Topic: Diffusion and Social Influence
Nowadays, social media influences everyone in different ways. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, scroll on their Twitter time line to see the latest news instead of reading a newspaper, and go to YouTube to see the newest music videos. These examples of social influence are harmless, however sometimes these social influences can cause great problems.
This morning I read an article on BBC.com, which draw my attention. The article is about two Tanzanian police officers, getting fired because of a widely shared picture on social media of them kissing. According to the authorities of the kagera police force they had breached police code of conduct, because of the fact that the kiss happened in public, whilst wearing their uniform. The picture was taken and uploaded to the Internet by a third officer, who got fired too. Many people are dismayed by the punishment, and started to post things on social media like:
- “They should have been reprimanded, sacking them is extreme, huuh!”
- “I once saw a pic of former US President the late Reagan kissing his wife in the Oval Office… and nobody called for his impeachment.”
- “Police couple kissing taken more serious than bribery.”
According to their code of conduct, we can’t say their dismissal was unfair, but from our own point of view do you think it is? What if the picture was not widely shared on social media, do you think that the authorities of the kagera police force would give them the same punishment?
Sources:
In my point of view, it is very fair to fire those two policemen. When they were on working, they were on behalf of government, laws. They should be serious to deal with everything. Otherwise, citizens would imitate their behaviors, look down on police, or even contempt them. So that society would be get harder to be controlled. No one who violates will follow police words. However, I think the kagera police force would still give them punishment if they saw the picture but not spread this wide . Just maybe the punishment would not so strict like this.
Furthermore, I believe social media is a dangerous thing if it can be watched by your bosses or colleagues. They will always know at what time you did what, and what comments you made. Maybe, in real life, you hide yourself and present the best of you in front of them. But on social media, everything is exposed to your boss and colleagues, including the dark side, which may lead you to lose the promotion chances. Overall, people should pay attention to their words and behaviors in everywhere and every situation.
In my opinion those policemen should not have been fired. But I don’t know the culture in Tanzania how they deal with issues like this in Tanzania. But I think if something like this would happen in Holland the policemen wil get a fine but I think they would not been fired.
On the other hand, it is their own fould because when you’re working as a policemen or another job under governments hands you have to watch out with social media. If other people see pictures like this on social media they will think: oh well, we pay tax to do them things like this?
After all, maybe it’s good that those policemen where fired because now it will never happen anymore in the future. On the other hand I think it’s a very severe punishment for only one kiss, and without social media no one had know it..