Kaylee Poehlein

11/20/15

Dr. Harold Blanco

Debate Research Paper

Social Media Explosion

In modern society the aspect of social media is up for constant debate on whether it is

harmful or helpful for those who partake in it. On one side, social media is arguably harmful to

society because it violates privacy and reduces communication among those who update their

statuses for everything that they do, but that is not my stance. I do not believe that

communications between those who are constantly updating social media have become

dissected.

“If you take technology away, you’ll lose people in minutes.” (Clemmitt 87). Our parents

that grew up in a world that didn’t have modern social media and technologies are more partial

to keeping their phones on them, as it helps them stay more aware as to what is going on in the

world as well as keeping up with their social circles. It is an eminent key issue in this article that

communications between close friends, old friends, and even strangers suffer from the deficit of

face-to-face conversation.

When you take away the aspect of modern technology or social media from people who

are not comfortable without their phones/tablets/laptop being somewhere on their person, the

environment between those in question then becomes a kind of awkward tension, which is

heavily avoided by all people. It’s not unusual to see people at dinner, communicating via text or

social media with people who did not go out of their way to see them, which brings the issues to

another key point: People who can’t go ten minutes without checking their Facebook, Twitter,

Snapchat, or Instagram updates.

Teenagers and twenty-somethings have grown attached to their phones as if it were his or

her child, per say. They sleep with their phones in bed with them, and wake up in the middle of

the night to answer texts and check late-night social media updates. They update their Snapchat

stories to reflect the time, weather, and location of where it was that they took the photo or video.

While this aspect is more modern that the article was dated, it is still important to the aspect that

contributes and reattributes the previously stated fact that young adults are attached to their

phones/other technological devices. They even become “anxious” when they go without having

their phones near them.

If you are ever in an uncomfortable situation with someone you aren’t comfortable with,

it has become a social norm to pull out your cell phone and check social media to ease the

tension in the room. If you’re ever alone in a crowded place, it’s the easiest option to pull out

your phone and pretend to be texting or to scroll through social media to pass the time. This

method of coping for most people, as this generation is afraid to be disconnected. Losing cell

phone service or running out of data is our biggest fear.

The benefits of social media extend very far. Social media outlets keep you updated with

people you haven’t talked to in a while, allow you to stay up to date with social, economic,

political, and popular issues, and is a very good way to pass the time out of boredom. Easily

though, Facebook and Twitter updates become like a public diary full of useless information.

People will go online to tell their friends and followers that they cleaned out the refrigerator after

they put their kids to bed – which is not something that you would (probably) bring up in regular

conversation. This brings us to the concerns of having social media.

People go on social media and update things about their private life that they would not

regularly broadcast. As mentioned earlier, people sometimes take their status updates a tad bit

too far (on Facebook more often than Twitter). Social media profiles are very detailed. Facebook

asks for your hometown, high school, college, profession, family members, relationship status,

phone number, and even your birthday. This leads to extreme privacy violations, if proper

security measures are not taken. Facebook and Twitter allow you to not let anyone view your

profile unless you accept their request, but oftentimes people are not careful about who they

accept. They will set their profiles to private and then accept anyone that is brave enough to send

them a request. And when people are not careful may be subject to “cyber-stalking” or

“catfishing”.

“Cyber-stalking” is a method that is like real-life stalking, but only on your online profile.

It’s a very lazy way to get the same job done. Someone can sit outside your house and watch you

through the window folding your laundry or working out, or they can just wait until you update

your social media to tell what you did with your day. Cyber-stalkers check out your high school,

your place of work, and your relationship status. Sometimes, they can even know you better than

your own mother. If you make your phone number on Facebook public, you may even be subject

to harassment calls and text messages. “Catfishing” is the action of someone making a false

social media profile and attempting to hold a social media or text conversation with you, all

while pretending to be someone else. Oftentimes, people go into committed relationships with

someone that they haven’t even met. You can become anyone you want when you know you’ll

never have to meet the person in real life, which could prove to be dangerous, depending on the

information you give out to the total stranger. Ironically, if someone believes they are being

“catfished”, they will “cyber-stalk” them to see if they check out.

In the article, Clemmitt stated, “Western commentators have claimed that Iranians used

Twitter to organize protests after a contested June 2009 election. But, in fact, Twitter was used

only minimally, according to Golnaz Esfandiari, an Iranian-born blogger and senior

correspondent for the U.S.-funded agency Radio Free Europe, which broadcasts to Eastern

Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East.” (86). This statement alones explains how social

media effects democratic, as well as other systems of government, societies. They were using

Twitter to organize political protests against the electors. This leads one to wonder what other

kind of events might have been organized on Twitter or any other social media outlets, and why

these events were not flagged as a matter of national security and stopped? There are so many

fake profiles, and anything could be organized or plotted on them.

MY STANCE

As a firm supporter of social media, my eyes were opened by the facts I discovered in

Clemmitt’s article, as many of my fellow classmates were as well. But I stand by my opinion,

and I urge you to do so too. Social media brings modern cultures together. It closes the bridge

between different social circles and cultures, and forms friendships based off of related interests

that probably wouldn’t happen in face-to-face confrontations. “Claims about the damaging

effects of social media on individual human behavior, societal morale, and mass processes are

usually passionate. However, research has failed to produce a diversity of participants or more

stable longitudinal data, and often because of that, it does little to establish causation beyond

correlation.” (Belangee 123). This quote leads to back up the fact that they only researched a

certain amount of people, and these facts are not generally true. I believe that social media is

beneficial to society, as we, as a whole are addicted to social media for all of the best reasons.

“The Internet is often used for communication and relationship building with others and

may be used for developing friendships and romantic interests. Relationships built over the

Internet may develop and change differently from those based on real-life interactions. While

pop culture is just beginning to accept online relationships, some individuals may feel the need to

hide online relationships due to the offline reactions of friends and peers. As Internet

relationships become more popular, it is important to discover the effect they have on the

individual and society.” (Thayer 432). Aforementioned, the communications aspect of this

certain part of social media is not at risk with young adults in social media. Young adults are not

at risk for altered, botched communications with the “problem” of modern social media. If

anything, it’s helping communication. People converse over Facebook, Twitter, and texting and,

since they’ve already gotten all the awkward conversations over without meeting face-to-face,

it’s easier to communicate with one another when in person meetings happen. Social media

keeps you updated on what is going on in everyday life, and communication is easier.

Communicating is easier when you don’t have to talk to a person and suffer through the

awkward tension.

“Effective privacy management can be difficult when interacting on Facebook because

people's networks are diverse and the privacy management practices are often varied for different

people based on the relationships, roles, contexts, and the functions of interactions.” (Child,

Jeffrey T.). The privacy is safe because Facebook is your own personalized experience. People

can choose the privacy that they allow other Facebook users to see.

Works Cited

Belangee, Susan, Marina Bluvshtein, and Daniel Haugen. "Cybersocial Connectedness: A

Survey Of Perceived Benefits And Disadvantages Of Social Media Use." Journal Of

Individual Psychology 71.2 (2015): 123. Academic Search Premier. Web. 18 Nov.

2015.

Clemmitt, M. (2013, January 25). Social media explosion. CQ Researcher, 23, 81-104. Retrieved

.. from http://library.cqexpress.com/.

Thayer, Stacy E., and Sukanya Ray. "Online Communication Preferences Across Age, Gender,

And Duration Of Internet Use." Cyberpsychology & Behavior 9.4 (2006): 432. Academic

Search Premier. Web. 20 Nov. 2015