In French New Wave director François Truffaut’s 1966, only English, film, Fahrenheit 451, an adaptation of the novel by Rad Bradberry, he depicts a future where the centre of life is a TV screen, not just a TV screen but one which features a family, indeed everyone in the world is part of the family, and every person is ‘chosen’ to take part in the family (sort of like a soap opera). You are told when you are chosen and when you have to interject your lines into the show a red light flashes the tv characters ‘look’ at you and you give the answer they expect. This is immediately rewarded by them saying ‘see X agrees with me’ or ‘X says let’s do this and I agree’. In this Truffaut portrays visually the need and desires which have gone on to shape what we would call social media.
Social media is a platform in which the likes of the President of the United States can divulge his thoughts on policy and ‘cool, hip’ CEO’s can tell people about stock plans etc. The actual media, quick to catch on, uses social media to boost readership and employ what is known as ‘click-bait’ to generate more ‘clicks’ (opening of links to their parent sites). Even reputable organisations such as the AP, Reuters and the BBC employ such tactics, one might se a headline ‘Man Found With Children’ and one clicks expecting delightful story of paedophilia but instead reads about an 80 year old man with dementia who went missing form his care home and, as he was a primary school teacher for 50 years, went back to where he felt comfortable, in a school with children.
However, one must ask the question, what exactly is social media? The recent hearing in the US Congress with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg showed two things a) the members on the committee (mostly old white men) have no idea what social media is (I like to satirise it as ‘So, Mr Zuckerberg, what is this book and why is it full of faces?’, ‘do you have the book with you now? Can I see it?’, ‘how do you cut off the faces to put in the book? Are you a serial killer?’ and so forth) and neither, more concerningly although not unsurprisingly, does Mr Zuckerberg. He has no idea what Facebook has become, what it will become and how to control it and scarily enough he is not alone, no one really does.
Social media responded to the hearings by, mostly, making personal comments about Mr Zuckerberg’s looks and height, something even the actual news did, and no one I saw/heard/read spoke about anything of substance. Social media is this nondescript entity with good and bad points. MSN had/have a campaign to tackle teen loneliness caused by the illusion of contact which can come from social media and social media has been seen to have played a big role in political dissent in the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ and in China. From this one can conclude that social media is neither good nor bad. It is, like many other things, just a tool. Likewise one must ask, if social media is a tool like a hammer or a gun or a pen etc why can it, like those things, be used to do great harm to people? And the answer is simple. Social media is an experiment which is only as good as its participants so if social media has been seen to fail it is not because it has failed, rather, it is because, we the users, have failed. Social media has drawn back the curtain of our public and private selves and many might not like what we find, possibly answering a question, what is the true nature of people?
‘till the next time I use social media for my ramblings!
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A Note On A Different Topic
If you have been following the elections in the US you will see that a change is coming, ten-term established Democrats are being replaced by new (in many ways new to politics) Democratic challengers, many from the Ocasio-Cortez/Sanders wing of the party, the far left (or in real terms, just left of centre). Whilst this may seem a good thing, headlines saying first this and first that to run for office be it Transgender or female or any other ‘minority’ in politics it is important to note two things. 1) Many of the ones being replaced are exceptional servants to their constituents and have done nothing wrong except not being seen (although some are) to be as far to the left and will be missed in Congress for their service and experience and 2) This grassroots movement is not a new thing. After the 2008 election of President Obama to office a grassroots movement called the Tea Party sprang up. Ten-term Republicans were ousted by the challengers and Congress was filled with these new republicans, republicans who thought that those in the party were not far enough to the right. Thus, grew the power of Mitch McConnell the nominal leader of the new Republicans (bankrolled by the Koch Brothers) and instantly things changed in Congress. Confirmations which usually were confirmed or at least had hearings on were refused simply because the Republicans had the majority and they did not like Obama. The Democrats started changing procedural rules, although refused to employ the nuclear options, and yet still were blocked (Obama has a seat on the Supreme Court denied as Mitch McConnell said you cannot have such nominations during an election cycle, something he is doing at the moment with Kavanaugh) and once President Trump was elected McConnell changed the rules so that Judges, indeed all decisions, need only 51 instead of 60 votes meaning all decisions can be made along party lines. There is much more to say but to keep it brief it is increasingly becoming clear that all of these issues are being done along ideological lines and it seems increasingly clear that people do not realise that ideology is not politics. Politics has necessities which fall on all sides on the political spectrum and is about serving people, a form of humanism. The longer policy is decided and elections are decided along ideological lines the more those who need the government most will suffer.
Something to think about
thegreaterfool2016 