Do you think free speech is what you find or deserve on Facebook? Are you outraged when Zuck censors you, thus stepping on your 1st Amendment rights? Well, please let me help inform you that there is NO social media site that owes you a place to share ideas, NOT A SINGLE ONE! Twitter, Instagram, Discord, Facebook, TikTok, or even Parler are companies, not government-sponsored platforms financed by taxpayer money, for the benefit of the people to vent whatever crazy idea they happen to be espousing.
Never in the history of the United States did a radio or TV station have to provide broadcast time for an individual to share their thoughts. No publisher of books, magazines, or newspapers has ever been obliged to print the opinions of someone. These businesses operate under the capitalist idea of needing to make money, end of story. Even public broadcasters like PBS and NPR operate under charters that demand they only distribute content that is in the best interest of the community and extends culture; they are not political platforms for sharing ideologies.
So why do people feel they are entitled to use a for-profit service on the internet to say or share whatever they strongly believe in? I’d guess that, in part, it has to do with them watching stupid cat videos and porn on the internet so that this idea seeps into their head: if these people can distribute this stuff, why can’t I share what I want? They fail to understand that cat videos draw people in for entertainment, which pushes advertising, which makes a profit for those involved in the behind-the-scenes operations, and the same goes for porn. But somewhere along the lines that delineate a business and a public area such as a park or the front of a government building, individuals come to see social media as an extension of the public domain, and hence, they have the “right” to say what they please. They do not.
This rapidly changing online sphere is evolving at lightning speed, and when the general public fails to understand history, they are blinded by their insatiable desire to have things their way, or so people want to believe when they’ve grown up in America in a system of total freedom. They don’t understand boundaries or evolution. Take books and newspapers, the printing press was invented in 1440, but it took almost 560 years before the average person could print on demand a title they wrote. Television was invented in 1927, but it took more than 70 years before an individual could stream their own content to try to find an audience. The first social media site was created in 1997, but it wasn’t until 2004, when Facebook launched, that the social media craze began in earnest. We are now in the age of growing pains.
The first books did not have photos because it took almost four more centuries until photos were invented; color printing first happened about 100 years ago. Color television wouldn’t start broadcasting until 26 years after the TV was invented, and now people watch 4k images on 86-inch flat screens and take for granted that it’s always been this way. The internet is going to go through the exact same transformations, and the reality is that someone else’s company, no matter how large, is not your personal platform to say and show what you please. The platform you feel you deserve is up to you to create, pay for, maintain, and deal with any legal ramifications that it might run afoul of.
At the root of people’s desire to put themselves on a platform is a history of the individual being on the sidelines, existing in the realm of the anonymous. Then in the past 15 years, humanity has been witness to every type of character finding riches by some act or other that catapults them onto the public stage. The person watching this feels that they have something valuable to offer as well and start looking for their voice. Controversy seems like an easy stepping stone, and so the messenger races down the rabbit hole, hunting for topics that have the ability to incite others. Raising eyebrows is a profitable business, and everyone wants their fair share, their moment in the spotlight, so they too can be important.
Cultivating something worth sharing other than a constant outpouring of rage requires one to hone the ability to craft something. While some would argue that manufactured outrage is valuable to our discourse, since when has bludgeoning an enemy ever brought those persons to a new way of thinking or living? If you are on the edge of the spectrum where the mainstream resides, you might try art, indie film, philosophy, or wrap your message in music to find like-minded souls, but believing your anger deserves the highest platform is delusional at best. But what of recent politics, John? Populism is typically (and hopefully) a short-lived movement that doesn’t inflict too much damage on the masses, but it can be undeniably profitable to exploit that part of the population that typically exists without a voice. If we are lucky, populist movements disappear, allowing the march of science, logic, and reason to move forward.
