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Jonathan Brown
English 1102
Adam Padgett
April 8, 2014
The Deceitful Influence of Social Media
Social media is used by everyone who has a mobile device or computer. From children
to teenagers to adults, all age groups use it and they are all influenced by it. Although social
media is a great way to network and stay close with friends it can also be very deceitful. Usually
when people post on social media sites they post their opinion through a status or picture. A
common thing that people post are memes: memes are usually made up by a picture of
something or someone and a caption, they are usually created with some kind of alternative
purpose than to just be funny. A lot of these social media statuses and memes consist of people
going all out to support their opinion on a subject. To support these opinions people will say and
post false and insulting information to make the opposing side seem negative or skewed. The
general public would probably see a status could say, The government is just made up of a
bunch of lazy old rich guys who dont even care about anyone. People would read this, and it
would influence them to feel the same way about the government. Obviously one hysterical
person created this status to share what they think about the government, when they probably
have no idea what is actually going on inside the government. This opinion based status may
seem harmless, but it will effect anyone else who reads it, then those people will share the status
on their social media pages thus it has the potential to be shared almost exponentially across
social media servers. Suddenly the majority of the country seems to know that the government is
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made up of lazy, overpaid, uncaring, old guys who obviously do not have any achievements in
life to have earned their position. Even though this is a common belief, not just anyone can be
elected into a position into the government without any kind of credibility or achievement and I
think the influence of social media has a lot to do with this common belief. I believe that social
media is very influential as we know it today and it affects the public opinion on many different
subjects.
Social Media is obviously being utilized by millions of users for multiple different
purposes. Photographers have their photography business Facebook page, music artists have
their band pages, and celebrities have their promotional pages, but what about politicians and
candidates? By the 2010 midterm elections, 92% of the major party candidates for the U.S.
House had created a campaign website and over three fourths of the candidates had adopted the
larger social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. (Gulati, Williams) This is a
sure sign that social media is used in the world of politics. An initial review of our data reveals
that nearly every candidate running for the Senate, 64 of the 66 (97%), adopted a Facebook page
for 2012. (Gulati, Williams) By 2012 almost every candidate was using social media to their
advantage. I think this definitely shows that social media is definitely influencing politics to
begin with.
In a democratic society we vote to elect those who represent us. Everyone has their
opinion on who they feel should represent them and who should not. There are two major parties,
the Democrat platform and the Republican platform. Democrats and Republicans often disagree
and argue. What better way do you have to voice your opinion for your party than to do it on a
social media website for people to see? Matthew Kushin says, Persons younger than 30 led the
way, many of whom used the internet to exchange political opinions and post their own political
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commentary. There are tons of arguments about politics on social media sites and these
arguments can have a lot of false information because of people who will resort to lying about a
subject to support their opinions. Later in Matthew Kushins article he states Existing empirical
evidence indicates that Internet use is positively associated with political outcomes including
situational political involvement I think he is wrong in this argument for a few reasons. For one,
how can one judge a positive political outcome in elections when there are so many definitions
of positive in this case? This positive outcome is usually noted by a winning candidate but
since democracy is based around an individuals opinion, saying that there is a positive political
outcome would only be valid for the winning candidates supporters the losing candidates
supporters would say this is a negative outcome. Also since the other candidate was not elected
he is never given a chance, so you cannot really be certain that it was a positive outcome or not
that the winning candidate was the best for America. In his statement he says Existing empirical
evidence. Empirical: relying on experience or observation alone often without due regard for
system and theory. This is the Websters definition of empirical, thus you could say empirical
evidence is evidence that relies only on experience and observation. I would not consider this
valid evidence that the internet positively effects politics at all.
Memes are personally one of my favorite things about social media. Usually memes are
hysterical pieces of media that individuals create and post to social media websites. They come
in endless quantity and you can find any kind of meme you want, from stick figure memes, to
memes about food, to memes about relationship, and memes about politics. They are usually
