Social Wellbeing Module

Question #1
• In today’s society, social media has become a void of hatred with the rise of “cancel-culture”. Sites like Twitter and Facebook allow users to filter their feeds with like-minded ideals, and when someone’s comment becomes a misconstrued trending topic, people are incredibly quick to attack and judge into oblivion. People are able to feed into the negativity and drag others down from the comfort and safety of their screens. Discourse no longer exists because people can easily log off, block or report people who have conflicting opinions. I do think social media has become a platform for shaming because the lack of physical interaction and the inability to debate topics, flesh out ideas and clarify our actions/comments. Through the screen we lose tone, inflection, and emotion behind the text, so thoughts shared online are constantly misinterpreted.
Question #2
• Social media does allow us to share internationally issues and topics that are important to us. We are able to share around the world views and stories that call for justice. Without social media, movements and events like the Black Lives Matter Movement, the “Me Too” movement, Feminist movement, LGBTQ movement, and March for Our Lives would not have gained the traction they have in the past decade. Social media allows us to unify communities across the globe for a cause and the power of social media has led to strides towards change. Additionally, social media allows us access to knowledge about anything and everything to help shape our views, and values. We are able to better educate ourselves to better our society and world.
Question #3
• I think “nice people like us” is objective. Someone who I may deem as nice might not seem nice to someone else. I think people who share similar opinions, beliefs and morals find each other “right”, “nice”, ect. I think there always will be an “us vs. them” mentality on social media, because as a society we do tend to lift others up by putting someone else down. There always is a good force and an evil one, always a right side and a wrong side. It all depends on whose side you are on.