Racism and social media No place to hide
Modern technology can no longer be merely defined as new machinery or engineering but as a source of power to change the world. Social media is one perfect example of this. Racism has been there for years, probably even in Shakespeare's time where it was only 'seen' or 'heard 'of in the presence of people who had voices but had no authority. We should all be familiar with his play ‘Othello’. Was there already there a racism aspect written into it? We have to remember that going to the theatre in those days (and debating in the newspapers thereafter) was like Twitter and Facebook all in one. The reach was huge, but the time frame lacked the instantaneous response The ability to go viral. Well, all that has absolutely changed as social media gives us a 'voice with authority'– the ability to talk and be listened to and hence, make a difference with immediate effect. Imagine if Penny Sparrow had opted to telling her friend about her racist thoughts somewhere in a restaurant instead of posting them on Facebook, what would have happened then? nothing. Nobody would have known. When racism strikes in public (and social media is as public as it can be), it causes the social media society to erupt and emotions to be felt. There will be voices from a variety of ethnicities from all over the world discussing the same issue and in many instances, causing presidents across the globe to take their opinions into consideration no matter who they are. Obama is operating on Twitter. A lot. He must listen to all the input as well. All these types of social media have privacy settings where it is possible to decide who to allow in your 'space' but now the question is: how come the world hear of those things in that space even though it is restricted? Share, in simple terms, is to give something that you already have to two or more people and in the case of social media — it is way more people! These people can also share with their friends or followers and their followers share with their followers and so on. The option 'share' allows someone's information to be viral in a matter of hours. This information could be thoughts or opinions even pictures and racism commonly occurs in these forms. We have Twitter storms on a daily basis. Everything is out in the open. Racists can no longer hide because social media will bring them to the front whether they like it or