Intimacy and Social Media

Recently in class, we discussed intimacy in terms of social media. Although some individuals believe that social media hinders intimacy, others believe it improves relationships and satisfies intimacy requirements. The problem with both of these claims is that intimacy is not just one component but a combination of several qualities, such as: verbal communication, body language, physical touch, communication through text, etc. With that in mind, social media does not necessarily hinder intimacy between individuals, but at the same time, social media does not fulfill all of the requirements of intimacy.

First and foremost, I believe that social media has benefited society in many ways. The service is changing journalism and provides personal information to friends and acquaintances with little effort. One can send private messages, share photos, and boost their friends' self-esteem through retweets, likes, and other ways of approval. However, intimacy is much bigger than any social media service can provide. Although social media may allow two individuals to communicate with one another, I do not believe that alone should be considered intimacy, but rather, a quality that is a part of intimacy. If intimacy were a car, communication through social media could be considered the transmission, a component of the final product.

Most people want more out of their relationships with friends, family, or significant others than just messages, Skype chats, or Tweets, showing that social media can only provide certain parts of intimacy. Even after Skyping with a significant other, a service that provides face-to-face interactions, one would typically prefer to see the individual in real life.

Many people believe that social media sites fulfill all of their intimacy (intimate?) needs, causing them to feel lonely or unfulfilled. This unrealistic expectation is something that is fueling our individualistic society, replacing the all encompassing, intimate communities that individuals had 40 years with ago with more abstract and psychologically unfulfilling communities that we see today. Don't get me wrong, social media can provide parts of intimacy and improve aspects of relationships, but it cannot provide every quality within intimacy that face-to-face interactions provide.

Drama Drama Drama

In reviewing my notes for our upcoming exam tomorrow I discovered the reason behind why the reality show The Bachelor/Bachelorette continues to grow in popularity season after season, even though true love has only been found a handful of times in over twenty seasons.  I myself have been caught under its spell, recognizing and labeling it as trash TV.  I know that there will be all kinds of dramatics and over-the-top dates and a romanticized image of what the dating world is really like.  I realize that the producers of this show have put the contestants in situations where it is next to impossible not to create drama.  And, yet, I still watch it, each season forming new and lasting para-social relationships with the men and women searching for love on national television.  In looking at this show from the dramatist perspective, however, I have come to understand the reason I, and the rest of America making this show a Monday night favorite, can overlook all of the things that make this show ridiculous.  This reason we accept these people choosing to portray themselves in the most outrageous fashions, and doing some of the most ridiculous things, is because of the higher calling they are seeking.  They are doing it for love, and when it comes down to it, everyone can understand the craziness that surrounds trying to find the person you are meant to be with.  The audience can relate to the god term of finding love and a happy ending, explaining the addiction to and overwhelming popularity of The Bachelor. 

Blackout for Future Superbowls?

Anyone who tuned in for this past Sunday's biggest football game of year, whether that was for the commercials only, for the half time show, or to actually watch the game, noticed that right after halftime, the players, coaches, officials, and fans were plunged into a darken stadium. Playing time was postponed for over thirty minutes.When the power finally came back on, the San Francisco 49ers returned with new life in their game. Before the power outage, the game really couldn't be considered a game. The Ravens were in top form and the 49ers couldn't do anything to stop them or get too many points on the board. This caused for many people to place fake blame on Buffalo Wild Wings, because their commercials have often depicted a worker pulling ridiculous stunts to prolong a game. However, with the delay of game, serious consequences were inflicted on the players. Coming out of an already longer halftime than normal, players were forced to sit on the sidelines, stretching and staying loose for the duration of the blackout. NFL Commissioner says that this blackout will not have any effect on future chances for New Orleans to host another Superbowl, but I believe he could be wrong. Stopping play for over thirty minutes in the biggest game of the year leaves a sour taste in everyone's  mouth regardless of how you were affected. The blackout was the main reason the 49ers came back and made it a much closer game. Despite being down by 22 points at one point in the game, they lost by only 3 in the biggest game of the year. If the Ravens had ended up losing the game, I honestly think a lot more people would be frustrated to the point of taking New Orleans out of the running for any future games.

