Emojis

This image is a clear representation on how social media and text messaging has totally infiltrated our day-to-day connection with others. In modern times, there is rarely someone out there who has never encountered one of these comical faces, often used to express emotions online. Today, more and more of these little guys are replacing true emotions that people feel. Over the phone it is not hard to reach for a smiley face to demonstrate happiness, or a thumbs up to say you are okay. However, these are not realistic emotions, and that is a problem. If you are communicating through fake means, like using a smiley face when you are not truly happy, this can give someone the wrong idea of how you are actually feeling. This can be dangerous when someone is in a difficult spot in their life, and their unhappiness needs to be discovered. Furthermore, there are other consequences to emojis. Emojis have become a representation of people over text, social media, etc. Is it possible that eventually, they will take over how we are viewed as people in society? I think so. Why not just meet someone face-to-face and have a real conversation, instead of coding someone's thoughts, emotions, and opinions through text? Not only will we all be better understood, we will not be misrepresented as something other than a human being.

I think this image represents the growing influence that political leaders have because of social media. Though, of course, political leaders have always had strong influence over people, everyone's ability to access technology like Instagram or Twitter make political figures easily reached and a little more human. Last April, congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez went on Instagram Live to build IKEA furniture, eat popcorn, and discuss politics with her viewers, including topics like Trump's tax return, the military draft, climate change, and Puerto Rico becoming a state. She answered questions and interacted with people who commented on the video. Her accessibility and humanity, shown through social media, makes her seem like someone trustworthy. President Donald Trump is also known for his use of social media to attack or support issues. The image shown here represents this phenomenon- a new age of political leadership using social media as leverage.

This picture represents how emotions are conveyed over the internet. No matter how hard we try, it's impossible to recreate human emotions through text messages and social media. There are hundreds of emojis at our fingertips, yet none of them can exactly replicate specific human emotions. Although people use emojis everyday, they will always be fake. They will never be able to match up to real emotion. This picture shows that people tend to hide behind emojis. It's easy to use them to express certain emotions online that you might not feel in real life. Expressing real sentiment, and typing out a thoughtful message can easily be replaced with a "crying" emoji. Saying somebody looks pretty can replaced by the "heart eye" emoji. Humans are losing touch sentiment, thoughtfulness, and real emotion by using emojis. Human emotion can be replaced by emojis, but they can never truly replicate human emotion.

To me, this image is exposing our society in the sense that we take everything we see and turn it into some kind of social media post, or text, or whatever. The image sort of speaks to the current situation of social media and technology addictions in this generation, and how us kids focus on likes and retweets rather than real experiences. All the smiley faces, and other emojis explain how people don't really even know how to show their emotions and communicate with others outside of texting and emoji use. To me, this image really speaks to me about how a change needs to be put into place before this lifestyle really takes over for good.

To me, this picture is commentary on today’s society, and how technology impacts our lives. The image displays a person who is hidden by emojis. I can not see this person’s face or expressions, the only thing I can see in the silhouette are countless little faces, some with heart or star eyes, and others with tear drops. This picture shows how social media not only affects human interactions, however, can also have a hand in politics, and other parts of today’s society. In the image, a person is shown at a podium, and their arm is lifted in the air, showing that they are exclaiming something important. I think that this works to further emphasize the point that social media plays a large role in today’s society, and life.

I think that this could mean one of two things. The first being that, people use social media as their podium to speak on political matters or just basic social issues without needing any credentials. The world is their stage essentially and they can be their own candidate. Or,it could be the fact that social media itself is more political than anything and politics is being combined with social media, no thanks to Trump's notorious twitter rampages and other public figures bashing companies, other individuals etc. based solely on the current cancel culture we are living in. As our own cyber candidates we thrive and go for the reaction and the praise rather than the votes. The more reposts, likes, comments, and emoji reactions we can get within one post fuels the fire. Whether or not our stance is valid or factual at all is insignificant so long as we make the most waves in our cyber social circles. In the era of "Blank is cancelled" and "#Blankisoverparty" these socially constructed movements hold the most weight and power over our news and public perception. Again, the world is our stage so why wouldn't you log on and spout out your unsound logic and unwanted opinions? perhaps you could be the next popular pic for the ever changing list of cyber candidates!

Schulten is commenting on the way society voices their opinions with this following image. I believe by having a person that appears to be presenting a speech surrounded by emojis, she is focusing on our use of technology and how we communicate with it. The thumbs up surrounded with blue and the heart surrounded with red icons especially are two "reactions" common on sites like Facebook. This is also familiar on IMessage where you can "thumbs up" a friends message or send a clapping emoji as a quick response. By surrounding the speaker with solely emojis, it is showing how society has defaulted their voices to emojis-- We are limiting our views and commentary to simply emojis. Agree with something? Thumbs up. By doing this there is no longer a need to think further, and one doesn't need to respond thoroughly as seen by the lack of anything but emojis.

