In this video, Prof. Alex Sévigny of McMaster University discusses the potential positive implications of using social media in a political context. Sévigny describes its use as a relatively new concept that was embraced by the Obama campaign in 2008 to great effect. He says that the Obama campaign used social media to "drive real-world connections between people...[which] would translate into a more engaged electorate as well as people who were fired up and ready to understand and take up Obama's message."
That is the impression that most politicians seem to have of social media, judging by the amount of politicians at every level of government who have gotten themselves Facebook and Twitter pages in the last couple of years. If for nothing else, social media is necessary because of its universality. Yet Sévigny notes that increased amplification of political issues through social media could actually lead to a downturn in actual voter participation: if social media makes people feel already sufficiently engaged before they reach the polls, election day could experience even sparser turnouts.
Of course, the opposite could also happen, and that is what most politicians hope for as they continue to make dozens of Tweets per day and update their Facebook statuses on a consistent basis. But that does not mean that social media's role in today's society should be glorified; in fact, social media can be used as a way to control the message and keep the public even more uninformed than they previously were.
I will demonstrate my point with two examples: the Anthony Weiner scandal, clearly a negative issue, and Pres. Obama's recent Twitter Town Hall, portrayed to the public as a positive utilization of social media.
In this video (until 2:40), Megan Lieberman and Ashley Parker discuss the implications of the Anthony Weiner scandal. Parker, a reporter for The New York Times, notes something I had not previously known: that Weiner was actually considered a connoisseur, so to speak, of Twitter before his scandalous photos reached the Internet. His honest reflection of his true persona won him many followers and arguably a larger voter base at election time. However, his scandal has prompted politicians to become even more cautious about the messages they are sending out and how those messages will be perceived by mass media. They often actively prevent the public from inserting their own opinion into what they say; Parker provides the example of Sarah Palin, who often uses close to all 140 allowed characters in her Tweets, to prevent people from re-Tweeting them with their own comments. The constant danger of revealing too much or displaying a politically unsound message, via social media, has resulted in politicians becoming less open to commentary and less open about themselves - two results that I view as contrary to democracy.
My second example, Obama's Twitter Town Hall, is a personal issue to me. This summer, I am working at the National Low Income Housing Coalition, a non-profit that seeks to advocate public policy that accommodates the needs of citizens who need to use low-income housing. Last week, on July 6, Obama's Twitter Town Hall was an event that was important to the non-profit. The communications department had been fielding questions from our various sub-groups, which include low-income housing coalitions at the state level and other housing advocacy groups. We consolidated these questions and included our own questions, the most important of which asked Obama how he intends to continue to provide for the increasing amount of people who rely on low-income housing in a time when the federal budget is decreasing.
Yet during more than an hour of questions, Obama did not answer a single question that related to low-income housing. This disappointed many at the Coalition, who vowed that - should Obama hold another Twitter Town Hall - the communications department must forge better connections with those who select the questions that Obama answers.
But that's just the problem. In my idealistic view, the Coalition shouldn't have to play politics to receive an honest answer. Obama should be answering questions about low-income housing because it's an important issue, one that directly relates to the economy. With unemployment rates at 9.2% and the country in the midst of recession, Obama should be making a priority of dealing with the nation's economic issues and answering questions truthfully about how he intends to deal with them.
Instead his Twitter Town Hall, meant to forge open communication between Obama and the American public, proved to accomplish just the opposite. Obama's Twitter Town Hall masked the fact that he was trying to promote his own image under an image of increased transparency. This article from the Huffington Post describes it well in its lede: "President Obama didn't say anything particularly newsworthy." Though Obama claimed he was not using the Town Hall as a means to promote his re-election campaign, he did use the opportunity to describe to the public the positives of his own administration and make pointed references to the weaknesses of Republicans, including their role in the debt ceiling debate.
Meanwhile, I suspect the National Low Income Housing Coalition was not the only group upset by Obama's lack of meaningful rhetoric. The Twitter Town Hall served as a disappointing example of using social media as a means to promote a crafted message and not the truth.
But is social media in general making people more aware? Perhaps. Can it increase voter turnout and election participation? Perhaps.
But can politicians use it to continue to play politics? Absolutely.
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