Never alone except for now takes themes that are common in our contemporary society but that we do not discuss much. It is if you will, intricate for most of us and our everyday knowledge of technology and social media platforms. Technological development over time are changing the way we act, the way we interact with each other and overall the way we think. By combining both forms of collectivity in the public and social media, Kris Cohen makes us understand different ways in which people will react in the occasion of perceiving shared intimacy both in the streets and on social media platforms. He talks about social media, the internet and pays close attention to the connection between Sharon Hayes performances and how people think when sharing pictures and other content on different platforms of social media. He also talks about trolls and the risk of toxicity on these platforms because of the openness and the lack of security in these. I will be talking about the chapter and its content in relation to my claim on social media and how it takes control of people lives.

The way in which Cohen structures the chapter is through making an initial introduction of the sociality, Social media and their components, a combination of private intimacy, public speech, and criticism coming from different agents on a platform with few barriers to entry. In other words social media platforms are a democracy in which everyone has a voice, but this democracy gets obstructed when different thoughts are introduced. When one person has an opinion that differs from a second one, this concept of democracy comes undone in the belief that ones’ opinion is more important that the one from one of our piers. And this where the trolls come into the picture, by having toxic behaviours other than just believing one’s opinion is more relevant, they betray the live ideal of a healthy online community.

An important concept introduced early in the text is intimacy without reciprocity, to explain this concept is simple, any sort of intimacy comes some sort of expectation. This comes into play when thinking of social media and posting pictures for instance, the person posting on her account is not posting for the sake of having a picture on her profile but to test things out and see the kind of feedback that can be received in response to this shared intimacy. Intimacy without reciprocity then, comes into place when the people observing, this picture, post or other and deny the reciprocity of sharing intimacy, they might react to it in one way or another, but they abstain themselves from displaying a visible response on these platforms. In this sense Cohen refers to bad behaviours online, as a broken genre of intimacy without reciprocity, as they go against this ideology of staying silent in regard to people sharing different elements of their lives and, instead, they decide to target vulnerable people (prone to be attacked by trolls) and make them feel self-conscious about this attempt to express intimacy.

One of the most important parts of the essay is Sharon Hayes’s “love addresses” and her way of demonstrating broken genres through her artistic representation. This part does not make much reference to my claim, but nevertheless it helps to put things into perspective before going further.

In this case by broken Genre, Hayes uses 2 different processes for her public performances, First she uses love talk and second, protest talk, these combine each other in an odd harmony that make people curious. By using a megaphone, she is conveyed the power of attention given to protesters when they are giving a speech and the audience is awaiting to be inspired, but in Hayes case, she is not seeking the attention of the crowd, she isn’t even seeking for the attention of a specific crowd. She delivers her speech on the street, talking about a love story that is no more, by addressing the street she has the hope that, as her lover did not want to listen, the streets will. There is no clear ending or beginning to the speech, she might start at some point and end when she believes it is right as she does not adhere to conventions of the protest. And here is the part where the audience comes in, because she does not bow at the end of her speech, it is as if she does not acknowledge her audience, she does not include them in the speech, there is no “fourth wall” being broken, there is absolutely no contact between her and the audience. An element fortifying this, is Hayes constant movement through the city, the farther she moves from the location she started at, the clearer it is that her performance is not meant for the pleasure of an audience. The lack of agency given to the audience results in many stopping by for a few instance and then leaving, but there is a small group of people following her during her performance, both her and her audience blends In perfectly with the ambient of the city streets. Here is where we can start to make connections with Hayes speech and social media of nowadays, she stands in the streets and recites her love letters in the form of a protest, she does not expect a reaction or a mere reception of this, she just puts it out there with the curiosity of what will happen. This will be talk furtherly in another subsection about social media, but this is what the person that post her pictures or her status on social media does, there is no direct expectation for reception of the content being posted. Of course, this is the case initially in one of the first contacts with social media, that are made, out of pure curiosity, what will happen next will be a motivation for a positive reception of the content (likes, comment about how good the picture looks). Overall Hayes through her repeated speech in the streets of new York achieves to break every expectation, first the expectation of the usual protest, then, the medium of a love letter (as it’s name is implied in a letter) by sharing it with everyone willing to listen and her treatment of an audience, her indifference that is on its own a broken genre. Even t People that are ignored start wondering why there is this lack of interaction and if there will be given some agency at a given point if they stay long enough. This is additionally achieved by sharing something that is deeply personal within an individual life, a love letter and the feelings that one feel when a love that once was is no more. People are interested in things they do not see everyday, something that will shake them out of their day to day nine to five routine, that will make them think about something that is not themselves.

