Threats and Pressures; of Social Media

Continuing my theme of the changes in interaction caused by social media and online applications, I will be discussing the threats and pressures which are found to be caused, by online medias.

Social media can be found to be the route cause for many of the younger generations pressures in life. This is due to the new endless opportunities to contact someone, and new ways to create further contact with classmates, beyond a classroom. Therefore, bullies now have countless opportunities to attack their fellow class mates with cruel messages. However, it can also be argued that these new social media opportunities of interaction benefit us, by allowing people to have an ease of communication, and create stronger bonds with people than what would exist without further communication.

Social media can be cruel when used for the wrong purposes. This is due to children, and even adults, using social media to send nasty messages, and also publicly post embarrassing images or horrible comments about individuals. These posts may sometimes be unintentional to hurt someone, or could be direct abuse to bully someone. Social media applications are available to us 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Therefore, they how the power to consistently attack someone, compared to school bullying many years ago which may have only existed in playgrounds, allowing people to escape bullying when they go home. Therefore, it perhaps could be considered that social media may require stricter age restrictions, or have more people looking over social media, watching what people are posting and having more boundaries.

However, it could also be seen that social media is an extremely useful, and now essential to stay connected with people. It is now possible to send instant messages and video chat with people, all over the world. This benefits us as it allows us to communicate with friends, family, colleagues, and meet new people. This makes communication much easier, as we now do not have to send a letter and wait days/ weeks for a reply, or have to spend long journeys travelling to meet up with people. Therefore, it can be seen that although social media can cause disruption such as bullying in peoples lives, it can also provide great benefits for us.

Therefore, it is clear to see that social media provides many advantages, as well as disadvantages for us, in concern with communication.

Type again soon, Anna