August 1, 2013

#NoFilter

#NoFilter: Why Social Media Will Be The Downfall Of Society. 

Todays Tunes: "Purple Rain" - Prince & The Revolution



Social media is like a child leash; it keeps us in contact with those who matter but prevents us from truly exploring the world. In the 21st century, our entire lives are ran by The Big Three. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. The last thing we do before bed is post a shameless selfie on the gram and wake up in hopes of seeing double-digit like notifications. Everybody is guilty of it, including myself. But DAMN I didn't wake up this morning to see your picture on my phone. And that whole "hair tied, sweats on" shit died out in '11 so no fresh out of bed pictures. 

Harvard Sailing Team - Hipster Thanksgiving

The opening scene is what I'm eluding too. Good watch though.


There are no such thing as secrets nowadays. Screenshots totally ruined secrets. Also there is no such thing as not being known, especially when your profile is visible to the entire world. For example, lets say you meet a girl or guy. First thing we do now is look them up on Facebook to figure out their birthday, which side is their good side in pictures and the last three people they could have potentially slept with. One major flaw in social media is that we are so connected that it takes the human away from us. Imagine how your parents met, I bet they didn't use FourSquare to find each other. Once upon a time in the Stone Ages (1999) I remember I had to call my friends house phones to meet up with them after class let out. That required me to memorize the area code and number and then learn how to communicate with adults. Now all I have to do in order to get in touch with someone is tweet or send a simple text message of 160 characters or less. Our people skills are slowly being drained by social media; we don't know how to talk to each other anymore. Icebreaker conversations are usually followed by "Hey, what's your twitter name?" or "Find me on Instagram at...". Instagram is useful in some cases but remember back to when you used to end a date by going to a photo-booth and posing for four pictures and eventually kissing on the last one? Yeah, Instagram doesn't allow you to put up PDA without being judged by your 12 year old cousin and your ex at the same time. Dudes find themselves in the automatic friend-zone even before they can get a girl's last name thanks to social media and social reputation. It ruined humanity's chance of living a life that is free from barriers. It's hard to find physical memories. Our language is also being significantly altered thanks to LOL's, ROFLMAO, and my favorite "Heyyyy"(1 Y=casual, 2 Y's=She's interested/it's cute, 3 Y's= She wants the D, 4 Y's=Mating call for a Stage V Clinger). Abbreviations won't get you an interview with a job, hell they won't even let you get out of English 101. 



Or you throw them back since you're obviously being attacked. 
Social media has caused our brains to be wired on superficial and mundane ideas. C'mon I know I'm not the only one who hates seeing TweetGrams about finding a perfect man, or waking up to #nofilter pictures that we all know you used the Amaro filter. Girls nowadays thing their beauty can be judged based on how much tits, belly and ass they show whereas every dude feels the need to show off every pair of overpriced shoes that Little Tap Sum Bong made for $1.17 in Asia.  Also I FUCKING HATE TWEETGRAMS! Everybody things they have the next insightful message that  the world has to hear, news flash. Nobody Gives A Flying Fuck. I may have personal vendetta against TweetGrams but they serve absolutely no purpose in the grand scheme of life. TweetGram take the greatest minds of our time (Gandhi, RWE, Audrey Hepburn) and pair them up with stupid pre-teen quotes about "Life, Laugh and Love". Do we really believe the fairy-tales still people? TweetGrams are the work of Satan along with child leashes. We are constantly basing our popularity on the amount of followers on twitter or how many RT's we can get. Who the fuck cares, we were placed on this Earth to live according to our rules and own guidelines. Why does it matter if Tom from Myspace sub-tweets me? But yet I need to take time out of my day to GroupMe message all my amigos a screenshot of someone talking about me.  Like they really care themselves. Unless it is detrimental to your immediate health, you can miss me with all that sub-tweeting nonsense. We place values on numerical data instead of ideals and beliefs. The world will eventually forget what words like "Hope, Faith and Love" are thanks to "RT, Upload and Like".   

Privacy is something that went out the window when the Myspace about me section came along. Now that we have Big Brother NSA watching our every single move, it's hard to envision what privacy really is anymore. Our data trail can be traced even when we are on the incognito window (All my fellas who use Google Chrome know about that).  We somehow think that it is perfectly okay to tell the Internet (A WEB OF STRANGERS) who we are, what our sign is, and how our favorite scene from any movie is the Rain scene from "The Notebook". Some majority of this information is what people are supposed to find out through interrogation sessions over a candle-light dinner (i.e. a date). By baring our souls on a profile we remove the curious aspect of life, which I believe runs about %67.78 of our lives. People thrive off of curiosity, if they sum you up before even shaking your hand what is the point of everything else. That's like watching an episode of Law and Order SVU and having Elliot and Olivia bag the criminal the first time around; or watching a bunch of sexually active, stoner teenagers and their dog solve a mystery after the first batch of Scooby Snacks. It takes away from the fun and the thrill. I don't think you need to know what kind of music I like, if you want to know then just ask me.  Privacy is about as rare as finding a person who has never heard of Facebook. Don't let the data keep you from connecting with others.


Now that I'm almost done bashing social media it's time to make a counter-argument about why it is useful. Social media has its upsides and as stated before is necessary in today's world. Life moves around us extremely fast and sometimes we don't have the time to look back; that's where Twitter Archive comes in to save the day. It's a function that allows us to look at our previous timeline, once again we are allowed the opportunity to see how far we advanced from our dark days of using LunaPic. Twitter can also inform us of local and worldwide happenings. Imagine back to September 11th how differently that day would've gone if Twitter was around. Instagram should be used to highlight and document milestones in our lives; getting an award or promotion, acceptance into school, proposal etc. Use it as a means of communication or promotion, not a popularity scale. Facebook has become so deeply rooted in America that even companies are using it to broadcast and advertise. Facebook is like the Constitution for the 21st century. It informs us of the rules and keeps us in the loop about matters both important and personal. It grants you the power to link up with anybody around the world, so long as they have a decent connection. Family doesn't feel so far away when you can see pictures of your sister's graduation or your older brothers wedding. All three are also very important to our aspect of humor and laughter. With the creation of memes and vine videos' people's creativity have spiked OVER 9000! It's great to see minds working in an effort to generate laughter. However the absolute worst part about social media though is how ingrained it is in our lives. We can't not use these media outlets lest our friends begin to worry and imagine that we have been taken hostage by a psychopathic doctor bent on creating a human centipede. Crazy but true; try not using all social media outlets for a month and see what kind of responses you get. Also it is my belief that  if you're not on any of the media outlets then you basically are about as real as an Iota; and we all know they are as real as Pokemon.


In the beginning there was the word, but eventually that word became a post and the post soon grew into a "Like" button. People, my opinions are strictly my own, but remember as to why you are using the Big Three. Is it to see if you can a higher number of likes than your IQ or is it to genuinely inform those who know you of your accomplishments? Don't tweet to see how many followers you can gain, words are just words and people will flock from good words to the next. Those followers can be gone at any moment; if you haven't noticed Twitter is lacking leaders. Be a leader and take those followers down the right path. For Facebook, don't use it as your means of venting or release. The world could care less if your cuffing season partner left you. Personally I believe I would much rather hear about how your summer internship went in NY or how your trip in Spain was the best decision you ever made. The Internet is a dangerous place, much like Mordor or Chuck-E-Cheese. Social media has proved to be the sword of the 21st century, it protects us on our savage journey through the Internet but it can also hinder us from returning in one piece. 

Remember that there are two sides to every sword. Swing carefully. 

~King of Hearts


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