Kierkegaard's Use Of Social Media

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“A revolutionary age is an age of action; ours is the age of advertisement and publicity. Nothing ever happens but there is immediate publicity everywhere” (Kierkegaard 6)
What is social media, if nothing other than advertisement and publicity? As anything happens whether it be in our personal lives or the world around us, we make sure to post about it instantly. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, we have become a generation that feels the need to broadcast our entire life to the world. We post everything from what we ate this morning, to what we overheard someone saying earlier in the day. The words we say lack both meaning and purpose. Personally, I know that I could go onto my Facebook right now and you would see meaningless statuses intertwined …show more content…

We have access to technology that can make something visible to millions of people within hours, however we use it to post useless cat videos. There are many people on social media who are there for a purpose, they post to make people aware of the tragedies of our world, and the speak words with meaning. In those instances, I believe Kierkegaard would have respected the use of social media. Sadly, these influential people become hidden under the hundreds of meaningless posts we see on a daily basis. To understand why Kierkegaard would not agree with the way we use social media, we must first understand his opinions on the world around …show more content…

He would have felt the speech as a waste of time and that it would be better if you were actually doing something of importance with your time. If there were an activist who was actually out in the world making changes for their goals who happen to embrace the use of social media then Kierkegaard could have agreed with this use. Being that these activists are not talking just to talk, they have true insight into the topic at hand and have first person experience. They are more than the public because they are actually taking action, taking a stand for what they believe in. They are embracing the use of social media to get the word out there and hopefully get more people on the issue. This use of social media is very different than the normal everyday updating of your status to keep others informed of your current life. This use of speech has meaning and purpose putting these activists in the realm of the ethical instead of the public. In this way Kierkegaard would have agreed with their use of social media, yet still not agree with how Darren used social media. Kierkegaard would not have detested the idea of social media as a whole, but instead as a majority. Being that there are some meaningful and important aspects that can come across through social

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