Blog #1: Contemporary Public Sphere

Social media such as blogs, Facebook and Twitter, yes, function as platforms for the public sphere. After all, blogs and social media allow an ear for political voices, and others can criticize those public opinions. The new wave of discourse via the Internet acknowledges that citizens all have something or someone to fight for, and what's more is the banter is readily available. Any gender, race, religion and class can speak openly. I guess some of our ancestors might say there are great advantages to using social media, especially to rapidly reach a wide audience, but this new, intangible public sphere is undeniably unhealthy for our society. 

First of all, look at Facebook and Twitter. Communication is ultimately disorganized. Imagine a room full of adults talking over one another for hours. Social media creates a sphere where anyone can propose his or her ideas about any topic at any given time. There is no sense of leadership. Who do we have to assemble the million, maybe billion, of ideas about one given topic? Who will fully digest and push others towards resolution? Also, once the ideas start flowing, response times are incalculable. Yes, a citizen can retweet someone else's 140 character "message" or can respond to another's Facebook post, but that message can be a week or two old. New information may obscure the meaning of the original post, which brings to light the second toxic ingredient of this sphere: misinformation. 

In previous centuries it seemed members of the public had time to chew upon information, and analyze it for inaccuracies and counterpoints. Yes, the public can still do that in this current sphere, but I would argue the public's mass research is insufficient (maybe a scan of a news report here and there before posting). The public can post in seconds and reach mass audiences across the world. Over two hundred years ago the newspaper purposely achieved the same agenda: it reached mass audiences in a significantly reduced amount of time. What's the difference here? Time. Where is the steady calculation in fact checks before pressing the publish button? Does the citizen fully understand the overall public interest before looking for a rhetorical response? Who is the citizen's target audience? It is illogical to expect any member of society to debate about issues that are quite possibly unfounded in accuracy and agenda.

 Members of a democracy are entitled to a voice in political discourse. Yet, arguably, society today wants to be heard but are unwilling to skillfully listen to one another, much like Habermas pointed out in his article. This communication conflict deters the needed resolution in a well-functioning society. Those who do agree need a voice to lead the charge; the current state of our social media readily projects any opinion, even a factually unfounded one. Those that have the same opinions are distracted by the disorganization, which creates a wall between the very idea of public spheres. Clearly, I left out many other ways the social media sphere is both beneficial and toxic to our society, but this is a blog, so what ideas can you add or contest?