Perceived Morality and Facebook

[Chazef]

Okay so this is an issue I've thought about for a long time, but never really expressed fully, so here goes my little rant. Facebook is littered with opportunities for people to believe they are a good person. It's not uncommon to see pictures of some poor child with some disease, with a caption saying 'every like = 1 dollar for operation' or something like 'doctors will contribute 3 cents for every like given for this cancer patient'. It's clearly a ploy to exploit the kind-hearts of some less-intelligent users of facebook (which are dishearteningly plentiful). Of course, when you think about the motive behind the images, it's just a person trying to draw attention to their account or a particular page, but it's incredibly difficult to fight against due to anybody attacking the images being considered 'immoral'.

My problem with things like this on facebook is this: people have been mislead to believe they are making a positive contribution to the world by liking some stupid picture. I think this has the effect of making such people less likely to ACTUALLY make positive contributions to the world due to the perception that they already have been doing great things. Why bother donating to third world countries when you just saved a child from cancer by liking an image? I know this seems far fetched, but these images rake up huge amounts of likes, so I'm certain this effect applies to some portion of people who like said images. The counter argument: 'so what if it's not real, it's raising awareness' never really convinced me of anything. You don't need to raise awareness for the existence of cancer in a misleading facebook image, it's one of the most well-known diseases in the world.

I remember when Kony 2012 was a big thing, and so many people were flaunting their moral 'superiority' all over facebook, by liking anything kony-related and even paying money towards the poorly rated charity organisation 'invisible children' -or something; I can't remember this perfectly. In the end, the whole idea of 'covering the night?' didn't really follow through, but the people felt satisfied that they fulfilled their moral obligation as humans, by virtue of their initial enthusiasm towards the cause.

Anyway, I'm glad the number of these types of things on facebook has been declining, but I still have concerns about it. By no means am I a role-model for charity donations, but I can't help but feel like these exploitive facebook morality-magnets are impeding on our ability as a society to meaningfully contribute to solving actual problems in the world.

[availn]

Do you believe that you are morally better than one who liked one of these campaigns and believes that they are morally better because of it?

[ShortBlackChick]

I think its just another form of keyboard warrior-ing whereby we (by we I guess I mean our generation and technology users alike) all think we're making a difference by telling off some sort of douchebag who likes the Janoskians, in the name of humanity. We're just a society who sometimes forgets that we cant save the world from behind a computer/laptop.

[Chazef]

Do you believe that you are morally better than one who liked one of these campaigns and believes that they are morally better because of it?

No, as I've done basically nothing more for charity than those who like the images on facebook. Though I've not financially contributed to charities with my own money (ain't got no cash), I'm currently the head of SRC at my school, and am involved in charities through that role. I just believe that surely, of the thousands who like those images on facebook, there must be a psychological impact on some of them that makes them feel less obliged to contribute to social issues.

[brenden]

I just sort of make a mental note *put that person the 'fucking idiot' pile.

[slothpomba]

You skeptics...

[lala1911]

Those statuses are solely added for likes and publicity for the page. There's nothing else to it but that. I agree though. You can read the comments and you'll see these uneducated people typing "pray for you.. i comment and share 4 u... god bless u..." "aw... wish u best.. evry1 pres like!!...".

Also, the sort of crap you find on Facebook now is just absurd. Is this forum PG13? You know what I mean if you have FB.

With the Kony 2012 craze there was a huge demand on Kony merchandise. Luckily enough, I bought quite a bit and resold it to doofuses.

[JellyDonut]

generally goes away once you leave school. if it doesn't, stop hanging around idiots

[academicbulimia]

I think that there might be something in our human nature that allows our sense of achievement or goodness to be easily satisfied, when really we haven't even scratched the surface.

And yeah what's the point of "raising awareness" if can't give any actual help. In 2011, $10 million of Invisible Children's went on its staff, surplus and  "raising awareness" , and only $3 million on Central African projects, surely they could've used up more money on giving actual help?