Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Social Media During an Election

Social media during an election has its clear benefits, as successfully shown by President Obama in 2008 and 2012, but it also has its drawbacks, as shown by Anthony Weiner. This article, http://phys.org/news/2013-08-social-media-double-edged-sword-politicians.html , discusses how social media is a double-edged sword for politicians. Social media is a great way for a politician to get their message and name out there, but a negative tweet outweighs the benefits of a positive tweet. A negative tweet can be the difference between winning and losing an election, or can even cost a politician their career, as seen in Anthony Weiner's case (as discussed in another blog post).
A big problem for politicians and candidates is their social media accounts getting hacked. Even if they did not send the tweet, it reflects negatively upon them. If a candidate is leading in the polls and already has name recognition, such as an incumbent usually would, then it might be wise for them to not even have a social media account because one negative tweet could cost them an election. 
Last week, Obama's twitter got hacked by a Syrian group called the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA). The SEA posted a link on Obama's twitter that led people to a YouTube video about terrorism in Syria. Although the link was quickly fixed, it shows that even the President's twitter account is not completely hack-proof. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/president-obama-twitter-account-compromised-syrian-group-hacks-link-shortener-article-1.1499201 . 
In addition to politicians and candidates' twitter's being hacked, news organizations have the same problem. This is actually more harmful to the public than politicians' accounts being hacked. If a politician's account gets hacked, then it just causes harm to that politician, but if a news organization's account gets hacked, it could cause chaos in public. In 2011, Fox News' twitter got hacked and the hacker posted that the President was assassinated. Although false, if people read this live, then it could create pandemonium. For these reasons, social media is a double-edged sword for politicians during an election. 

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1 comment:

  1. UnknownNovember 7, 2013 at 11:08 AM

    Social media can be a great tool when used appropriately (just like anything else). Social media can be a great way for a politician to get his name out there and to be able to get his message out clearer and more concise than news media or television can. It lets them have a platform to be able to communicate more directly to the constituents. Think back to FDR's fireside chats during World War II. Those gave people a great source of comfort. The only negatives of it are when people don't have self-control. It can be tempting to want to respond to a bad comment or an insult, but if you don't do it respectfully or ignore it, then it will become the double-edged sword.

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