I am very enthusiastic when it
comes to posting in an online group discussing
the topics that I feel passionate about. I am typically the most enthusiastic
when it comes to discussing American football. It is so easy to find someone
with similar interests on facebook. All I need to do is check out my home page
and scroll through the posts and there will be hundreds of friends posting
sports discussions in many different groups. A friend of mine from high school
started a facebook group named “The Man Cave” to use for sports discussions
(regarding the NFL, NBA, MLB, etc.) and added me to it a few months ago. In
this group, we are allowed to be as positive and negative as we wish, as long as
we respect other group members. Nonetheless, when posting in this group, I feel
that I have a very high degree of anonymity,
meaning that one will always be able to maintain a certain degree of
invisibility, without needing to worry about being judged by others. There are
only two people I actually know personally from this group and I can effectively
vent all the “frustration” I may have whenever I feel like something did not
land in my favorite team’s favor.
As we have discussed in class
regarding the likeliness of online
aggression, I find that many people are using relatively brash language
compared to how they would most likely talk to someone in person. The group’s
members are not obligated to conform to the particular viewpoint of anyone
else. I do not feel pressured at all to say a certain thing since nobody in the
group sees me on a regular basis.
Even though online groups such as
the one I mentioned often frees people from the pressure to say a certain
thing, there is undoubtedly a heavy amount of polarization. Members of the group become either very in favor of
or very opposed to a certain viewpoint. For instance, in “The Man Cave”, there
have been multiple posts regarding the recent situations surrounding Vikings
Running Back Adrian Peterson and Ravens running back Ray Rice. The comments
which follow these posts usually are say things such as “oh this *&^$%$#@
really deserved this punishment. He totally had it coming” or “What the heck is
going on with the league? I thought they knew a much more mature and better way
to handle this.”
Despite the heated debates which
can result from controversial posts such as the ones above, cohesion is always bound to exist. As discussed
in our text, this concept means that group members try to stick together and
want to help everyone else do the same. This is what prevents people from
leaving an online group due to feeling unwelcome or inadequate. It is necessary
in order for both online and face-to-face groups to remain working. This is the sense which makes the group
members feel proud about being in the group.
A good example of this is the
facebook group that my friends from Church here at Penn State have formed
called “ACF Class of 201?”. In this group, members write posts about multiple
interesting things happening in their lives. If there is anything in particular
that is either bugging us or a question that has been lingering in our minds
for a while, we are free to post it on the group page. There are always many
people to read and comment on these posts, which makes everybody feel welcome
and invited.
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