In recent months I have seen much less of the behavior that inspired this editorial, but I have still seen some. The issue at hand is that during this past presidential election, many people took their politics to social media. While this is absolutely fine — in fact I think that it is generally better than apathy — it prompted many people to make statements along the lines of, “If you support Trump, unfriend me,” and vice versa with Clinton. I am not going to tell you that you are not allowed to make these kind of statements. However, I do believe that this causes a much more damaging effect to society than simply losing some friends on social media.
Social media already uses algorithms to feed us what we want to see. For example, if you pause on a certain post, Facebook is that much more likely to show you posts by the same person.
This is very helpful in terms of making social media users happy, but means that we get a limited view of the world. This would not matter without the additional factor that the majority of my generation receives most, if not all, of our news from social media. Therefore, with the posts that we see being comprised solely of posts that we enjoy, or from people with like-minded views, we do not see entire sectors of the population.
This issue expands beyond social media as well. While it begins with a simple unfriending of someone supporting a Republican or a Democrat, it becomes a hatred for people who think differently from you. It also instills in us the idea that we can simply ignore people with opposing views and they will cease to exist. This is the most dangerous aspect of this new phenomenon because it means that there is no open discourse about big issues.
For instance, during the past several weeks the gun debate has reared its ugly head on social media once more. I, for one, have only seen posts arguing for stricter gun control. While this makes me happy to see that people I know agree with my viewpoints, it means that there is no discussion and no changing of opinions.
If nothing else, I would like one takeaway from this article to be that this country is incredibly divided, and it does not have to be. Just because someone believes differently from you does not mean that they are wrong. Discussing the problem with them is far more likely to lead to compromise and growth. There will always be people who disagree with you and it is far better to know how to have a pleasant discussion with them than to ignore and hate them on principle.