always funny and fantastic- that is until you are offended. Memes are funny but they can be very
insulting also. One cruel meme about Jesus could upset a Christian. Limor Shifman talks about a
certain video called Leave Brittney Alone where a guy posted a video of him ranting about
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Brittney Spears and for the media to leave her alone. The boy was made fun of, his video was
remixed and recorded in cruel ways. The author of this article also states that memes shape the
mindsets, forms of behavior, and actions of social groups. If this kind of insulting behavior can
go on with subjects such as religion and celebrities, which means it must also have an insulting,
false depiction towards politics.
One political based meme is one on Facebook, and probably many other websites. It is
labelled Democrats in the Midwest the picture shows a man standing in snow with two
captions, one above and one below the picture. Before I tell you what the captions say, imagine a
simple picture of a man dressed up in warm clothes with a beanie hat on standing in a foot or two
of snow. What can you assume from that picture? Well basically the only things you can assume
is that he is a man with heavy clothing in the snow with his hands in his pockets and nothing else
(you can find the meme at the end of the works cited page). The top caption analyzes the
obvious, it says Wow! Cold. The second caption declares an assumption that is not evident by
any means, it says It was so cold this morning, I actually saw a Democrat with his hands in his
own pockets. By saying this the creator of the meme creates a fabricated idea because he does
not know who the man even is probably or even if he is a Democrat. Memes like this one, and
many others, are deceiving. The meme was probably based around the thought that Democrats
are utilizing taxpayers money in a way that benefits the Democratic supporters through welfare,
medicate, and other kinds of government issued free aid. This could be a decent argument for a
republican such as myself through solid evidence, but to have a meme that shows such an
assumption is a terrible way to show evidence of Democrats taking money from taxpayers, or
you would think so at least. With the exponential spreading tendencies of memes and social
media posts this kind of insulting falsified meme could be seen by millions of people worldwide
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and it probably has been seen by millions considering it is also one of the top images on Google
Images when you search political memes. I believe that the actions and opinions of people are
almost entirely based around influence and when someone sees a meme like this they can be
influenced to think about a subject entirely wrong by false information. From this inference, if
individual users on social media sites can so easily falsify information then why can politicians
not utilize it in this way? A use of a meme by Senator John McCain on his personal profile
(shown below the works cited page) shows a picture of Orville and Wilbur Wright and their
airplane. Obama is in between them and there is a caption that reads You guys didnt build
that! as if Obama is downplaying the Wright Brothers achievements. This is an insult towards
Obamas campaign. I understand that it is a rhetorical strategy to insult your opposition but this,
in my opinion, is not a valid way to argue because Obamas arguments are not even considered
in these types of insult memes. Just as individuals use these memes as weapons against each
others opinions, so do politicians.
Although social media brings people together in a digital community and enhances
political involvement, it can be very deceitful. The spread of viral media can be a fantastic way
to become informed on subjects, but since it can be created by anyone, social media is a very
poor resource to gather information on any subject really. From religion to celebrities to politics,
it can all be insulting and false. Memes can be a great past time to enjoy a laugh or two while
scrolling down the seemingly harmless propaganda it is influencing you in ways you never really
thought possible. These memes and statuses can change your opinion on serious subjects based
around false information and can even leave you insulted.


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Works Cited

"Empirical." Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 9 Apr. 2014.
<http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/empirical>.
Kushin, Matthew J, and Masahiro Yamamoto. "Did Social Media Really Matter? College
Students' Use of Online Media and Political Decision Making in the 2008
Election." Mass Communication & Society. 13.5 (2010). Print.
Gulati, G.J, and C.B Williams. "Social Media and Campaign 2012: Developments and Trends
for Facebook Adoption." Social Science Computer Review. 31.5 (2013): 577-588. Print.
Gil de Ziga, H., Jung, N. and Valenzuela, S., Social Media Use for News and Individuals'
Social Capital, Civic Engagement and Political Participation. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, April 2012 Ch.17: 319336
Shifman, Limor. "Memes in a Digital World: Reconciling with a Conceptual
Troublemaker."Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 18.3 (2013): 362-377.
Print.
Political Memes, Democrats in the Midwest! Credit: leahebae https://www.facebook.com/
(March 11, 2014)
John McCain
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151097147688707&set=a.1015011371157
8707.294021.6425923706&type=1&theater (4/10/2014)

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