Valuing Other People
As a kid growing up in the 90’s, times were obviously different from the way they are today. We played outside, jumped in mud puddles, ramped ditches with our bikes and shot firecrackers out of empty coke bottles… mostly at each other. Even had less exciting things like band practice in my living room. No, not the Van Halen or ZZ Top kind of band. I’ll let the photo below tell my story in this case.
We did crazy things, but we were happy then. We were happy to get outside and explore the world, although our world was mostly contained in the neighborhood we lived in. There weren’t distractions such as social media firing every dopamine receptor in our brain, as we mindlessly scrolled through thousands of posts, photos, and news articles for hours each day. Our notifications were a pile of bikes in the front yard that notified the kids in the neighborhood where the action was happening.
As we grew older, the internet became a thing. I remember my Aunt having the first computer in the family. She used it for research in genealogy; there was a purpose other than social media. The first “social media” I ever recall was ‘ICQ,’ followed by AOL’s instant messenger ‘AIM,’ then ‘Yahoo! Messenger.’ Sure this was social, I suppose, but what seemed to kick things off for me was Myspace. Myspace was a great platform to share photos, write things, stay in touch with friends, and even share your very own music playlist that your visitors could listen to while visiting your page. Your page. Your page, which was decorated however you wanted it to be. Colorful backgrounds, different fonts, borders, accents… you name it. But I never remember the word “algorithm” really being a thing.
“Back then we didn’t have people such as Mark Zuckerburg and Jack Dorsey deciding what we should see.”
We didn’t have algorithms telling us what we were going to see each day. We made those choices ourselves. As time has evolved, so have our social media platforms. Back then we didn’t have people such as Mark Zuckerburg and Jack Dorsey deciding what we should see. Today, it’s a different story. Let me not jump ahead of myself. Another platform was introduced to me by a very close friend that had been on this platform during her time at college. Having a college email gained her access to the once student-only platform we now know as FaceBook. Back then it was simple. You had your page. There weren’t millions of users, businesses, bots, and scammers. Your friends list was filled with people that you were actually, wait for it… friends with.
“We literally allow FaceBook to determine what we see, which inevitably influences our lives.”
Now we have so may platforms, but there are a few things in common with the big players: News feeds and algorithms. Now, we literally allow FaceBook to determine what we see, which inevitably influences our lives. Don’t believe me? Here me out… Let’s say, for example, you’re a conservative. When you log into Facebook, what do you mostly see on your Facebook new feed? I’d be amiss to say that you primarily see liberal posts from your liberal friends. Most of it is conservative posts, news articles and videos. Am I wrong? Why is it that some of our posts gains attraction to people with opposite viewpoints? Could it simply be that one of our posts just happen to gain enough likes, comments, and shares for the algorithm to allow that conservative post in a liberal person’s newsfeed? Possibly?
Have you ever heard of political polarization? I can honestly say that I had not, until I watched the documentary “The Social Dilemma.” It’s interesting to see the data that links the separation of political parties to the use of social media. And Facebook isn’t the only guilty party. I encourage you to watch this documentary so you can gather your own data and determine your own opinion.
If you’ve made it this far in my article, you may be asking, “What does all this have to do with other people’s opinions?” Glad you asked! Rewind back to my childhood. We didn’t have corporations acting as puppeteers in our daily lives. We had each other. We all came from different backgrounds, yet we still were friends. Sure we didn’t all agree about every little thing, but if little Johnny got upset because Susie wanted to play soccer instead of football, it wasn’t a big deal. An agreement was made, and the kids worked it out. Life went on and the disagreement was a mere memory of the previous day.
Now we may see a disagreement on FaceBook, or any other social media platform, and think to ourselves, “How the hell does this person not see what I’m saying?” “How can they be so arrogant?” “Are they that stupid?”
“I’m pretty sure that I referred to this man as the anti-christ.”
I’ve seen it from both sides, and unfortunately been a contributor to this madness. I remember the 2008 Election when President Obama took office. Looking back, it is clear that I wasted a fair amount of my time on social media, debating about things that either didn’t matter, or I have no control over, with people that were clearly on the opposite side as me. I’ll be the first to say that I was a dick. I’m pretty sure that I referred to this man as the anti-christ. I was way out of line. I had been mislead by things that fed into my way of thinking. I was victim of the algorithm. Literally, all I saw was conservative posts, because this is the way the algorithm works. You see more on your timeline of the things you interact with, such as liking, commenting and sharing. I didn’t like things that fell under the democratic party, so all I saw was republican posts and news articles. Most of which were extreme conservatism. I don’t think it was necessarily my fault, it was just what I was exposed to, by an unknowing force. This didn’t happen to just me. This happened to my liberal friends as well. They too fell victim to the algorithm, and thought that their views were the only things that made any sense.
I have a very good friend that we both have similar views, in certain areas, and actually have disagreements with various topics. Yet, we still stay in contact with one another. So what’s the difference you may ask? We met for lunch the other day and discussed our friendship, and what makes it special. It didn’t take long to determine that a factor in our close friendship was one thing: Respect. It’s that simple, we respect each other. We respect each other’s values. We respect each other’s opinions. We can literally have a disagreement without batting an eye, because we respect each other. Yet we remain close friends.
“Hatred for me spread like a wildfire… I had a break down and quit my career”
I have personally lost friendships with good people because of arguments created from this destructive platform. In the past, I worked as a firefighter. It was a great job, but I honestly feel like social media made me lose friendships. One in particular was a post that I made about black Friday shoppers. It was a stupid post. It wasn’t well written and was actually one sentence, the best that I can remember. Yet this post cost me a good friend. He thought that I was directly talking about his wife, even though I wasn’t, he felt I was. The worse part is, I didn’t even know this until years later when we got in an argument about, you guessed it, a social media post. I was getting into fitness and bettering myself mentally and physically, yet some posts I made on social media, showing the progress of my journey, drew hatred towards me, from many people at my work. This time it came to a head and exploded. I was devastated. Hatred for me spread like a wildfire, and my social media posts weren’t the only reason for the hate expressed towards me. Other reasons aren’t the topic of this article, so I’ll leave them for another day.
Hate was anchored so deep, I had a break down and quit my career. Not necessarily a mental breakdown, I was just broken. Everything happens for a reason though, and some of the best lessons are those learned the hard way. But is it worth the cost of losing friends? I found another job, which opened doors to where I am today. A place I am irrevocably happy with. Can we all respect each other though? I’ve learned it’s possible, and in doing so has made me a much happier person. I’ve learned to respect someone that has opposing viewpoints in politics. …And honestly, I’ve learned that I don’t associate myself with either major political parties. My opinion is: They both equally suck. Neither of them can stop acting like children long enough to actually work for the people. Disagree? It’s ok to, as long as you respect my opinion, because I have learned to respect yours.
Try limiting time on social media, or deleting it altogether. I know 2020 has been a difficult year, but try to have face to face conversations with people, even if it is using FaceTime or Zoom. Not all technology is bad. You should try it. I promise you a better life if you do!
