The Social Network Film
- Identify a character in the film that presented both their public and private self
In the film The Social Network, Mark Zuckerberg presented his public and private self. Zuckerberg is socially clumsy. He does not have the social skills to connect to anyone. The film portrays Zuckerberg as a person who does not care for anyone other than himself. One trait that could define his character in the film is egocentric (Brown, 2013). He is so egocentric to the point that he is only concerned with issues surrounding his personal affairs and interests and how always to be a step ahead of his peers. In his private life, Zuckerberg is not socially interactive. Consequently, he does not build string friendship relations with his peers. Nevertheless, public Zuckerberg is a different person altogether. He shows himself to be a concerned person with how the rest of the world communicates, and facilitate their friendship. In this regard, Zuckerberg wants to create a social network platform for purposes of global creation of friendship, a platform which would be the biggest social networking site.
The behaviors of Zuckerberg as depicted in the film are contradicting. He has a dual personality as seen in the film. He gives a different public image to his true self. Before the public, Zuckerberg wants to be famous, and he wants people to think that he cares for their social well-being (Merchant, 2012). The public image of Zuckerberg is not only limited to his anticipation of the social impacts but also at Harvard University. The inner self of Zuckerberg is so different from what he portrays before the public eye.
- Identify a scene in the film that offered an excellent example of perception and emotion
A good example of perception and emotion in the film is found in the scene where Eduardo Saverin finds out that his name has been deliberately omitted from the co-founders of Facebook. Eduardo goes to Mark’s headquarters on finding this shocking fact and finds all the shares of others are still intact except his shares. His shares were massively reduced from 34 to a negligible 0.3 percent invoking his emotions. The film gives a scenario where he storms Mark’s office and snatches his laptop before starting to scream. At this point, emotions of anger and disbelief are portrayed in Eduardo. Later into this scene, Eduardo again undergoes emotions of denial, hopelessness, and disbelief. His voice begins to change as if he is about to break down into tears. This scene reflects the emotion of breakdown and emotional hurt. Eduardo quickly regains his voice before starting to scream again. He threatens to sue his company for the omission of the efforts he made in creating the social network in the final list of the creators of Facebook.
- Identify a scene in the film where the language was key to your understanding of the situation.
Language plays a crucial role in understanding the situation at the scene where Erica Albright breaks up with Zuckerberg. This scene takes place in a bar where both Zuckerberg and Erica are having a normal conversation. However, Zuckerberg keeps nagging about why he wants to get to the university league. He says that Erica should be supportive because if he gets into a good university, Erica would get to know new people she would have not known, or met by herself. Erica is offended and thinks that Mark is an egocentric man who only thinks of himself to a better person than anyone else. She tells Mark that they no longer dating. Mark is shocked but still condescends on her by telling her that she does not need to study since she goes into a type of university where you can excel without studying much.
Zuckerberg accuses Erica of sleeping with Bobby the guard boy so that he would let them in the bar. The language used by Zuckerberg in this scene helped in understanding the type of relationship between the two. Emotions usually accompany breakups in relationships. These can be reflected in cries, disappointment, and force. Nevertheless, in this scene, such feelings were lacking, and it would be difficult to understand the situation if it were not for the type of language used.
- Identify a character in the film that effectively used nonverbal communication.
Zuckerberg is seemingly the dominant character who uses nonverbal cues depending on his character and behaviors. In the final scene, the searcher for Erica on Facebook and finds her profile. He contemplates adding her for a second before sending her friend request. He begins to refresh his Facebook page numerous times for the feedback. His emotions and perceptions can be perceived via nonverbal communications. His face shows mixed expressions of anxiety and anticipation.
- Identify a scene in the film that negatively portrayed gender or cultural (or both!) in relationships.
The negative portrayal of culture and gender in the film is portrayed in the scene where a group of boys and girls are seated hacking. Every time they try to unlock the code, the hack becomes successful. They become happy and drink some shots of alcohol. In many cultures, they breach some of the social norms in relationships. Hacking into someone’s data is socially wrong. It is thus not culturally accepted to be doing certain things illegally. Many relationships suffer such consequences. In this scene, hacking is a significant achievement for boys and girls.
- Identify a scene in the film that positively portrayed conflict management.
Conflict management is very vital for a group of business merchants whose ideas contributed to the development of a robust business franchise. The film about the social Network portrays many scenes where conflicts erupt. However, in some scenes, there are effective conflict management methods. The scene where Eduardo finds out that his name is missing from the co-founders of Facebook is the scene with effective conflict management. Eduardo storms Mark’s workplace and many anticipate war. Marks behaves stubbornly and fuels Eduardo’s anger.
Nevertheless, Eduardo did not physically harm mark or destroy his property. Eduardo used a positive way of conflict resolution. He involved the jury and the court in the case. He sought justice first. Eduardo observed patience and did not take the law into his own hands. The court and the legal processes were taking too long to resolve the issue. Despite this, Eduardo still went for all the hearings with patience.
- What lessons, if any, did each of the characters learn? What lessons in life do you think teach people to be more accepting of others differences?
In the film, Mark has been a stubborn and selfish character. His desires were too personal to him, and he would want to achieve them at the expense of people’s efforts. He is sarcastic and arrogant. Zuckerberg ultimately loses the case against the Winklevoss’ twins and Eduardo. He learns that patience and humanity pays. On the other hand, Eduardo learns a lesson that patience pays. Due to his patience, he was served justice by the court by winning the case against Zuckerberg.
The lesson learned by Zuckerberg teaches people to be more accepting to others and especially your peers. It is morally wrong always to think that people should do things the way we do. From the onset of creation, every human being was unique. This implies that at no point human beings will be the same. Therefore, it essential to accept the divergent opinions of the people who surround us. By not accepting other people’s opinion, humans tend to brew hatred which will only require good conflict management strategies to avoid fatalities (Brown, 2013).
Any person who has the personality of devaluing others usually cannot develop a true friendship. Their relationships are also at stake. People may be nice to such people to avoid any harm. Accepting challenges from people only makes us stronger in thinking and in developing concrete ideas that foster innovative minds. Success should also be celebrated by those who took part in developing it. This is one way of accepting efforts from individuals and eventually earns human beings respect.
Reaction
The film Social Network presents various scenes that teach the importance of social integration. Social integration means accepting the views of others in society, from their perspective, and finally respecting their opinions. We should never think we are always right and our ideas are still correct. We must, therefore, accept challenges in entirety. If we have to challenge the new ideas, we should do so in a way that is not provocative or demeaning.
References
Brown, W. (2013). Becoming Cinema: The Social Network, Exploitation in the Digital Age, and the Film Industry. In Work in Cinema (pp. 49-67). Palgrave Macmillan, New York.
Merchant, G. (2012). Unravelling the social network: theory and research. Learning, media and Technology, 37(1), 4-19.