Storytelling, The Rising Social Media Ethical Issues

Question

Task:
Applying Ethical Theories
Follow the instructions given below to complete the task.

• Write a report based on your argument visualisation created in Task 1 and the media article or case study you selected in Task 1. 
• Undertake further research about your chosen case and the ethical issue involved, to assist you in analysing and discussing it in your report. 
• Analyse the ethical issue applying the classical ethical theories, including utilitarianism, deontology, contract, and virtue. Your report should present well-reasoned arguments, logically leading to appropriate recommendations. 
• You should not introduce new arguments in your report that were not contained in your argument visualisation, and your report should contain all of the arguments contained in your visualisation.
• Write an overall conclusion that justifies your recommendations made in your report.
• Include a Reference list at the end of your work, using the correct APA referencing style, corresponding to in-text citations. The word limit for the report is 1500 words +/-10%. Headings, citations, references and appendices do not count towards the word limit, but quotations do.

Note: Please use the template provided in the subject Interact site for your report.

Answer

Introduction
Ethical storytelling in Social media has been chosen for conducting the analysis of social media ethical issues that might arise due to storytelling on such platforms. Social media plays a definite role in making the post go viral specifically those that prompt a visceral reaction from the users and always seek to re-share. Thus, the scalability and free nature of social media make it quite lucrative in nature for the non-profits organization. This also plays a definite role in leveraging the platforms for donations as well as spreading awareness among the general population through the idea of storytelling. Along with this, conducting campaigns on social media through like and few clicks can significantly earn a small range of profits (Glozer, Caruana, &Hibbert, 2019). This small range of profit earning likes and clicks comes at the expense of communities that representnon-profits serves. Thus, people opt for telling stories in social media to gain significant attention. They also earn significant profits from these. The pain of people, when displayed on social media, can attract the attention of people in the form of likes.

What are the possible social media ethical issues? Discuss.
The social media ethical issues that are identified in the ethical storytelling for the topic include taking issues our privacy seriously and aim for transparency. The non-profits storytelling on social media particularly takes the strides in a specific ethical direction whenever the people are provided with a chance. Social media ethical issues arise when people are not comfortable with such kind of portrayal and it goes in the favour of discomfort. Thus, the success of social media comes at the expense of maintaining good relationships with the communities that are served. Along with this, involving community members in social media campaigns will impose significant time on this. Through the visualization map, it has been identified that being honest and transparent with the audience is important for ethical storytelling (Andalibi, Haimson, De Choudhury & Forte, 2016). Furthermore, under-delivering of anything can also be considered as one of the major social media ethical issues in storytelling. Creating spam on social media will result in a loss of followers. Muting the product or service on social media can be considered as one of the social media ethical issues that can restrict people from sharing or interacting with the new services (Elkins, 2018). Furthermore, the stories that are shared on social media can possess significant risk that reinforces specific stereotypes for people that are receiving services for such non-profit organizations.

The ethical consideration for the social media platform is not new to digital settings and the non-profits storytelling illustrates a wide range of appeals that lasts to substantive. The posts that are posted on social media are usually not edited or reviewed which poses a significant risk to the people posting it (George & Green, 2016). There is a lack of implementing time for the ethical reflections and thereby ensure that the posts are aligned with the advancement of mission.

Applying theories on the social media ethical issues
Utilitarian: This refers to normative ethical systems, which is concerned with the outcomes of ethical decision-making. It is also known as a teleological theory, which is particularly a notion that is the result of an act that plays an important role in determining the action. As far as storytelling on social media is considered, the person taking action of the entire thing will perform it right only when the action is good (Niemi & Multisilta, 2016). Thus, in this case, it is important to locate morality with respect to the consequences of the action. The consequentiality nature of utilitarianism would result in ethical decision making before the determination of decision mortality. The principle of utilitarianism illustrates that pleasure should not only include sensual but also mental pleasure. People telling their stories on social media should follow this particular principle in order to differentiate between pleasure and happiness.

