As a learner, this journey enabled me to develop a sound understanding of the basics of social media and its power. The certificate was very well structured, and I learned that the fair usage of social media could pave the way for the provision of human rights to the oppressed segments of the community. Furthermore, it discovered that contrary to the common belief, social media is not only on par with the mainstream media but there exist sufficient evidence about the incidents where it may even be more powerful than the commercial media that empowers the oppressed sections of the community to be more vocal about their situation to seek international interference in the matter.
Furthermore, throughout the certificate's duration, I participated in several courses, presentations, and events that broadened my academic and intellectual horizons and provided me with a different perspective on the world. CMAP has also enabled me to study and analyze the complex interrelation between media, culture, and politics that would not have been possible without enrolling in this subject. This certificate has not only been an important addition to my academic journey as an International Politics student, but it has also enhanced my understanding of the role of mass communication and social media platforms in their various forms, genres, and formats, as well as how the political, diplomatic, and policy-making processes work in controlling and shaping public opinion. While studying human rights, crisis communication, and the impact of social media on the refugees of the Arab world, Middle East, and the Gulf segment, I realized the brutal reality of the political power and social media bias-ness. I also came across different theories of the media and politics that improved my understanding of the connectedness of these two fields and their dual policies.
Ever since the arrival of the internet, it has completely revolutionized the ways humans connect and communicate; an important invention of the internet is the introduction of SMPs (social media platforms) such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. These platforms are essentially more interacting and engaging forms of conventional chat rooms. Over the years, these applications/platforms have emerged to be a primary source of socializing and communication for the human race around the globe. This is truly fascinating to realize how these platforms have promoted the idea of globalization and blurred down the physical boundaries.
This is a common fact that all of the conventional media houses and news agencies are heavily controlled and regulated by their respective government, which makes it nearly impossible for the general public to communicate with the international community. If described otherwise, with the rapid advancements in telecommunication, social media users have also increased tremendously. Nowadays, social media platforms have become a massive part of the lives of the modern-day generation. They are highly reliant on social media and digital media to seek information regarding national and international events. Traditionally, individuals used to rely on newspapers, governments, or leading organizations to look into current affairs. However, the arrival of the internet and social media platforms has revolutionized the old tried-and-true method, and today, only making information available is not enough for the general public; they utilize these platforms to interact and share their opinions on matters to gain knowledge of the recent events or to spread the information regarding a cause.
In this scenario, the role of social media platforms gains significant importance as most of these applications are owned by the companies belonging to the western and liberal states that encourage freedom of speech. The mass application of these tools was observed during the Arab spring movements when the Egyptian youth stood up against their government to demand their basic civil and human rights and utilized Twitter as a primary source of communication to connect with other people and spread their message. However, the government control media framed these protestors as anti-state groups and promoted state-run propaganda against them. But their utilization of the SMPs allowed them to suppress the state propaganda and they were successful in that the movement quickly spread to the entire Arabian Peninsula, resulting in mass protests forcing the government to shut down. This single incident showcases how powerful the effective utilization of media can be.
The well-structured course of the CAMP (Certificate in Media and Politics) has also increased my ability to observe and analyze the dual political and social media policies and made me aware of the brutal realities of today's contemporary world. As mentioned earlier, social media serves as the primary source of information for the majority of an international audience to attain insights into global events. Therefore, it would be safe to assume that social media platforms play a vital role in shaping individuals' views about an event, place, or country. Indeed, the global media network has enabled us to track political campaigns, protests, and events from around the world. The events vary from elections to surveying revolutions and insurgencies, human rights violations, the evolution of laws and legislation, warfare, etc. Therefore, it can be concluded that it is not viable to study a modern political event or social event without taking into account the role of the media as a central or intervening factor in that event. Nevertheless, it all comes at some costs.
Vast evidence of the existing literature in the domains of mass communication and political influence demonstrates that political policies have a great influence on social media trends. The social media revolution has highly affected and will continue to impact mass communication, journalism, and news reporting. Despite the connectedness and an easy mode of communication, social media platform have gone from the liberation of technology, freedom of speech, to a tool of oppression, and authoritarianism in the world that can be observed in the recent conflict of Palestine and Israel in the response to the movement of the Palestinian Sheikh Jarrah.
As mentioned earlier, everything associated with social media comes at an added cost of privacy and political agendas. For instance, this series of incidents at Sheikh Jarrah, Palestine, suggests that social media is biased, and despite being a global advocate of freedom of speech and human rights, the censorship policies of these policies may be biased and fueled by the political agendas of their owner organizations. For example, Instagram is a part of Meta (formally known as Facebook) that owns many social media applications and chat rooms i.e., Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook Business. Mark Zuckerberg, the owner, is a Jew, and he has expressed his solidarity with Zionist movements (modern-day Israel) on more than one occasion.
