Simplify, Simplify, Simplify
Good and happy Wednesday uFam, I hope y'all are having a great week. I know this week is a struggle as time feels like it’s at a crawl with a week-long break in sight, but stay strong, you can do it! Think of how sweet the turkey and stuffing will taste when it is complemented with the fruits of your labor. So without further ado, I give you one last article to enjoy before break. Happy reading!
It feels like every year is more eventful than the last nowadays with wars across the globe rearing their ugly heads and political divisiveness at home reaching an all-time high. (Editor’s note: Well, except for that one time 160 years ago.) These issues are all sorts of messy and incredibly intricate, having both historical backgrounds explaining their existence as well as long lasting repercussions no matter the outcome, making it difficult to navigate and form an opinion on them. You may be thinking, “Geez, I sure would like to know how to feel about a certain topic that everyone is screaming at me to take their side about, but I don’t know where to start!” Well first things first, we are not gonna touch a single history book or peer-reviewed article because those are both long and boring; no, we have a solution fit for the modern thinker!
In the year of our Lord 2023, we are blessed to all be on social media, and social media puts things into bite-sized chunks making them easier and faster to read. What once was a heavily debated sociopolitical issue can now be delegated to a fun Instagram post with fancy fonts and clip-art! The best thing about these posts is that you can repost them onto your story, so now you can show your support for a given issue with little to no effort! Sources? Not needed! Who is gonna read those when they can look at some corporation-chic Google art on top of a tan background! Here’s 35 words total to get you to take a stance and foam at the mouth when someone disagrees.
The key to making these Instagram posts work is that they do a little thing called lies of omission! If you simply omit information that works against you for the sake of proving your point, then wow, look at that, you’re always right! Is the goal of these posts to educate you on a topic and make you a more informed thinker? Don’t make me laugh! Well-thought-out and in-depth arguments don’t get reposts, but pretty slides that play solely on emotions? That does the trick.
If you’re reading this article, I’m gonna take a swing and say that you’ve 100 percent seen one of these articles pop up somewhere on your social media, maybe even reposted one yourself. Is there anything inherently wrong with that? Yes. Just kidding. It’s easy to be swayed by things on the internet, but if you make sure to do research on your topic you can gain a better understanding on the issue and through a more thorough knowledge, sway people to your side. Not with pretty fonts and pictures, but a solid argument.
Eh, who am I kidding, that takes work. Have fun reposting your graphics and have a happy Thanksgiving.
By Mason Piva