Advanced Essay #4: How social media and technology affect violence?

Technology have controlled how we do things in society today. In the last 30 year, internet have been invented and it has revolutionized many forms of communication. People have no problem contacting their relatives from all over the world. There are many benefits to this creation, but there are also many consequence that come with it. For the years that technology has changed our lives for the better, it also increased the rate of violence in our society.

I have a friend that likes to spend her time on social media posting pictures and tweets about what she is thinking, where she is at, what she is doing at the moment, etc. I received the news one night when talking to my cousin that she got into a severe argument because of a social media interaction that she had with another girl. Apparently, the girl commented on one of her photos intruding her business, then my friend got mad and got into an argument with that girl in private message. The time and date was noon at Love Park. They decided to bring that small situation to the actual world. My cousin and I knew that this will turn into a fight and we did not think that it was necessary at all. We were able to convince her into not showing up. The moral of my personal experience is that because of another person clicking the send button from their phone, it triggered someone else on the other side of the channel. From that point on, it can turn into an argument that can end up like my experience and turn really physical and violent.

With domestic violence being everywhere in the United States, the city of Chicago is specifically known to be a dangerous city. With many people living in the ghetto, you have many really menacing communities and neighborhoods. Many of those locations in Chicago contain dangerous gangs, illegal drug transactions, many weapon misuses, etc. With that, having the power of technology and advanced communication techniques, it made everything a lot more efficient. That make everything a lot more dangerous for those neighborhoods and it made it a lot more complicated for the police department to track down. Relating back to the thesis, because of the advance technology that is available to almost everyone, they were able to use that to their advantage and create a easier way of communication for themselves. With that, it increased the rate of overall violence, and most importantly, for the people that are natives to Chicago.

Violence is occurring because of the advance technologies that we create everyday. Looking at it from another domestic perspective: on December 3 of 2015, a teenager from Olney Charter High School was arrested because of a threatening post online. The teenager posted on social media saying that he is intending to shoot up the school. That message was apparently sent to a young teenage girl from his school. The mother saw the message and it triggered her into calling the police department. The teenage boy was then arrested a couple days after; the police found a semi automatic pistol in his house. This shows the great matter of what social media can do to individuals like the teenage girl and her mother.

On the other hand, there was two students arrested on November 11 of 2015 because they also posted a threatening post on social media. The two student, from University of Missouri, posted saying that they will shoot any Black person in their sight when they come into class tomorrow and warns everyone to be ready. They got arrested 3 hours after they posted online. This enhance my argument of technology and social media making violence a lot more revealing through our blurry vision in society.

Speaking of vision, there are many things that people, especially teenagers, are not careful of. People have two sides and we tend to forget that sometimes when we become their friend. The teenagers that have been arrested might have friends that never thought that they would do such thing, but coming to realize that, they really did commit something like that. The picture below explains a lot about what I am talking about, and that is why I chose it. This explain the different sides that people have, and you should always be cautious about who you hang out with.

I only provided three examples regarding mostly social media violence, but there are most definitely more examples out there in the world. It is sad to say that, some of these posts actually lead to the physical violence phase, and people get severely hurt. With that, this does not mean that you stop using social media or technology in general, in fact, be cautious about what you are posting online and who you choose to hang out with because all of it have an impact on your safety.