This image might be making a statement about the role of social media in politics today. The person pictured appears to be making a public statement or speech, standing behind a podium with their arm raised to address the audience. Their features are almost completely obscured by smiling emojis, approving facebook thumbs-ups, and red hearts, the well-known symbol of a "like." This could be interpreted in different ways. The fact that the figure is completely covered could mean that social media tends to drown out objective stances on candidates with the opinions of the masses. Once someone is beloved by the internet (for example, Joe Biden), they tend to be showered with emojis and blind approval, regardless of what they're talking about. However, I don't personally see such a cynical message here. The background is a fun shade of blue, the person's image has the texture of a pop-art collage, and the emojis bounce in a friendly manner. Maybe this means that with social media, people are able to show their approval of political figures in new ways. Conversely, one is easily able to examine the public opinion on a candidate by scrolling through social media.

I think that this image is saying that in today's world of advanced technology and social media that we tend to have a lack of words when conversing with one another. Instead of expressing our thoughts through clear text messages or captions we use an emoji symbol. Plenty of these emojis can be misleading or be multi functioning as more than one meaning. When people try to express themselves through a huge lack of words it can cause a strain on the conversation. Personally I am not a big fan of using a variety of the emojis; I'll use the heart emojis or kissy face ones but other than that they just take up space on my phone. However my dad, when he talks to me sometimes he does it in emoji sentences. He'll often think it's funny but it may take me a minute to figure out what he is saying. Even though I am very close with him, things can get lost in translation. Therefore using emoticons to take space of our words makes things less personal and hard to understand.

I think that this image is about the desire to receive positive feedback no matter what. It seems like the goal of many people is to now see how many hearts, smiley faces, and thumbs up they can receive opposed to being given real feedback. People would rather just be given an emoticon that has positive connotations than being told real thoughts that may not be as positive.

The image exhibited in this post reflects color and icons which would make any viewer smile, but reveals a hidden and far more serious issue underneath. The fun icons fill in the outline of a person who holds higher power in American civilization, as they wave there hand upon the podium. But why can we not see them? Well, because the icons that flow through social media provide a whole new representation to our government representatives. The icons shown here represent the use of the social media in a variety of higher power issues; politics. People with higher influence and power over our society are abusing the use of social media to make their stances. This can be seen as very dangerous, as social media is a form of communication that hides the speaker behind the screen, leaving the interpretation to the viewers. For example, our President, Donald Trump, has abused his use of social media to socially attack not only political leaders around the world, but also normal icons like athletes and comedians. This image may seem all fun and colorful, but it exhibits a threat to our civilization as social media consumes politics, making it easier for leaders and speakers to spread their opinions, good or bad, faster yet less efficiently.

I believe that this image is saying that people in today's society care too much about what other people think, or how people will view their opinions. I think this because the person who is made out of emojis seems to be someone in power, or a politician, and they seem to just be saying things that everyone wants to hear. People in today's world are too afraid to give their own opinions because they are afraid of being shot down, or opposed by people who have differing viewpoints from them. I believe the emojis represent how technology has played a role in our lives, and it is a platform where many people are able to express themselves. The emojis represent how people react to these posts, and they represent how people show support on the internet. The picture itself is meant to represent how people need to stop caring about how many comments or likes they get when posting an opinion online, ad instead stay true to what they believe, even if its not everyone's favorite opinion.

In my opinion I believe that this image depicts how society is viewed today. Society now is being taken over by social media and its negative effects. When people use social media people instantly create a direct image about who they are. Those images that they create can either have a positive impact on how people see them, or a negative impact. Here I believe that this image is saying, if you show your self as an uplifting person, people will immediately start to like who you are. Also if you show off fame, or likes people may feel like they need to like you because everyone else does. Personally, I think that people are on social media so much that it affects who we are as humans. IF we see trends going around that the majority of the "reviews" are positive, you might personally feel obligated to follow the majorities opinion give them likes. I think if I could agree or disagree with the message of this picture, I would have to agree because society now a days, even in politics, has become a matter of who has more social fame.

I think this image relates to the media and how it influences elections. The person standing at the podium looks like she is making a speech or is being welcomed somewhere, so it seems political. The emojis and likes are used in media: twitter & Instagram. The use of media in persuading people to vote has had much more of an impact than any other voting propaganda I've seen in the last decade. Celebrities posting pictures with their "I Voted" stickers and asking people to utilize their constitutional right. The effect of influencers asking people to participate in our government is an influx of young voters. People who turn 18 usually have voting on the backburner of their mind, but when influential people advise them to make an effort, people usually will.