J.Lewis Blog 4

J. Lewis - Blog 4

Social Media Pro/Cons site uses some powerful words of persuasion. On the Pros side words used in the titles of the listed 22 pros such as “faster” (#!), “catch” (#2), “help” (#3), “allow” (#4), “find” (#5) and so forth are vivid words used in the titles to catch your attention. Each of the Pros go on to say something good which correlates with the title, throwing in statistics for you to ponder. So if you believe only the Pros side of the argument: you will be faster at receiving the news which will help catch criminals, thereby helping students, which will allow people to improve and empower women, to help employers find the right person, to increase the quality of life, and facilitate interaction, voter participation, and political change, which will be good for the economy and community to help seniors and the socially isolated feel more connected, to allow for quick and easy dissemination of health and safety information to reduce stigmas and to accomplish a goal of collecting more money for non-profits, which will educate more people to benefit consumers, so that teachers, students, musicians and artist can build an audience so colleges can recruit and retain students. Sounds Like a Great Plan!

However if you only believe the Cons side of social networking the social media is spreading false information, exposing users to intrusions which will lead students to have lower grades, leading to stress and problems, which will entice people to waste time, harm their chance for a good job, give them a brain disorder, thereby making them less social, and more likely to promote crime and endangering the military and journalist, which will harm the economy and facilitate bullying and sexting, which will further socially isolate to the point where they will seek amateur advise and self-diagnose their problems, leading to the spread of hate, endanger children, promote cheating and invasion of privacy, to the point of inappropriate relationships exposing themselves to loss of income and a chance for college, all of which are completely unintended consequences of security attacks and the social media.

As you can see from the above run-on sentences, both sides use of persuasive words, ultimate terms, doublespeak, euphemisms and intense language combined with the power of labeling and statistics to persuade one to agree with their arguments. If we lived in a good/bad world with no shades of gray or any other color it would not be very easy to decide which side of the argument you were on. But I suppose you could always just sit on the sideline and wait for the dust to settle and text the answer to the world. Thereby making yourself the hero for the day.