Educational mythology tells us we live in a time where the truth feels almost nonexistent. Jeff Orlowski’s The Social Dilemma digs into this “untruth” era, exploring the post-truth world and how society and media seem to push anti-pluralism. Maybe it is more accurate to say that truth still exists—but it is no longer absolute or straightforward. These “truths” are less about facts and more about perception.
It is a truth that always feels uncertain. Throughout history and across cultures, examples like 9/11, Brexit, Donald Trump, the Rohingya crisis, and the Uyghurs show how our information circus shapes our views, often pushing society toward anarchy, opposition, and misleading narratives without clear, objective evidence. It is no wonder many thinkers see this age as the dawn of a postmodern world.
By amplifying conspiracy theories, we have coined the term ” post-truth,” a catchy term tossed around by politicians, philosophers, and academics when discussing misinformation.
The Social Dilemma plunges into how this deceitful generation relates to our everyday energies, indicating how post-truth thought currently overlooks all parts of mortal energy. Sociable media goliaths like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok have leaped into the online globe with innocuous joy. What started as a fun description has become a new way of seeing and experiencing life.
In the past decade, social media has changed how we connect, making gathering, chatting, and communicating incredibly easy. Some say the “golden age” of the internet is over, but perhaps we are just beginning a new phase for social media. In many ways, not much has changed since it started. This invention has taken on a life of its own, wielding enormous influence over society.
Orlowski’s The Social Dilemma explores all this in a documentary format. He brings social media insiders, tech experts, and psychologists to explain how social media operates. Beyond scratching the surface, The Social Dilemma offers insights from credible sources on how modern society has intertwined with digitalism.
Educational mythology tells us we live in a time where the truth feels almost nonexistent. Jeff Orlowski’s The Social Dilemma digs into this “untruth” era, exploring the post-truth world and how society and media seem to push anti-pluralism. Maybe it is more accurate to say that truth still exists—but it is no longer absolute or straightforward. These “truths” are less about facts and more about perception.
It is a truth that always feels uncertain. Throughout history and across cultures, examples like 9/11, Brexit, Donald Trump, the Rohingya crisis, and the Uyghurs show how our information circus shapes our views, often pushing society toward anarchy, opposition, and misleading narratives without clear, objective evidence. It is no wonder many thinkers see this age as the dawn of a postmodern world.
By amplifying conspiracy theories, we have coined the term ” post-truth,” a catchy term tossed around by politicians, philosophers, and academics when discussing misinformation.
The Social Dilemma plunges into how this deceitful generation relates to our everyday energies, indicating how post-truth thought currently overlooks all parts of mortal energy. Sociable media goliaths like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok have leaped into the online globe with innocuous joy. What started as a fun description has become a new way of seeing and experiencing life.
In the past decade, social media has changed how we connect, making gathering, chatting, and communicating incredibly easy. Some say the “golden age” of the internet is over, but perhaps we are just beginning a new phase for social media. In many ways, not much has changed since it started. This invention has taken on a life of its own, wielding enormous influence over society.
Orlowski’s The Social Dilemma explores all this in a documentary format. He brings social media insiders, tech experts, and psychologists to explain how social media operates. Beyond scratching the surface, The Social Dilemma offers insights from credible sources on how modern society has intertwined with digitalism.
The big question is, “So what is the big deal?” Orlowski dives into it with the help of his sources, breaking it down into simple, easy-to-understand pieces. Slowly, the audience begins to see the whole picture: social media tracking our every move, the disturbing reach of AI, the blurring lines of hyperreality, and all the ways capitalism, psychology, politics, and more are all intertwined.
The Social Dilemma also has its layer of irony: We are warned about a system built on a lack of trust, which is manipulative and even a little dangerous. However, precisely this complexity makes us more mindful, although “trust” is still elusive. We can watch The Social Dilemma, feel enlightened for a while, and then return to the real world, carrying these insights.
Ironically, post-truth and illusion can be like self-made traps, a double-edged sword crafted by the public; the experts featured in this documentary and thinkers.
Post-truth has changed how we view truth, like post-structuralism or post-imperialism. Truth used to be at the core of belief and decision-making. Whether it involves material facts, human empathy, or outright lies, truth is used to anchor political beliefs and conversations. Nevertheless, today, even manipulation and shows usually return the facts when shaping general ideas. Moreover, this is not the foremost while we have visited this post-truth fantasy recreated in the community.
Bring ancient Greece, for instance—the politicians in the senate watched better about saying effective than existing real. What about the past? It is usually composed by whoever succeeds, turning the level to their taste. Just glance at the propaganda of the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany—they manipulated and used data to control the public’s senses extended before “post-truth” was a specialty.
Truth is always mixed with bias, and the media often shapes public opinion before the facts emerge. With social media amplifying misinformation, traditional media now must re-establish itself as a trustworthy outlet. The “golden age” of media was not perfect; newspapers, radio, and TV once shaped the public narrative with little accountability.
