Global Citizen: Digital Dialogue in Turbulent Times

Human ignorance is bliss until it isn’t. It creates unpleasant emotional experiences for others. It creates misunderstanding and misconceptions, leading to chaos, confusion, and violence, which permeates our world. Ignorance leads to losing trust, respect, and understanding of other humans, freezing foreign relations, and creating hatred between nations. Patronizing diplomatic relations opens different things and potentially leads to large populations being susceptible to being swayed by their right-wing political governing bodies.

Choice, Challenge, Change

There are many ways in which we can communicate for social change in development. A different approach to understanding development is considering three vital Cs of Communication for Development: Choice, Challenge, and Change. In this framework,  we envision designing participatory approaches where we can work within the international development global community. Choice arrives whether self-awareness is present or not. The challenge stems from friction between what the individual wants and what society needs, a process in which we want to change the environment socially to suit human needs in the long term.

Furthermore, a participatory process is essential to democracy: We make individual choices to challenge unjust and autocratic systems of oppression, resulting in changes leading to betterment. Whether the mass media heavily influence such decisions is a looming concern.

Mass Communication for Social Change

The “new” media is more often the “old” media. If we pay attention to the past ten years of mass media news, the pattern is remarkably like what we see today: the focus is on negativity. To capture our attention and to feed us content that highlights hatred, fear, ignorance, and violence. Positivity does not bring viewing rates high and does not bring profit margins. Although the human brain is hard-wired for negativity, which the mass media is “banking on,” it is also hard-wired for growth, which brings us to the following critical questions.

Are the mass media influences re-igniting polarizing dormant attitudes and distorting public perceptions when using charged communication? In certain contextualized situations, charged language can lead to misunderstanding and misconceptions instead of critically addressing the root of problems and how to find solutions.

Alas, in our modern societies, what is collectively being done to include and support upward social mobility for the BIPOC ( Black, Indigenous, (and) People of colour) and immigrant communities? With the rise of populism in Europe and the US minorities often find themselves being spat out instead of being integrated into society. Therefore, posing what diversity means without inclusion in social stratification is essential for European nations. International development demands accountability through action and promotes positive changes. Honesty, integrity, and character are self-explanatory; it is self-serving and essential in governance to achieve prosperity in democracy. 

The role of pop artists as social drivers in globalization is to advance such positive changes by broadcasting messages that bring people together since music is the universal language—a shared similarity with the roles played by other actors and stakeholders in development. Humans tune in to performances that make them feel emotional empowerment. Emotional memory is what lasts any memory. So, in this respect, pop artists can achieve a more substantial social impact than some other conventional alternatives. Moreover, the artists are the voices of collective memory in their communities through self-expression and creativity.

People pay attention to pop artists and other creative artists’ broadcasting, and cling to whatever fringes of positivity they can find to keep them organized and united from constant negativity in a world that drives them apart with constant fearmongering. Unsatisfying consumption of social media is now the norm. Still, as we observe, it is only a question of time before it starts to be detrimental to our mental health, and our well-being starts slowly to deteriorate.

A different way to resist the status quo apparatus is to become free from the shackles of misinformation and disinformation by making informed choices regarding mass communication consumption. Technologies created by wealthy nations and private sectors are not neutral. There is no such thing as a free lunch regarding “upholding data privacy protections” (Hu, 2020), and freedom of speech does not come free.

So, how can we communicate effectively as global citizens of the world? Do we inspire people to mobilize and collaborate, or do we create further divisions between people? Turning to the mass media for answers and to privately owned commercial entities to advance social change is like asking the guardian to remove the prisoner’s shackles. The individual needs to remember how to remove the bonds themselves. There are no governing bodies or institutions that would be doing that for us. Blaming government institutions for failing citizens is not a solution. It is entirely up to us to make different choices: hatred and violence or embracing acceptance, diversity, and inclusion.