The term troll is well known in the online world or Cybernet, it corresponds to bad behaviour online in general. From spamming to racism and hate messages, these individuals are what is considered toxic on social media. This is made possible by the extremely low barrier to enter these platforms, one doesn’t even need a mobile device, as long as they have a functioning computer and an internet connection. Additionally, it is very simple for Trolls to conserve their anonymity on forums or chatrooms which basically gives them immunity to do whatever they please, if they know they cannot be caught their behaviour will not cease. Trolls engage in this behaviour in order to trigger an emotional reaction from their victims, as if just like Hayes did with her audience, they are ignored the purpose of their efforts is reduced to zero. Cohen, makes reference to this as the Troll wanting to disrupt the democratic operation of a forum or chat room through those actions, they protest conversation itself and specially, non-conflictive conversation. Most of the targets trolls choose as their victims are seem defenceless, in many cases women are targeted by their apparent sensibility to critics. Some of the notable threats against women are death threats and sexual violence. In the text, Cohen, mentions Shaviro on his comment on Haraway’s quote saying, “if you are connected, you are fucked”. This is certainly true, when one person decides to get on the internet for the first time it can be overwhelming, and if not prepared for it, it can have very negative effects on one’s ego. A comparison of the internet with a jungle can be proposed, it is a wonderful place to be in but if not careful, it is probable to get hurt. Would removing all the trolls from the internet, make this issue get better? It is not an easy question to answer as, most trolls resist the categorization of being a troll, one doesn’t want to be called a bully, even if they are. Cohen concludes this part of the text by saying that in the sense that the internet has renewed the idealism of a public sphere, that everyone can be equal within one society, that trolls are utterly normal in this setting. Another reference made about trolls is them as being misogynistic, as they target groups such as women, queers, people of colour, and other people with visible disabilities as they are an easier target.

A possible although extremely complex method to abolish Trolls, would be to highly monitor the internet traffic and prosecute the people that break the law. Unfortunately, this will have to wait until the adequate technological advancements allow for all the information to store on cloud servers to. Thinking about real life situation, we rarely see a troll that is black mailing a teenager, threatening to show revealing pictures of her to all of her Facebook friends. Nowadays we see too many of these cases that results in the teenager committing suicide because the subsequent bullying she received because those pictures were revealed.

The widespread use of social media over the past decade have made it easier than ever for people to communicate with each no matter where there are. A wide array of different platforms such as Facebook, that allows you to send messages, post on your friend’s wall and nowadays even video chat with each other. Instagram, allows people to share their life experiences by posting pictures on their profiles, keep track of what their friends are doing in real time , and follow their interest such as celebrities, movie studios, and more. Or even YouTube that has become more common than television among young people, where they can keep track of the people they like, find tutorials and overall entertain themselves. This surge of social media platforms has slowly become part of our everyday lives and has had many benefits in them, how else could an exchange student be able to speak face to face (or in this case screen to screen) to their family that is more than 6000 kilometres away. All technology is supposed to help make our lives easier for us, we are better interconnected than even but oddly we are really, alone, as sinister as it sounds.

