Social media has exploded in recent years, fulfilling needs that previously went unrecognized. Social media consists of online platforms that are built on web 2.0 technologies which allow content to be published easily and quickly. The content is user-generated and highly accessible with the goal to connect with other people online, creating an online community. For example, Twitter is currently a very popular social media micro-blogging platform where users create their own personalized profiles and where all the content is user generated. A tweeter’s profile can display their posted name, their location, a short bio and their continuous stream of conversational tweets.
The dictionary describes 'ethics' as: the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture with respect to the rightness and wrongness of certain actions and to the goodness and badness of the motives and ends of such actions. With regards to social media, anything goes! Arguably the greatest feature of social media is that it is an unrestricted platform for people to express themselves, you can set your own limitations and can decide for yourself what you consider 'right' or 'wrong.' This gives us a self-governing freedom that redefines the notion of ethics all together - we are creating the culture that once shaped us! I can guarantee you will find people who will share your views and people that will disagree with your views, no matter what views you choose to broadcast on the internet – this challenges the conventional meanings of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’.
One’s moral principles become evident through one’s blogs and tweets, for example Miley Cyrus, a Disney darling, made her views supporting gay marriage public through her twitter posts saying: “God’s greatest commandment is to love. And judging is not loving. Everyone deserves to love and be loved and most importantly smile” in response to a question about gay marriage. This leaves social media participants vulnerable to criticism of their ethics just like how people are vulnerable to criticism when expressing their values, beliefs and morals in person. This was evident with Miley Cyrus as she received very harsh criticism for her tweets supporting free love. However, the possibility of ensuing criticism after publishing should not deter social media enthusiasts from expressing their views – it is important to put down one’s own ethics in writing as it forces you to clarify them to yourself and gives your ethics solidarity – one of my favorite quotes of all time is, “if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything,” having ethics is respectable.
The first day of my public relations 101 class, my professor taught us a mantra to use not only in our professional lives but also in our private lives; the mantra was “always be open, honest and direct.” This has stuck with me ever since. I strongly feel that if we live our lives in an honest and open way, it gives us a strong platform that not only gives our opinions worth and credibility, but also allows us to influence other members of the online social network community as people generally tend to respect and listen to those who seem to have solid, well thought out opinions of right and wrong.
Public relations professionals aim to help their clients make strategic decisions which are thought to be ‘good’ ethically and that will therefore help them look favorable in the public eye. If the public perceives a company to have an air of dishonesty, then the reputation of that company will go down. A prominent professional ethics controversy is the issue of whether or not ghost-blogging is seen as dishonest. On one hand, ghost-bloggers argue that they are trying to make an honest living by utilizing their writing talents to help companies promote their messages as business executives do not have the time to blog. On the other hand, people argue that writing under the name of someone else, such as using a business owner’s name, is misleading. This deception could jeopardize the company’s relationships with their customers and the general public. It is a slippery slope to go down.
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