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Has social media made people worse or have they already been this bad?


Sophia
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I used to think social media made people worse but I think all's it has done is given a platform to people who shouldn't have one. It shined a spotlight on humanities biggest problems when it comes to human logic, fears, narcissistic tendencies, and ignorance. 

What do you think? Kind of a chicken or egg scenario in a way. 

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I think the anonymity of the internet has made things worse. It is not just social media we can go all the way back to the usenet forums. When there is no recourse for your actions people typically will do really strange things. 

People hide behind their avatars now most of the time and do not represent their real self because their real self would never behave that way. When you can say whatever you want and have zero impact on your social status or what people think of you as person because they have no clue who said what they said then people will say some really screwed up stuff. 

I really feel even face to face discourse has gone down hill over the years. I have a lot of conservative view points and I believe we need to be able to take care of ourselves before helping others. I preach that to my kids and to the country. 

I used to be able to have conversations with people with opposing views and gather an understanding of where they were coming from. As time has gone on that conversation is fading away.

I want to discuss and I want to understand but it just feels like people do not want to have the conversation anymore. They rather just call you a name or call you racist. Or tell me I do not care about society. All of which are untrue statements. I know I care. I am a job creator. I give back to the community that supports me. 

People just need to remember how to have a conversation again and stop being so extreme. 

 It's like just because I or my family is not vaccinated does not mean we are anti vaccine. All our kids have their vaccinations they needed to go to school. We just have been infected with the disease already and we feel fine with the antibodies. People are free to do what they want to do. When getting into conversation about this I typically hear that we don't care about society, just another crazy anti-vaccine people which is quite extreme if they would take a moment to understand our choice. 

I live in the United States so I can have choice. I will never take an action because someone else wants me to. I make my choices and live with the consequences of my choices. 

I just do not understand how its starting to feel like mob rule. Well if you watch the media you feel that way. If you just live life without ever hoping on social media or watching the news its extremely normal. 

People just need to go back to having conversations and learning to compromise. There is to much confirmation bias going on with technology choosing what we get to see and what we are exposed to. 

This I must say is going to be an extremely interesting time in history and I wonder what will will be said when we are studying these events in a couple of decades. 

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21 hours ago, Sophia said:

I used to think social media made people worse but I think all's it has done is given a platform to people who shouldn't have one. It shined a spotlight on humanities biggest problems when it comes to human logic, fears, narcissistic tendencies, and ignorance. 

What do you think? Kind of a chicken or egg scenario in a way. 

Well, social media has just brought to the fore some characteristics that people were hiding pre-social media. But again, we should not blame the social media because it depends on how someone uses it. Some people are using it to do good, or just to promote their business. 

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On 8/26/2021 at 2:30 PM, James said:

I think the anonymity of the internet has made things worse. It is not just social media we can go all the way back to the usenet forums. When there is no recourse for your actions people typically will do really strange things. 

People hide behind their avatars now most of the time and do not represent their real self because their real self would never behave that way. When you can say whatever you want and have zero impact on your social status or what people think of you as person because they have no clue who said what they said then people will say some really screwed up stuff. 

I really feel even face to face discourse has gone down hill over the years. I have a lot of conservative view points and I believe we need to be able to take care of ourselves before helping others. I preach that to my kids and to the country. 

I used to be able to have conversations with people with opposing views and gather an understanding of where they were coming from. As time has gone on that conversation is fading away.

I want to discuss and I want to understand but it just feels like people do not want to have the conversation anymore. They rather just call you a name or call you racist. Or tell me I do not care about society. All of which are untrue statements. I know I care. I am a job creator. I give back to the community that supports me. 

People just need to remember how to have a conversation again and stop being so extreme. 

 It's like just because I or my family is not vaccinated does not mean we are anti vaccine. All our kids have their vaccinations they needed to go to school. We just have been infected with the disease already and we feel fine with the antibodies. People are free to do what they want to do. When getting into conversation about this I typically hear that we don't care about society, just another crazy anti-vaccine people which is quite extreme if they would take a moment to understand our choice. 

I live in the United States so I can have choice. I will never take an action because someone else wants me to. I make my choices and live with the consequences of my choices. 

I just do not understand how its starting to feel like mob rule. Well if you watch the media you feel that way. If you just live life without ever hoping on social media or watching the news its extremely normal. 

People just need to go back to having conversations and learning to compromise. There is to much confirmation bias going on with technology choosing what we get to see and what we are exposed to. 

This I must say is going to be an extremely interesting time in history and I wonder what will will be said when we are studying these events in a couple of decades. 

Have you seen what is happening in the UK? I have family and friends there. They will legit come to your house, the police, and possibly arrest you for saying something they consider to be a hate crime on social media. So if you say something mean or negative about any woman, black person, gay/trans, Muslim, etc. you risk someone reporting you to the police and them taking away your computer for investigation. That is absolutely insane to me. Bad things get said all the time, on and offline but you shouldn't be arresting people over words! This is worse than a religious cult!

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2 hours ago, Sophia said:

Have you seen what is happening in the UK? I have family and friends there. They will legit come to your house, the police, and possibly arrest you for saying something they consider to be a hate crime on social media. So if you say something mean or negative about any woman, black person, gay/trans, Muslim, etc. you risk someone reporting you to the police and them taking away your computer for investigation. That is absolutely insane to me. Bad things get said all the time, on and offline but you shouldn't be arresting people over words! This is worse than a religious cult!

That is out of this world. I understand we should all be nice to other humans but there are some things we should be able to say without them sending law enforcement after people. 

I still remember being in elementary school so many years ago now. Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me. 

What happened to people being able to listen to each other and disagree on things. As society we will never agree on everything but the solution is not to go arrest people that are disagreeing with the majority... That is a scary world 😕

 

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I think it's just become easier for people to give their piece, but usually it doesn't always go with what most of the crowd would agree with. Social media is so popular because people are free to say nearly whatever they want. Of course, social media has tried to combat this, but usually it means they just make it easier to mute and block people, which is nice. 

Anonymity is a big one like James said, mainly because it allows for people to use an alias and say whatever they want. That's also the beauty in the internet, in that you can be private online and not show your real face. But you also shouldn't use your anonymity to be a jerk either. 

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I think social media just made it easier for the bad people to come out. So many trolls exist online these days, but the past in chat rooms was just as bad, so many bad characters out there. I'm just glad these days, you can mute the annoying jerks online. I just block everyone who comes at me or offends me. Complaining or arguing does nothing but cause anxiety, so no thank you. 

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On 9/2/2021 at 5:49 PM, James said:

That is out of this world. I understand we should all be nice to other humans but there are some things we should be able to say without them sending law enforcement after people. 

I still remember being in elementary school so many years ago now. Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me. 

What happened to people being able to listen to each other and disagree on things. As society we will never agree on everything but the solution is not to go arrest people that are disagreeing with the majority... That is a scary world 😕

 

It is a scary thought. It is something straight out of 1984 (if you are familiar with the book) and the fact that people are praising this is puzzling. This is heading in the direction of a totalitarian run country. I would hate to see the UK become such a place. 

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