Social Media Shipwreck
“The invention of the ship is also the invention of the shipwreck”
The net value of social media has been heavy on my mind this week. Amongst a slew of free speech debates, platform’s rights to fact check Donald Trump’s tweets, and today’s statement from Mark Zuckerberg that “… Facebook shouldn’t be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online”—my finger has hovered over the DELETE ACCOUNT button on Twitter a few times (I’ve gladly been Facebook-free for over a year now and have not once regretted it).
In spite of what I believe to be a well-curated feed, my stream is constantly full of things that crush my spirit, stifle my belief in humanity, and out and out leave me with a pit in my stomach.
I believe I have a responsibility to be an engaged citizen and be current with what is going on in the world—but what do we do when (seemingly) everything that’s going on is soul-crushing? I don’t want to turn a blind eye to reality just because it is not what I wished it was. I don’t want to tune things out because things aren’t directly affecting me (the most privileged demographic in the world—White Heterosexual Male). I don’t want to be idle…but I’m tired of inviting toxicity into my life.
I just don’t know…
The internet and social media have done amazing things for the world. There is still so much potential. There is good out there even though it seems incredibly hard to find.
