AGATHOKAKOLOGICAL SOCIAL MEDIA

    Source: Forbes

Happy 2024 to our readers across the world.

More than ever, there is a serious need to unbiasedly review the use of our social media space and the Nigerian online community in the wake of new realities.

Not politically but responsibly.

This is first a call on the Nigerian populace, which according to Statista, a global data and business platform, boast a whooping 108 million internet users in 2022 and expected to grow by 60 percent in 2027.

This is a humble appeal to Nigerians who wants actual growth and development genuinely to adjust to the right angle of things.

Social media can be a huge gain and it could be a collosal loss as well.

It is purely in its usage.

While millions of Nigerian youths have gone to amass unprecedented wealth from the internet legitimately, millions have also landed in jail, if not in the grave for their crave to impress the internet's social space.

People, especially the youth have picked role models among criminals who have convinced the vulnerable that there is a world where people live in affluence with no proof of their lifestyles sources.

A dangerous yet glamorous portrayal of falsehood!

This is damaging our historic culture of hard work while promoting criminality, accounting for some of the lurid crimes we have heard since 1996.

The desire to amass social media likes and comments have override human sympathy, empathy and sanity.

Yesterday 18 January 2024, Punch Nigeria Newspaper carried the news of the death of a skit maker identified as Churchill who died in the process of creating a dangerous skit content.

Sadly, he may have gotten the views, comments and likes he anticipated but not his life.

May his soul rest in peace.

Churchill is just one of thousands of brilliant young Nigerians who have lost their lives, properties and freedoms to make an impression on the hundreds of millions of Nigerian internet users.

It is even much worrisome to see many unscrupulous people on social media claiming Facebook, X, Instagram and TikTok are the ones funding their luxurious lives in return for likes.

Big lie!

Prostitution, unhealthy networking, criminal syndicates have now found a safe haven on the internet's social media.

Young people see the cars, the stacks of US dollars thrown in the air, vacations and they want them all to also show their friends who are reading their books and working hard in their jobs, that hard work is not enough.

But then, is social media?

Rudeboy of P-Square sarcastically hinted in his hit song "Audio Money", poor man no dey for Instagram (Nigerian pidgin for, there are no poor people on Instagram).

The make believe perfect life that has become famous as fake life is the new normal among young people with some going the extra mile to maintain the life, and as we know, fake life is very expensive.

People who can't afford a meal now appear like Hollywood celebrities on social media with borrowed clothes, cars and gadgets and sometimes, stolen just to be perceived as rich.

These days it is not impossible to castigate your blessed marriage and home or even end your relationship, just by seeing a beautiful photo post of a seemingly perfect relationship on social media, mostly captioned "couples goal" 😂 when in real life they do not even cross the same path.

They call it, doing it for the Gram 😅 and this usually get unsuspecting young people screaming "God when" 😂

Unlike in the immediate past where family privacy was fashionable and respected, nowadays even the least family issues are brought on WhatsApp statuses and other social media platforms, making total strangers judges in matters they have no business being a part of.

When we were children and family matters involving husband and wife gets to the police, the police would say, "Na family matter, make una go settle am for house" (Nigerian pidgin for, it's family matter and it should be settled at home).

Not these days.

Humanity has totally lost her dignity.

What is termed content on our social media space today is absolute contempt.

Nudity, anti-sociality, insanity, inhumanity, indecency, criminality, cruelty and depravity.

This is not a call to quash the social media, I am on nearly all social media myself and this article will be going to the ends of the world via social media, I am appealing to Nigerians, Africa and the rest of the world to understand that what we post on the internet makes an impression; some very positive impressions, some very damning impressions.

Today young people have selected role models among kidnappers, robbers, ritual killers, serial killers, pedophiles, drug lords and other hardened criminals whose unrestricted activities on social media have earned them millions of followers worldwide and a celebrity status.

These leaves us with a huge responsibility; parents, wards, the society and the government.

We must do something about this or risk losing our entire society by a single click. 

Oh yes, a trigger is to a riffle what a click can be on the Internet if we don't watch it.

It is important to note that a careless statement or post on social media can tear down both our national and global security.

In conclusion both citizens and government have a responsibility to regulate our social media activities to ensure that the contents that reach our children, our youths and our entire citizens are not inciteful, dangerous, misleading and destructive but rather that they are true, suitable, inspiring and positively impactful.

God bless Nigeria and the rest of the world.