First and foremost I believe that I am primarily a media consumer, whether it's Facebook, Instagram, or Snapchat, I consume or intake a lot of information and entertainment via these social networking apps on a daily basis. I also think everyone should be critical and aware of the messages that media outlets are sending to us as consumers. So I try to do my best on doing my own research on the pages I have liked and people that I have followed. I personally don’t have a public profile where I interact with a global community. I prefer to share my life and my interest with a smaller and more close knit group of friends and family.
When it comes to mass media events, Social Media makes it very easy for individuals to share their experiences or thoughts on events like the super bowl, political campaigns, and natural disasters (example: Hurricane Harvey) . It is also possible for individuals or companies to share their experience and become part of a media frenzy or in layman's to be trending or going viral. An example of this is Casey Neistat’s Video “THE $21,000 FIRST CLASS AIRPLANE SEAT” which was posted on Sept 19th 2016. As someone who follows Casey I wasn't surprised that his video was trending. Several of his videos have more than 10 million views on Youtube but this video in particular got a lot of media attention from all types of news outlets and it currently is his most viewed video with 43 million views.
Social media is a very powerful tool that can have positive and negative effects on the human psyche. I think that when I first started using social media I didn't realize the effect it was having on me. It was only when I could not handle all the negativity and blatant hate on my Facebook newsfeed that I decide to unfollow all the people and pages who were sharing and spreading content that was affecting me negatively. When I did this it completely changed my experience and instead of having to deal with everyone's nonsense I was just receiving positive and uplifting messages that I enjoyed (Screenshots below of things in my newsfeed recently). A similar situation happened with Snapchat, but with snapchat I struggled with the actual filters that made me appear more “pretty”. Pretty is in quotes because I don’t think lightening my skin tone and making my eyes lighter is something that enhances my appearance rather I feel it is degrading to people of color and those with dark colored eyes. So I just deleted it. I think figuring out who you are in the age of Social Media is very difficult because you are constantly being analyzed and you also have access to everyone else's life. Which leads to a constant comparison of your low moments to their high moments. This is why we have to be extra careful when we are trying to figure ourselves out and have to understand that we don't have to be doing what everyone else is doing.
Overall, social media is something that I thoroughly enjoy because it allows me to connect with friends and family, keeps me updated on news, and also gives me the opportunity to explore different niche environments that weren't accessible like they are now.
I very much agree that social media can have both positive and negative effects. I also understand having to cut people off who post things that negatively affect you. I've been there myself and have had to make those choices.
ReplyDeleteI find it interesting that you mentioned that snapchat filters lighten the skin and brighten the eyes on some filters intended on making people "pretty." Those things don't correlate with being pretty at all and I am glad you mentioned it because I never truly though about what they were doing.
ReplyDeleteI also find the snapchat comment worth discussing. Not only do they brighten your skin but they narrow your nose and widen your eyes. I'm interested to know if there have been think pieces written about these...
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