Is social media the “head-desk boy” in the face of political engagement?
Just a few short weeks ago the popular blogging website, Your Friends House made the decision to share with its audience the newest wonder of the Instagram world — Tony Abbott Eats. And yes, it is exactly what you would expect it to be — an account solely dedicated to providing you with daily images of Tony Abbott eating various foods and occasionally kissing children. On the surface it appears pretty pointless and doesn’t really act as a form of thought provoking stimulus but it is funny, and so it has attracted quite an audience.
Then there is of course the standard Facebook page Tony Abbott — Worst PM in Australia History, which, funnily enough, has almost half the amount of likes as the actual official Tony Abbott Facebook page.
And finally, I’m sure we all remember the legendary “head-desk boy”. This unwitting little boy managed to articulate the exact feelings of so many Australians. Does anyone actually know why Abbott showed up to this poor kid’s classroom and what he was saying to these primary school aged kids? I certainly didn’t. All I knew was that this one kid in particular was having none of it. Apparently the story goes that Abbott visited Sydney’s Seaforth Public School, a school in his Warringah electorate, to answer questions about how to write with persuasion. And during one of Abbott’s long-winded answers a photographer managed to snap THE picture.
What got me thinking was just how aware my peers were of the “head-desk boy” and how completely unaware my parents were, who definitely aren’t as attuned to the world of social media. I then continued along this thought process, which led to a debate amongst myself and my peers of whether sharing or liking political related media content is a form of political engagement or whether it is nothing more than just the trivialisation of politics?
We’re living in a day and age where technology, particularly social media, is central to the way in which society functions and communicates. Opportunities for self-expression are more prevalent now than ever before. So, it seems reasonable to state that social media acts as a platform for the expression of political views.
Jeffrey Jones addresses the notion that politics is now presented in a variety of formats and genres beyond the traditional news and documentary formats. The conventional lines that once separated “serious” from “entertaining” political content are now largely interwoven. Political communication and popular culture are now thoroughly integrated, and at times, mutually constituting. Furthermore, consumers themselves are now empowered to participate in the creation of content — repurposing news or other “serious” political content for their own commentaries through remediated materials. This convergence between producer and consumer, politics and popular culture, and across distinctive technologies certainly allows for a refreshed and revived democratic citizenship.
However, these changes in the media-politics landscape are ridiculed by claims that consumer culture pollutes the important element of democracy. Because it is easy to view politicians and popular culture with cynical disdain, it is also temping to let normative desires overcome serious analysis of the changes that are occurring and the effect of such changes on political culture.
Though, it is important to recognize that social media is a multidimensional communication channel that allows for numerous rhetorical, perceptive, and disseminative positions for presenting, understanding, celebrating and critiquing politics. We must also attempt to understand the complex readings and relationships that audiences make and have with social media, including their abilities to appropriate, employ, and appreciate many different types of formats that include politics.
Jones goes on to discuss that the success of these new forms of political content suggests that social media explores various avenues for presenting politics in imaginative ways, treatments that can offer perspectives and critiques not found in traditional political discourse. It also suggests that audiences are responsive to, if not also hungry for, political content that is meaningful and engaging to them — content that connects with their interests and concerns, provides new ways of thinking, criticizes that which needs scrutiny, and speaks to them through accessible and pleasurable means.
There will always be debates surrounding the entanglement of popular culture, politics and social media with regards to whether it hinders or enhances the way society behaves and functions. There’s certainly a relationship between social media and youth political engagement that defies the predictions of those who criticize social media’s role in shaping political behaviour. Political content and debate often comes across as nothing more than an argument. So, making light of politics certainly makes political discourse far more accessible and less intimidating. Discussions regarding the trivialisation of politics falsely limit the scope of social media’s potential impact on the political landscape for youth culture. Political content such as the “head-desk boy” may be a visible product in the world of social networking however; the most obvious result of social media is likely its role in shaping the political identities and behaviours of the millennial generation.
