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Read & Annotate Chapter 6 of They Say/I Say: “Skeptics May Object”: Planting a Naysayer in Your Text. Then, copy a paragraph from your free draft in which you present a clear argument. Paste into an ePortfolio Post and practice planting a naysayer (or skeptic) in that paragraph. Then respond to that naysayer within your paragraph utilizing information you gathered from reading the chapter. Post the revised paragraph as “Naysayer Response” to your ePortfolio.

Social media is able to create friendships and acquaintances as we see in Adrian Chen’s “Unfollow” article. We begin to read and learn more about Megan Phelps-Roper, her journey to leave the church and the people she met along the way. This was all possible because of Phelps-Roper’s social media usage on twitter. We see her connection with Adrian Hughes, “Phelps-Roper showed him more concern than many of his real-life friends. ‘I knew there was a genuine connection between us” (Chen 11). Yet is it necessarily true that social media doesnt allow for meaningful connections as we see here? Megan Phelps-Roper wouldn’t exactly be the person I would associate myself with on social media. She in some ways had a fake personality over twitter where she was someone completely different in real life. As soon as we start to see a change in Phelps-Roper’s morals, “She told C.G. that they couldn’t talk anymore. She deleted her words with a friend’s account. C.G. deleted his twitter account” (Chen 15-16). She thought she had a genuine connection with C.G. but it was just one click and that connection was lost. Phelps-Roper never even knew his name until after she had left the church. Some readers may challenge my view by insisting that social media can create many close connections. They were lucky to be able to rekindle that connection in person, as Chen writes, “She and C.G. connected as strongly in person as they had online, and now they live together” (Chen 22). While it is true that social media can form relationships, it does not necessarily allow for these relationships to prosper without the in person connection. In this instance social media provided this connection it never would have grown to this extent without the in-person aspects.

9/15

Through Konnikovas article, the Dunbar number is discussed in correlation to the increasing use of social media. The Dunbar number is a series of numbers that relate the number of people in someone’s life from close family and friends to people you are familiar with. There comes the concern of this number lessening with the unknown effects of overusing social media.

Hi 🙂 I’m Sarah Wilton. I grew up in New Hampshire prior to and plan on permanently moving up to Maine after graduating from UNE with my BSN. I have worked as a group fitness instructor teaching spin, strength and yoga classes as well as a lens care advisor at LensCrafters.

I enjoy spending my time outside exploring new places and traveling. I have been out of the country a couple times and definitely have a list of places I want to visit. My favorite trip so far was in 2019 when my family and I hiked the Inca trail to Machu Picchu in Peru. That was definitely an experience I will never forget. I enjoy hiking and running and just staying active in general. In 2022 I traveled to West Virginia to purchase my first car, a 1993 Honda Del Sol SI. Since then, in my free time I have been working on that, making connections in the car community as well as continuing my photography.

 1) Choose one paragraph from your Konnikova assignment response. Go through the paragraph sentence by sentence with specificity in mind. Revise and rewrite the paragraph to make it more specific, but try not to lengthen the paragraph too much. Think about word choice, clarity, and using your own voice. Post each paragraph (clearly marked “before” and “after”) to your ePortfolio as “Konnikova Revision.” Then, write 1-2 paragraphs detailing the specific improvements you made and why you made them. Did they help? How did your adjustments impact paragraph length? Clarity? Practice uploading as a new Post on your ePortfolio site.

BEFORE

One concern, though, is that some social skills may not develop as effectively when so many interactions exist online. We learn how we are and aren’t supposed to act by observing others and then having opportunities to act out our observations ourselves. We aren’t born with full social awareness, and Dunbar fears that too much virtual interaction may subvert that education. “In the sandpit of life, when somebody kicks sand in your face, you can’t get out of the sandpit. You have to deal with it, learn, compromise,” he said. “On the internet, you can pull the plug and walk away. There’s no forcing mechanism that makes us have to learn.” If you spend most of your time online, you may not get enough in-person group experience to learn how to properly interact on a large scale—a fear that, some early evidence suggests, may be materializing. “It’s quite conceivable that we might end up less social in the future, which would be a disaster because we need to be more social—our world has become so large” Dunbar said. The more our virtual friends replace our face-to-face ones, in fact, the more our Dunbar number may shrink.

AFTER

  From the increasing amount of social media use, there comes the concern that real world social skills may not develop as strongly. This is due to the fact that many interactions have moved online and therefore limit the amount of physical and social interaction someone experiences. I learned how I should present myself and act in social situations, from my past experiences in them. For example, I recently just had to have a meeting with a woman in the student access center who I didn’t know. I was able to have a successful face to face meeting and I knew how to present myself. We all know communication over  social media and even email is far easier than face to face. Dunbar does fear that too much virtual interaction will change the way we interact with others, and believes that he is totally right. People aren’t born with complete social awareness, they need to experience and grow from embarrassment, conflict, and joy that you experience in day to day social interactions. Dunbar mentioned, “In the sandpit of life, when somebody kicks sand in your face, you can’t get out of the sandpit. You have to deal with it, learn, compromise,” he said. “On the internet, you can pull the plug and walk away. There’s no forcing mechanism that makes us have to learn.” It’s quite possible that in the future we, as a population, may become less social. This would be detrimental to society as we need to be more social with the growing world. The more people we are friends with online rather than in person, the more the Dunbar number will decrease.

