Andrew Selepak authors op-ed on how doomscrolling can affect voter response during elections

Andrew Selepak, University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications Media Production, Management, and Technology associate instructional professor, Is the author of “Doomscrolling to the Ballot Box and Only Getting Empty Promises” published on thefulcrum.us on April 21.

Selepak comments on doomscrolling, the virtual consumption of negative social media and news content, and its possible impact on voters’ responses to the upcoming election cycle.

“When we see these potential threats, we keep scrolling to learn more about them; it is part of our natural fight nor flight response to threats, evolutionarily ingrained in us as a form of self-protection and survival,” writes Selepak. “For politicians, our doomscrolling provides a different but related opportunity. Politicians take advantage of our fears and anxieties by offering themselves as the remedies to all the threats in the world. They tell voters that they alone can prevent the danger and that we neither need to fight or flee; instead, we only have to vote for them.”

He adds, “The standard advice to ‘put down the phone’ is no longer enough. We need a strategic refusal to quit treating the ballot box like an anxiety-release valve. To break the cycle, we need to apply a ‘scroll-check’ to every candidate. We need to ask ourselves: “If the digital threat this candidate is shouting about disappeared tomorrow, what would be left of their vision?’ If the answer is an empty room, they aren’t a leader; they are a symptom of the news feed.”

Category: Alumni News, College News
Tagged: Andrew Selepak Doomscrolling MPMT
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