Social Media: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Truth
As the years have passed by, social media has become more efficient and prominent throughout society. It is used for entertainment, for day-to-day living, communication, inspiration, art, etc. The more we use social media, the more we rely upon it in our daily lives. The biggest concern about social media is the positive and negative ways it affects society. In the following paragraphs, I will explain the positive effects, the negative effects, and my own opinion about social media.
Social interaction, communication, and making friends are just a few of the positive effects social media has had on society. Social media helps people from all over the world to socialize and communicate with one another. This communication leads to meeting new people, learning about different cultures, and making friends. Another positive effect of social media is that your confidence can be uplifted, due to the fact that you are able to communicate without being judged on your appearance and what you may or may not have. Likewise, information that needs to be sent or shown to someone else is easily transferred rather than using mail that might take longer than expected.
The negative effects that social media has had on society is substantial. A few negative effects of social media are cyber bullying, invasion of privacy, and sexual predators. Cyber bullying is when two people that may or may not have liked each other, began to threaten each other over the internet. The results of cyber bullying have lead to suicides, murders, fights, and injuries. An invasion of privacy is when you put too much information on the internet and someone is able to steal or observe your information, leading to stolen identity or harassment. Sexual predators use social media to make fake pages in order to seduce their prey. Another negative effect is time consumption. Social media causes someone to spend more time on their website rather than finishing homework or doing chores.
Overall, my opinion of social media is that is has had a negative effect on social media. I chose to pick this because there are more negative impacts rather than positive impacts. The negative impacts that social media has had can change someone’s life from the cyber bullying to the sexual predators. These impacts can result in death, lying, depression, suicides, etc. On the other hand, the positive impacts are of social interaction and making friends. These impacts can lead to a positive outlook on life and better communication skills. In other words, the negative impacts should be considered more serious and should be handled accordingly.
In conclusion, social media has spread throughout the world in an efficient and prominent manner. It is used for communication, cyber bullying, sexual predators, making friends, etc. The biggest concern of society today is whether or not social media has affected us in a positive manner or negative manner. In my opinion, social media is used in more of a negative manner more than a positive manner. I chose this answer due to the fact that there are more negative effects than positive effects that social media has had on society.
Comments
I think one should know how to use social media correctly and not to the extend that real life communication would be ignored. I use fb for example only to communicate with my relatives and friends around the world and for backlinking my articles. Enjoy your Sunday!
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@The Examiner-1 Hey, thanks for sharing this information with others and for leaving behind positive feedback.
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@GiftsByDiana thanks for agreeing with me and that they take up too much time and you are correct in saying that social media is a great way to communicate.
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thanks for reading my article and for leaving behind positive feedback.
Excellent article here torrilynn, HubPages is a form of social media. Thank you for sharing. May we all be good friends to each other and spread love in our very own way!
We need them if we have a business and they are great to talk to friends all over the world, but yes sometimes they take up too much time and some folks post TMI - LOL
I found your site very interesting to read Torri. I am on a couple of social media sites and I use as little info as possible. I voted it up, shared, pinned and Tweeted it.
Kevin
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@susansisk I agree with you and feel that the old fashion way of doing things will soon disappear altogether due to technology and Im glad you agree with the points that I've made
I agree. We are all hooked on social media, and use it daily, but there are many negatives. One of the biggest negatives for me is that it gets to the point where nothing is real. I miss real letters, postcards, and phone calls.
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@DeborahNeyens this is true people are more brave now behind a computer than what they would be in front of the persons face
Good discussion here. I think social media has contributed to the rise of incivility because people feel like they are insulated behind their computer screens. They will say rude, awful things that they never would say to someone in person.
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@InsightfulTiger thanks for you feedback and I understand your overall perspective of social. I chose that is was more negative due to the consequences being more extreme than the positive benefits.
I'm sorry I think I misunderstood the conclusion. While I agree with you that there are both positive and negative effects. I feel like the positive outweighs the negative. But then again, I have never dealt with cyber bullying. I agree with Duchess and you that we need classes that teach people how to use social networking and the internet. Before watching the movie cyberbully, I remember thinking why don't people just ignore negative comments or block/delete them? Now I know it's harder when you have deal with the effects in the real world and sometimes people don't even know how to block the negativity or report it and ask for help. Although, I personally don't think the impact is negative, I can see how it has been for many people. Still thank you for the hub, it is an important discussion that is pertinent to our here and now.
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@InsightfulTiger you are more than welcome thanks for the positive feedback and for feeling the same way as i do about social media
I agree with your conclusions the positive effects of Social networking far out way the negative. I love being able to collaborate with like minded individuals. I think that the benefit of information sharing is truly amazing. Thanks for sharing!
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@Shelley thanks for the positive feedback and I'm glad that you agree with me
A lot of important points are brought to the fore here, and I largely agree with your points. Some of the fun has also gone out of our friendly relationships as when we meet for coffee, we already know what the friend has been up to, and the expectation of listening to the latest is lost. The keeping up to date with news, events etc is always good though and I enjoy that very much. Up, interesting and useful.
