Problems of Social Media: Moral issues and fair use
By Fr. Pasquotto - Social Media produces vanity, is against meekness, give us illusion we are brave, offends purity, promotes curiosity (not studiousness), waste our time ...
Note from the translator: A series of sermon by Fr. Luiz Fernando Pasquotto, IBP, in 2016. The original in portuguese can be read here .
Sermons: Problems of Social Media:
Changes your self perception (link)
Crafted to be anti-theocentric and favor depression (link)
Jeopardize intellectual life (link)
Moral issues and fair use ←
6. As for the most common moral problems of Social Media, they are:
a) Vanity, because what you put on the page is for someone to see, comment, agree, like. You try to put something that people approve and give reason to you; curiosity about other people's lives, waste of time, idleness. Consequences: spiritual laziness, great chance of impurity, superficiality, non-fulfillment of state duties.
b) Against meekness. Many times you read things you don't like and you always get into fruitless discussions, in which no one will be convinced, but at least peace will be lost. They often end in disagreements and offenses contrary to charity, producing enmities and hatreds. It occurs mainly with publications against the Church, in Catholic circles. But with non-Catholic people the quarrels take place over the most deplorable issues.
c) It gives the person the illusion that he is brave. On the internet, people write everything they think without criteria, without respect for authority, without reflection. He thinks he is being sincere, a great defender of the truth, of doctrine, correcting errors, enlightening people, etc., etc. At the same time, they are people who don't even pray a tenth of the rosary a day, who don't pray in the morning or at night, and don't even realize how the time they spend on the internet jeopardizes the most basic duties of state as a father and mother, husband and wife.
d) It offends purity: There is no way to control what is seen. When scrolling the page, everything can be seen, even if you limit contacts to a trusted group.
The scandals that were given remain, even if the person who published them has regretted it and, as far as it depends, has erased them. Often old photos and comments, from a past and bad life, are recorded in other places, replicated by third parties, where the content does not depend on us, and as much as we do our best to erase them, our past life is often remains forever exposed.
e) A lot of time is wasted keeping the page updated, observing what others publish, reading the whirlwind of information that appears, but without actually delving into anything. Wasted hours.
f) Curiosity is always provoked. A photo, a piece of information, something minimal, makes you want to investigate more and more about something that was not even known before and that there is no reason to know.
h) Contact with people from a previous (sinful) life, being a temptation to think that they are happy with the non-Catholic life they lead and that when we convert we abandon the apparent happiness we see in the publications. Temptations of discouragement and the desire to return to the bad life we had before arise. We have already commented on how these publications are, in fact, simulacra and falsehoods.
Necessary use: work, study (there are teachers who pass the material through Social Media), publicize events of a parish or group, for example; even so, the person needs to be very clear that he will need to use Social Media making an effort to go in the opposite direction to which they are inclined; Another justifiable use is the dissemination of apostolate events — make no mistake: the apostolate is, in fact, done face to face. The dissemination and presence of many people is not a consummate apostolate. It is necessary to teach, give principles, convictions, example, the person needs to change his life, abandon bad habits, acquire good habits, etc. This can only happen by a man-to-man action. Only the internet does not convert anyone. Even more so when everything remains in a virtual world with all the flaws we mentioned.