In Defense of Social Media

Go ahead and sling tomatoes at me, but I gotta say: social media is awesome.

I have trouble when people say, "ugh, social media is the worst."  To be sure, I don't believe in a completely unfettered marketplace in which social media platforms absolve themselves of responsibility, just like a store is culpable if it doesn't think through that some of the things it stocks on its shelves may be offensive enough to customers as to warrant not selling them.  I also know that cyber-bullying is real, and just like with bullies in real life, we have to stand up and say no.

But, a free society depends on us erring on the side of allowing lots of opinions and ideas and content.  Just ask your friends in China, or who are from China and now here in the US, whether it's better to have too much or too little freedom of expression.

Ultimately, social media is just an amplification of the slice of humanity we choose to be exposed to.  It's our free choice to curate that slice however we wish.  It's our free choice to decide, within that slice, what material we choose to consume.  And it's our free choice to decide, having consumed that content, whether we will believe it or otherwise let it affect our opinions and moods.

I will grant you that, by privilege as well as by temperament, I am well suited to be discriminating about content consumption.  I have the discipline to not go down a social media rabbit hole every night.  Materialism, body image, and "keeping up with the Joneses" just aren't things I struggle with.  I'm smart enough and skeptical enough to not automatically believe everything I read.  I don't mind and in fact enjoy hearing about differing opinions.  And I'm able to let negative material slide without taking it personally or otherwise letting it throw me off my game.  

That said, I do think it's on us to decide if and how we are going to use social media.  I love what it does for me, and only wish for more time in the day to interact with it.  News, memes, updates on friends, all at a click of a button or a swipe of a finger?  Sign me up every day and twice on Sunday.  

As for the worst of social media?  Opt out.  Or opt in and laugh at it.  Or let it be a prod for some self-reflection about what emotions or insecurities you need to deal with and not blame social media for.  This holiday season, let's commit to marveling at our friends' vacation photos and holiday decorations without a twinge of jealousy.  Let's consume some content that we agree with and some we disagree with, but let's always come away more informed of where we are and more understanding of others.  And let's unplug altogether for long stretches when we need to.  (But not too long...those cat videos aren't going to watch themselves!)