Attacks on social media unwarranted

Like many modern innovations, social media has made life a bit easier for people around the globe.

We all can connect with loved ones and the wider world at a fraction of the cost of what it would have been in the absence of these wonder tools.

Celebrities use them to connect with their fans, governments use them to communicate with people, businesspeople utilise them to sell their products, and so on.

However, the use of social media in SA is increasingly becoming a heartless platform where people get attacked for no reason.

Some users on Twitter, especially, are uncaring people who stop at nothing to fuel hate or start a fight. They never pause to ask if they have their facts right before attacking a person.

Cyberbullying has also become the order of the day.

The latest victim of this is actress Sophie Ndaba, who was insulted on Twitter over her remarkable weight loss after posting pictures of herself on social media.

Some louts started by asking what happened to her, if she is sick and why she is not taking the ARVs.

Ndaba had to issue a public statement on Instagram to disclose that her weight loss was by choice – she had chosen a healthier diet because she is diabetic.

She owes no one an explanation but the pressure was so much that she had to explain herself.

There are many others that get attacked all the time. They include celebrities such as Bonang Matheba, Basetsana Kumalo and ThickLeeyonce – who was also bodyshamed. Matheba got attacked for not speaking English properly on her reality show.

Kumalo likes posting photos of her beautiful self and haters will talk about how she is too old for one pose or the other.

ThickLeeyonce has been called a buffalo because she is a plus-size woman who has walked down the Woolworths runway modelling underwear.

All these are some of the many examples of how social media users are not about celebrating each other but finding a way to bring people down.

We need to use social media for positive influence and not as a tool that will make people fear being active on it. We are fully behind the likes of Ndaba and we hope she will overcome her illness.