It’s become fashionable to blame all of the world’s ills on social media. I’ve done this myself from time to time.
Society is becoming increasingly polarized? Blame it on Facebook.
Civility is breaking down? Blame it on Twitter.
Public discourse continues to move into the shallow end of the pool? Blame it on TikTok.
Whether it accelerates the anger or increases exposure to hateful rhetoric, social media definitely has a lot to answer for.
If we could go back 20 years and ask for a redo as the nascent technology was introduced, I wonder what we would do differently?
Read Also
Late season rainfall creates concern about Prairie crop quality
Praying for rain is being replaced with the hope that rain can stop for harvest. Rainfall in July and early August has been much greater than normal.
However, what gets lost in the criticism is the reality that social media has also done an awful lot of good.
It’s brought us closer together, whether that be allowing Grandma and Grandpa to keep in touch with their grandkids half way across the country or making it easier to launch campaigns to help somebody in need.
I recently read about one example of how social media can be used for good instead of evil.
A man in the Netherlands bought a Second World War-era Jeep from someone who had kept it in storage for 30 years.
During a test drive one sunny day, a sunbeam hit the vehicle just right, exposing the words “Buck Cyr, Campbellton, N.B. — New Brunswick” scratched into the steering wheel.
Twenty or 30 years ago, that would have likely been the end of the story. But now we have the internet and social media, and the sleuthing began.
The Dutch man did an online search for Buck Cyr and eventually found a Facebook post of an article about Cyr’s involvement with the Campbellton Tigers hockey team.
Cyr’s daughter had left a comment at the end of the story, and the Dutch and Canadian families were soon in touch.
Cyr is no longer with us, but his daughter, Phyllis Roy, says it means a lot to the family to know a bit more about their father and grandfather’s time spent during the war.
It also had a practical benefit for the Dutch Jeep owner. The previous vehicle had been turned into an American Airborne Jeep, so the new owner is getting it restored as a Signals Division Canadian Jeep.
Thank you, social media.
