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The Role of Social Media in American Politics pols essay
The Role of Social Media in American Politics pols essay
Negative impact of social media on politics
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In the article, “The Case for Partisanship” by Matthew Yglesias, he explains how in the 1950’s, the American Political Science Association’s Committee strongly presented the idea that polarization is good. Today, many people look down upon political polarization. The mid-20th century appeared united politically but in fact the country was deeply divided over civil rights and politics. Conservatives and liberals could appear in both the Republican and Democratic parties due to foreign policy and racial issues overlapping on traditional conservative and liberal beliefs. The interconnection of political parties in the past has suddenly gone down.
This chapter focuses on other possible explanations for increased political polarization and then explain how they don’t account for increased polarizations. The authors give plenty of possible counterarguments for their audience to consider and then show why they are right by shutting those counterarguments down with an overwhelming amount of evidence. They introduce counterarguments like intraparty competition during primaries, partisan congressional reforms, redistricting, and Southern Realignment. Intraparty competition during primaries does not show significant differences in legislators for there to be a solid argument. There are statistics that show that polarization would have been unaltered even without changes in partisan congressional reforms.
In the article Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America, Morris Fiorina addresses the issue of the illusion of political polarization. Political polarization is the separation of political beliefs into two separate extremes. The main illustration Fiorina uses is the use the electoral map. The electoral map is used to gauge which party won an election or polling.
I believe that political polarization is very damaging to our society. As stated in the text book, polarization can lead to no middle ground for Americans. Having people who support a certain political party so strongly can prevent there to ever be a compromise. Tom Davis and Martin Frost, both former US Congressmen have even suggested a law requiring states to appoint representatives that are non-partisan in the hopes of diluting the polarization in Congress in 2008. They believe that too much polarization in Congress is because of the popularity of primary election for the government.
According to a report by the Knight Foundation, 86% of college students believe that social media companies censor political views that they disagree with (Grimmer & Tucker, 2020). This is a concerning trend because it is leading to a lack of diversity of thought and ideas, which is essential for a healthy democracy. This technology addiction distracts people from reality and limits our ability to think. This excessive use of technology is a cause for concern because it is leading to a lack of meaningful human interaction and critical thinking. If America continues down this path, it may end up like the society depicted in Fahrenheit 451, where people are unable to think for
The trend in congressional polarization overshadows the trends in public. While congressional moderates dissipate, moderates in the public “in the United States stands at its highest point in more than 75 years” according to polling (Smith). Many moderates ‘lean’ toward the left or right which causes the first problem in many polarization studies. Polarization means that constituents disperse from the center of the line to either or right into political parties, not necessarily radical, but many of these ‘leaners’ continue to vote on an issue to issue basis (Enns and Schuldt). Congressional polarization differs immensely; this trend appears more as sorting where partisans move to more “extreme ideologies” (Hill and Tausanovitch 1060).
Party polarization in American politics is a phenomenon that has been pervading into American government for the last few decades. Simply put, the term refers to the ideological distance between the two parties within government growing farther and farther apart in Congress, which have various consequences on the American way of life. The causes of party polarization include historical demographic changes since the 1950s, external forces acting upon the public, as well as demographic changes. Possibly the most popular explanation for polarization in American congress is Southern Realignment, a term coined to describe the increasingly Republican southern White, and the disappearance of southern Democrats, particularly those who are more conservative.
Polarization in politics refers to a sharp division of political attitudes as a party, into opposing parties. Partisan polarization over the past thirty years has negatively affected Congress’s ability to govern. Because of this polarization of the parties, Congress is now divided and practically dysfunctional. Similar voting between the Republicans and the Democrats was common through the 1980’s, but in the 1990’s the parties became ideologically distant with a decline of a center ground and began pulling away from each other. The main causes of this polarization are that Republicans have become more consistently conservative while Democrats have become more consistently liberal.
Information is spoon fed to individuals. An illusion of choice is present; people can always choose the news station they watch, but which station, if any, has the most accurate information? Social media and television create opinions for people so they can sit back and accept the ludicrous concepts as their own. Post are composed of current political events such as gay marriage and police brutality, but the repetition is obvious; it’s evident that the opinions are derived from others without true original thoughts or consideration on the matter. Thoughts are crammed down the throats of the people, and the people willingly accept and adopt them.
Although social media can be powerful for voicing opinions and thoughts to a wide variety of people within minutes, it does not involve strong-tie connections and therefore results with less participates interested in the commitment and high risks necessary to catalyze a
The polarization plays a role in the changes in politics over time as a symbiotic relationship since Wilson mentions the polarization and political change
There is a general belief among social media detractors that this form of communication is dehumanizing. People who spend all of their time updating their social media platforms with 140 characters of thought will fail to recognize the nuance of a real issue. It is common for a person with a potentially controversial stance to be completely dehumanized by social media lynch mobs, who do not care about the nuances of his message, rather, simply want his/her life destroyed for daring to oppose the mainstream narrative. Whether the goals of this opposition are good or bad, their message is often contained within a social media bubble where the nuances are completely missed. This leads to arguments on social media that completely miss people’s real points and instead engage in fallacious arguments that wander off topic (Miller,
In 2007, CNN stated a word “Youtube-ification of politics” prepared for the U.S. Presidential Primaries (Youtube and Policits). However, the impact of social media on politics can be either positive or negative. Social media can have a positive impact on politics when it is used properly. As people mentioned that social media is a free platform for sharing information, a tool of freedom and empowerment and a door of equality.
In conclusion, political impact on social media is huge and obvious. Social media platforms is substituting the traditional formal news media which has restrictions on the news and information they share especially in closed societies. Governments of closed societies are facing a problem because the government cannot control the news and the information shared on the internet which diminish the government authority to control their citizens. Lack of control on internet has made social media a platform for activists in politics and human right
Social media was developed to link people to the world and is an effortlessly convenient method for communication. Due to this, people are able to get in touch with just about anyone from all over the world and it no doubt has an incredible amount of influence on our lives. However, not all of it may be positive. Almost everyone is aware of how social media impacts us on a micro scale, but what about the influence it has on a macro level? Interestingly enough, it has taken a tremendous toll on politics.
