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Blog Post 1
Truth Beneath the Cakes
Representations on Social Media
It’s becoming absurd how often I ask myself lately if what I’m seeing is real or true. There was this viral video on social media of cakes disguising as anything under the sun. You thought it was a fruit, a bag, or even a wall at first sight and then there goes the knife slicing through the object, confirming that it is, indeed, a cake. I binge-watched these videos on Youtube that it came to a point where I asked myself, “Am I a cake?”.
Social media has been part of my everyday life for a while now. In fact, the platforms that are distinct on it have effectively ‘colonized’ several aspects of my life. I could say that my social media experience is shaped by my discernment and consequently, inculcation of the media contents I am exposed to. Relationally, I can see how realness, or more accurately, the variations of ‘real’ is the central theme which feeds the indomitability of this new media. I see these online posts and oftentimes, I find myself asking if they were true; if what the people involved in it depict the real thing. The game metaphor Erving Goffman proposed can nearly be a cliff-notes explanation of the environment in social media. It’s the same reason why Snapchat/Instagram filters and Photoshop are a thing. Social media feature publicly visible personae, tools for reward and appraisal, and multiple clear indicators to gauge the impression made on others (Boy & Uitermark, 2021). This further proves the relevance of Goffman’s propositions which emphasize impression management and self-presentation in interactions.
It is ironic, however, when people want to present an ideal yet incomplete version of themselves while demanding accurate media representations of reality. Well, I’m one of those people. I’d like to think that even though social media is quite influential in the formation of my various inclinations, I always have agency and control on this very influence. But every time I want to post photos and statements on my social media accounts, I feel anxious before posting it. I have to review or edit them again and again. Honestly, I think this behavior of mine is rooted in the fact that I wanted to present a persona that has the right looks and the right words---the right online presence. Through what I display on social media, I want to be acceptable and be impressive while being seen as genuine by others.
All representations represent the social world in ways that are both incomplete and narrow.
In the modern social world where complexity and ambiguity is the name of the game, representations do not serve as reality, indeed. As what Croteau and Hoynes (2019) said, representations are the result of processes of selection that invariably mean that certain aspects of reality are highlighted and others neglected. Even though we often use the “realness” of the images as a basis for evaluating whether we like or dislike particular representations, all representations represent the social world in ways that are both incomplete and narrow (Croteau & Hoynes, 2019).
These assessments and consequences would then make you wonder. Do we not value what’s real anymore? How do we prevent these media representations from creating further misconceptions and conflicts? At the end of the day, I don’t think we want to be handed an apple to find out that it’s a cake.
References
Boy, J. D. and Uitermark, J. (2021). The dramaturgy of social media: Platform ecology, uneven networks, and the myth of the self. In H. David and S. Fisher-Hoyrem (eds). Social Media and Social Order. De Gruyter Poland Ltd.
Croteau, D., & Hoynes, W. (2019). Social Inequality and Media Representation. In Media/Society: Technology, industries, content, and users. essay, SAGE.
Blog Post 2
nerds, they run the world
nerds, they run the world
The wealthiest and arguably most influential companies in the world are the technology companies. But before acquiring these titles, these were startups envisioned by the brilliant minds—well, by the nerds. Look at the richest people in the world. Larry Page, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, and Jeff Bezos are some of the bonafide ‘nerd’ tycoons, the tech giants. These people revolutionize the world through developing and innovating cutting edge technologies. In turn, the media landscape is constantly altered as well as the vital parts of the users’ lives.
The social world has never been the same since the invention of Facebook. Today, the social media site has also been a source of entertainment and information, a memory-collector, and a gallery-diary to its approximately 2 billion users. It is also the most popular social media platform in the Philippines with over 40 million active users. It has become part of the everyday lives of millions of people like me. Consequently, the social world is plagued with the rapidly evolving information communications technologies (ICTs) and increased connectivity to online sources (Wanless & Berk, 2021). However, we have to remember that nothing vast enters humanity without curse.
