Social networks have brought another way of interaction between humans. At this point I think is very clear for anyone that has engaged in social networking that different rules apply of interacting within the network in comparison to face-to-face interaction. The question is what are the rules? In the book “The Exploit” Alexander Galloway and Eugene Thacker write, “What sort of ethics is possible when the other has no “face” and yet is construed as other (as friend or foe)?”
It is true that many of the people with we whom we interact in social networks are people to whom we have a strong relationship based of face-to-face interaction. Still networks allows to have interaction that although we are able to put a face on there is not enough of a relationship to be able to classified them as friend or foe, but they are classified as an acquaintance. Finally, the network allows us to have relationships with people that we cannot put a face but we still might consider them our friends. Technically the same ethics should apply to any of the different interactions we might encounter in social networks, but it’s not like that. It does not has much to do with being able to put a “face” to the other person, but how much we actually know about who that person is. Of course the obvious assumption is that if we had had face-to-face interaction with a person, we know the person better than if we only know them through the network.
Social networks give us a lot of information about any particular person. Most of them have detail formats for people to include as much detail as possible about who you are, and they even give you free space to write your own biography. Still, I think there is so much we can know about who someone really is based on a couple fill in the blanks about our ‘favorites.’ A lot can be infer about the person, assuming they did not lie, but I still believe you only get to know a person until you actually interact with them. I think the ethical problem presented in social networking is the access we give to people to our lives, even being aware on how little we know of them and how little they know about us. When we see posts about people that we barely know or know nothing at all, our reaction is completely different than from someone we know even if they have the same exact post. It is just easier to assume or judge people when we do not know them because of the different meanings we can give to any text. It is not an excuse, justification nor makes it right, but is usually how it works. Technically one is not being unethical for thinking wrong of a person for what they post online, but some people take it farther than that. Good example is YouTube. People post videos of themselves all the time doing ransom stuff, singing, dancing or showing basically any skill that can be show off in video. Now a vast of these videos, not to be mean or anything, but truth be told they are horrible, people do not know how to sing or dance or whatever is that they think they can do. And yes if you decide to broadcast yourself to the world, you’ll have to be ready to take on some harsh criticism. But there is a line in between telling someone they are bad at something from insulting them. Most people probably fell comfortably posting on people YouTube videos insulting and diminishing things because they do not know them, so they do not feel remorse or they know that they will never have to go the awkwardness of seeing them face-to-face ever. Obviously the website expects certain behavior from users since they remove comments due to inappropriate content. So users if users are aware of it, why do they still decide to break the code? Does the fact that we sent the message through a computer miles away from the person directed to, (and often don’t even know the person) makes us forget the fact that the other person is still a human? Have social networks make us unaware of the power of words?
Ethics should be expected from any person when interacting with another person, even if is in a social network. I think people forget about ethics when they do not know the person at all. But, once someone classifies the other as friend or a foe, whether they know them in person or not, ethics would be a factor when interacting. True different rules sort of apply depending on the kind of relationship you have with people outside and inside the network. Between close friends there is always an understanding of what can be post online, between acquaintances you don’t really have an interaction although you might want to know more details about stuff they post. Between strangers there is still a question mark, especially on social networks where people expose big part of their lives.
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