What is This "Sarahah" Thing Anyway?
At the top of the screen, Sarahah's URL was displayed. Lost in this new social media trend, I decided to consult my little sister (a kid who's hip with the times) what the "constructive message", "swipe up", Snapchat explosion that is Sarahah was all about.
She told me, "Oh, it's this new thing where you leave anonymous messages on people's pages for them to see." Then I searched Google to find out more. According to Furtune, "'Sarahah' is the Arabic word for candor or openness," and is an extremely popular, anonymous messaging application with over 4 million downloads. It also says that Sarahah was primarily used by employers to get anonymous input from employees about higher management before it became all the rage. I found this fact to be highly surprising and interesting. I think that using Sarahah in this context could potentially be beneficial to a company.
Knowing more about Sarahah, I thought it sounded like it could be a fun way to find out what other people truly thought of me. The more I thought about it, the less appealing it became. Although the app has the potential to be entertaining, it also has huge potential wreak havoc. We've seen both sides already on previously popular, anonymous messaging apps like YikYak and After School.
Cyberbullying is a serious issue within social media, especially for younger kids and teens, and can take a serious toll on one's mental health and self-esteem. Unfortunately, anonymity online only contributes to the problem. Without names people don't feel restricted in the use of their words and often don't take the time to think about what they are saying or recognize the damage they can do. And if they are intentionally being cruel, they don't have to take any responsibility for what they are saying because they can't be held accountable. Taking all this into account, the costs outweigh the benefits by a landslide.
I personally feel that anonymous messaging sites and apps are very juvenile. To an extent, I don't care that much about what people think of me and quite frankly if someone doesn't have the bravery to tell me something in person, I don't want to hear it anyway. That being said, I certainly won't be downloading or partaking in any activity involving Sarahah.
What do you think about Sarahah? Comment below!
See you next post,
Casey
I think that it is interesting on how it has changed from its original use. Personally I feel that anonymous apps like this typically will never have a good outcome. People are already cruel enough on social media. The sense of anonymity will make what they have to say that much worse. Cyberbullying is already enough of an issue without the factor of being anonymous.
ReplyDeleteI agree that anonymous messaging is quite juvenile and like you said is just asking for cyberbullying. I feel that this has probably significantly more negative messages rather than positive and I think that is pretty sad to think about because our generation and today's society focus on negatives and putting others down more than focusing on the positives.
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