Social media and Somali view

Social media and Somali view

 

 By Abdikarin Garrun

Social media is web based, and mostly people access social media by their mobiles, computers and tablets. It is a way of creating a platform through which individuals, communities and organizations can share, co-create, discuss, and modify user-generated content or pre-made content posted online.

In Somalia, access to social media has broadened over the last 20 years, and at first people used it for their jobs, like telecommunications, networking and so on. In the last 10 years, the Somali people have have begun  using social media daily.

Originally, only small telecommunication companies were offering internet service, its price was high and only international agencies, government  and some companies could use it. But over the last 7 years, many companies owned by Somali investors were formed and made a great effort to give fast internet service to their society. Since then market has opened, and more companies are now providing internet service in Somalia

Internet service is now available in any region and district in Somalia. So this offers people a chance to use social media daily, like emailing, chatting, calling, video chatting and so on.

Although social media is wide and has different applications, Somalis mostly used Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp, Viber and skype.

For the last 7 years in Somalia internet service has become faster and clearer year after year. Social media has become a controversial issue among Somalis.It is a new technology, it is a new service, it is a new way of communicating and millions of Somali people have adapted to it and use it today.

Is social media a good thing or a bad thing? That is the most frequently asked question Somalis have today. Well, there are always two sides to everything; it depends on your perspective. The same goes for social media, most people admire it as a revolutionary invention and some seem to take it as a negative impact on the society. Let's look the positive and negative opinions Somalis express for social networks:

Positive View

-Friends and Relations: 
Social media like Facebook, Skype, twitter, Whatsapp and others  are  places to connect with your friends in an easy and convenient way. Truly speaking, many of you might have found your old pals from school or college who were out of touch due to one reason or another, Social networks have provided us with the opportunity to connect with people and build better relationships with friends whom we are unable to meet personally.

-Modernized marriage: 
Social media make it easy to chat with your life partner. You can see anywhere in Somalia a girl in Germany and a boy in America married to each other, but their marriage contract happened in Somalia. This means that social media has helped to modernize Somali marriage.

-Reducing Communication Barriers:
With social networks, we are able to communicate our thoughts and perceptions over different topics with a large number of audiences, and raise our voice.

-Opportunities for Businesses: 
Businesses have noticed the value of social networks in our life, and they are using different techniques to promote their products. This increases the brand of their business.

Negative View

-Increased the bad behavior: 
Many young children adapt to use bad things in social media by watching videos and pictures, which are not good in their lives, so parents always worry about this.

-Increased family conflict: 
The young generation who are married mostly use social media. When a mother or father use it and become busy, the other one feels lonely, a lack of confidence and always doubts that their spouse is developing a relationship with someone else, so this causes disputes, divorce or separation.

-Leads to Addiction: 
Many studies have shown that the extensive use of social media can actually cause users to become  addicted to it. So most Somali scholars and elders urge that social media is a time waster, and has no benefit at all.

-Lead to Isolation: 
Extreme usage of social media has reduced the level of human interaction.. Face to face communication and meetings has been reduced and many of us have lost the flavor and charm of being together under one roof. You can see different people living in one house, but everyone is busy on his phone, using social media.

-Affecting Productivity:
Most businesses use social media to find and communicate with clients. This is a new way of reaching customers to their homes without price, time and effort.

By Abdikarim Garruun

Edited by  Rick Boychuk