SOCIAL MEDIA VISUALIZATION - ESSAY HELP

In recent years, boom in usage of social media sites has reached new heights. Networking solutions such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and many others have not only become a portal for individuals to foster and maintain tight knit relations with friends and family, but are being utilized by corporations and different business entities to expose their brand, products and services, and create a positive relationship with customers. However, it’s alarming to realize that same social media platforms are now being engaged for terrorist activities, bullying, and spreading hate and phobias among the online population(Parka, Na, & Kim, 2014). 

Couple of months ago, the world witnessed live an ultimate act of horror, when the shooting in mosques of Christchurch South island, New Zealand took place. The uproar that was initially created was because the terrorist had gone live on Facebook for the shooting and even posted his manuscript for the world to read that consisted of hate speech. In light of this attack, a debate initiated that discussed whether social media sites such as Facebook are to be blamed for wide streaming of this dreadful video? The question will be answered through lens of classical ethical theories to garner a better understanding of the situation. 

For start, the argument in favor of the question claims that yes, social media deserves to be blame, primarily because the employ tools  such as algorithms and pinned content that allows video to be spread among the general public. Nevertheless, to counter this point, deontology perspective claims that each individual study their set of duties and obligations to other individuals and society when following any action (Devlin & GerardMagill, 2006); (Pratt & James, 1994). Therefore, it was viewers who searched for the video voluntarily, which indicates from the deontological perspective that the morality of their actions was flawed and wrong.

Another point striking against social media claims that the professional site provided terrorist with the platform to showcase his agenda with the assistance of features such as live streaming. On the other hand, another way to view this argument is that because of social media viewers were allowed the opportunity to highlight and understand the motivations of such individuals who commit such crimes and escalate the sentiment of hate. Yet again, to dissent this argument is the expression that when such heinous crimes are being witnessed over social media, there is a higher chance that it can encourage individuals with the same mind set to carry out similar crimes in the future. 

Moving on, the blame on social media carries on with the fact that the platform allowed raw footage of the incident to be posted without undergoing any kind of check by the social media companies. In association with this argument, social media platforms are responsible and liable to introduce and enforce rules that regulate flagged content and delete them before they go viral. Nonetheless, social media platforms should and can explore options such as blocking the account of frequent violators who have the history of posting and uploading content that hare hateful, questionable, and incites crime.