The Oxford dictionary defines “Influence” as “the capacity to have an effect on the character, development or behaviour of someone or something, or the effect itself.” The question is, would society rather be influenced by true leaders and successful people like Bill Gates, than being influenced by some self-proclaimed “influencers“ using Instagram as a way to build fame and wealth out of exposing nudity or fashion brands ?
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It's a quite interesting topic as it highlights the major issue regarding Western societies:
1) Our elites' dramatic decline.
In the old days, to become an influencer without being affiliated to nobility was challenging and forced "self-starters" to surpass themselves - one mistake, one misjudgment could socially kill you. One was to be extremely intelligent and intellegible to get the fame every Man desires. Thinkers and artists were constantly in intellectual competition since places at the top were scarce. Only a King or a wealthy sponsor was able to get the world to know you.
In that sense, standards were high and even geniuses were struggling - look at the wars between Molière and Racine; Tesla and Edision etc. Today, social media have given this platform, that was to be earned before, for free. The Offer, that was only available to the best of the best, has become unlimited - anyone with an email adress can connect with the world.
This "improvement" has 2 paradoxal societal consequences:
1) Positive: It improved freedom of speech, and the democratic exercise to some extent, because it allows anyone to share ideas and opinions. I admit that this point is debatable in pratice, not in theory.
2) Negative: People can't realise when they're being manipulated because our era is driven by image. Chinese were so right when they said that "a picture is worth a thousand words." Yet, what they forgt to mention is that words have always been necessary for the picture to be decrypted. Nowadays, people don't read, don't think. They follow influencers, and listen to them based on what they posted and the life, they pretend to have. This profusion of Offer is an issue because it removed all forms of filter. Showing your ass and a nice house in Ibiza can get you more infuence than writing a 500-page book on how to cure cancer. You know Kim Kardashian's sisters' name, step-sisters' name, mother's name, mother's ex-husband's name right ? Name me 2 cancerologists (even the most renowned one) Name me the 2 Nobel Prizes in Medecine - we're in the middle of a pandemic, it shouldn't be that complicated. At the end of the day, who would deserved to be known ? The one who developed a vaccine for deadly diseases or the one who showed her fake tits on the beach ?
This problem comes for the fact that we only understand iconography and it's not new. Why are Churches full of paintings ? Why is Jesus so handsome? Anthropologist have conducted research and showed what the "real" Jesus would have looked like and the difference is striking (evidently, there were no blue-eyed blond guys - Swedish type - in Bethlehem 2 thousands years ago, still now). If the "real" Jesus was to enter in a Church and proclaim his return, no one would believe him because no would recognize him. I'm saying that to point out the power of images.
Instagram/Twitter are business that are based on ideas' simplications - on IG, you can only post pictures / on Twitter, no post can exceed 250-ish characters. How could you even develop the simplest idea ? Other social media would allow you to do it but they're not as popular - coincidence ? Of course not. The Sillicon Valley is using our worst flaw - laziness - with a lot of dexterity.
Consequently, narcisit priviledged unexperienced and dogmatic kids (Greta Thunberg) believe that the more followers you have, the smarter you are.
But it's the opposite actually, the more followers you have, the more time you spend working on your social media accounts, the less time you send reading and thinking. Would Aristole be on Twitter ? No, he would have despised it.