Social Media & Politics

The 2020 presidential election will go down in history as one of the craziest elections ever! For the past four years, this country has been through a lot. Whether it was war, police brutality and killings, mass shootings, social injustice or even a pandemic, Americans have seen it all. This is why this upcoming election is extremely important. It will not only determine our leader but also where this country will be in the future. Social media is a place where people are making their voices heard about the upcoming election. Social media has the power to influence almost everyone in the world. In 2020 people have been more vocal about certain issues and topics in this country more than ever. In the last nine months there have been police killings and also an on going pandemic. The deaths of George Floyd and Brianna Taylor sparked an outrage of violent protest across the country. Many people took to social media to express their emotions of anger, sadness and frustration about what happened but, people were really upset about how the situations were handled. People felt as though President Donald Trump was being too quiet about what was going on across the country. This is why social media may influence many people when it relates to the 2020 election. For example, someone may tweet about how bad of a president Donald Trump is and that may have a direct effect on a person that is for Donald Trump or indecisive. Social media can also lead to many spreading lies and misinformation which can lead to many people believing the wrong thing. I too, have fallen victim to the misinformation and lies that are on social media. It was this one meme in particular on twitter that showed Joe Bidden saying something terrible about minorities a couple months ago but, it turned out that it was a lie created by the Donald Trump campaign. I tend to not believe everything that I see and read online because half of the time, it may be coming from people who aren’t even educated on a specific topic that you were looking for. If I ever had second thoughts about something that I saw on twitter or facebook, I would do my own research because it will be more beneficial to me. With only one week before the 2020 election, I am involved in voting more than ever. When the last election took place in 2016, I was a senior in high school. I didn’t really take things seriously especially when it came to politics. I honestly thought the whole “voting” thing was a waste of time and that my vote didn’t actually matter because I was a minor. Four years later and I see what voting can do for a country as a whole. This is why I’m also encouraging my friends and my family to go out and vote! I strongly believe that we can’t and should not take this election in particular for a joke because this is our future that is on the line.