The best thing about social media is that it does not have boundaries.
Last night, listening to ghazals by Pakistani singers on the Internet, I scrolled through the comment box. One thing I often notice on such videos is that an intense sense of unity prevails in the hearts of both Indians and Pakistanis. Comments such as “divided by borders, united by music” are pretty common to come across. Some types of movies, a certain genre of music, some sort of cricket videos, and a few memes unite these countries.
Of course, there are also kinds of videos in which Indians and Pakistanis abuse each other at will. But this does not deter the love spread through the other channels.
Global platform
Social media has provided a platform for people across the globe to interact without any boundaries. Such a seamless conduit for communications across the borders was available never before. This has created an avenue of new opportunities for people around the world to write a new chapter in the history of international relations. Earlier, government-to-government (G2G) and business-to-business (B2B) contacts were the only prominent channels available across the international borders. But now, people-to-people (P2P) contact have received a booster dose, with the advent of the Internet.
But everything thing comes with its challenges. Incidents of bullying, trolling, frauds and plagiarism have also transcended borders. Spreading hate has become easier like never before. Anti-social elements utilise these platforms to leverage their agenda by spreading fake news and doctored videos. Cryptocurrencies have facilitated an era of cross-border scams, hawala, and money laundering as well. Letting hate content go viral has become a lot easier.
But will the positives be overpowered by the negatives? I don’t think so! After all, the ethics of being a good citizen and a good netizen is the same. As responsible netizens, we need to ensure a proper code of conduct in cyberspace. We need to speak out when we see something wrong, which happens not very often. Many good Samaritans report the things that are not supposed to be going viral. Because it is we who make things go viral, right?
The enormous autonomy that the Internet has bestowed on us needs to be taken seriously. We need to be cautious on how we utilise the technology, because with great power comes great responsibility. We should use the Internet as a platform to spread peace. It has immense potential to heal wounds that even time cannot heal. A platform with so much happening cannot be sacrificed to the whims of vested interests. And we have numerous examples of the same. We have had several online solidarity movements, social campaigns and so on which show us the right way to deal with things.
I firmly believe that this world has far more good people than evil ones. The common persons do not have any vested interests irrespective of the community they belong to. Social media has provided a platform for all the kind-hearted ones of the world to bring about a difference. Let us unleash its potential to make it a platform for humanity, and let humanity know no bounds!
emailtoaakashbajpai@gmail.com
