With the penetration of social media into masses and the internet connected smartphones in every other hand, more and more of our "friends" are online at any particular time.
Some had hoped that this might provide new outlets that encourage more discussions and the exchange of wider range of opinions.
But we see the opposite- a notion called the "spiral of silence" exists online, in which people tend to keep opinions to themselves if they think they are in the minority.
In simpler words, people have self-censored themselves. Self-censorship is the phenomenon of preventing oneself from speaking.
Social media also affords users the ability to type out and review the contents before posting.
Still, people refrain from posting that controversial political argument online that they used to easily express when they hanged out with their friends in the past.
The fear of online bullying as well as the fear of even losing a friend restricts the people to post or express only non controversial views.
This phenomenon recently attracted my attention while talking to one of my friends,
and I realized that it was not just me but most of the people fear to express their views on social sites where they have most of their friends online.
People are more likely to express the same argument offline than online.
Consider the recent Israel-Gaza situation, I found my Facebook news feed flooded by one of my friends with anti-Israel posts and racist posts promoting hatred against Jews.
But, I found that none of the mutual friends commented on the issue, neither I did. Unknowingly, I along with my other friends were self censoring themselves.
Every now and then, I find anti-Pakistan posts on my Facebook news feed, but I ignore those posts because, I fear being labelled as "traitor" by my "patriotic" friends.
I am more comfortable posting my views here on the blog or on my Twitter channel considering that very few of my friends care to visit my blog and I have very small list of Twitter followers.
This can also be attributed to the fact that we as the social media users know more about the depth of disagreement over the issue in our wide circle of contacts.
This makes us hesitant to speak up either online or offline for fear of starting an argument, offending or even losing a friend.
It is just another visible sign of the way, online activities affects a person's life.
May God give me power and will to express my views freely.
Some had hoped that this might provide new outlets that encourage more discussions and the exchange of wider range of opinions.
But we see the opposite- a notion called the "spiral of silence" exists online, in which people tend to keep opinions to themselves if they think they are in the minority.
In simpler words, people have self-censored themselves. Self-censorship is the phenomenon of preventing oneself from speaking.
Social media also affords users the ability to type out and review the contents before posting.
Still, people refrain from posting that controversial political argument online that they used to easily express when they hanged out with their friends in the past.
The fear of online bullying as well as the fear of even losing a friend restricts the people to post or express only non controversial views.
This phenomenon recently attracted my attention while talking to one of my friends,
and I realized that it was not just me but most of the people fear to express their views on social sites where they have most of their friends online.
People are more likely to express the same argument offline than online.
Consider the recent Israel-Gaza situation, I found my Facebook news feed flooded by one of my friends with anti-Israel posts and racist posts promoting hatred against Jews.
But, I found that none of the mutual friends commented on the issue, neither I did. Unknowingly, I along with my other friends were self censoring themselves.
Every now and then, I find anti-Pakistan posts on my Facebook news feed, but I ignore those posts because, I fear being labelled as "traitor" by my "patriotic" friends.
I am more comfortable posting my views here on the blog or on my Twitter channel considering that very few of my friends care to visit my blog and I have very small list of Twitter followers.
This can also be attributed to the fact that we as the social media users know more about the depth of disagreement over the issue in our wide circle of contacts.
This makes us hesitant to speak up either online or offline for fear of starting an argument, offending or even losing a friend.
It is just another visible sign of the way, online activities affects a person's life.
May God give me power and will to express my views freely.
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