As I begin to think about social
media and its effects on society, I wonder if it is providing a less or more
truthful reality. As far as reality goes, as Stephen Colbert says, “Look it up
on Wikipedia”. With the advent of
social media, there are so many more perspectives and accounts available for
the everyday Internet user to peruse. Information about the world no longer
needs to come from institutions, and money is no longer necessary to provide
one’s opinion. However, in this new climate of unregulated exposure to any and
everyone’s opinions is the truth being more exposed than when it was so closely
regulated? I would argue yes, that individuals have more information now than
ever before, and can therefore discern the truth far more easily than ever
before in history. However, some might argue that the massive influx of ideas
and opinions, in many cases presented as facts could lead to an altered
perception of the truth by some unwitting individuals.
For example, there are websites and
blogs of all sorts. For every left wing blog, there is an equally extreme right
wing blog. For every website about healthy eating and body image there are
websites explaining the virtues of anorexia and providing support nets for
girls to connect with other anorexic girls to share tips and stories. When I
did the Google search “Pro Anorexia tips”, in .11 seconds 405,000 results were
presented to me. When I did an “Anti Anorexia” Search .16 seconds returned over
a million results. The majority of these results were blogs and other personal
websites. Anyone seeking information on either of these subjects would be
instantly validated in their opinion if they made the correct search. I am not
in any way advocating for censorship, or stating that information was better when
controlled by industry and corporation. There is such a fine line between
policing material that could help individuals make unhealthy decisions, like
anorexia, and robbing individuals of the right to free speech.
If one looks hard enough, most any point can
be validated through some site of information available on the Internet or
through social media groups and blogs. Because of this, I wonder that although
there is a far greater amount of information, and variety of opinions present,
do people have the tools to use this new information to find and understand the
truth, or is this new information being used to validate pre-existing opinions
and stereotypes? I do think that the fact that so much new and interesting
information is available to anyone with a computer is a wonderful thing. The
ability of individuals to become creators and share their insights without the
constraints of government or industry is ultimately a good thing. However, as
with anything, there can be those who use something that should be a good thing
for other purposes. The good outweighs the bad in this scenario, but is there a
way for the bad to not exist, or does it go hand in hand with freedom and free
speech?
