The 2016 Presidential Election acts as a macrocosm for all the downsides of social media that critics have been so adamant in pointing out. More so than any other elections before it, social media played a huge role for both sides- through the campaigns, the use of rhetoric to arouse support, and in the spread of headlines.
Throughout this election, Donald Trump used social media as a platform to connect with his base, and many of his supporters followed suit. In using this tactic, Trump was able to easily create headlines, spur his base forwards, and create an environment that exploited the downsides of social media to heavily divide people from one another. Many on the opposite side of the aisle, including candidate Hillary Clinton, but none were able to garner anywhere near the level of momentum that Trump was using this tactic.
There was nothing new to be learned in terms of social dynamics in this process- rather, this election served to unearth the heavy divides between American citizens that almost always existed. Social media sites became highly politicized and were often the grounds on which arguments between people ignited into virtual shouting matches. These arguments between people online were often built on the increasing bias found in many news sources, paired with the increasing nature of social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter to act more as echo chambers than anything.
Part of the reason for this conflict is the format of social media as a whole. Most social media websites use algorithms to determine what shows up in each user’s news feed. Though these algorithms will differ slightly depending on what site, the gist is simple- if a user has shown interest in a certain topic, that user will be shown more of that content based on past interest. While convenient in many cases, this sort of algorithm only works to further divide people come election time. If a user is shown only content based on their own interests, that same user will put less stock into more reliable sources of news.
Social media sites are also notorious for their propensity for fraud. For example, Twitter- which could be considered the main culprit of social media sites in terms of fake users- allows users to create anonymous accounts in minutes. These opinions can then be tweeted out in out in short, 280-character bursts- which, as Sam Saunders of NPR points out, “makes Twitter antithetical to sophisticated, thoughtful political conversation” (1). This issue, in conjunction with heavily biased new sites, allowed misinformation to rapidly spread through the internet.
Through the means of huge divides that social media is largely responsible for, Donald Trump was able to win the 2016 election. He did this by working to undermine the credibility of the press through Twitter, which allowed him to ignite feuds at a whim. Along with this, social media had evolved to largely create a personal echo-chamber for each individual user, serving to broaden the gaps in political views between people and to undermine previously trusted news-sources purely by the massive influx of extreme headlines. Overall, social media’s role in the 2016 presidential election was to make it a battle of extremes in which winning became more important than what was best for the most people. It destroyed moderate opinions, and largely created the political environment in which Americans live today.
Citations
1. Sanders, Sam. “Did Social Media Ruin Election 2016?” NPR, NPR, 8 Nov. 2016, www.npr.org/2016/11/08/500686320/did-social-media-ruin-election-2016.