Social Media clout in Pakistan
If the 20th century would be termed as the age of conventional media, the 21st century could be undoubtedly called the age of Social Media. Nowadays, Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Micro blogging, etc. have become an integral part of our everyday life and they have brought some revolutionary changes in communication between people as well as groups and communities. Putting it more simply, social networking is a way for one person to interact with other people or groups on the Internet. People use social media not only to express themselves but also for meeting new friends and locating people who have the same problems or interests.
Most social networking sites provide different resources such as email and instant messages in one place. Availability of these resources makes the communication easy and faster. When we look at the social impact of social networking sites, we find that these sites have both positive and negative effects. Because of this fact, it is necessary to analyze both advantage and drawbacks of social networking sites.
Undoubtedly, social networking sites are dominant to young generation. By using these sites, people can communicate and express themselves by exchanging messages, point of view and comments. Therefore, a person can interact with any person from any place. For example a student can clear his doubts with the help of a teacher. People having different professions can make groups like doctors, lawyers, students, poets, writers, social workers etc. In the past few years I have learnt that the political parties, multinational companies, educational institutes, hospitals are also using social media for promoting and marketing their services and manifestos.
Let’s talk about Pakistan – social media offers a platform to the people to challenge and raise voice against status quo and played an important role for highlighting the issues like Shahzeb Khan and Hamza Ahmed murder. 22 years old Shahzeb Khan was allegedly shot dead by a boy from a feudal family but the law enforcement agencies were hesitant to register a case against the criminal. Pakistanis took this issue on Twitter, Facebook and expressed their feelings against the system that protects these feudal lords. The social media activists demanded the chief justice of Pakistan and other higher authorities to take strict action against the killer.
The most common disadvantage of social networking sites is addiction. Most of the people spend hours accessing these sites for negative purposes and it harms their mental and physical performance in other fields. Sometimes users provide their personal information to others which is insecure, which others can use it in negative way.
Another common misuse of social networking site such as Twitter is that it is used to emotionally abuse individuals. Such actions are often referred to as trolling. Trolling can take different forms, such as defacement, name calling and controversial comments with the intention to cause anger and arguments. Social media is being used for spreading sectarian violence, banned organizations spread fake graphic images of Raja Bazar incident, Rawalpindi.
Social media has also risen up as an effective tool for political campaigns and voter persuasion. Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are used by political activists to promote their agenda all over the world but unfortunately, Pakistan has witnessed more petty politics on the social media, where supporters of rival political parties specially Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has crossed all the limits of morality and ethics. From baseless allegations via fake accounts to impersonation of various political & social celebrities PTI social media team has tried its utmost to conquer the social media.
The recent tussle between PTI & Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PMLN) over the resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has unleashed the new depths of immorality where PTI social media activists have left no stone unturned to defame the PM, even his private life and family members were not only discussed but also abused openly on the social media.
We can see clearly that social networking sites are advantageous only if they are used wisely. Using these sites would be helpful, if users do not spend time there unnecessarily. Wise members never provide personal information to strangers.
Violation of ‘twitter rules‘ has become a common practice as overwhelming number of social media activists of political parties use unfair means to promote themselves and their party hash tags by copying others tweets and spamming hash tags by creating multiple fake twitter handles to give numerous retweets to their own tweets.
It is necessary for us to read the user manual/rules of any product before using it and I believe that most of the twitter users haven’t read the ‘Policies & Violations’ clearly and completely. Use of a tool depends on users –– a doctor can operate with a knife and a murderer can kill a person with the same knife.