Why I wrote what I did

I chose this paragraph to rewrite because it was the conclusion of Konnikovas article where the topic, dunbars numbers, and a good amount of personal opinion were all included. I felt that I could relate more to this paragraph and add in my own opinion while having an outline to go by. I decided to keep this paragraph around the same length as the original paragraph. To rewrite this paragraph I decided to go sentence by sentence so I could closely read and rewrite little by little. I wrote what came to me as I reread the original paragraph. As I am writing this response to why I did what I did I see myself going back and revising my altered paragraph. I don’t believe that in my rewrite I changed a whole lot, I did add in first person pronouns. As well as my own opinion and experiences. I tried to add my voice into my rewrite as well.

9/7 homework

My pages are different then in the book

1. Write a brief summary, using your words and direct quotes, of Megan Phelps-Roper

personal transformation, as described in Chen’s piece. Be sure to include 2-3 direct quotes (with proper MLA citations) that illuminate changes Phelps-Roper experienced along the way.

We suddenly see a change in how Megan Phelps-Roper perceives the death of famous actor Brittany Murphy’s death. Chen writes, “The contrast between the grief on twitter and the buoyant mood in the basement unsettled her” (Chen pg 10). Megan enjoyed this actress in the movie ‘Clueless’ which was a new feeling to her. It is hard to dismiss what Phelps-Roper thought, “We weren’t supposed to care about what other people thought about us, but I did” (Chen pg 10). She was beginning to see the flaws to her religion.

 Soon after this, she made a close connection with Graham Hughes, and “showed more concern than many of his real-life friends” just over twitter (Chen pg 11) While reading article I began to see her twitter account becoming less and less offensive as Phelps-Roper began to figure out who she really wanted to be and how she wanted to contribute to the world. It took twitter and seeing how people around the world live, what made them happy, and what made their lives worth living. It is often said that social media is fake, but to Megan Phelps-Roper, these joyful, heavily planned out uploads held a lot of value. She began to see all her followers and the people on twitter as human. When Phelps-Roper has a question about the doctrine she would ask her mother. Phelps-Roper realized, “That was the first time I came to a place where I disagreed … I didn’t accept the answer that they gave me” (Chen 12). She was able to begin to realize that not everything about her religion is true. She enjoyed her conversations with people online and learning about what they cared about. In 2012 Megan Phelps-Roper and her sister Grace left the church. 

2. In your opinion, how did social media embolden Phelps-Roper’s initial message as a spokesperson for Westboro Baptist Church? How did interactions via social media influence her drastic shift in personal belief? Use at least two direct quotes, framed with help from Ch. 3 of They Say/I Say), to support your claims.

Social media allowed Phelps-Roper to see into the lives of others and connect to people outside her church and town. In the beginning her uploads and responses to events were something almost unbelievable. It’s hard to imagine someone saying those kinds of things and having little consequences. She was in fact the voice of the Westboro Baptist Church on twitter. Common sense seems to dictate how I personally use social media but I have come to realize that isn’t the case for everyone. She created another account with fake names out of curiosity to see if Wesboro’s prophecies were true. With the death of Brittany Murphy, Chen writes, “she felt an unexpected pang– not quiet sadness, but something close– over her death (Chen pg 10). I’ve always believed that creating a connection to a person can help change who you are, and that is exactly what happened to Phelps-Roper. She continues on to create a friendship with Graham Hughes and later posts a concerned tweet, “Isn’t this close to you?” after reading about the earthquakes off of Canada’s coast (Chen pg 11).

3. “Anybody’s initial response to being confronted with the sort of stuff Westboro Baptist Church says is to tell them to f*** off,” said blogger David Abitbol (Chen 79). But it was less-aggressive communication styles that “got through” to Phelps-Roper, that in part influenced her to reconsider her belief system. What style(s) of conversation (consider message, tone, perspective) had the most impact on Phelps-Roper? What might her story teach us about confronting hate speech? What about redemption?

What helped spark change with Phelps-Roper was making connections over twitter with people outside her community. She made relationships with people who she was able to talk to and ask questions. More specifically when she was learning about Westboro’s new prophecies about the end world, she needed to understand more about Judaism. Instead of reading a book she bought she asked her acquaintance Abitbol who was more than happy to help. By asking a real life person then a book she was able to get the help to also learn the vocabulary. Over twitter she was almost a different person, “Other twitter users were fascinated by the dissonance between Westboro’s loathsome reputation and the goofy, pop-culture-obsessed millennial who Phelps-Roper seemed to be on twitter” (Chen pg 11). Phelps-Roper was able to be someone else over social media which helped her spark change in her life outside social media. 

4. If you were to meet Phelps-Roper today, what question would you want to ask her, and why?

I think if i were to meet her today I would honestly be conflicted on whether to ask her anything at all. If I were to have to ask only one question I would ask her what she would have done differently. This a very broad question to ask but I am specifically curious on just if she would have handled leaving her church differently if she would have done it sooner. I would ask this because I know change is hard and it’s scary. It’s important to face your fears and do things that scare you, but I am also curious just how she wishes she could have handled that change. I wonder how she would encourage others from her own personal experience, to embrace change and how to adapt to new situations.