And we have to thank (not affectionate) Mark Zuckerberg for that. As a user myself, I can say that I became responsive and engaged in anything that happens on social media because of two-way communication. There were multiple dynamics and meanings that have formed and unpredictable phenomena have emerged. For instance, political institutions or organizations can be powerful in using the media as a tool to spread their messages (ideology or propaganda) across populations. With the internet and social media, the users or the target audience can play a more significant role in spreading propagandistic content and influencing others through personal networks (Garrett & Weeks, 2013). Case in point: the Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal that changed how elections is run in democratic states.
These technology companies' data scientists, experts and executives developed a rather sophisticated system to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior of a target audience using persuasive communications methods. It is all about mining users’ data and analyzing them to develop a model that accurately predicts their preferences and interests. It is a model that thrives on feeding users’ steady streams of content built for and seen by them—a version of reality, the one that the developers or scientists wanted them to see is created. Essentially, what these “nerds” do is change what you do, how you behave, and even what you are. Worse, they made citizens participate in the killing of democracy.
Many times now, I have experienced how social media algorithms (nerd alert!) become effective in both little and monumental instances. By just scrolling through my Facebook timeline, I have witnessed how the history of my own country is being revised or how a simple recommendations tab influence my decision-making process. I thought a simple search on Google about a type of dress was just that, simple and harmless. It turned out that Facebook also knew about what I was looking for and advertised to me the wonders of online shopping. The first several times I learned about Shopee, I spent at least three hours browsing on their site. Long story short, a hobby of mine was developed and it is called add-to-cart spree. I also have to thank the father of online shopping and enabler of hyper-consumerism, Jeff Bezos, for that. And just recently, Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, just bought Twitter and is allegedly continuing his advocacy of bringing the humanity to Mars.
These tech moguls have changed the media landscapes and by extension, personal attitudes and culture. When you think about it, these circumstances are simply unethical. But then, these figures and the corporations they lead do not think about, or even mind these. They just treat us as consumers; and the very product to be manipulated upon.
“The hardest part in all of this is that these wreckage sites and crippling divisions begin with the manipulation of one individual. Then another. And another.”
David Carroll
References
Garrett, R. K., and Weeks, B.E. (2013) The Promise and Peril of Real-Time Corrections to
Political Misperceptions. CSCW ’13, February 23–27, 2013, San Antonio, Texas, USA.
Wanless, A. & Berk, M. (n. d.). Participatory Propaganda: The Engagement of Audiences in the Spread of Persuasive Communications .
Blog Post 3
Personality Trait:
✨ Media Consumption ✨
A Tiktok video posted on Twitter asked this question:
"So what’s your hobby outside of media consumption?”
And let me tell you, I have never felt so attacked.
I use my smartphone all the time; as an alarm clock, in school, during leisure, and even when I use the bathroom. It is becoming a miracle how it has not yet fallen into the sink or worse, into the toilet bowl. More accurately though, I consume media using my smartphone all the time. Electronic books and soft copies of learning resources have become my reading materials. Most of my communication with my family and friends are conducted through social media nowadays. Additionally, I watch news or become informed of social events through the mass media distributors’ equivalent platforms online. Most of all, my kind of entertainment and leisure is done through the new media—streaming music, reading novels, watching movies, and surfing my social media accounts. In other words, the media have integrated themselves into the many areas of my social life.
I always say that one can learn a lot on social media. It is a breeding ground for ideas and it is also where long-established beliefs become contested. My most used social media platform is a micro-blogging site—Twitter. Media content is influenced by ideologies (Croteau & Hoynes, 2019) and Twitter is arguably the platform where the progressive ones dominate. I often find myself being influenced by the perspectives that come out of interesting discussions on it. Several times now, I echoed these perspectives when behaving in the real world. And these instances were when I realized that mediated realities do not reflect the real world. It was not easy to express and explain to my friends and family that abortion should be legal when discourses in practical settings revolve around conservative narratives. You cannot really directly tell the local gays working in parlors or small-scale rural farmers to fight for their rights when on top of their concerns are how to earn money sufficient for their families’ needs.
I am aware that media consumption is a large part of my everyday life. To some extent, social media has become a sort of escapism to me. There are a lot of social realities that can become difficult to face. However, it would also come to a point that the complexities that characterized the media in the social world become overwhelming.
Well, that’s enough internet for today.
References
Croteau, D., & Hoynes, W. (2019). Social Inequality and Media Representation. In Media/Society: Technology, industries, content, and users. essay, SAGE.
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