Listen now | The Consequences of Covid-19 within the World of Social Media - In light of the 5-yr anniversary, I'm focusing the discussion around how Covid-19 entered our lives in March of 2020. Using the retrospective to ponder: what did I learn? what did we learn? On the heels of sharing my article about Why I Saw Through the Media ManipulationPart of my personal experience was noticing the shadow-banning and imposed limitations when sharing on social media. This hindered my outlets for connecting with my network and contributed my own self-censorship (in addition to the deliberate censorship enforced by the social media platforms). Which, in turn, led me to find other online outlets for sharing and for gleaning from other's experiences. One of the biggest consequences within the social media space was the influence it had on how we relate with one another. My engagement with others diminished a lot since the onset of the Covid crisis. It appears that there are other forces at play driving the social fabric apart. What have we consented to? What will we consent to? Can we re-establish our social contracts ourselves without forced guidance from external sources?
Yeah ..now that you said that, I too see that my engagement with others dimished a lot too since then .. especially online, and especially through social media. I deleted most of my soc media apps then as I had lost trust in them and I had lost the motivation to participate there. I am not sure if that is detrimental, though. In some ways, it is limiting perhaps because most people I know are still on them and most people I don’t know and perhaps could get to know are still on them. However, I found others who are not on them and who use different social platforms, away from the mainstream. It is a double edged sword, though, because it firmly plants me in the outskirts of society, with the others in the margins where it seems there is very little power and much despair at the moment. Although, I certainly sense despair in the majority too. The masterminds of covid seem to be getting their results.. I don’t like to say it, but the after effects are well and strong it seems. We are weaker, more alone, each individually bewildered and fighting private hell. I keep coming back to a thought to keep it small. Only concentrate on what is right ahead of me, what I see and feel today. I had never done life this way before, always had plans, always driven towards a longer range goal. I no longer seem to have many obvious goals because I can’t. Everything seems wobbly. These are the after effects.
PS: I hear you on wanting to re-engage with your old network. This week, I am suppossed to meet up with a now former friend, someone who was dear to me for 30 years, but I chose to cut contact with during a really turbulent time in my personal life during covid. I no longer could handle her opinions as I was grappling with what was happening to me and my family and I felt like she was totally insensitive to it with her continued mass media driven opinions, even though I had shared with her what was personally happening to us. Anyway.. fast forward several years, we ran into each other by chance, and it sparked a cautious desire in me to want to re-engage. She is very cautious too and now after more than half year of messaging each other every once in a while, we agreed on a day to meet up..
Thanks for sharing Jana! I appreciate you taking the time to share about how this has affected you. Naming your perspective around the after effects and how everything feels wobbly. Yes, the instability is there. And it appears we can’t rely on those popular social media platforms like we once did. It’s great that there are other alternative options, but like you mention they have limitations. So this is where we are - good to take an assessment, and see how we can meet our needs moving forward.
Wishing you the best of luck with meeting up with your friend who’ve you broken contact with. I understand how it can be necessary to break off ties for a while with someone who’s coming across as insensitive. Good for you for taking into consideration that it may be time to re-engage.
Thanks, James. The meeting went fine. Cautiously fine and that was expected, so it’s fine by me :) .. I understand that the external pressures and the trauma caused by those pressures were the culprit and I see my friend the way I have always seen her, a warm-hearted person. We do things differently, think differently, but the fundementals of why we had been close friends for decades are still there. And that is to be treasured.
Wonderful to hear Jana! Yes, we mustn't let these external influences continue to disrupt the relationships we've built through the course of our lives. So much damage has been done, yet we have the strength to repair and regain. May your friendship with her continue to flourish!
Yeah ..now that you said that, I too see that my engagement with others dimished a lot too since then .. especially online, and especially through social media. I deleted most of my soc media apps then as I had lost trust in them and I had lost the motivation to participate there. I am not sure if that is detrimental, though. In some ways, it is limiting perhaps because most people I know are still on them and most people I don’t know and perhaps could get to know are still on them. However, I found others who are not on them and who use different social platforms, away from the mainstream. It is a double edged sword, though, because it firmly plants me in the outskirts of society, with the others in the margins where it seems there is very little power and much despair at the moment. Although, I certainly sense despair in the majority too. The masterminds of covid seem to be getting their results.. I don’t like to say it, but the after effects are well and strong it seems. We are weaker, more alone, each individually bewildered and fighting private hell. I keep coming back to a thought to keep it small. Only concentrate on what is right ahead of me, what I see and feel today. I had never done life this way before, always had plans, always driven towards a longer range goal. I no longer seem to have many obvious goals because I can’t. Everything seems wobbly. These are the after effects.
PS: I hear you on wanting to re-engage with your old network. This week, I am suppossed to meet up with a now former friend, someone who was dear to me for 30 years, but I chose to cut contact with during a really turbulent time in my personal life during covid. I no longer could handle her opinions as I was grappling with what was happening to me and my family and I felt like she was totally insensitive to it with her continued mass media driven opinions, even though I had shared with her what was personally happening to us. Anyway.. fast forward several years, we ran into each other by chance, and it sparked a cautious desire in me to want to re-engage. She is very cautious too and now after more than half year of messaging each other every once in a while, we agreed on a day to meet up..
Thanks for sharing Jana! I appreciate you taking the time to share about how this has affected you. Naming your perspective around the after effects and how everything feels wobbly. Yes, the instability is there. And it appears we can’t rely on those popular social media platforms like we once did. It’s great that there are other alternative options, but like you mention they have limitations. So this is where we are - good to take an assessment, and see how we can meet our needs moving forward.
Wishing you the best of luck with meeting up with your friend who’ve you broken contact with. I understand how it can be necessary to break off ties for a while with someone who’s coming across as insensitive. Good for you for taking into consideration that it may be time to re-engage.
Thanks, James. The meeting went fine. Cautiously fine and that was expected, so it’s fine by me :) .. I understand that the external pressures and the trauma caused by those pressures were the culprit and I see my friend the way I have always seen her, a warm-hearted person. We do things differently, think differently, but the fundementals of why we had been close friends for decades are still there. And that is to be treasured.
Wonderful to hear Jana! Yes, we mustn't let these external influences continue to disrupt the relationships we've built through the course of our lives. So much damage has been done, yet we have the strength to repair and regain. May your friendship with her continue to flourish!
Thank you :)