This weeks readings were very interesting to me. One quote from a reading that stuck out to me was "President of the United States has called, in Sinophobic language, the 'Wuhan Flu." (Vats & Dutta 157) It's just crazy to me that a world leader of the United States would actually say those words. When we speak about communication ethics in class there are things that I admit I don't fully understand. One thing that I understand is respect for other people, cultures and I just don't understand how a president of any country would think that's a good idea to say.
The Trump era was full of poor communication ethics which I would like to use as my real life example. The first thing that comes to my mind is Twitter. Social media in general I think is detrimental to society because it seems that not many people learn how to use communication ethics. I believe we need to do a better job spreading information about communication ethics to younger people. It is hard to accomplish these tasks though when for example, a president of a country, doesn't know how to perform. I think we must spread awareness in order to change the future of social media in terms of ethically communicating via the internet.
I think your point on the communication issues of Twitter are really valid, especially right now, now that it looks like the platform is going back to a rough place with the takeover from Musk. I think the former president was one of the best examples for someone who operated social media without much ethicality. This came to a head in the pandemic where there was so much misinformation coming from everywhere, that it became easier to just turn off the app all together. I don't use Twitter myself, but even on Instagram there was still a level of misinformation that was clear, and made the experience of being online much worse than before, and I've seen the same things surrounding the midterms.
ReplyDeleteAs Michael mentioned, you make a good point about how communication ethics have been extremely questionable on Twitter. I agree with you, the Trump era was a crazy, scary time in our history. It is quite appalling that the President of the United States would go as far as to say insanely offensive things that would get him banned from the entire Twitter platform. That is no way for a leader to act. He was immature, and had no ethical reasoning to his posts. Like you said, because social media is one of the main ways we communicate with one another, we need to practice ethical dialogue. Especially when children are entering the social media world at such a young age. I know for me, my parents would have restrictions on my phone for what apps I could use when I was younger and which I was not allowed to. I was not allowed to have typical social media platforms such as Instagram or Twitter, because often times there would be hateful, offensive comments that my parents did not want me to be exposed to.
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