During the introduction of the speaker,
Siyanda Mohutsiwa, from the TED talk entitled: “How Young Africans Found A Voice
on Twitter” assigned for us to watch, I immediately though of the many, many Filipino
posts that have gone viral on social media. The speaker used a hashtag in her
tweet about Africa which became viral and the hashtag being used in various
ways. Filipinos use the same hashtag as well to make their messages go viral or
go along with what is trending not only in twitter but in other social media
platforms as well. The speaker then talks about her parental roots, with her
father being from Botswana and her mother from Swaziland. She brought to twitter
her obsession about a shared African identity and goes on about the way she
utilized twitter given its limitations in characters and follower count.
In the Philippines, a divide among the
people has been established since long before because the country is an archipelago.
I have read twitter wars between Tagalogs and Bisayas, which only increases the
level of discrimination within the country. I, being a gamer, have my share of
using online games as a way to rant about the differences of our skills and
blaming their being Tagalog for that. The Tagalogs as well mock the Bisaya
community in the online gaming world so it is kind of like a back and forth of
mockery on cultural identities.
The speaker continues about how she and
other young African travelers met and discussed about politics and society but always
end up on twitter. In twitter, she explains, they found a voice there where
they can share their brilliant ideas with different great purposes without having
to mind the borders of different African nations and the limitations that their
government has set. In the Philippine scene, especially now that it is time for
the midterm elections, the voices of the different people from different places
across the country has achieved a great reach. Senatorial candidates are often
criticized, particularly on twitter and social media in general. The candidates
as well use social media to share their ideas and platforms but, on the
flipside, social media has been used to rip off opponents, share false information
which poisons the minds of common Filipinos. The divide among Filipinos has become
so prominent in this time as the mockery from people in Luzon, Visayas, and
Mindanao greatly became so evident in social media. There is no common identity
that has been highlighted but, instead, the identity of who is better and who
is bad, who is from this place and who is from that place, whose idea is great
and whose is garbage.
The Filipinos use social media every
day. Their use of it may bring great benefit among the Filipinos as it can be a
medium to share ideas, share memes for a laugh, create a community with a
purpose, and find common ground, but it can also be used to share false
information, spread toxicity in the society, highlight the differences rather
that finding a common ground and resolve common problems. There are a lot of
benefits to using social media, but with what I can see, there are a actually
more people who use it in a manner that is not goof and shapes that identity
that the Filipinos are a divided people with a mentality of dragging down whoever
tries to climb on top.
