Social Media Stereotypes

Public opinion and social attitudes are defined as the expression of beliefs, ideology, and sentiments within a citizenry concerning conduct of human affairs (Freeland, 2015 pg. 562)25. Public opinion and social attitudes can shift the perception of others to start a social revolution, just like what’s taking place with Bernie Sanders’ supporters. Most young voters who share their views on social media reflect on what they learn in their home. A (Jennings et al. 2009)26 study found that children are most likely to adopt parents’ political orientations and opinion when parents have a greater interest in politics. This allows candidates to be aware of what the public thinks of them, especially in households, which becomes visible on social
If a candidate makes a bad joke or a false statement, it can cause them to lose support in a presidential election. In Robert E. Denton, Jr.’s “The 2012 Presidential Campaign,” he discusses candidates’ memes and videos on social media. Denton elaborated on how a candidate’s actions can “go viral,” in minutes and “leave the campaign little control over the message.” For example, Big Bird memes were the highlight of the second 2012 presidential debate when Romney stated: "he would consider cutting federal funding to PBS though he liked Big Bird." After his statement, The Washington Post reported that Twitter users posted 17,000 tweets per minute mentioning Romney’s Big Bird remarks. After the debate, the public viewed Romney as ignorant for not understanding the value of education on public broadcasting
Hillary Clinton’s email scandal did just that and was detrimental to her campaign. Most debated whether Clinton was a corrupt politician or just someone who wanted to separate her professional and private life. Trackur, a social media monitoring platform, reported that Clinton’s email apology increased her negative ratings from 21 to 30 percent based on social media conversations. At the same time, social media flipped the negative news once the State Department released 3,000 pages of Clinton’s hilarious chit-chat emails. Though Clinton did not face charges for using her private email account, most voters viewed the scandal as a waste of