In this day and age, social media has given us a lot of advantages over the former generations. From being able to have your talent spotted on YouTube to making business connections on LinkedIn, technology has served us well. I am able to see what my friends are doing whether it is in a tweet, a Snapchat, or a “check in” on Facebook. We all live vicariously through our high school friend who is traveling through Europe or just recently got engaged to their significant other. In a way we do not have to pick up the phone and call, we can just log on.
Instagram is my favorite social media because getting to see happy people in pretty pictures is fun. Usually, it is a more positive outlet for people to log on to update people about their lives. Twitter, on the other hand, is where I see a lot of the negative conversations that I tend to steer clear of. Usually people are arguing and I think we can all get sucked into it. Recently an incident occurred that involved, "Ghostbusters" star, Leslie Jones. People were tweeting her very racist and hateful things, like comparing her to an ape for example. Someone even went as far as to mess with her account and tweeted extremely awful things about the LGBT community in her name. Leslie fought back though and made sure everyone knew those things said were not actually something that would have ever come out of her mouth.
Now yes this platform lets people discuss beliefs and points of view, but there is, in fact, a difference between practicing freedom of speech and using hate speech. These things said to her were people using their right to freedom of speech to bully and demean a human being. They used discriminatory language and their bigotry will and should not be permitted.
Leslie Jones decided to send a tweet out that stated what she was feeling after a day of being harassed on social media. She did not delete her account, but Leslie did take a break from the social media platform for a little while to process what had just happened.
I leave Twitter tonight with tears and a very sad heart.All this cause I did a movie.You can hate the movie but the shit I got today...wrongThis is not the first account of cyber bullying. Celebrities and non-celebrities face this kind of stuff daily. Log on to any social media platform at any time and you will see someone being attacked. I truly believe a line is crossed once freedom of speech turns into hate speech. Once you begin demeaning someone for his or her beliefs and turn towards angry vocabulary to attack another human your freedom of speech is no longer a right. If you, in any way, are also attacking another human being for his or her outward appearance then, No, that is not using your right to freedom of speech. In fact you are just being a hateful asshole.
— Leslie Jones (@Lesdoggg) July">https://twitter.com/Lesdoggg/status/75527100452034... 19, 2016
I believe a lot of times social media can be a place where bullies can hide their faces to get away with more. A lot of times accusing a cyber bully of harassing is harder to prove than if someone were to harass you in person. Many people can stay anonymous and this can lead to even harsher accounts of harassment.
Freedom of speech is something that the citizens of this country are lucky to have a right to, but there is a silver lining. If you begin to feel like your speech is demeaning in any way, stop. People get offended and things happen, but if your use of vocabulary begins to discriminate, fix it. There is no reason to hide behind your keyboard and make someone feel like complete scum. "Think before you speak" is one of the most cliche phrases used, but it holds a lot of truth. There is no need to project your self-hatred onto others. Project love instead.
