Whoever first coined the phrase “double-edged sword” could not have possibly conceived of social media. However, in this day and age, no better example exists.
Social media is a wonderful tool that can be used to connect people in unique and creative ways. Hope can spread rapidly across geographic and ethnic boundaries. The popularity of certain brands can flourish.
At the same time, such avenues can spread hate and vitriol and divisive rhetoric. When misused, social media can be a headache for companies or organizations whose representatives abuse it or whose most negative qualities are spotlighted.
In many ways, social media sites can create small-scale celebrity status for those outside the public sphere. For those inside that sphere, the responsibilities are enormous in terms of branding and fostering a certain image.
Young people are drawn to this type of access—the kind of access that allows a person still maturing into the world to have a dangerous amount of reach (or at least the perception of it). There is empowerment in posting on social sites that allow people all over the world to view and share all kinds of content.
For college football coaches, managing this dilemma can be a nightmare. Charlie Strong found out the hard way at Texas, as his 2-4 football team has been the most glaring example of what not to do on Twitter.
First, there was the halftime retweet by a Longhorn player of a tweet from a Texas A&M fan suggesting he transfer during a 50-7 loss to TCU. Later that week, a contentious back-and-forth ensued between players over things like effort level and accountability.
The same thing happened down the road in Columbia. A series of tweets by a freshman player about the mistake he made attending South Carolina set off a firestorm, then effort level and commitment once again became a subject of banter between teammates.
Both Texas and South Carolina saw the walls break down from the inside. They saw what happens when opinions are shared via a medium where the only perspective that matters is that of the reader, where tone is hard to pin down.
That brings us to Clemson.
Dabo Swinney’s social media ban—first instituted by players several years back—has come under scrutiny this year. Reactions have run the gamut, from the free speech crowd arguing for the unbridled use of media by college students to the control-the-message folks who believe a keyboard in the hands of a young person is a weapon of destruction.
While the Tigers have stayed silent—the players, at least—the opposition has not. Twitter provided motivation for Clemson’s defense when Notre Dame’s Will Fuller proclaimed the meeting between the teams would be “#savage”, probably in a rather good-natured way.
No one asked for his perspective, and no one cared. The bulletin board was full.
With the message controlled, Clemson’s athletic communications department is able to have virtually unhindered access to social media to help build and share the brand of the program. Vines of coaches dancing in the locker room, highlights, graphics, memes—all of it exists elsewhere, but not quite like it does at Clemson.
It probably exists at South Carolina and Texas, at least in some small way. No one is talking about that, though, because of the negative stories generated by emotional players firing off characters left and right, failing to use sound judgment before pressing “send”.
Frequent users of Twitter have no doubt experienced the double-edged sword. Even this week, I have seen both extremes in my personal interactions with people. I sincerely desire to have the good without the bad, knowing full well I cannot.
Rarely do we notice the absence of something, so the absence of anything controversial at Clemson on social media likely won’t make headlines. Being the top-ranked SM school in the country by SB Nation will, which is just how the Clemson brass envisioned it.
After drama kings and queens grabbed those headlines during the first half of this season, it seems pretty clear a social media ban wasn’t the worst thing in the world after all.
God Bless!
WQ