Human rights are not self-evident. They were not discovered until the 18th century when the idea of an individual being a separate entity from the collective society began to form. According to Lynn Hunt, after the Enlightenment period in Europe, people’s perception of individualism expanded consequently from the evolution of culture, specifically where the arts are concerned. Since art is an expression of emotions, they were able to push standard culture into learning empathetic. From novels giving insight to other people’s lives, specifically lower-class, to portraits becoming centered on everyday people and not solely the aristocracy, society learned to be empathetic, discovering that every human despite differences is at the core similar. We all feel the same emotions and physical sensations. Once empathy became more prevalent growing with the idea of the individuals distinct from society, torture and inflicting pain seemed less for the greater good and more as excessive punishment. Thus, due to the shift of societal views empathy was born forming a foundation for human rights; consequently, laws were placed to protect individuals and what society viewed as their self-evident rights.
If artistic expression during the 18th century had the ability to expand human nature, creating a more humanistic trait, empathy; then, the new artistic platform of Snapchat (a smartphone application) has the same potential now. Snapchat allows the immediate sharing of one’s daily life experience with others despite geographical and cultural limitations, for users send pictures or videos (1-10 seconds for either option) to other users in a matter of seconds from anywhere in the world. This arises a new psychological structure: global empathy. People are connecting around the world through a personal medium, learning this new paradigm. Snapchat teaches users how to empathize across locations and cultures, expanding the reach of empathy globally. Before Snapchat, it was easier for people to believe in stereotypes; however, with this new technology and the increasing usage of technology, barriers between humans are being destroyed by shedding light on unique and common aspects of individuals around the world. People located on one side of the planet can see the daily life of people on the other side of the planet and realize, like those reading the novels, that people different from those in one’s comfort zone are still at their core human, same. Snapchat provides indirect communication, direct communication, bitmojis, and facial filters to aid in the learning of global empathy.
Indirect communication provides insight to the lives of strangers or friends no matter where they live in our world since snapchat offers a unique feature called a “story.” A story is a collection of pictures and videos a user posts for all of their friends to see, or the story can be a collection of pictures and videos organized by Snapchat itself. The private stories accessed only by a user’s friends provides understanding into a person’s life, for these stories show the daily life and rituals of a person to their friends, giving insight into the person’s personality without the friends needing to personally know or directly communicate with them. For example, after adding friends from an academic program I participated in, I began to watch other’s daily life across the United States, giving me the ability to understand the life of people in different subcultures than mine. People can gain friends on Snapchat through other social media, like Facebook or Instagram, or by being a part of regional, global, or local organizations. The public version is composed through themed stories about specific celebrations, regional or local, for any user to watch similar to the private stories. As well, depending on each user’s location, any user can contribute to the themed stories if they are in the area of celebration. Sometimes, I watch students at my university post about daily doings on campus, and during Christmas season, I watch people around the world celebrating Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and other global holidays. Snapchat really personalizes social media by allowing people from any location to connect to other people from any other location with the sharing of daily and personal activities.
The public stories act as the private ones, but allows room for further expansion of location, thus empathy. The company’s stories display people’s own photos and videos, depending on their location or the story’s purpose (the event or celebration), for every Snapchat user to view. This artistic expression fights to break down geographical barriers holding back the power of human empathy since anyone can to add to a public story for all to watch. The stories can be located in specific areas or in multiple places, both of which bring together numerous people from across the globe. This form of indirect communication connects people together without them needing to form a conversation, invest in a relationship, or be from the same place building our empathy to be more global. While watching a global story with people across countries celebrating Ramadan, I was able to see how spread out the Muslim community is and how much they were similar to my Christian family. I learned that day how important Islam is as a religion and now meet people who are Muslim with more empathy and understanding, without personally meeting someone who practices the religion, which was hard for me to do living in Louisiana.
Direct communication lets two or more users send pictures, videos or instant messages to each other similar to text messaging. The pictures and videos visually show what a user is accomplishing throughout the day with the lens being at level with the user’s eyes. So, a personal atmosphere is created due to the connections being genuine and, in a sense, from the user’s own perspective. Unlike regular social media where the videos and pictures shared appear more professional and put together, Snapchat’s media is a more realistic representation of people’s genuine lives. This insight allows the followers of the user to connect to the user over simple, essentially human similarities. After adding friends from my academic program, I now connect with people across the country. I’ve bonded with people whom I have never met in person over simple daily struggles like making the perfect winged eyeliner to discussing our country’s social and political issues. Everyone has their own unique identity; I’ve seen how alike I am to people with identities I never knew existed or groups I held prejudices towards, pushing me to empathize with them and further understand them as fellow human beings.
