EXCERPT: "CULTS OF THE CULTURE WARS (PART 4"). (A. Glass 2021)

 

"...As the platform has been almost completely taken up by a politicized broadcast, Twitter also has limited, not by its intention, but design, the intellectualism of topics.  Rather, it is has embraced rapid response of a headline styled  Tweets, with its associated hastag as an attempt at setting a trend forming topic.  As long as they stay within the user guidelines, that for a long time have been lapsed, which also included other social media outlets.  It was until gun violence and mass shootings that “hate speech” and users issuing provocative threats of violence have now been removed by Twitter.   

Regardless of the issues of reigning in the culture wars that have spilled over into actual violence, the platform was exploited and this exploitation is neither a sophisticated hack or a algorithmic ‘bot’, but by simply aligning oneself as cult like fixture, which within the scales of politics, academia and journalism.  Figure heads on either side of politics, once they Tweet a message or news item, it is received directly as a personal message into your feed.   Very much like Glass said, “It makes you feel like your right with that person,”  and that “person” could very well be the President of America or some fringe activist, either way, the Twitter phenomenon has evoked a culture war that has become unparalleled within history. 

But, Twitter, as the hashtag Culture Wars continue on, is not a egalitarian socialist inspired platform to spread equality that some right wing pundits would have you believe, it is business and a very successful one.  At the end of 2019 it had over 150 million daily active users, spanning every country in the world, even astronauts from International Space Station are able to muster up a Tweet from time to time, with an captivated audience at any giving moment within a second of a short message being delivered (and associated hashtags), is instantly seen in tens of thousands of personal feeds which doesn’t include the so called ‘re-tweets’.  Twitter relies heavily on advertising, with its licensing agreements also as a money spinner, but it’s ad campaigns through the so called “promoted” posts. is where the bulk of the company financial gains are made, with its overall revenue, ending June 2020 year-on-year was at $3.5 billion pocketing a generating $1.3 billion of income for a years worth of ‘Tweets’.  This newfound cultism of personality with its profits in tow, more so, as mentioned, has been solely derived from celebrity and political cues,  offering rapid fire information, that has been cherry picked for its designated audience.  As a platform of activism, which, when a Culture War is defined on social media, is only projected as a trend seeking hashtag by both the Liberalism and Conservative value systems as they bicker it out online."

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Full article:  "Cults of the Culture Wars" (Part 5) 

(A.Glass 2021)