Social media influences our political opinion

In my fifth week as the opinion editor of The Bona Venture, I’m beginning to come to a realization: I don’t have an opinion on many things.
While I can think of a lot of things I have opinions on, such as spiral macaroni and cheese being better than elbows, most of my opinions aren’t on topics that would warrant an entire article.
While racking my brain for an idea this week, I got bored and took to scrolling through Twitter. Interspersed between the memes and Bona’s-specific tweets were political tweets, many surrounding the Kavanaugh hearings or Kanye West’s support of President Donald Trump.
It occurred to me how often I see more liberal tweets on my timeline; if I see conservative tweets, usually they are within a quote tweet.
In 2018, social media is everywhere. People are constantly double-tapping Instagram pictures, checking for Facebook updates and sending forehead pictures on Snapchat. The president himself sends numerous tweets a day.
The impact social media has on politics is obvious. Not only does it allow politicians to interact with potential voters, but everyone else can also share their opinions online.
However, an even more powerful feature of social media is its ability to form people’s opinions on certain topics. Based on who you are following; what they are retweeting and liking; and what tweets go viral, people’s exposure to opposing sides of the political spectrum will be very different.
In my case, most of the people I follow fall on the more liberal end of the political continuum, and I’m not following accounts like Trump or political commentators like Tomi Lahren. This makes my feed much more liberal. Why would I want to see content I don’t agree with? This can lead to a skewed view of the world since people are only taking in media from one side of the political spectrum.
Heavy social media users in their teens and 20s are still building their opinions and stances on politics, and the ability for social media to have a heavy impact on this shouldn’t be overlooked.
In the 2016 election, candidates’ updates and posts seemed to be on the news frequently. Social movements like #BlackLivesMatter and opinions surrounding it vary vastly depending on what end of the spectrum a user’s social media feed falls on.
More recently, the Nike advertisement featuring Colin Kaepernick caused controversy. My Twitter timeline had lots of messages of support for Nike and love for the ad. On Facebook, where I’m friends with people of a more diverse political background, I saw posts being shared disparaging Nike’s decision to feature Kaepernick.
Depending on what social media a person is most active on and what kind of content they are exposed to can have the ability to change a person’s mind on topics of differing opinions.
There are many other factors that contribute to the overall political viewpoint of a person, but with the technological revolution society has been experiencing since the turn of the century, social media has appeared as another facet to help mold people’s opinions.