Is Twitter a Step Towards Ending the Ignorance?

Individuals may argue that social media platforms are pointless in regards to factual information, seeing as the platforms are primarily used to share status updates, selfies, food pictures, and memes. Has the use of social media introduced individuals into a new age of ignorance? An ignorance so intense that is distracting individuals from factual evidence and feeding lies in order to suppress the voice of the public? The article “The Age of Ignorance” by Charles Simic discusses the idea that ignorance is preferred in our country as opposed to intellect. According to Simic, “A truly educated populace would be bad, both for politicians and for business”. Simic argues that gullible individuals are what politicians desire, because they will be unable to distinguish lies from truth, which may sound odd but it is a very real thing. A perfect example would be last years presidential election; plenty of individuals gave into President Trump’s long list of promises, fully believing plenty of ignorant things the now President said. Ultimatley, Trump was unable to fulfill many of the immediate promises he vowed to his supporters because he simply does not have the sole power to do so (i.e. building a wall that Mexico would pay for), yet his “uneducated” supporters were not aware the government worked in that manner. An ignorant population definitely benefits the corrupt, however, the truth is out there and I believe Twitter is a valuable source to introduce individuals to a variety of conversations to further expand their knowledge. 


The social media platform that is Twitter grants individuals the opportunity to share thoughts and ideas about any given subject with users all over the world. The article “Twitter Theory and The Public Scholar” by Pete Rorabaugh, discusses the relationship between Twitter and its positive use towards helping engage informative conversations. Rorabaugh states “Twitter provides the academic community with valuable communicative tools that help our work gain more public attention and relevance”, and I fully agree with his statement. Whether the discussion be about politics, or something fun like discussing the eclipse of 2017, individuals will gain some sort of knowledge from engaging in the public conversation that is Twitter. However, Twitter is not an entirely reliable source seeing as it is largely opinion based, and anyone can fabricate their own lies. President Trump has his fair share of questionable tweets, yet they bring awareness whenever they are “trending”, causing users to do further research. For example,when trump made his tweets surrounding the infamous wall in Mexico, I began to conduct my own research on the matter because I truly questioned if he had the right to do such a thing. That is what Twitter is all about, spreading information intended to bring awareness to topics! Twitter does not guarantee the truth, but it is a large community intended to share and voice opinions, which I believe can help individuals step outside of their comfort zone and introduce new ideas.

articles mentioned:
http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2012/03/20/age-of-ignorance/
http://www.digitalpedagogylab.com/hybridped/twitter-theory-and-the-public-scholar/

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