Megan Crawford
Matthew Herzog
English 101
According to the Pew Research Center, out of the American adults who use social
networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, 66% of the users have engaged in various
political activities from those sites (Pew Research). Social media, regardless of the
means, has redefined the political atmosphere through its ease of use and frequency in
society. With the increase of social media outlets, politicians have more and more ways
to spread their message and connect to voters. The evolution of social media in the
political realm affects and informs readers, as well as aiding politicians in their
campaigning strategy. Overall, when it comes to social media and politics, it isn’t so
much about the number anymore, rather it’s about the impact one can make with that
number and social media creates that easy outlet for a big impact.
Social media makes the lives of campaign directors a breeze; rather than calling
hundreds of numbers hoping someone will listen instead of hanging up, directors can
easily spread messages through ways that are harder for users to ignore. Politicians will
go where the voters are and if that’s the World Wide Web, then so be it. On Facebook,
Barack Obama has over 31 million followers whereas Mitt Romney has a little over 10
million. Now this doesn’t mean that the polls will have a gap like that in the final election
but it gives campaign advisors a bit of direction, and helps word spread to a giant mass of
people with little to no effort. Through the method of “liking” on Facebook, political
figures can not only get a decent understanding of the polls, they can also discover the
likes and dislikes of the voters pertaining to their platform. Politicians are also capable of
spreading anti-opponents messages and commercials to a large mass of people without a
big cost for advertising. The best part of social media sites for politicians is it is a free
way of campaigning and connecting with voters. There are so many political advantages
to using social media so it is only reasonable for politicians to participate in social media
sites.
Clay Shirky, in his article, “The Political Power of Social Media” is completely
correct in his claim regarding the role of the media in politics; Shirky believes that social
media enables the messages of the political realm to spread and impact more people. “As
the communications landscape gets denser, more complex, and more participatory, the
networked population is gaining greater access to information, more opportunities to
engage in public speech, and an enhanced ability to undertake collective action” (Shirky,
1). In other words, the vaster the Internet world becomes, the more people can access
more information, whether it be factual or opinionated. The more and more the Internet
advances, the more users there will be and the more thoughts, facts and feelings will be
readily available for the general public. This phenomenon has lead to an increase in the
numbers of blogging and other social media sites. Whether you are far left, far right or
anywhere in between, your online comments, opinion based or fact based, can impact
thousands of other social media users. The design of the social networking sites allows
one’s opinion to reach hundreds, even thousands, of people within a second. Shirky uses
the example of protest against political corruption to prove his point and much like the
protest, Americans can find out the smallest of slip-ups by politicians within minutes via
social media. Within the state of New York, the news of former Governor Elliot Spitzer
having affairs with prostitutes was rapidly spread amongst social media within minutes of
the information being discovered. Social networking sites are in a sense like high school,
everybody knows everybody’s business and word gets around fast. These sites are
specifically designed to spread information with ease and speed, and it does just that.
Millions of people can be connected over one thing in a matter of seconds, demonstrating
that America is a united place where the citizens have the freedom to be aware of their
world rather than be shielded from the truth. That ability to connect and bring people
together is one of true powers of social media and one of the main reasons politics are
prevalent in social media.
Danah Boyd, in her article, “Can Social Network Sites Enable Political Action?”
places the power and importance of politics in social media in the users hands. Boyd
argues a computer or other technologies are just objects that the users determine the
importance and principles behind the technology and quite frankly, politics are the last
thing they wish to include in these places. “Technologies are shaped by society and
reflect society’s values back at us, albeit a bit refracted” (Boyd, 113). Boyd, like others
that may disagree with the relationship of social media and politics, claims that politics
are not a high priority in the mindset of most therefore it cannot leak into other aspects
(more “important”) aspects of our lives. Boyd feels that there is a lack of motivation to
change politics via the Internet, thus the social media world lacks politics in its
infrastructure. She fails to recognize the true power of social media for the users that do
involve the political aspects of life via the web can impact millions. Although not
everyone may use social media for political purposes, politics is very present in the social
media world, especially with this upcoming election. People constantly post to all their
followers about their opinions and since the election is a subject very present in
conversations there are millions of people giving their two cents to the world. The subject
of politics is one that comes quickly to the mind and the fact that the next president can
change your world people are very motivated to talk about such subject matters. Boyd
fails to recognize is that both the democrats and republicans are using social media to
slam their opponent, spread their word and encourage people to vote for them. Another
thing Boyd fails to realize that yes the users’ intended purpose may not be to use social
media as a political outlet, but the politicians are the ones who contain the motivation to
involve politics. To say that there is no involvement of politics in social media is the
furthest thing from the truth; politicians are like businesses and will advertise wherever
humanly possible and voters want to voice their opinions to others. Contrary to what
Boyd believes, politics are very much alive in the social media realm and motivation, or
lack there of as Boyd claims, cannot prevent its presence.
The ease and power of social media as a political output unfortunately has no
filters for the facts, causing many voters to be misled. Horse race journalism is another
way in which the availability of social media can quickly impact millions of voters, even
if it may be misleading. Horse race journalism is the reporting of the elections that
focuses on which candidate is ahead in the campaign, rather than discussing the
candidates’ platforms. In the republican primaries this past year, when Newt Gingrich
won South Carolina the media had a field day and there was a complete shift towards the
coverage of Newt Gingrich on Facebook, Yahoo and other social media sites. Horse race
journalism demonstrates that the hype and excitement of politics floods into the social
media world even if it is just jumping to conclusions and not being rationalized. What the
media publicizes spills into the talk of the social networking world and since so many
people can access things at a rapid speed, people can be misled. Social media is a word of
mouth system but amplified; people can reach strangers or friends anywhere from two
feet away to over two thousand feet away. The power of an opinion is much stronger than
one could possible even fathom when given the proper tools such as social networking.
Yes, that one opinion could be fact less but it is guaranteed to move others. Although,
voters can at times be misinformed at times, it still defends the fact that social media and
politics are intertwined.
In today’s society, we live in a world where our main mean of communication is
through social media outlets; it’s just the way it is. People spend numerous hours out of
their day constantly checking social media sites, as well as browsing around for anything
and everything. With this way of living come pros and cons for the political arena, this
lifestyle is ideal for reaching out to voters and spreading their message. Whether users
mean to or not they are bound to come across politics on their social media ventures
because it is such an easy place to share thoughts and feelings. For one to claim that
politics aren’t prevalent in social media would simply be inaccurate and are truly
oblivious to their surroundings. Social media enhances politics in numerous and powerful
ways with the capability of spreading messages to citizens across the country or even the
globe in the click of a button.
Works Cited:
Pew Internet. Pew Internet & American Life Project, 19 Oct. 2012. Web. 2 Nov. 2012.
Boyd, Danah (2008). "Can Social Network Sites Enable Political Action?" In Allison
Fine, Micah Sifry, Andrew Rasiej and Josh Levy (Eds.) Rebooting America. Creative
Commons. 112-116.
Shirky, Clay. "The Political Power of Social MEdi." Foreignaffairs.com 13 Feb. 2011: 19. Foreign Affairs. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.