The instant messaging feature allows followers to comment directly on other user’s pictures and videos they follow, enhancing the personal connections. This direct commenting connects the users together in that moment since one user is directly commenting on the event that another user went through; then, users are able to bond together over commonalities instead of focusing on differences. Although this method is limited to users who are friends, users can meet online, at events, or anywhere globally and quickly add each other by exchanging usernames, similar to me connecting with students across the country participating in the same academic group. I’ve been able to really befriend many of these people over experiences we share by commenting on their stories. For example, once my friend in Florida posted about their devastation of Trump winning the presidency, and I messaged them directly from the picture they posted with consolidating words. We then discussed our emotional distress over the issue allowing us to connect from miles away through a topic personal to us both. Even though I am not familiar with Florida or its people, I was able to connect with someone over an issue pertinent to our entire country. The direct communication feature on Snapchat provides an easy method for two users to connect through realistic representation of individual lives. Connecting through this medium can really teach humans to expand their empathy to become more global similar to my empathy expanding towards people across the country without the necessity to meet them in person.
The bitmojis enhance the personal connections developed between users during the direct and indirect communication. Bitmojis are virtual avatars that users create to look like themselves and can post onto their media, and these avatars act as full body emojis presenting the user’s emotions in any way they choose. The bitmojis are offered in numerous emotional states and each state has its own variations of the emotions depicted. Since the bitmojis express the emotions of users, people can understand each other from anywhere in the world by sharing the same emotional bitmoji state towards a specific subject. The bitmojis give users a personal witnessing of people across the world reacting with the similar emotions represent as a human, which can reaffirm empathy growing to a global scale. For example, while watching a public story celebrating “Pie Day” (March 14 – 3/14), I witnessed people in from China to the United Kingdom to South Africa posting stories about the holiday with the holiday themed bitmoji. I felt more connected to these people globally over a holiday I enjoy celebrating myself due to my love for Albert Einstein. When a user sees other people first hand who are different yet so similar from using the same international holiday bitmoji, the idea that people from different places in the world are foreign to one’s self begins to be questioned and eventually thrown out. Instead the idea that we are all human despite our geographical and cultural origin takes over, a more globalized empathy.
The facial filters are like the bitmojis but in a slightly different way. Through the direct and indirect communication between users, facial filters are “worn” during pictures or videos presenting the user’s facial expression. These filters are able to recognize facial features and add objects onto the face. For example, a dog’s ear and mouth can appear on the face or the addition of a flower crown on top of your head or morph your head into different shapes like a fun mirror. Some filters even include voice changing options or additional features depending on if you raise your eyebrows or open your mouth. Bitmojis present virtual emotions; whereas, the facial filters force the user to display their facial expression. Since this option on Snapchat is popular, every user is able to enjoy sharing their faces with added features. This displays the similarity of humans across the globe, for people around the world are viewed on Snapchat’s stories with facial filters. These filters are used by everyone, providing a connection based on the human face, a very personal feature. Like the bitmojis, I watch people across my country and the globe wear these filters in public and private stories. However, the facial filters increase the amount of faces shown in the pictures and videos posted to the stories. During St. Patrick’s Day, I saw faces of people across my country to Ireland to the United Kingdom using the holiday’s facial filter. This personal, facial connection really aids in global empathy from its ability to show people across geographical and cultural boundaries their human essence of emotion towards the same ideas. The people’s stories I watched showed me how alike humans are at the core from how much happiness the holidays can bring to anyone around the world, and I saw this happiness and related to these people since I saw their facial expressions of emotions. Almost any day I can watch Snapchat stories and see people in countries around the world using the same filters as me during similar activities. I am able to form a connection with these users without knowing their names and learn how expansive empathy can be. The facial filters really aid in personalizing the connections through Snapchat and building upon the foundations of connection that the indirect and direct communication already form.
A hopeful new era of connecting with people across the world has come upon us with technology. The Internet is the quickest way to contact someone besides text messaging or phone calls, and social media combines all of the fastest ways for us to contact one another. Snapchat specifically connects people on a very real, personal level with an easy way to make acquaintances with people of all backgrounds and areas. Even further, Snapchat forces personal and emotional connections to full foster a new perspective to another culture.