As you know, today social media is a very powerful tool in that myriad voices can express their opinions and advocate for certain positions or types of social change. It results however in a cacophony of voices that creates a din of noise for which it can be hard to discern a purpose or goal which is being advocated. It can disseminate news and opinions faster than ever before and "call to act" on certain political issues or actions. Further, the open platform nature of social media means that one particular group's set of goals or positions can be "drowned out in the sea of noise" when it lacks effective leadership or that even news itself may be trustworthy or accurate (as the Associated Press and CNN recently found out when they ran with a "fake" news story about Trump's ties to the Russians or when ABC ran a story that turned out to be false).
This raises the issue of political leadership. Clearly it is important to have a leader who advocates clearly and strongly for a position of behalf of the group. Think of Martin Luther King, Jr. who advocated for peaceful, non-violent means to bring about civil rights for all. His voice rose above the din and the groups he represented were successful in their efforts at raising awareness and passing new laws for civil rights. His leadership was the voice for a large number of citizens who felt as he did, but needed a strong leader to be a proponent and push for change. In reviewing history, there are a number of strong political leaders who successfully represented group(s) to bring about change, start new political systems, or even start new nation-states (for better or for worse).
All of these social and political changes pre-date social media. Would you say that social media serves to speed up the process of political change, or do you think that it creates more confusion, anxiety and underscores that, without an effective leader, meaningful change is difficult to come about? Some have argued that social media makes it "too easy" to advocate for a certain political position and that, in today's political environment, there are meaningful goals interspersed with frivolous goals.
What are your thoughts?