The Twitter Bowl

This Sunday was a big day for a lot of people. Especially football fans, chicken wing enthusiasts, and social media users. By the end of the big game I noticed that every one of the trending topics on Twitter were football related. I was not particularly surprised seeing how The Super Bowl is the most watched event on television. This really got me thinking of how social media has changed the way we watch and enjoy events such as this. As soon as something happened during the game it seemed it was instantly thrown onto Twitter for all the world to read, even though most people were already watching the game. Why did people feel the need to post updates about the same game everyone else saw too? For me, it was fun to go on and skim over the trending topics to see what others had to say about some of the best (and worst) plays, calls, and commercials. I wondered if what I thought was supported or if there was someone I could argue with over it. I imagine that I was not the only one to post my thoughts to see if my idea was more supported than my opposition's. This is not the only time this happens either. I notice every week there is something in the trends that is argued about, just on a smaller scale. Twitter has become the easiest way for people to get their ideas out quickly and effectively and we are now using this to watch shows and it completely changes the experience. It is like sitting and watching the game with several million people all putting their hate, love, and witty comments into your head.

Super Bowl Commercials - Too Much Hype (Bonnell1)

I'm an advertising major. Every year one of the biggest days for the business is of course, the Super Bowl. Advertisements are at the highest price ever, but with that comes the largest viewing audience of the year. In many cases, people watch the Super Bowl for only the ads. I see no problem with that. However, my main pet peeve is each year the hype for these commercials is huge, but each year it just seems like everyone is disappointed.

I can understand people not liking every single commercial, but just because they aren't all amazing does not mean that they should all be called "bad" commercials. My roommate was arguing with me today about how each ad needs to knock your socks off. My main argument was that that was literally impossible. Advertisements are targeted toward different groups of people, an Audi commercial that we thought was epic could be completely irrelevant to an older demographic. Or another example would be that older demographics loved the Dodge Ram Farmer commercial and the younger age groups just didn't get it.

Here is my point, the Super Bowl commercials are hyped up way to much that it is not possible for these companies to keep up with our expectations. Certain ads will be amazing, but due to the fact that companies are trying to reach so many different people, every single ad cannot adhere to our liking.

The Intrapment of Social Media- Ellen Lee 002

The question of whether or not social media controls our lives was brought up in a class discussion and it started to really make me think about how technology has been a crutch to our generation. Our generation was born into the technology era, and it is weird to think that maybe one day technology will no longer be available to us. I have a Twitter and Facebook account, but I do not use it to update the world about my life, but rather, I use it to check on the lives of others. I think social media is a great tool for college students who have left their homes because it is an easy way to stay connected to friends. I am opposed to the use of status updates and twit pics when it comes to younger generations.

I find it disheartening to see how many younger people then me are using social media cites to plaster their nude bodies and hopeless romantic feelings. It feels like people refuse to communicate verbally anymore, and instead is being used as a friend masker. People mainly post on Facebook to feel that others care about what they are doing at all times. I think people post because they have nothing better to do and are too afraid to be themselves in real life.

I believe that society as a whole would be much happier without the ability to have instant connection to the entire world. Heck last night I streamed the Super Bowl live from my computer, which means i could have stayed at my house instead of attending the party I was invited to. All these little things accumulate to show that media is cutting us off from the real world.

I think if we take a step back from the internet that we will communicate with people and make better friendships. Have you ever had a friend that you met online and you have never met them face-to-face? This is the problem I see with social media. People feel like they know someone from talking to them through instant message and then experience fear when they are to meet them in real life. I think people need to step away from the media and see how it makes life more fulfilling.

Social Media Lives

Do we plan our lives on social media as much as we plan our day to day plan? After discussing in class our obsession with social media and constantly updating it, I’d say so. We display ourselves as a different person on Facebook, Twitter and any other media. There are those who have different profiles for different groups of people—family, professionals, friends and maybe those who they don’t even know.  This hinders our real relationships outside of social media. (This goes back to the whole Catfish idea and not displaying ourselves as who we are). Or does it?

If we’re constantly posting picture of what we are doing, does it help our relationships outside of social media? People post constant updates, facebook statuses and pictures to let the world know what they are doing. We plan to take a picture and then post it up as soon as it’s taken so that the world knows what we are doing. I even have certain friends who will plan to post a certain status or tweet at a certain time to create some sort of “message.” Do we go out of our way to do something that we can tweet about it, or do we really tweet in the moment? This goes with pictures. Are we really having fun, or do we have to post a picture, get “likes” and social media attention to have fun?  I’m guilty of posting pictures as soon as I take them, but the more and more I think about planning life around social media, it makes me want to reject it.

People would be more interesting if they didn’t post on social media all the time. It would make people a little mysterious. Instead of tweeting everyone five minutes, posting one creative tweet or something that actually means something would make life a lot better. Sometimes people feel the need to update social media. They NEED to change their picture. The world just needs to know what food they are eating or hear a rant about their boyfriend/girlfriend/whatever friend.

What I’m saying is, we plan our media, we plan what we want people to think of us, and it’s constantly changing. The only way to make this addiction useful is to post quality things. Because you can only be so famous on the internet for long.