The social media network has problems that emerge and is criticized but the positive values are many. Recently some entertainers were involved in some scandalous behavior that was immediately picked up by social media.
Internet and social media play a big role in our lives. In the past a small number of those with power were able to control public opinion, hiding or exaggerating what they wanted. The strong and wealthy could hide disadvantageous reports but now all the citizens are in the know; all are able to circulate information and even produce it. What is said can return to the sender like a boomerang and not like a simple comment but with intent to hurt like those involved with scandalous behavior that was made known to the whole world.
No longer is it easy to keep secrets. Sadly, we do have those who have evil intentions in the use of social media, but the positive is greater than the negative and to try to censure will be going against the spirit of the times. We need only go back a few years before the time of the internet and recall the many things hidden and lies that were spread.
One such case is the People's Revolutionary Party Incident in which the South Korean Government accused individuals of actions against the Anti-communism law. They were executed and a few years after the return to democracy they in a new trial were exonerated and the families compensated. The execution would never happen today with the network that we have. No longer easy to keep information locked up from the public.
Celebrities and government are not the only ones trying to keep bad publicity out of the public's eye. Most have the same tendency when it comes to embarrassing news. As long as what is done is not made known we are at peace. Even though the internet and social media have broken down many of the walls of society, self-admiration, still does well. And yet when we see it in the media we applaud, laugh and envy the distorted appetites we see and make what we see popular and forget that we are putting to sleep our natural human feelings to examine and judge.
As with most things in life, cyberspace has both the light and dark, the good and bad. However, without observation and vigilance to think we are advancing democracy is a great mistake. We have good technology but also the emerging of wrongful functionality and one of the best examples is false news. With the growth of cyberspace, the money required, control of the system, power of a few over actions, one has to laugh when we hear, without reservation, it is helping the spread of democracy.
Religion's respect for authority leaves us also with serious problems. We have a case in a diocese where scandalous goings-on was known by a handful of Christians but for fear of tarnishing the church they kept silence and the problems continued to grow like poison mushrooms. Christians in Korea when they see corruption within the church are reluctant to bring it to the internet. But it will eventually be made known. With the appearance of corruption in the different religious bodies, many are leaving.
Frozen ice begins to melt with the coming of spring and from the bottom up and is not seen with the naked eye until spring arrives and the awakening. This is when we see the problem. We all need a mirror in which to look. The higher the person in the order of authority the bigger the mirror that needs to be used. "What can be done with a simple hoe all know that a plow will not be able to do it."