As Mentioned previously technology was created as a tool for us to use on everyday basis, but the more time passes, and the more technology takes control of people. When walking into a restaurant or bar for instance, how many couples/friends/ relatives are sitting at a table together using their phones instead of paying attention to each other. In this case social media and the things happening in other people’s lives are more important than to have a conversation with physical people. This is where the title of Cohen’s book come into play, never alone except for now. We are never technically alone, with all these social media platforms there is always someone to talk to, someone’s profile to check, or some youtuber’s video to watch. From morning to night, we are in front of screen, and in many cases, especially young people in university, people base most of their daily interactions with sending a message. Thinking about how often we do call each other on the phone this is made clear, most people using social media as their main gate of communication will not want to answer a call and instead just message, as this would put them in a position, they haven’t been on for a long time. Another issue is that although many “friendships” are created though these platforms, whether it is because you saw the person in class or they just followed you on Instagram, this is not a truthful friendship. The issue here is that most of the young people using social media, were born into technology or as they got into adolescence these media planforms exploded in popularity. This is why they never had to use MSN on their computer when they get back from school to catch up with their friends, or actively makes plan to hangout outside Instead of using facetime texting every minute of their day.

Today, we live in a society so utterly saturated with information that it is possible for one person to lose themselves in this environment. Instagram, Facebook, tweeter and more are social media platforms that the vast majority of population use on the day to day to keep track of each other’s life. I Used never alone except for now because it seemed to me as a very interesting topic, along with other text that we have seen this semester about technology and how it affects people. In chapter 3 of Never alone except for now, Kris Cohen talks about social media and how it combines private intimacy, public speech and autonomous criticism. I have used the text as a support to my main claim which is the dangers of social media on people’s life and their sense of worth. Although more the time passes and more the awareness for internet security and data protection comes to become a realty for daily internet users, the typical university student browsing on Instagram will not think of having his account hacked or information stolen. As these threats are not an everyday thing, we are aware of, who likes our pictures, comments on or even share post is something we are more aware of on the day to day. We have come to the point where we care more about what a “haters” comment on a picture than someone criticizing us in real life. Cohen, in this chapter talks about social media exposure and posting pictures or texts on these platforms as an intimacy without reciprocity. In short, this meaning that by posting and sharing our lives with a perceived audience, we are testing what will happen, in a hopeful attempt to get attention. When we share a picture on Instagram, we are expecting a response, no matter which one, just a response, this comes with the risk of receiving a positive or negative one. I would describe this as the mentality of someone that is fairly new to social media as, people start posting by curiosity or because everyone around them is doing so and they do not want to feel left out. But as I will explain furtherly, that first curiosity of seeing what will happen will result in a certain satisfaction in result of people paying attention. Of course, this attention can be good or bad, Cohen talks about trolls in the chapter I will use this to talk about both positive and negative responses on social media and how these affect people In such a way that will eventually end in creating the feeling that these responses define who I am.

This comes into action especially for younger more impressionable subjects, as their sense of self develops with time, they look for a role model, and in this day and age, for both gender those are located on social media, the most common being Instagram and YouTube. And what do those personalities do that make them so notorious? Sharing part (or in other cases such as vloggers or streamers most) of their lives with an audience. This makes young people and their friends to do the same, start a YouTube channel a fashion blogger Instagram and exposing their personal life to anyone who has access to a computer really. The issue comes in when these youths start basing their sense of self on the reception of their exposure on these various platforms, If I do not get as many followers as I predicted or as my friend who started a new Instagram at the same time as me I will feel embarrassed and like a failure. This is a reality for young people that are still developing their sense of worth, and quite a dangerous one.

Additionally, here is a false sense of community that exist within social media that everyone can attest to, no matter how many followers a person has, if it is hundreds, thousands or even millions, receiving notifications of likes and comments will bring them a sense of as Cohen explained it so well a broken echo, that a single reaction will make you feel like you are not alone until the inevitable moment comes where the person realizes that they are indeed alone. This is the problem with social media nowadays, we have more interactions with people on Facebook or Instagram message than having a conversation without recurring to small talk. Although technology helps us feel more connected to each other, its real effect is to make us alienated from each other, created a false sense of community that we blindly believe to be real.