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@DuchessO'Blunt i agree as well that there should be classes on how to properly use the internet thanks for the feedback
Interesting perspectives here. I think perhaps it is not just social media, but the internet at large that has created some of these issues. That, plus the fact that we were not really equipped to know how to deal with it all because we did not know all the ins and outs of how it worked, or would work.
Now that we have a better understanding of the difficulties that can arise from so much virtual interaction, perhaps we should be teaching these things at home and at school. As well as how to cope, and how to deal with it all.
Just my thoughts.
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@vishnujoshi001 you are more than welcome and i was more than happy to provide this information to you and others
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@BesaksTriviaStop I agree with you and feel that social media will be never ending and will always change due to the demand and wants of the people getting bored and wanting something new
I do not think social media will ever go away.....it will just keep evolving very rapidly...who knows what will be the next big thing....but I bet in 10 years....there will be a new Facebook and a new Twitter.....and will be the current Facebook/Twitter seem behind the times.
I enjoyed reading your hub and causes me to think....job well done.
Voted up and across the board.
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@teaches12345 thanks and yeah if kids are taught what to avoid and how to maintain responsibility of using social media then maybe that can result in fewer negative consequences from happening
The balance between good and base usage is still undecided, but I do believe it is addictive which is not a good thing. Social media can be a good thing, but I believe some people should be educated on proper usage in order to prevent harm to others (and themselves!). Good food for thought, Torrilynn.
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@SheriFaye i believe some people do get lonely and use social media as an outlet
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@unknownspy yeah I feel that we have to be very careful about using social media to communicate with others and actually to just meet only people in person instead of online. Most people these days are not who they say they are. Therefore, the show "Catfish" was created.
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@RTalloni i agree with you that some crimes go unreported because the people are embarrassed and i get that . Im sure they would get negative feedback by falling pray to something online and not using their brains to think through the pros and cons of social media.
You highlight some important points here. Some say that the amount of violent crime as well as other harm done to people via social media is underreported due to the fact that victims are embarrassed that they opened themselves up to the crimes by revealing too much about themselves to too many people and by interacting with people that they thought were telling them the truth.
i agree with you Torri that social media when used wrongly can have such disastrous effect. Heard of people killed or raped because they abused what these social media can give to them.. we just have to be very careful.
Interesting hub. I sometimes wonder if people get lonely using social media instead of real life connections. Thanks for this.
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@dwachira
Thanks for enjoying my hub
and giving me feedback about
social media.
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@JoanCA
Thanks for your feedback and i agree with you that it is a gateway for people that do have problems to prey on others that are generally trying to make friends with people online. I still feel though that the overall impact of social media is negative due to the cons outweighing the pros and the negative consequences being more severe.
I think the biggest problems are time consumption and the amount of troubled people who use social media, forums and even comments on articles to bully and harass. That's why I'm wary of social media. But it definitely is a way for people to develop strong friendships with others around the world. So, I have mixed feelings overall.
Hi torrilynn,
We have just witnessed the power of social media, toppling dictatorial governments and instilling government reforms. Personally i think social media has a big role to play in the society. Voted up, useful and shared.
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@shin_rocka04 thanks for sharing and the positive feedback that you have given. it is quite sad that technology has taken over and instead of a simple conversation people would rather text instead.
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@prospectboy
Thanks for the positive feedback and understanding of how technology plays a crucial role in our lives whether it reaps good or bad effects.
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@Express10 thanks and i appreciate the fact that your old fashion i would rather meet in person as well i feel that technology has gone too far into making face to face communication less popular in order to make more and more money.
I agree. It's sad to say but I know people of all ages that use FB, Twitter, Instagram to lie about how their lives actually are, to bully others, or as just one of many routes of cheating on their significant others or spouses. When "found out" these same people either go private or delete the account for a while. I like talking on the phone or in person, everything can't be expressed from behind a computer screen or mobile phone keyboard/keypad. I am just "old fashioned."
Nice and thoughtful article you've written regarding social social. Somewhat reminds me of a previous article I wrote about Facebook awhile back. I agree with you on many of the points you made. Social media has definitely taken over a majority of the people's lives. For a lot of people, it's become the primary way of communication, which is good in some aspects, but it can also be a bad thing. Great article and great perspective. Voted up, and shared.
I definitely agree with Billybuc on how social media is starting to take the real life human factor or the simply conversing on the phone aspect of life out of the equation. I'm all for change and evolution in technology, but it does not beat real life human interaction or a personal phone call. Sharing and voting up.
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@GailMeyers i agree with you 100 percent about the pictures kids post thinking employers cant see them but they actually can. Social media is starting to take over slowly but surely
You make some important points, torrilynn. I do not know if the average person realizes employers, opposing counsel in many lawsuits, etc., can and do search social media. So those pictures on someone's profile at a party having a great time and obviously drunk or the person who brags about something they did, etc., can and often do end up where they least expect them to.
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@billybuc i feel the absolute same way as you do in the fact that social media has taken over the way that we communicate and start off relationships. It is quite pathetic but i can only see this getting worse instead of better due to the constant advancement of technology.
Interesting conclusions and I tend to agree with you. One thing I see with social media is that it has taken the place of true communication, and lessened the value of relationships. It is a surface type of relationship with no depth, and I find that sad.
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