Social Media and Shame
Monica Lewinsky appeared in Iowa for her first time to share words of compassion to remove shame from the internet on Tuesday, October 24th 2017.
There stood Monica Lewinsky, on stage. Her stance gave off a lively mood, and her voice resonated throughout the room. Her purpose? To express the dangers of social media, and how to combat hate through compassion.
At the Iowa Memorial Union on November 24th, Monica Lewinsky gave a speech titled, “The Price of Shame.” This wasn’t the first time Lewinsky has given a speech though. Lewinsky spoke at a total of 10 events and 4 summits. The room was full of all kinds of people, young and old alike. Some people were students at the University of Iowa, others older adults. All came to hear Monica’s story on how she was put into public exile for a year. She spoke about her experience, after her incident in the White House with President Clinton, and how media made it worse than she could have imagined.
Lewinsky went from being a private person to becoming a public figure for harassment, and what made this possible was the internet. “There are no borders, there is no limit to how many people can watch, and the public will shame you,” Lewinsky said.
According to Lewinsky, sometimes you can’t eradicate the issues with social media culture, but you can always help minimize it. “What we need is a cultural revolution,” Lewinsky said.
She believes that the internet should an open arena for compliments and innovation, not hate and shame. Clicks (as in clicks on stories) happen every day on the Internet, and even though people have freedom of speech and expression there are moral limits to this freedom. Lewinsky was able to point out key problems with social media, but she also pointed out key ways to minimize shame from cyberbullying on social media.
“Compassion can reduce the half-life of shame,” Lewinsky said. She believes being sympathetic to someone who has been shamed can affect the person in ways no one would expect, and in some cases saving a person’s life.
Cyberbullying may only be virtual, not material, it can still bring harm to many people. As Lewinsky described it, “there is nothing virtual about it.” She is showing that it is not just a matter of two people conversing from different ends of the screen. A person is getting hurt and oppressed in the actual world, and this is causing real world problems. She thinks we all have a choice to make when we are on the Internet. As Lewinsky described this “with every click we make a choice.” We have the chance to click on something that will benefit the world, but there are also websites and articles that shame other people. Lewinsky explained that your choice will not only place a view on one of the articles, but (most of the time) be paying money to the producers of the website. So, your clicks online will always matter.
For example, 5 million people viewed a website that leaked obscene images of Jennifer Lawrence. Now imagine, Lewinsky explains, if all this attention was directed toward something complementary or productive. Instead of shaming a person’s life, or possibly even destroying it, you could be assisting or showing compassion to someone else. This all comes down to what you click online. A few words of advice from Monica Lewinsky: “stand up for somebody online” and help create this “Cultural Revolution.”
Although social media culture can be the cause of many issues, it can also be turned around and be used for better purposes. One way Lewinsky shows this is through her #BeStrong emoji keyboard app. Through social media, Lewinsky shows that we can change the culture in which we live. Her idea is to send compassionate messages through emojis, which is the purpose of her keyboard. This can change the focus to peace from the same device that is used to bring about shame. Lewinsky also released a series of public service announcements over cyberbullying called “In Real Life.” The purpose of the videos, which are shared over social media, is to raise awareness for the issue.
A few of the audience members had an opinion on Lewinsky’s lecture. “News is everywhere,” a former journalist, Tiffany Tam said. Tam believes that social media is a good tool for informing, but with it comes many negative aspects. One of those aspects is fake news. “Internet brought so much, but brought us fake,” Tam stated. She also believed that the event was good to bring light to the issues of social media, and that Lewinsky was able to highlight this issues well.
Gregg Shoultz, principal of Iowa City West High School also had a strong opinion on social media. “People don’t always act like themselves on social media.” said Shoultz. However, Shoultz doesn’t believe social media is entirely a bad thing. In fact, he expressed his opinion on how social media can be beneficial, even in a learning environment. “The site we’re using now for our classrooms has a sort of social media component to it, that is, our canvas site. We can do discussions online. That can be a strong learning element.”
Shoultz believes that social media is also a good way of informing people on events and organizing activities. In reference to the excel sheet that ranked women that was created by a student and spread through social media, Shoultz was glad to see that students retaliated in defense of the women. To prevent another such event from happening, Shoultz turns towards education. “Education would be the best way to prevent it.” he said. In a way, using social media allows the student to learn how to use it responsibly. Also, because of how popular social media is in our culture, Shoultz believes it can also be used as a medium to express opinion and make change.
Allie Schmitt-Morris ‘18 is the social media editor at the West Side Story. At the West Side Story, social media tends to be used for the paper itself. Specifically, to promote their website. Promoting their website on facebook has gotten them over 3000 views on their page, making social media a useful tool for an educational environment. Although social media has its downfalls, she believes that most of that can be prevented. “Once you put that out there, it’s never gonna go away,” said Schmitt-Morris. In order to keep students using social media responsibly, she believes that just by watching what you put out on social media can make a difference.