Deontology: This refers to an ethical theory that illustrates the responsibility of the individual as per the rules designed. Social media is an interactive tool that plays an important role in interacting with people. However, there are significant issues associated with it that are partially invading personal lives. The theory illustrates that it is important to secure the visibility of the posts shared on posted on social media sites (Budabin, 2017). On posting such content on social media, it becomes quite risky as it reinforces some people who are stereotyped in nature to receive services from the non-profits sector. The theory in this context illustrates for doing something right, people require performing their duty, and no action is required. For this, the intention is of significant

Contract: The social contract theory illustrates that people who communicate together within an environment with respect to the norms and rules of behaviour. Social contacts can sometimes be explicit in nature such as laws or can also be implicit in nature (Rieger et al, 2018). Posts on social media are considered myth busting and similarly, it becomes onerous at times.

Virtue: This refers to an approach that illustrates rules results as well as acts that focus on the type of person involved in the task. The issues do not stand out to be right or wrong, instead, it refers to the implementation of correct rules that are relevant in nature. The moral virtues include admirable characters that can be implemented for determining the accuracy of action with relating to such traits (Meretoja, 2017). Various cultures as well as a model can be used to demonstrate the conflicts within a given culture. The character of a person would thus help in determine the posts shared or posted on the social media from the perspective.

Recommendation
In the modern era, social media plays the most vital role in terms of spreading information over the internet platform across the globe. Social media is referred to as the most powerful tool to be used by the local people in order to increase the popularity of the information released socially. The social media ethical issues, which are being applied for the storytelling of the public on media, stand as a competitive advantage for the users. The people are required to put more attention to the social media ethical issues in content to social media and social media marketing. In the society of the local people, there are more various ethics for the content of the social media that must be followed by the users in order to stay protected from the unwanted information spread over the internet platform. The people must be more serious about the privacy and safety of their social media. In the present time, it has been observed that people are more connected to social media compared to the practical life. Any information which is released on social media connects more than thousands of people stay connected to social media. The users of social media must use informative and protective devices in order to protect their information socially. The owners of the organization do not release any kind of information on social media before introducing the products to the customers in the market. The users of social media need to be honest and accurate about the confirmations to be posted socially. Before releasing any kind of information on the internet platform, the user must ensure that the information is correct and respectful towards the audience. The users can create several likes, profit and popularity on particular information whereas; it can spoil a life or a business of the information. Any such kind of information can spoil the life and business of a person. Social media is as powerful as dangerous to be used.

Conclusion
The study concludes with the understanding of the ethics of storytelling on social media. The paper depicts the importance of social media in the daily life of the people. The people seemed to be more active on the platform of social media rather than in their practical life. The paper includes the understanding of social media ethical issues and the ethical theories. The people are not supposed to evaluate their promotion of products and services before its establishment in the market. The paper has identified all the possible social media ethical issues for the user to be utilized in reference to the use of online platforms. The social media is known as the most powerful tool to be used for elaborating any kind of information to every corner of the world. The study is very essential for users of social media to detect the importance of social media in both good and bad terms.

References
Andalibi, N., Haimson, O.L., De Choudhury, M. & Forte, A.(2016).May.Understanding social media disclosures of sexual abuse through the lenses of support seeking and anonymity. Social media ethical issues In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI conference on human factors in computing systems (p. 3906-3918).

Budabin, A. C. (2017). Crafting humanitarian imaginaries: the visual story-telling of buy-one give-one marketing campaigns. In Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute Proceedings (Vol. 1, No. 9, p. 905).

Elkins, D. M. (2018).Book Review: The Ethics of Storytelling: Narrative Hermeneutics, History and the Possible by Meretoja, H.

George, D. R., & Green, M. J. (2016). Social Media and Storytelling in Medicine: Probing Deeper.Academic Medicine, 91(5), 610-611.

Glozer, S., Caruana, R., &Hibbert, S. A. (2019). The never-ending story: Discursive legitimation in social media dialogue.Organization Studies, 40(5), 625-650.

Meretoja, H. (2017). The ethics of storytelling: Narrative hermeneutics, history, and the possible.Oxford University Press.

Niemi, H., &Multisilta, J. (2016).Digital storytelling promoting twenty-first century skills and student engagement.Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 25(4), 451-468.

Rieger, K. L., West, C. H., Kenny, A., Chooniedass, R., Demczuk, L., Mitchell, K. M., ...& Scott, S. D. (2018). Social media ethical issues Digital storytelling as a method in health research: a systematic review protocol.Systematic reviews, 7(1), 41.