How Does the Election Effect Your Social Networks?
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If you're Facebook feed is anything like mine, you're currently being hammared with political agenda and opinion. Proclaiming your love or hate for a candidate, party or the entire system used to happen behind closed doors between friends, family and colleagues. Social media has given anyone with a strong opinion a megahorn and the ability to shout at anyone who at somepoint opted into listening.
As someone interested in human behavior I find this fascinating for several reasons. First, is the lack of credibility required to make bold claims. Pre-wide spread social media adoption, having a large audience required adhering to certain standards of quality. Now days, one can broadcast their ideas to hundreds of people in their network without a concern of how factual or well represented said ideas are.
Second, I often wonder how likely people are to have their opinion swayed by others political posts? I see lots of digital arguments but never anyone admitting to being wrong. Are we actually expecting to change peoples opinions? Or are we just looking for fights from those who oppose us and validation from those who agree?
What's your take on how social is used for political opinion? Do you post your views? Do people in your network? Does it influence you? Do you argue when you disagree or just ignore it?
Comments & Feedback
Personally, I do not like to post my political beliefs because I think it is pointless to post it and then inevitably argue with one of my friends who does not agree with my opinion. I think it is mildly entertaining when someone posts something political and then gets into an argument with someone over it, but that is the extent of my participation. From what I've seen, it seems that people post political opinions just so they can argue with others about them. I don't think it's about trying to convince others that they are right; I think people post political opinions to either get positive feedback, or to have an online argument with someone about whose opinions are right.
I agree. I don't understand why people want to publicly argue with people about these topics, especiallywith friends/family on Facebook. I think if you want to debate about political topics just do it in conversation with people. I don't believe that other people want to read you and another person type out paragraphs of facts and data that sway their opinions.
I believe people with a strong political opinion just want their voice and their shared ideals to be heard. Some may be searching to stir the political pot by posting absurd and angry content. This could be a desire to interact with others on social media. People with a strong following are most likely the ones able to sway political opinions. What interests me most is people who are heavily influenced by actors and actresses. Though these people are often brilliant at their craft, they aren't as seasoned in politics as your conventional polititian. Could this be because it is a popular trend to not trust our country's politicians?
In my opinion, I think using social media to express your political opinion is off putting. This could be because of the circumstance of this current presidnetial election has caused me to become exhausted from its redundancy presented on social media. Rarely, I will retweet the occassional twitter post of an article I find to be important or has rational relevence. To be honest, mostly the few politically themed posts on twitter are memes that are geared towards either party, but its nothing harsh. Many people in my network will post their political views and I would love to argue but I prefer to hold back on my engagements. This is because I dont want my opinion on political issues to have an effect on people's opinion of me. As far as being influenced by others, I would still say that I am not influenced by my peers but by role models and I believe that goes for a lot of people.
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This topic is something I had been thinking about myself. While social media can be used for good, such as to inform those who would not otherwise be informed, it is also a dangerous tool because those who are not well educated can post whatever they wish to, with no real backing. While we were told throughout our primary education years that "Wikipedia is not a reliable source and therefore should not be used," people seem to hear "Trump/Hillary lied about x" and soon, even if this statement has no evidence, it spreads like a wildfire. I do not post my views because 1) I do not believe I am well suited or educated enough, and 2) I believe the people in my network will argue with me for being more/less educated, again, with no reasonable evidence.