Blurred Boundaries in Social Media

Picture taken by Jonathan Acuña at Parque Francia, Panama City, Panama (2017)

Blurred Boundaries in Social Media

A simple ethical solution

By Prof. Jonathan Acuña-Solano, M. Ed.
Head of Curriculum Development Academic Department Centro Cultural Costarricense-Norteamericano	Senior Language Professor School of English Faculty of Social Sciences Universidad Latina de Costa Rica
Tuesday, July 28, 2020 Post 352

	Opinion Prompt
	For example, you have been working at a new job for six months and are starting to become friends with some of your colleagues. One of them sends you a friend request via Facebook. ·       Would this be a problem for you? ·       What are the ethical issues around blurred boundaries that most affect you?

         Starting new relationships with people at a new job is something normal all of us go through. Befriending others is part of being a social being, and this will allow to create and foster a comfortable atmosphere in the workplace. However, when people want to see a bit more than your professional persona, this desire can be the fagots of firewood needed to start a fiery bonfire. In other words, can others get to see the difference between your personal self and your professional online persona especially if the existing boundary is rather blurry? The problem with blurred boundaries is that they are like a bleak island where anything can manifest and then take shape and substance in many various ways.

         Would a friend request via Facebook be a problem for me if it comes from a new co-worker? To be honest, it would not be a problem at all; I would simply tell my new partner that I do not have a Facebook account because I have never believed much in this particular social media site. I would also inform my partner that I do not have any intention, in the near future, to open an account, either. I may also suggest him to follow me on Twitter where I have a professional account that I use to get information from publishing houses and English Language Teaching (ELT) experts. I would also state that though I have this Twitter account, I am much of a passive user because I only use it to get information and not exactly to share information. I bet this answer will suffice, and my partner and I can go on with our relationship as if nothing has happened. And somehow my private life is not at stake.

         Now, if you ask me about ethical issues around blurred boundaries that most affect me in this “friend request” scenario, I have some things to say. Back in 2004 Facebook was born, and through that decade it became more and more popular. Consequently, a lot of people I knew at the time got engaged and started experiencing dire repercussions due to their postings and statuses. Analyzing the situation, I decided not to mingle around with others in social media sites just because. And the first thing I was able to observe was the blurriness between people’s professional persona and their personal online self. In my understanding of the situation, both things have collided and turned into one. Can social media users pending approval of their friend requests differentiate one from the other if profile owners could not set a clear division?

         Being rather dramatic in my statement of the facts, this blurriness told me (and others) of shadows and forebodings regarding the collision of online personas. I have a group of friends and another of family members where we share stuff via WhatsApp, but I do not get judged by a colored joke I send. But if I got to publish it on social media where any co-worker or boss can see them, can somebody predict what their reaction towards them will be? How will they judge me by not separating my hobby, personal self from my professional, academic persona? We have seen it before, when postings in social media can turn into a storm in a glass of water, and people’s careers can be severely affected.

         The ethical solution is simple if you do not want your postings to be labeled inappropriate and disrespectful. The nuances can be plentiful when people start to decode your messages out of context through their local media outlets; misunderstanding will be very much present. For this reason, and as a sound suggestion, both selves must clearly know where the boundary between them is, and trespassing must not be allowed. A blazing torch should not be needed to find the boundary on social media blurry surface; it must be clearly drawn.

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