Shame On You, 953

After our discussion of shame memories this week, I thought a lot about what triggers shame memories. This line of thought made me recall a video I saw shared on social media. The video outlines the development of cyberbullying and effects of new technology and applications on human communication.

This video acts as a shame memory for all of America. Although the video focuses on cyberbullying, it also calls attention to how humans are slacking in communications and how they treat other people. One line which sticks out to me was the line in which they state that all the new social media websites have changed the way that we think of "friends". Instead of friends being people that you know and enjoy being around, they are someone who can be a complete stranger to you and the amount of friends a person has measures their popularity. This draws attention to the fact that we are getting out of touch with our fellow people and can even ignore their humanity. 

There are many people in our society who believe that cyberbullying is bad but they still participate in it. In the opening sequence of the video, there are many examples of comments used against people on the internet. Saying something behind a screen about someone else is supposed to make the bully to feel powerful but, it is extremely cowardly. In my experience, when someone is being bullied online, there are more people who defend that individual rather than support the bully. When an opinion is not supported greatly, it can make the antagonist want to take away their comment. Overall, the video draws attention to the difficult and negative elements of our culture, making us assess how connected we are to people who are close to us.