Breathe
By Shelly Moses
Uncle Ben was quite right when he told Peter "with great power comes great responsibility". Even if we are not people with superpowers, our actions and words can have an impact on society, especially when we have public visibility.
All opinions are valid, all points of view are valid, because they come from each of our realities, however, we must recognize the responsibility they entail when we share them with people in our circle, however small or large it may be.
But it seems that people now called content creators -formerly influencers- still do not understand, after so many years, so many scandals and so much cancellation culture, what this responsibility is, even though some influencers have also had legal proceedings for their actions and/or words.
When we create a community, the people who follow us, agree with our way of thinking and acting; it is only natural, we create a bond with people who think and act like us, so, with this in mind, why do we continue to allow people with no professional preparation in communication, to have so much power? They become famous without having the slightest consideration of what they generate in their communities and in society; recognizing all the power they have in front of millions, without knowing what they affect our realities.
Cases such as Luisito Comunica, Florencia Guillot or YoStoP, make it more than clear that we must demand professionalization. With millions of people watching them and blindly believing what they say, they only provoke disinformation and perpetuate actions that do not contribute to a more respectful, peaceful and objective society.
Creating one's own opinion is an arduous task, which not everyone is willing to do. Before the boom of social networks as a means of information, we used to find out about events from journalists, people specialized and educated in how to provide information.
Orson Welles, in the 1930's, thought it was a good idea to make a dramatization of H. G. Wells' novel "The War of the Worlds", in which he narrated how an alien invasion of the earth began. The story is long, and I don't want to bore you with it -although I find it fascinating- however, what I am interested in telling you are the reactions of the people when they heard Welles, since many people believed it was real, there was chaos and suicides, all because of a false news.
Today, probably, if we were to hear something like this, the first thing we would do would be to check the social networks to see if it is real, but... would it still be real if we see that some famous content creator reaffirms what is happening? And this is not far from what is happening with current issues.
The punitivism promoted by Luisito communicates and the lack of humanity in his words, the romanticism of a clearly abusive relationship of minors in the case of Florencia Guillot, or the revictimization of a rape in the case of YoStoP, is only the tip of the iceberg. People follow these examples, and stop being informed by prepared people, that is, by journalists who spend a lot of time researching and corroborating data so that society can generate its own opinion and not believe something that is not real, so that it can have different points of view and with that, can decide its own actions and not just be carried away by what ONE person thinks.
In 2022 it was made public that China will require by law that influencers be qualified to speak on complex topics. Disinformation in our current times is a reality that must be attacked urgently, and although the Chinese law aims to combat other things beyond disinformation, we cannot overlook the need for those who have the power to be seen by millions to be prepared for it.
For many people it is obvious that many influencers make paid content and therefore speak well or badly of brands or even people and are not influenced by their opinions, because they are paid, or also, they know that these content creators speak without any knowledge of the issues ... However, there are those who take as reality everything they say, which is dangerous and harmful.
We are in an era of overinformation, the only thing we can do is to teach the new -and not so new- generations to deal with it, not to stay with what a single person says or does, to demand the regulation of those who provide information, because yes, with great power comes great responsibility.
She has a degree in Communication Sciences and a master's degree from Tec de Monterrey, and for more than 13 years she has been dedicated to public relations for literature, business, entrepreneurship, and technology, among others. In 2016, she founded La Puerta, a boutique public relations agency that seeks to give visibility and media exposure to projects that contribute to the growth of our society. She has supported more than 40 national and international companies to achieve their communication goals.
The opinions expressed are the responsibility of the authors and are absolutely independent of the position and editorial line of the company. Opinion 51.
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