Social media was created with the intent to connect people in ways we weren’t able to connect in the past and to create opportunities to stay in contact with people who we may have let slip through the cracks otherwise. However, social media has taken a change in path. Rather than connect people as it was intended to do by its creators, it has instead become a breeding ground for polarization amongst society and now serves to divide people just as much, if not more, than it does to connect them.

Our society is quick to react extremely to minor inconveniences, and many often spend time fighting problems that exist more in their imaginations than they do in reality. Why is this occurring? While many factors may be contributing to the over exaggerations and ignorance plaguing our society, social media appears to be one of the primary contributors. People post extensive rants about things that may or may not be true, complain about things that may or may not be legitimate problems, and make claims that may or may not be valid. The posts that are exaggerated or illegitimate are often designed to appeal to the emotions of their viewers, and people are quick to react to the posts they see rather than take the time to determine whether or not they are genuinely valid. Because of this, falsified posts are rapidly shared, and before someone steps in to determine the information being shared is exaggerated or untrue, it can easily have already been seen by thousands, even millions, of viewers.

While it may seem harmless, falsified or exaggerated posts can greatly impact the emotions and beliefs of individuals reading them, and can cause conflict over problems that may not even exist. While we’ve all been told not to believe everything we read online people do so all the time, and doing so has filled the heads of individuals with extreme beliefs and ideas. The limited view of perspectives people make available to themselves on social media can lead them to believe that more people share these extreme beliefs and ideas than truly do, and they then go to battle to fight for their beliefs in a way they believe is heroic despite the fact that in reality, they may be causing more harm than good. This goes on to create severe division between groups of people as conflicts begin to arise, and much of this could be avoided if people were to stop relying on social media for news and were to instead spend time determining what is fact and what is fiction.

Social media allows people to quickly fabricate stories and news to mold to what it is they want to hear, and can lead to people fighting battles over conflicts that exist nowhere other than in their imaginations. While the original intentions behind social media were to connect people around the world, it is quickly morphing into a platform that divides people rather than brings them together. While you don’t necessarily need to delete your social media profiles, at least take the time to unbiasedly sort through posts on your feeds rather than allow yourself to emotionally react to things that may or may not be completely truthful.