social media – Kate Norlander

Five Wonderful Social Media Time-Wasters

We Rate Dogs is my favorite social media time suck — *We Rate Dogs explains its rating system and gives birth to a meme*

Social media can be a time-suck, but it also can provide a momentary escape.

It’s likely that you have some social media accounts you follow just for fun. I’d like to encourage you to add a few more to your list — five accounts I especially enjoy. I decided to confine myself to accounts on Twitter, Instagram, and/or Facebook. This meant that I had to leave out the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). LACMA is active on the platforms I was considering, but their Snapchat account is where they truly shine. I also chose to stick with accounts that are mostly light-hearted. That decision disqualified Humans of New York, which frequently dwells on serious subjects.

The sites listed below are in no particular order, except for the first one, which is definitely the best-known account of the group and the one that brings me the most joy.

We Rate Dogs

We Rate Dogs is on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, but — perhaps because it got started there — I really associate it with Twitter. There’s something about seeing a dog pop up in my Twitter feed that makes me smile.

Most We Rate Dogs posts are exactly what the account’s name promises. People submit photos or videos of their dogs, and the dogs are rated — always on an “out of 10” scale in which the dog’s rating exceeds a “10.” Between the photos and the ratings, you are practically guaranteed to feel happier after reading a few posts.

You don’t need to spend too much time with this account before you notice certain themes popping up. My favorite “series” involves dogs that are accused of being other fictitious animals, such as “sandy sea slugs.” One recent photo shows a happy dog in a lion costume with the accompanying comment: “This is outrageous. We do not rate Deadly Moroccan Road Lions, no matter how jubilant they may appear. We only rate dogs… 12/10.”

If you are not already familiar with We Rate Dogs, check it out on your favorite social media platform right now. You can come back to the rest of my list later.

A Small Fiction

Also on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, A Small Fiction is a microfiction account by James Miller. Some stories are funny (“‘You can’t have your cake and eat it, too.’ ‘Alright. I’ll have my cake, and eat your cake.’ ‘Wait, no, that’s–‘ ‘Who else brought cake?'”). Some are sad (“‘We won’t grow up. We’ll build tree forts and never come down,’ said the kids. ‘Good luck,’ said the adults, ‘we’re killing all the trees.'”) Some are simply beautiful (“Dog watched his human cry, concerned. Where was human’s smile? Probably lost somewhere, dog thought. That was OK. Dog knew how to fetch.”). If you’re a person who’s too busy to read for pleasure, you no longer have an excuse.

Unvirtuous Abbey

Unvirtuous Abbey has accounts on both Facebook and Twitter. These “digital monks” aren’t afraid to approach Christianity with a sense of humor and many pop culture references. In other words, these are my people. They’re a welcoming bunch, providing space for people who question faith or feel rejected by the church. Here’s a taste of what you’ll find if you visit them: In late February, Unvirtuous Abbey shared a tweet from @keet0007 about naming a German Shepherd “the Lord” so that they could say “The Lord is my Shepherd.” In classic We Rate Dogs style, the abbey added: “13/10 would definitely walk on water with.”

Virtuous Abbey

I’d love to know what the relationship is between Virtuous Abbey and Unvirtuous Abbey. There clearly is one, because the abbeys sometimes mention each other in posts. Virtuous Abbey is the newer of the two. They post less often and have fewer followers. But despite their name, they can be every bit as irreverent as their “unvirtuous” brothers. They describe themselves as “putting the attitude back in platitude, and the pie back in pious!” The pop culture references are there, too: in 2017, they posted an article on robot-led funerals with the comment “Ideally they’d take the form of Daleks and shout ‘Incinerate” to encourage cremation.” You can find them on Facebook and Twitter.

Queen of Luna

Saraswati, who goes by Queen of Luna on Instagram and Facebook, is a Malaysian makeup artist who incorporates her hijab into amazing cosplays. Her recent posts on Instagram have included her cosplays of Aquaman, Jessica Rabbit, Two-Face, Fiona (from Shrek), and Cinderella. I’m not usually into celebrity cosplayers, but I am awe-inspired by what she is able to do. If you are a geek, a Disney fanatic, or an aspiring makeup artist, I encourage you to follow Saraswati.

What are your favorite enjoyable ways to waste a little time on social media?

Use the Power of Social Media for Good

Fed up with social media?

