The Ethical Dilemma of Social Media and Media

ABOUT THIS COURSE

In this time of disruptive change and crises, like the Covid-19 pandemic, your charity or nonprofit may be feeling especially squeezed. You may be stretched with meeting a growing number of client needs while facing resource constraints.

Traditional media formats such as print media, broadcast media, and TV and radio face an uphill battle for readers and audiences. The advent of social media platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat, Spotify, Google, and Google, has turned the news feed from a portal largely curated by professionals to one where everyone can be a news creator. The speed of the news cycle within social media has resulted in a phenomenon where perceptions about the news become more paramount, rather than objective truth based on research and legwork. News has become more one-sided and polarizing as a result.

The objectives of this course are:

• To understand the origins of social media and its rapid growth
• How perceptions of the news, rather than the objective truth, have become the desired outcome of the news cycle, instead of revelation of the objective truth of an event.
• To understand how this connection with the perception, rather than the true background, of the news leads to polarization and social division.

At the end of the course, you will know how to:

• Know how the perception of the news, rather than the truth behind it, boosts and drives social media and traditional media.
• Counter the polarizing effects of social media with research and search for objective truth instead of perceptions.
• Look out for inappropriate means of media propagation by traditional media channels and social media.

SESSIONS