Pune: Sociology experts have pointed out that people want to feel valued in the Internet world and hence indulge in the behaviour of sharing and forwarding posts. While incidents of sharing of fake video of child lifters continue, so as cases of mobocracy which is taking the lives of innocents in the country.
Sociology expert Vidya Avachat who is head of sociology department of SP College said that there are different groups who are indulging in sharing of such videos and the agenda to share such videos depends on the social media group.
“For instance, parents are concerned about their children and so they share such video messages to make people alert in the society. While in rural areas, people just share such messages without thinking of its repercussions. Some political group would share such video with a political agenda. People want to be valued on social media and want to create their self-identity and so they forward such messages,” Avachat added.
The expert also pointed out that as the world has adapted social media people can only participate by sharing, liking of content on such media. “However the content on such media is not under scrutiny which is the cause of the damage,” he added.
Another sociology expert Vinayak Lashkar who is head of the sociology department at TC College in Baramati said that people are living in a consumer culture and act like they are consumers.”People are unaware that social media products are there to sell things and are marketing their products. They do not want people to think and they are successful in doing that,” he added.
Speaking on the issue of sharing and forwarding such posts, Lashkar highlighted that people need to be taught about things like fact-checking, reasoning and scientific thinking. “In rural areas, schools can play a big role in teaching these things to young students who in turn can spread the thing in society,” he added.
Experts pointed out that incidents like fake information, morphed pictures, edited videos are forwarded by people which is causing the damage as can be seen in recent incidents of mobocracy, Blue Whale challenge and others.