The idea of objectivity in the press was always a farce because conventional media pays heed to those in authority and dismisses any and every counter-argument. This “black mirror” comes from this more dystopian perspective. It shows a world where considerably post-truth ideas live, thrive, and become understood as a reality, as shaped in The Social Dilemma.
The Social Dilemma looks at how fake news operates. Hundreds of former industry employees reveal how we are treated as products and how the social management of human behavior is achieved through data for specific marketing purposes. Some call it augmentation theory, but it is impossible not to see the commercial value of the data.
Platforms like Facebook and Twitter generate revenue from advertising, acting more like businesses than public services. Jeff Orlowski’s The Social Dilemma uses fictional characters to show how algorithms keep us in a bind, exposing Silicon Valley’s fierce competition to dominate the tech world by keeping users engaged.
For all its innovation, Silicon Valley is like the “smart guy” in the room, pushing boundaries. Digital rights activists have been calling out these risks for years, trying to get society to take them seriously.
Disinformation has been a big part of media since the days of print. Social media is like investing in a twisted hyperreal fantasy where “truth” is about personal perspective. The bright ideas of objectivity and journalistic ethics are being questioned as new media becomes popular.
Take 1987, for example—at that time, the press pushed for U.S. involvement in the Middle East under George W. Bush. Historically, the media has even fueled conflicts, such as in Spain. These examples fuel an almost conspiratorial idea of how people perceive facts and misinformation.
In The Social Dilemma, it is clear that the media does not care about ordinary people. New media and the internet have stepped in, pushing traditional media out of the spotlight and changing the game entirely. The “Mass Media Regime” has had to step back as new media became more open and less exclusive, though they still lack a consistent ethical standard.
The media world is more than just a revenue-generating enterprise where responsible dissemination of information and adherence to ethical standards are also important. These principles have become a guiding factor in distributing content and services to the audience.
Reading for leisure is the main reason most people access the internet, which is a reasonably healthy practice. However, secretly, there is a more severe problem: rewriting articles to fit the title, or more precisely, the practice of clickbaiting. For this reason, the internet has become more effective than cognitive development, especially concerning issues of politics, terrorism, racism, religion, capitalism, and espionage. In addition, this is because most of the subjects mentioned above can attract the attention of a specific audience.
However, factors like likes, comments, and time spent online spread the misconception that everything is linked to a total post-truth breakdown. The Social Dilemma is not aimed at solving the problem at its root. Changing our behavior may seem like a better answer, but changing habits is easier said than done. Of course, all apps on Android come with an “uninstall” button that removes the app from the device, and in theory, the data privacy and psychological issues are solved.
However, of course, dealing with addiction is not that simple. For influencers and others whose livelihoods depend on social media, quitting is not an option in this internet-bound business world. So, we have to ask: Is there an alternative?
As technology advances, social media strategists and engineers have developed new techniques for surveillance systems that are less invasive and easier to use. These networks, which encompass the entire social media faculty and the drive of the media community, have led them to appreciate how this digital transformation continues into our present and future. They also try to track the “absolute truth” on the internet. However, it is difficult to understand whether the “truth” is shared among the masses or only a few privileged users on the internet.
Philosophically, society’s idea of truth evolves as knowledge structures change. That does not necessarily mean the truth becomes weaker or less accurate. In a way, post-truth operates in the shadows of idealism.
The Social Dilemma and its insights into the post-truth state may be inaccurate and may even oversimplify or misrepresent the issue. Nevertheless, it helps illustrate the ramifications of the issue. After all, no truth is free from emotion or bias. The concept of truth in a given society is usually hierarchically organized information. So, with the advancement of technology, the principles and functions of organizations also change.
With the shift in values and thinking of society, adapting to these new challenges does not mean a setback. The stakeholders of this technology began to create it positively to develop society. Unfortunately, even advanced technology has its drawbacks. At the end of the story, there is a “time capsule” with which the idea of social media as a means of mobilizing mass consciousness is still tentative.
It is a harsh but strangely beautiful “black mirror” reality. The best we can do is to stay ahead of this shifting truth.
References
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- Chadwick, A., & Dennis, J. (2019). Social Media, Professional Journalism, and the Challenge of Disinformation. Journalism Studies, 20(1), 1-11.
- Lazer, D. J., Baum, M. A., Benkler, Y., Berinsky, A. J., Greenhill, K. M., Menczer, F., … & Metzger, M. J. (2018). The Science of Fake News. Science, 359(6380), 1094-1096.
- Levin, J. (2019). The State of Media Literacy Education: An Overview of Recent Research. Journal of Media Literacy Education, 11(1), 1-14.
- McCoy, K. (2020). Conspiracy Theories: A New Model for Understanding. American Journal of Cultural Sociology, 8(3), 387-404.
- McLuhan, M. (1964). Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. McGraw-Hill.
- Orlowski, J. (Director). (2020). The Social Dilemma [Film]. Netflix.
- Pariser, E. (2011). The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You. Penguin Press.
- Sunstein, C. R. (2018). #Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media. Princeton University Press.
- Tufecki, Z. (2017). Twitter and Tear Gas: The Power and Fragility of Networked Protest. Yale University Press.
