.pdf
12.
Manjoo Ferhab. (2016, Nov 16). Social Media’s
Globe-Shaking Power.
New York Times. Visit: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/17/technology/social-medias-globe-shaking-power.html?smid=tw-share&referer&ref=nyt-es&mcid=nyt-es&subid=article
13.
Raynne Dany. (2017, July 20). Education, Educational
Benefits, Internet and
technology
Comentarios
Publicar un comentario