Social Media Networks: An Opinion

I am just changing my blog template so that it appears like a twitter. I am currently in love with twitter. It is one of the most accessed social media networks now. Twitter offers you simplicity, and let you stay connected with others in much simpler ways than other social media nets. But, I am not going to promote twitter in this post. :P

Social media network becomes a debated issues. There were many cases involving social media networks in Indonesian society. Those include elope, affair, prostitute and others. Why do we love social media network? Are we ready with the impact? In this post, i would like to share my opinions concerning those two questions.

As a communal society, social media networks really fit Indonesian society. In such sites, we can communicate with our long lost friends or even make new friends. Communication is what these social media sites at the first hand offer to us. As a society that loves to communicate a lot, social media sites really gives us enjoyment. That makes us attached to it. The second enjoyment offered is that these sites provide an opportunity for us to be what we always want to be. In reality, we may not be comfortable to express our inner desire. We may not be able to be who we really want to be. But we can do it in the cyber world.

For example, i am examining my own blog :) . Blog is also a social media network in which we can express our ideas, experiences, stories and all. It is like a blank paper and is up to the creator what to write. That is why, it is often that a blog usually represents the blogger through its content. My blog is filled with analysis, comments, and opinions. It is all because I love doing this. I love criticizing people and I love observing. But I cannot do it so often in the reality because people will think of me as weird fro criticizing anything. So then, I create this blog to represent my inner desire. How does your blog represent your personality? Do you have more than just one blog? Is it the same as the other or is it different ? Do you ever find a fake facebook photo profile? This is all because people want to show the image of what they want to be through social media sites. That is why social media sites is really popular because it offers us pleasure and functions as escapism from reality.

Now then, is our society ready to face the impact? I strictly answer that our society must be ready to face the impact. We are now living in a globalized era. All of globalization impacts start to emerge. Cases stated above -rape, elope, prostitution from social media sites - show that gradually our moral traditional values start to evaporate. Let's take a smaller example. All of social media sites are not meant to children less than 13 years old. But tell me, how many children below 13 having facebook account? They make their age older just to have a facebook account. Realize it or not, it shows that they have become older enough literary. Then, pay attention to the relationship status. How many couples are listed "married to" in facebook though in reality they are not married yet? It may be simple matter but it posits real danger. It shows that our traditional values are crumbling because marriage status that once considered sacred in our society is now taken for granted.

Yet, we cannot just ban these social media networks. The world is growing rapidly through all of its technological development. Don't we want to achieve what other modern countries achieve? banning is not the solution. Rather, we should resurrect our traditional values by promoting them through these social media networks. We should be able to manipulate these tools, and not being manipulated by them.