The Power of Social Media

When I say the Power of Social Media I don't necessarily mean the power it can have on society or anything like that. I'm talking about the power that you "think" it can give you.

Recently I've had a sort of a dramatic "falling out" with a really good friend of mine. He has never really been too aware of other people's feelings but that's okay. All of us can be selfish at times. But whenever he got angry with me (which was very frequently) he wouldn't ever try to work out the issue with me in person. He wouldn't even tell me that there was a problem to begin with. He would wait until he got home and got on Facebook before he would rip me a new one. Most of the things that he would say were incredibly rude and I know he would never say in person, which baffled me.

After this I decided to pay more attention to how people act on different social media. I began to notice that many people act very differently than they do in real life. A lot of people are more rude than they normally are, but interestingly enough I saw some people were nicer than they normally are. This blew my mind! Social media must give us a feel of anonymity and we feel like we can have a different life. Perhaps the life that we would want to have. Some people do it just for fun and to have a good laugh.

I still don't really understand why but now I'm more aware of this and how it can affect many people. Does social media change who you are?

"What 'Tis to Love?"

I am one to become very emotionally attached to people. I wish that wasn't so, because it has gotten me very hurt in the past. But why is that? Why do we love? According to Helen Fisher, romantic love is not an emotion; it's a drive. For me, I don't want to be alone. The more I think about it, the more I fear being alone. But I am afraid of being in any kind of relationship because I become very attached. The more attached I become, the harder it is for me to let go (that is if the relationship comes to an end). After watching that TED Talk by Helen Fisher and listening to lectures from my professor, I still cannot understand the thought of love. I cannot understand why I become so emotionally attached to people. I also don't understand why women can treat love (or infatuation) to be nothing. Of course not all women are this way, but most of the ones I come across are! Perhaps I just have a bad taste in women.

Disconformation

To disconform is to ignore others. Disconformation is the barrier that i most often default to. Why? Simple because I can get annoyed by others and I wish for their presence to be elsewhere. It also may be because I'm not in the mood for interacting with others. But don't worry! This usually is only the case with people that I know fairly well. I don't usually ignore people that I do not know... Unless they are terrifying!

Perceptual Influence

Once I saw a very muscular black man in a rather deserted parking lot. It was night time as well. There was no one around so I immediately felt in danger! I thought he was going to mug me or something along those lines! But in the end he did not mug me. He didn't even look at me. All was well and I overreacted for no reason whatsoever.

Contextual Impacts

Today I talked with a pretty girl that works at the Sno Shack on 700 South. It was very noisy and hard to hear her because of all the cars driving by. She was happy to have company and I was happy to be talking with her. We talked about several different, meaningless things. Before I left to go home, she gave me a high-five.