The Ugly Side of Social Media Movements

"DEBATE IS HEALTHY, HATRED IS NOT"

Ignorance always attacks in groups, because “attacking” in its very nature is irrational and unnecessary. What some call social media fan support can sometimes display itself as cult like indoctrination towards brands that feed their fears, insecurities, and ignorance. 

Let me contextualize this quickly. 

Living in a world of 140 characters, emoji captions, and Gif responses the joy of debate is not one which is commonly known or accepted amoung many millennial and younger generations who participate on the social media space whether it be through content creation or content consumption. 

Perhaps debate is tricky because it requires a certain level of comprehension skills many social media users abandoned at certain points of their lives?

Because we build communities online, through having significant followings and specific value propositions

we confuse our support for the brands we like, as a call to fight against anything that threatens the validity of that community’s ideas. 

If a community can go to war over a single disagreement, then it will fall when a louder truth is marketed to it.

History has shown us that cult like community  is brought together by an intolerance to differences in people, a fear of the unknown. 

In our desperate pursuit of community, we have categorized disagreement and constructive criticism online as hatred towards another person.

It’s as if people are desperately clinging to belonging, and acceptance more than learning and liberation. 

It takes lot of emotional maturity to accept that someone can disagree with you and still wish you all the kindness and success in the world. Being part of a healthy community exposes you to differences in others, and helps you develop an oppenness to the possibility that what you know as true today might just be just as a result of the things that you have been exposed to thus far , and not necessarily a positive or productive truth for tomorrow.