We also must be vigilant in the way we manage our life and the exposure to social media because as Cohen talks about the internet as being an unregulated platform in which anyone can participate, toxicity is meant to be part of it. He talks about anonymity being a key factor for trolls to continue their behavior online, if a child knows he won’t get caught bothering another kid he will. The activity of posting hate comments or just spreading negativity on someone’s post does not fall too far away from the case of the children, because someone can create a fake account to just troll people on Instagram, it is difficult for people to identify them. Although most people know about the risk of never ending spam, hacking or being targeted as a troll, they still take part in social media platforms because those elements are common to us by now. But to come back to the example of youths starting to use social media for the first time this can have a very negative effect on them, from simple mean comments to cyberbullying these platforms can cause several mental health issues within the victims and even suicide.

We live our lives self-consciously seeking attention, we want people to notice us, to tell us we look good today or to praise us for our special skills, it makes us feel good. This is exactly what happens with Instagram for instance, when a person post a picture and they see that heart notification at the bottom of the app, research has shown that the dopamine receptors of the brain react by giving a brief sensation of pleasure leading to us wanting to post more, get more followers more likes and make us feel better about ourselves. But what happen when, say, 10 minutes passes by and we get 1 like, some people will delete the post because they feel ashamed of the unpopular nature of their latest post. This phenomenon is present in our day to day relationships, when one’s friend, partner or family member gets more like in the same picture posted and there is a feeling of jealousy that surges, what is that person jealous of? The amount of strangers that liked the picture from behind the screen. How have advance in the technological world to the point where we crave stranger’s attention to heighten our sense of worth.

Coming back to Sharon Hayes “love addresses”, here is an interesting connection between the way she carries these performances and people’s attitudes towards sharing information on social media. In her love addresses, Hayes creates a mix between a love letter and a protest, moving through the city, continuing her speech with a megaphone, with some people stopping to listen what she has to say and following her to see what happens and the ones that stop for a momentary peek out of pure curiosity. Here Hayes does not actively seek for people reaction, she leaves it in the hands of the pedestrians to stop and pay attention to what she has to say. This is kind of the model people follow when posting on social media, they post in the curiosity of seeing what will happen, you can stop and look my picture and even like it if you want, or not, but this is totally in the hands of the audience. In a typical protest, the person with the megaphone is addressing the audience by engaging them in what they are saying, but as we’ve seen previously in this entry, Hayes refuses to give agency to the audience, almost ignoring them . This negation to give the audience any type of agency is what makes it satisfying for the people listening, it is like they are trying to get Hayes attention by standing there, hoping they will be acknowledge at some point of the performance. There is a clear parallelism here between how the audience seek attention and people on social media that comment on some celebrity profile, in hope to get an answer or for the very least be acknowledged.

After the lecture of this text, you will likely have a different perspective of social media and social interactions with people, not in a negative light, but more of an objective one if you will. It is of course important to utilize these platforms to our advantage but always remembering what is the most important. Through this chapter and throughout the book, Cohen, focuses his claims on giving readers a better understanding of the structure of the ongoing interactions on social media platforms( as well as the lack of thereof). When understanding why people react the way they do and why they get involved in content creations, on these platforms, what are their motivations behind it. Although I think this essay is very interesting and informative, I think Cohen has a rather simplistic view when it comes to trolls and the consequences they have in people’s life, and the negative effects that cyber bullying has had in the last decades on people. In the troll portion of the text, Cohen, superficially emphasizes their actions, reasons, and some solutions that doesn’t present a bright horizon. One of the critics that I had with this text is I wanted to learn the behaviour of trolls, and more of a reason, that because they see vulnerability In persons, in my opinion a more sociology focused approach to reasons behind their behaviour would have been more beneficial to the purpose of the entry. Additionally, in this chapter, I excepted Cohen to talk about the interpersonal relationships between people more than just people on the web, as technology has made these more and more complicated with time. People feel estranged from each other, although they talk to each other, they rarely listen, many people either wait for their turn to talk or think about something else. Technology and social media have fomented that through the shift away from having meaningful conversation to small talk, from having coffee together to sending each other snapchats. The more time people spend on social media and ironically the more their social skills deteriorates.

Cohen, Kris. “Broken Genres”. Never alone, except for now art, networks, populations. Durham: Duke University Press, 2017. 41-77. University of Toronto libraries. Web. 1^st Nov. 2018