As global citizens, we cannot forget that all governments change. Therefore, as with any contextualized digital information, we must analyze and discern what is presented to us: Does it lead to positive social change? Or does it feel like it leaves us confused, angry, weak, and powerless? Is it a transitory trend that will mean nothing a few years later? The shared information that we can all access is at our fingertips. Nevertheless, we must discern if it can enhance our civilization by distinguishing how it makes us feel and think and the diffused effects in societies. Hence, we cannot believe everything we think; our moral compass must arrive at this point where we learn to tap into our potential powers: honesty, integrity, emotional intelligence, and empathy, to name a few.

A new paradigm of “I.”

The purpose of life for humanity is to live and be happy in a safe world. While at it, we prepare a legacy for the next generation, sharing what we have learned and experienced. Specifically, we have a collective responsibility to inform the next generation of what we experienced in highs and lows, as we are busy living in our digital era. The stakes are high, and our survival depends on this, so we must entrust each of us with reaching this goal. Advocacy, therefore, is not about ‘I.’ It is about all of  “us”. To underline the “I,” that serves as a conversation opener in English as a global language in advocacy, whereas in individualistic societies, advocacy must serve all of us.

So, starting the conversation with an “I” is a good starting point but should not be the focus or the finish line. “I” by itself does not solve anything. It intends to serve a bigger purpose, of being transformative socially and evolving to actionable courses on what humanity needs. Humans are born the same, and it is the social construct, social stratification, complex geopolitics, and other hindrances that divide us. Therefore, it does not matter how slow we go in our societies if we keep the difficult conversations going. We, as humans, are exquisitely complex. We have created systems that have been transformative in how we live, and now, our countries rely on the global economy. We are in a constant state of mega-crisis as we try to dig ourselves out of the depths of complex issues we have created on a planet with finite resources. Our problems are global. We are interconnected and dependent on each other for survival. Finding ways to communicate and understand each other through dialogue is critical.

Global Digital Dialogue

In the digital space, we can empower ourselves through dialogue with other global citizens. We must choose what information and knowledge we consume and observe what it does to our well-being in the way it is diffused to democratic processes and into the world. Media is not holding the executive decision function for us. It is our brains that do that.

In these turbulent times, we are past the stage where conventional methods can get us results. What answers can we get from governments to the question that global citizens are increasingly concerned with within the safety of our world: are the big powers just playing around with human lives?

Parents are escaping fearmongering, non-functioning governments with their children in Gaza and Ukraine right now. Any violent actions cannot be justified. The mass shootings in the US, targeting Black people (and non-white people), are what the center news stations are broadcasting day in and out. There are public schools that were on the mass shooter’s list, so the schools need extra security. War and violence should not be happening in healthy societies. Let us pause and reflect on this for a while. How do we stop community decay and social problems? How can we find solutions and defend and advocate for all children of our world?

The problem with speaking for the voiceless instead of with them is that it is not conducive to preparing the next generations to find solutions, as they are the ones who will one day inherit everything we leave behind after we are gone. Human civilization and the planet we all live in are a collective responsibility.

Our hope for the future is to collectively do better than what we are doing today and strive to understand our purpose as global citizens by making the right choices.

Personal Reflection

Some takeaways from this exercise: an important reminder that self-love and self-validation are essential for everyone. Showing cultural sensitivity to the people who have lived on the margins and are systematically exposed to subtle oppression, while maintaining an open dialogue on how to distinguish between gaslighting and their lived experiences and reality. When working with others, an adjustment to personal preferences is required. Hence, recognizing situations where speaking up when needed is essential, even though it can lead to tension. From my professional and personal perspective, and to engage with a keen sense of fairness and justice, something must be said about the normalization of invalidating others and being complacent about differences of opinion that tends to happen when dealing with stressors in any type of workplace, including the academic environment. For this reason, optimizing time and energy while practicing self-preservation and moral integrity is a conducive way to leadership, self-growth and the betterment of others. Therefore,  continuous improvement must take precedence, since moving forward requires persistence and a willingness to maintain a positive mindset while working with people.

My academic queries in this international program are no different than my everyday life mindfulness in everything I do, which is to open doors while keeping an open mind within the intellectual borders to people from outside cultural spaces, geographical locations, and socioeconomic backgrounds.

Lastly, I will end my blogging journey here with much appreciation for having the opportunity to participate in an educational environment where we can support each other’s learning for the sake of the global community.

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