“The medium is the message”

On Wednesday, April 30, 2025, I had the opportunity to deliver a short talk to the youth of Argao during a seminar entitled “LSakto: Leader Sakto – A Youth Empowerment for Wise Leadership and Career Development.” The event was organized by the Argao Youth Development Council, led by the town’s Sangguniang Kabataan officials. The event focused on scholarships, leadership development, and voter’s education. I was assigned to speak on voter’s education, with an integrated focus on media literacy and disinformation.

Whenever I talk about media literacy, especially in relation to social media, I always frame it through the lens of Marshall McLuhan’s famous dictum, “The medium is the message.” McLuhan, a Canadian philosopher and media theorist active in the 1960s and 70s, is best known for coining that phrase along with 'the global village.' Although McLuhan coined his theory decades ago and is no longer with us, I figured --having studied his work in college-- that it was worth connecting his “the medium is the message” to today’s society and our apparent failure to grasp the nature and impact of social media on our lives.

“The medium is the message” suggests that the way a message is delivered (the medium) “is just as important --if not more so-- than the content itself.” The medium shapes how messages are structured, perceived, and even the kind of impact they generate.

Social media came to us in the mid-2000s, and it came fast --quickly becoming mainstream and dominant by the 2010s. By the mid-2010s, it had fully reshaped how people consumed news, formed opinions, and interacted with the each other.

Obviously, we were not ready for it. It started with clicking and sharing --often without thinking about the consequences of the information we consume and pass along. Now, we scroll through reels, most often without reflection. Terms such as 'doomscrolling' and 'brain rot' have become common.

We use social media, but few of us understand how it uses us. That’s why we’re in this mess today; most of us are unaware of how social media changes the way we communicate messages, how we perceive them, and even what our message becomes.

Social media thrives on short, digestible content. Unlike traditional media, where messages are often long-form (newspapers, in-depth reports, editorials), social media compresses complex ideas into quick, shareable posts. This leads to a headline culture, where people react to snippets rather than full analyses.

It is also in the nature of social media algorithms to favor engagement, and engagement often means content that sparks strong emotions. Anger, joy, and outrage spread faster on social media than reflective content. This incentivizes people to craft their messages in ways that gain more reactions, often by being more vulgar, sensational, or provocative.

There are no gatekeepers in social media to verify content or ensure accuracy. Anyone can post anything, and it can go viral. Back when I was a Communication major in college, we dreamed of the democratization of media. That dream has come true today, but has quickly turned into a nightmare. Disinformation and misinformation have become the norm.

Another aspect of social media is its integration of text, images, live streams, and interactive content. This is certainly great, until we realize that this kind of communication fosters instantaneous reactions and echo chambers. These instant reactions often lead to knee-jerk outrage, cancel culture, and online spaces where users engage only with like-minded opinions.

Social media has caused many educated and well-meaning individuals to settle for virtue-signaling --projecting their values and ideals through Facebook posts while neglecting the need to engage with real communities and people outside their bubbles and comfort zones.

What we see on social media is also chosen for us by algorithms. This personalized feed, experts have found out, creates bubbles that reinforces biases and shapes perceptions in ways we may not realize.

On social media, opinion pieces, conspiracy theories, and fake news appear alongside factual reporting, making it increasingly difficult to distinguish truth from distortion. Political figures use these platforms to strategically control narratives, discredit opponents, or even avoid accountability by sidestepping the tough questions typically asked by legacy media journalists.

Social media is not bad per se. Yet McLuhan’s insight reminds us that to understand its impact, we must first understand the nature of the medium. Only then can we begin to use it with greater caution and prudence --for the greater good.