Social media gets a lot of negative press. Beyond the recent news that Cambridge Analytica was scraping data from Facebook users through a quiz app, there are plenty of stories about how social media is addictive and can make us feel bad. And, of course, the news is filled with stories about a prominent person putting others down on Twitter.

I’m not anti-social media. As a nonprofit marketing communications professional, I see social media as a valuable tool. It allows organizations to use their marketing budgets more effectively through carefully targeted messages. (I’m not talking about what Cambridge Analytica did, which was underhanded.)

As for feeling bad, humans have always compared themselves to others; social media is just another way to do that. I do read potentially envy-inducing good news on social media, but I also read about people’s struggles. And how often do your online friends just make you laugh? I probably read more messages that move me to mirth or to prayer than posts that make me wish I had what someone else has.

Not everyone feels the way I do. If you’re concerned about how social media affects you, you may choose to delete your accounts. I won’t criticize you for that. But if you stay on social media, whether you like it or your career requires it, you can use it as a force for good in the world.

Use your accounts to do good.

I’ve already written about a couple of ways you can use social media to make a difference. You can boost someone’s career by writing a recommendation on LinkedIn, by connecting with strangers who could benefit from networking with you, or by leaving a positive review online. Social media can help you step outside your bubble when you choose to follow people who are not like you.

You can also use social media to establish genuine connections. Facebook lends itself to this beautifully. Over the years I’ve found it useful for getting to know people better and even for establishing new friendships. I didn’t know my cousins well when we were growing up. Now Facebook has helped me have stronger connections with some of them. Through Facebook, I’ve reconnected with people I thought I’d lost track of and stayed in touch with former coworkers. Best of all, I met one of my dearest friends through Facebook. Although I seldom send friend requests to people I don’t know, nor do I usually accept them, I once took the risk of sending a request to a person who shares many of the same friends, because I loved reading her comments on their pages. She accepted my request and invited me to meet her. My life has been better for it.

Facebook isn’t the only form of social media we can use this way. I’ve yet to establish a new friendship through Twitter, but sometimes I’ll experience a moment of connection that represents the best of the service. Sometimes when I follow someone, they’ll send a message that doesn’t seem to be an automatic response. I’ll message them back, they’ll respond, and we’ll have a genuine conversation. Other times, I’ll tweet or retweet something, and someone will really engage with me in response. Those moments are gold — the times when Twitter stops becoming a tool for merely “following” somebody or broadcasting to the world and becomes a venue where complete strangers actually connect.

Perhaps the most difficult thing we can do is to use social media to reach out to people in love instead of criticizing others. It can be very tempting to take someone down a peg when we disagree with them. And the likes and retweets we get for a clever insult only validates our behavior. (Even when I’ve resisted a nasty tweet, I’m afraid I’ve validated a lot of them.)

But what do we really accomplish with these tweets, other than showing off? If our goal is to take a stand on something, we can address the issue rather than an individual. If our goal is to change someone’s mind, we can probably find a more effective way than delivering a clever remark at their expense.

There are times when it’s good to call someone out on their behavior. As a Christian, I would describe this as using a prophetic voice. Much of what the biblical prophets said can be boiled down to either “Turn your life around” or “There’s hope.” In the spirit of the former type of prophetic message, there are times to use the communication tools at your disposal, social media included, to tell people they’re on the wrong path. But if you’re thinking about how many people will “like” your message, or if you’re focused on insulting a person rather than correcting them, it’s safe to say you’re more concerned about your own glory than about encouraging someone to change.

So, while there may be times to say something critical to someone, perhaps we should focus on building people up. What if we used the power of social media to say “Well done” or “I’m sorry you’re going through this”? What if we vowed to start being more encouraging?

The story of Chamillionaire’s desire to help the Garcia family shows the power of social media for both good and ill. When the rapper and tech investor read about Jorge Garcia’s deportation, he emailed the reporter, wanting to contact the family. Instead of responding, the reporter tweeted about the email, giving Chamillionaire lots of unwanted attention. Some people used social media to criticize him for supporting the Garcias; others helped him connect with the family. In a series of videos, Chamillionaire expressed distress about the reporter’s behavior, explained why he wanted to help, addressed critics, and mentioned the family’s GoFundMe page. The sequence of interactions sparked by his desire to make a difference shows people using social media to build themselves up, to tear others down… and to help.

If we’re going to use social media, let’s be the people who use it to do good.