Well hello, Happy Sea friends! I’m Lexi, the newest member to The Happy Sea crew! I am assisting artist Owyn and business guru Laurie on all things social and digital for the brand; so naturally, I wanted to blog about social media and its relationship with ocean conservation, which is The Happy Sea’s main focus, always.
So let me tell you why social media is THE WORST for ocean conservation.
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1. High Exposure… Social media has given each human the chance to share photos as freely as we breathe air, leading to high exposure to the beauty of the ocean. With this capability, everyone is able to share photographic evidence ofwhyocean conservation is so important. Which is horrible, right? That means, little girls in landlocked states can fall in love with a video of whales singing to their babies; high school students can visually see the damage single-use plastics have done to beaches everywhere and grow up knowing that their actions can change this one day; people who do not get to have constant contact with the ocean can still directly experience the need it has for conservation. With this high exposure, ocean conservation is readily viewed by people everywhere, all because of social media.
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2. Personal Connections… Gross! Nobody likes to get personal about things. That’s why the second reason that social media is the WORST for ocean conservation is that as these visual photos are shared through various social platforms, entire populations are becoming personally connected to conservation movements. People are able to cheer on marine biologists, coastal engineers, relief workers and so many more ocean warriors from afar, and support them with donations, awareness and even comments of support. That means that social media is encouraging crowds of people to care, love and protect the ocean, personally! Bleh!
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3. Education… This is probably the worst reason, for sure. Social media has this terrible aspect where it engages thousands of people into topics and ideas that originally they wouldn’t think to educate themselves on. Just picture this disastrous scenario: someone clicks on a photo of a whale, that leads them to a website about wildlife conservation for marine mammals, that then sends them to a sign-up for a weekly, educational e-newsletter. From then on, this person is trapped into an educational cycle that gives them information about how to they can help the ocean, eventually leading to the creation of an aware, educated, ocean-minded individual.
So, as you can see from my three reasons, social media is doingnothing for ocean conservation. Social media is exposing, connecting and educating huge populations of people about ocean conservation and why it’s needed.
Isn’t that just...the worst?
