News Analysis | Jan 05,2020
August 29 , 2020
By Kidist Yidnekachew ( Kidist Yidnekachew has degrees in psychology and journalism and communications. She can be reached at kidyyidnekachew@gmail.com. )
People seem to be expressing discontent and reservations about the usage of social media as the initial euphoria of being able to comment and express opinions that were brought on with a change in government administration subsides.
“Maybe Ethiopians should not be allowed to use the internet in the current situation the country is in,” a friend said to me recently.
Banning the internet completely should not be a solution, but we need a crash course on how to use social media for our welfare. TikTok, the Chinese social networking service, is the only social media platform I am using at the moment. Compared to the older platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, its content seems to be lighter. It is not as politicised.
But internet trolls and extremists have penetrated their way into the platform. It is not just the politics that is hurtful. There is sexism as well. The sort of verbal abuse that female users of the platform are subjected to is appalling. Body shaming is normalised, and the vulgarity is shocking.
“Why do we say the things we'd never be able to say in person on social media?” a friend once asked. She went on to answer her own question: “The internet has a way of making us feel powerful, invisible and untouchable.”
I could not agree more. It also gives us a platform to express ourselves freely and in an uncensored manner. For too many users of social media, this means being as offensive as possible.
The state of Ethiopia’s politics is not helping either. I often pride myself on being non-confrontational, but the highly extreme views that are being propagated through such platforms make me want to shake some sense into whoever posts them. The amount of hate and hostility that is spewed on the internet against lingo-cultural groups is antithetical to the spirit of decency, solidarity and fairness that is being preached by those very same people.
Months ago, I was scrolling on Facebook when I saw a popular post by one of the minor celebrities who is highly active on social media. This is an individual who is not above opining on issues that are wildly harmful to groups. At the time, the video had over 100,000 comments. I decided to watch it.
I wish I had not been so naive. The video was 28 minutes of ethnic slurs and political incorrectness, and the comments were a long thread of tit-for-tat insults piled on one another. I felt hopeless, as if everything were beyond repair.
How can these people have nothing better to do than fan the flames of some hatred by playing to the whims of a person known for saying outrageous things and forcing a reaction? Are we this gullible?
The actors of such sexism and prejudice take part in mindless attempts to comment on current events or take actions to sow division. It is all politics, but it also sometimes is untruthful behaviour that ultimately leads to regret.
Whatever the motivations, many on social media are trigger happy. They are swayed too easily by opinions. And once an idea is out there, it is immediately picked up by the followers and echoes through the cyberspace occupied by active Ethiopian users of the internet. It is not unlike the proverbial Butterfly Effect, where the flapping of the wings of a butterfly somewhere causes significant weather anomalies elsewhere. We are at a time when a Twitter or Facebook post incapacitates a city for a day.
We have been handed a loaded gun in the form of social media. It has an inexhaustible ammunition clip and no safety catch. It is there to serve our enormous egos. Hopefully, we will learn one day to control it.
PUBLISHED ON
Aug 29,2020 [ VOL
21 , NO
1061]
News Analysis | Jan 05,2020
Editorial | Aug 14,2021
Radar | Sep 14,2019
Fortune News | Mar 12,2020
Viewpoints | Jan 04,2020
Agenda | Aug 10,2019
Commentaries | Dec 19,2018
Covid-19 | Apr 25,2020
Radar | Oct 10,2020
Viewpoints | Jan 31,2021
Photo Gallery | 50371 Views | May 06,2019
Fortune News | 45386 Views | Jul 18,2020
Photo Gallery | 42043 Views | Apr 26,2019
In-Picture | 40352 Views | Dec 14,2019
November 27 , 2021
Against my will, I have witnessed the most terrible defeat of reason and the most sa...
November 13 , 2021
Plans and reality do not always gel. They rarely do in a fast-moving world. Every act...
October 16 , 2021 . By HAWI DADHI
Residing in a country with no capital market, an organised marketplace for trading se...
August 28 , 2021 . By HAWI DADHI
The streets of Addis Abeba are as varied as they are many, although too many of them have yet to be named. From the narrow alleyways of the...
May 14 , 2022
Diana Yohannes is one of those actively engaging in social media platforms with her T...
May 7 , 2022
The Ethiopian Economic Association (EEA) recently proposed the formation of a macroec...
April 30 , 2022
There is no ambiguity in the UNDP's assessment of Ethiopia’s economic performance a...
April 22 , 2022
Most African countries top the list when ranked on the prevalence of conflict, food i...
May 14 , 2022 . By BERSABEH GEBRE
The mismatch is apparent. Federal budget planners want to slash expenditures for the...
May 14 , 2022 . By TSION HAILEMICHAEL
Thousands of employees of a sputtering state-owned sugar estate have received a settl...
The federal government is to introduce an arrangement that would allow investors and...
May 14 , 2022 . By BERSABEH GEBRE
Regulators at the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) have issued a stern warning to seve...
Loading your updates...
Put your comments here