Social Media

Yesterday I made a circular allegedly from my school’s vice chancellor’s office and imposed his official signature on it and posted it on social media. It spread like wildfire.

The response? No one bothered to verify its authenticity or even question why a public holiday was indicated as the official opening date. Almost every comment I saw condemned the School administration and the Vice Chancellor. That’s the effect of social media and what’s alarming is that such scenarios play out online daily.

Social media is a powerful tool (education wise and communication wise) but can be a very destructive weapon. Social media can make or break a person, a political career or an institution.

 Social media can even kill someone literally and figuratively. Not once have we seen a fake obituary posted on social media and people go ahead and post conciliatory messages without even bothering to verify the information; no one even bothers to question the cause of death for the alleged deceased.

In a neighboring country, a political aspirant even used social media to declare himself president after elections and posted a swearing in ceremony video.

Cyber bullying is another common practice on social media platforms that is usually taken slightly but research has shown it to be life threatening at the extreme.

People commit suicide due to cyber bullying, kid’s loose self-esteem due to cyber bullying yet there is no comprehensive legislation to combat cyber bullying.

Terrorists, on the other hand, have become tech savvy too. The war on terrorism is now fought on the digital frontier with tech-savvy terrorists fighting against government establishments slow to adapt digital warfare strategies only relying on bullets and mortar but the enemy is invisible, the enemy now hides behind the computer and not in trenches and alleys.

 The war on terrorism is now fought in the cyberspace and not in battlefields. Terrorists have devised ways to spread their agendas on social media and recruit new members online leaving governments on the losing side on the war against terrorism.

As we head to an election year with alarming high political temperatures it is my strong proposition that social media be regulated or the necessary law enforcement bodies to keep a keen eye on social media, but as His Excellency The President says, “Security starts with you”.

Parents should be wary of their kid’s activities on social media and monitor who they interact with and the content they are accessing. Parents should watch out for social media addiction in their kids and even monitor behavioral changes attributed to social media.

Social Media users should question every source of information and not take everything at face value. They should also be wary of forwarding information whose contents they cannot verify and whose origin they do not know.

Social media, like fire, is a good servant but a bad master. The government should put in place necessary laws and policies or set up a taskforce to tame social media and protect us from ourselves.

This may be difficult in a free country where people have rights to information access but as Doctor Matiangi said, “Painful decisions must be made….”… to safeguard this country. Those wreaking havoc online should face the full force of the law and authors of false information should be prosecuted.