The ongoing situation between Palestine and Israel; Palestine is a long-standing issue in the United Nations, and no efforts have been made to resolve it, which has given birth to consistent unrest between the nations. In a recent series of clashes between Israeli occupying forces and Palestinian freedom fighters. On April 13, 2020, when the Palestinian Muslims were celebrating their first day of the holy Ramadan, the Israeli troops unethically invaded and attacked the Mosque Al-Aqsa. To display their power, the Israeli forces oppressed the Palestinian Muslims by using force and fenced the grounds of the masque to ban the entrance of the Muslims in the mosque.
Nevertheless, the complexity of the situation increased when Palestinians started to protest in East Jerusalem over an anticipated decision of the Supreme Court of Israel over the eviction of six Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah. Initially, this particular decision was being delayed by the Israeli supreme courts; however, the high court of Israel ruled the decision in favor of Israel and ordered the evictions of the residents of the Sheikh Jarrah in May 2020. Therefore, to claim their rights, individuals of Jerusalem protested against the eviction and residence in Sheikh Jarrah and started a movement against the ruling across the country.
To control the situation, the Israeli police started deploying force against protesters for the freedom to stop strikes. On May 7, the Israeli forces began to utilize heavy artillery and rocket fires, stun grenades, rubber bullets, and water cannons in clashes with the Palestinian protestors which left more than a hundred Palestinians wounded while several lost their lives and increased the ongoing stiffnesses between the countries. Sighting the situation, several social activists and the general public of Palestine started to raise their voices through social media platforms to spread the news of the violence of the Israeli forces and to plead the United Nations and the superpowers to use their resources to protect their human rights.
It is important to note that since 2016, the social media platform has oppressed the pro-Palestine movement, and during the recent breakout, mounting evidence of the social media discrimination and operation displays the prejudice and biases of Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Furthermore, a media blackout was observed by the Palestinian people, which forced them to rely on social media, most prominently, Instagram. However, the social media platforms banned the activities that supported the Palestinian cause, instead, these platforms supported posts/updates that favored Israel's stance. If described otherwise, the social media applications became a central point for individuals across the globe to get updates about the events and protests and advocate for the human rights of the Palestinian and asked the world powers to intervene to control the situation. The people of Palestine had to experience disappointment like nearly all the social media platforms and websites censored the news, hashtags, and images related to Palestine. Nevertheless, the arrest of Mona and Mohammad El-Kurd, Palestinian activists, also brought the world's attention to the case.
As Israel was suffering heavy losses, therefore, in response to the situation, Facebook covertly started the “ In Pray for Jerusalem” campaign while actively censoring the updates/users’ posts expressing solidarity with the Palestinian cause. The aforementioned campaign triggered a serious response from the Facebook users; however, the administration of these applications refused to turn down their campaign; instead, they used diplomatic techniques to hide their biases and stated that the videos, hashtags, and the ban of the accounts was purely the result of a widespread global technical glitch that affected the whole social media platform and they were trying to update their social media application.
Furthermore, they also stated that the posts were banned because they were against the community policies of the Meta group, however, the critics argue that the Palestinian movement only raised a voice for freedom and their movement did not directly impact anyone which makes the stance of Meta group invalid. Besides, users of Facebook and Instagram have also criticized their vague stance and suggested that the reaction of Facebook and Instagram is against their moto as the key idea behind the existence of the social media is to provide freedom of speech to every individual regardless of their ethnicity, color, or creed.
The above-mentioned incident serves as a classic example of political and ideological bias that runs deep down the policies of these platforms. Before I took this certificate and before choosing this to be my topic of research, I could never have been able to critically examine and analyze their bold hypocrisy while believing their vastly publicized narrative of freedom of speech. It is important to note that a vast majority of social media users are unaware of the previously stated political and ideological bias and they usually don’t cross-check the information that they read on social media with other sources that allow SMPs to possess the power of shaping the public opinion.
All in all, by efficiently attaining the objective of CMAP and by effectively utilizing the methodologies, frameworks, mass communication theories, and academic outlines in the real life, I am confident and self-assured that the knowledge that I gained from this particular program will continue to help me analyze and understand the complex relationship and interactions between media, culture, and politics. Moreover, this journey has empowered me to think more rationally while making a decision instead of letting social media brainwash me into heaving a false opinion.
References
Alaref, J., Awwad, J., Araujo, E., Lemiere, C., Hillis, S., & Özaltin, E. (2017). To Ban or Not to Ban? Regulating Dual Practice in Palestine. Health Systems & Reform, 3(1), 42-55. https://doi.org/10.1080/23288604.2016.1272980
Allen, S., & Vincent, T. (2010). Bombing to Bargain?. Foreign Policy Analysis, 7(1), 1-26. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1743-8594.2010.00120.x
Watson, R. (2017). Affective radicality: prisons, Palestine, and interactive documentary. Feminist Media Studies, 17(4), 600-615. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2017.1326560