D-Day in America 8 November

Which party will win the 2022 U.S. Midterms? Voters will decide what they want, not social media, which tends to behave like a waterfall: one direction. Any election campaign anchored solely on social media is myopic and is bound to crumble, for many reasons.

1. It is fumbling in the dark, because the most vocal commentators are synonymous. They have no pictures on their pages and cannot be classified by race, residence, buying power, age or religion. They have bullet point power, which does not give any substantive reason why they think Party X is vile. They prefer stronger language.

2. Yes, rival political parties are transparent. They post their photos and political stripes, but a campaign anchored in name calling without giving reasons, repels voters. A ruling party must monitor opposition parties, but a strategy solely designed to babysitting them is wading in a swamp.

3. An election campaign anchored on social media is bound to fail because of exclusion. We have a digital dictatorship where renters, voters, vaccination process, everything in life is online. There’s no choice. You must register online, which excludes senior citizens, people with disabilities and people not fluent in English.  Assistants advising political parties do not care about such groups. That’s how there are major upsets in American and Canadian elections.

4. Social media campaigns are stagnant, based on 100 years’ old strategies that are defunct. Voters change, but campaign strategies remain stagnant. Social media is a one size fits all, which doesn’t cater for changing neighborhoods and diversity.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.