Stop Kony

It's All Politics Part Deux

I spoke before about how Social Media can cause us to disconnect from face-to-face socialization and how it can cause widespread protests. Social media can play a good hand in most aspects of society and that especially of politics. Think throughout the years about how much of a role social media plays in elections and see just what I mean.

Facebook played a huge role for the 2008 elections and especially for me with that being my first time voting in the elections. During that campaign I had the honor of being in Times Square to see a multitude of celebrities in the “Barack The Vote” shirts and their signs and such. Sure this is not social media but those shirts played a big role on Facebook and the dying days of Myspace.

You could not avoid the constant status updates that read “Barack The Vote” or sometimes the ever so ignorant, “My President is Black and my Lambo is blue” based off of a song by Young Jeezy at that time. If any candidate wanted a good lead they would need to target my age group and of course elders the only two groups that vote at large.

Social media allowed many people to come up with catchy sayings and spread it fast such like Obama’s HOPE picture that eventually started a new trend with my peers. Obama became relatable and soon well identified by my peers especially when he spoke amongst college students. Soon as one word about changing the interest rates of student loans leaked out it soon spread fast throughout all social mediums making its way to us who wish nothing more but to be rid of student loans for the future.

Now in current elections, we find ourselves much more involved in politics. I steadily follow the Republican Primaries trying to see if we do have a good opponent to go up against Obama himself. I have seen some of my peers talk about voting republic now (even those who were strong democrats in the 2008 elections). With twitter we can get access to information from all sides faster than we could facebook with just a click of a retweet button.  

In the next election, I’m sure social media will have a larger role and play in our politics. I’m pretty sure larger scale of propaganda will find its way on twitter. Let’s see how the 2016 elections make that all happen.

It's All Politics

Occupy These...

You've heard about it. We've all pretty much heard about it. Occupy Wall Street Movement. I was oblivious at first until one day on twitter. I follow a few celebrities not many but one in particular was filling my timeline with the trend #OccupyWallStreet by none other but my favorite hip hop artist Lupe Fiasco. So, being the fan that I am clicked the hashtag thinking it to be a new mixtape or project he was working on. To my surprise I saw a movement growing from people all over the United States.

Lupe stated, “I plan on supporting the #Occupy movement from now forward in whatever capacity I can,” he said. “In the short term I plan on giving my total focus to both #OccupyChicago and #OccupyLA but I am making myself available to any and all #Occupy movements no matter the size or circumstance. I hope the #Occupy movement becomes institutional and a permanent fixture of the social and political landscape of America. God willing.” His strong passion for this movement has spread to his fan base as well as through social networking sites. 

Occupy Wall Street is a movement or better yet a protest in opposition of banks and wall street, who they blame for economic recessions of now and the past, as well as against the 1% who make the laws which benefit themselves yet hurt the remaining 99%. The movement itself spread fast with the help of social networking sites. Without these sites or outlets the movement wouldn't have spread as fast as it did. With twitter we seem to be a lot closer to those involved especially celebrities with a high level of influence with our generation (who most of the occupiers are). Could the Occupy Movement be an eye opener for the government? I'm pretty sure right now there is some higher up in government trying to pass another bill to stop social networking or at least control (Hello SOPA!)

The Occupiers have showed the United States and the world just how strong of a potential social media has and the power it has as well. Imagine a possible larger revolution caused by social media. Hopefully we will never have to go to those extremes but now spreading the word allows it all to take place quicker than before. Who knows what the future lies. Will Big Brother be watching?

Extra! Extra! Tweet All About It!

It was a regular old Tuesday on campus. Nothing particular. I found myself rushing much more than normal in between classes when I was stopped by someone who seemed to recognize me more than I could them. "I know you from somewhere!" they told me excited and looked a bit confused. Then a light bulb came to that person, "You're ashersz!" I smiled finally realizing who it was, "I follow you on twitter. It's me *******!" Just like that my Twitter name became my other identity. 

If any person looks on my profile they can see I have 60,000 tweets with 903 followers, which plainly states that I tweet a lot. Which is more than true. I tweet my thoughts no matter how random or foolish they may be. I tweet what I see from something as beautiful as a rose to something atrocious as a too tight bikini on a rather obese woman. Twitter became my "diary". I don't pour my heart out to twitter especially not with 903 people reading my tweets but I sure do share things of interest to me and the masses that I encounter.

Has twitter made me more social or has this social networking site done the opposite? I have made a lot of new acquaintance thanks to twitter as well as new friends. Even now there are a vast amount of people on twitter tweeting about spring break rather than putting their phones down to enjoy it. We have been so consumed by our social networking site that we lost what it meant to truly be social. What will life be like 10 years from now?

Social Media is so accessible that we can access it virtually anywhere. We disconnect from reality only to connect to these mediums. I'm not saying social media or networking is bad, far from that, I'm simply stating how times have caused us to communicate differently. Social networking is fine in moderation but to live your life through these means is too much and will make society lose what it is to really communicate with one another. Even today most of the news I hear about is through twitter whether it be national news or just random celebrity gossip. 

How much do you tweet a day? What do you tweet about? Who do you follow? When you factor all these things in you start to realize how this new found social networking tool is vastly growing and how it has impacted our generation and society all together.