Allkpop.com is a news site dedicated to all things related to Korean pop music, or K-Pop, and I’ll admit that it is a guilty pleasure of mine to surf that website whenever I have a minute or two of down time. I call it a “guilty pleasure” because it can barely be considered a news source with the kind of unprofessional reporting that make up most articles. The writing oftentimes doesn’t even make sense and lacks professional standards or editing, and the bias is thick (think DailyMail). But it gets me my K-Pop news and does so quickly, and it covers interesting topics compared to other K-Pop news sources.

One feature Allkpop is rather known for are its lively comment sections, which tend to be filled with rabid fangirls and random Internet trolls, but which can occasionally hold some interesting discussion about controversies in K-Pop news.

An example of one of these comment sections can be found here. This is the comment section of an article about boy group BTS and their view toward a common explanation of their success, which has continuously grown since their debut in 2013, but recently exploded exponentially. Because BTS’s level of success is unprecedented in K-Pop, many have tried to pinpoint exactly what the key was to their international stardom.

The comment section of the article is full of readers debating the true reason for BTS’s success and whether their rise was due mostly to social media or whether it only played a small part. There are many debates that quickly devolved into petty personal attacks and name-calling, but here’s an example of a discussion with substance:

I think this particular exchange comes pretty close to deliberation. One commenter relayed his or her viewpoints, and another read them and took the time to come up with a response to the first person to enhance the other’s argument while sharing new thoughts, resulting in a civil discussion about BTS’s merits and success without either side seeking to “win” the conversation or bring the other side down.

Furthermore, it enhanced my own perspective on the subject by causing me to think about it from new viewpoints that they brought up. Both sides clearly showed a degree of respect for the other’s views while also bringing up points of contention. Their arguments were based mostly on personal experience and observation, however, so both sides’ arguments could have been enhanced with some solid evidence as support (in fact, Rose_Blue’s second comment says that girl groups are more popular than boy groups in Korea, which is blatantly incorrect based on overall sales in all aspects).

This exchange goes to show that even in a largely spiteful comment section such as the one under this Allkpop article, there are still pockets of interesting ideas and almost-deliberation from which readers can glean new understandings and a broadened view of the subject.

William Clifford’s essay “Ethics of Belief” is a piece of writing I wish everyone could read and understand. I wish this because its content is precisely what I think so many people, especially my contemporaries, either fail to practice or think of at all, but is basic to our functioning in a society. I believe there is a growing amount of people with “credulous character,” who subscribe to an unsound method of belief formation that brings down the character of humanity as a whole with each insufficiently evidenced belief. (By my own observations, the increase in “credulous” mindsets is largely due to the increase in availability of a vast wealth of information thanks to the prevalence of the Internet.)

While I don’t think Clifford’s intention was to persuade, his essay helped me understand why I feel off when certain logical inconsistencies in belief formation are brought to my attention, which in itself persuaded me of Clifford’s credibility and depth of thought. Clifford’s clear analysis of the basis of belief formation, inference, and the dangers of improper belief formation gave form to thoughts that I had had, but was unable to describe well, and also brought to my attention novel thoughts that I had not considered before.

I agree with Clifford that we are morally obligated to support our beliefs with evidence, that insufficiently corroborated beliefs are detrimental to human society as a whole. However, I think that using the argument that “people should care about forming beliefs legitimately for the sake of the betterment of society” or conversely, “people should care about forming beliefs legitimately because unsound belief formation is immoral” is one that is too idealistic, too high an aspiration for many modern day people.

Rhetorically speaking, why should anyone care about the betterment of society anyway, especially when unsound belief formation can lead to his or her own benefit? Maybe in Clifford’s time, a day and age when perhaps more emphasis was placed on righteous character than now, encouraging people to make sound beliefs for the sake of society was a more plausible notion.

Evidence is essential in the formation of a belief. The role of evidence is to validate beliefs and give credibility to the belief’s holder. Imagine a world in which credibility is nonexistent–people would be forced to be suspicious of one another, not knowing what’s true and what’s false. Society would be unable to exist because man would be turned against one another, each looking out only for their own interest. In such a world, one without cooperation, humans would, in Clifford’s words, return to “savagery.” This is why it is immoral to form beliefs without sufficient evidence: a belief formed on no basis but a whim is detrimental to the character of society, and so is immoral by definition.

I remember the first time I learned about the existence of an emoji keyboard. After I got my first handheld smart-device, the iPod Touch, in 2013 and first began texting, I realized that emojis could be used to liven up a boring text and also add some depth and nuances to my words.

Since then, emojis have become more and more commonplace in digital communication, a trend reflected by the large increase in the number, variety, and quality of Apple’s emojis over the years. Emojis gave texts a new dimension: graphics. In a world where texting is quickly becoming the preferred and convenient form of communication, emojis allow users to quickly express a feeling or idea that would take much longer to express in words, which could be interpreted differently by different people.

What I came to notice, however, was that certain emojis were not used the same way by me and my peers, American teenagers, as how they were intended to by their adult Japanese creators. For example, the smiling emoji with its tongue sticking out meant a teasing or playful expression to us but was originally intended to be an expression of hunger. This observation of the disparity of emoji meaning across different cultures led me to think about whether emojis were truly conducive to nuanced expression.

The thing is, no matter how many emojis are created, there will never be enough emojis to encompass the entire spectrum of human emotion. We make do with the emojis we have, oftentimes using an emoji that doesn’t quite represent what we’re feeling but is the closest compared to the others. In this way, emojis may be limiting expression in digital communication: we oversimplify what we are feeling and limit ourselves to expressing only the emotions that the emoji keyboard has options for.

On the flip side, emojis encompass the main range of emotions that people feel on a regular basis. It can be argued that more complicated emotions should be typed out in detail or just conveyed in person anyway. Emojis weren’t meant to represent complicated emotions in the first place — they are just a convenient way to express an emotion without having to go through the trouble of looking for the right words. A graphic is so much more telling and faster to pull up as well. In that way, they do their job, and they do it well. It may be our own fault for trying to use overextend the use of emojis in digital communication.

So have emojis given digital communication depth or hindered self-expression? Overall, I think that while emojis are limiting in some ways, in general people overuse them and stretch their purpose. Used within their intended range, emojis can enhance digital communication in a world where texting is more and more common.

Digital storyteller Roman Mars presented a TED Talk titled “Why City Flags May Be the Worst-Designed Thing You’ve Never Noticed” in 2015.

The topic of flag design, also known as vexillology, may seem like a niche or irrelevant topic to some, but Mars’ TED Talk makes a strong case that vexillology is in fact a great starting point for understanding the principles of design and developing appreciation for design in all aspects of life. I left with a new understanding of design and its importance in everyday life: how to goal of design is to make life better and bring joy, and how paying attention to design can allow us to appreciate the “bits of genius” in the world that nameless designers have created for our lives to be a little better. I also learned the five main principles of flag design, and how they can be used to understand the design of almost anything: 1) keep it simple, 2) use meaningful symbolism 3) use two to three basic colors, 4) no lettering or seals, and 5) be distinctive (or be related).

Beyond the ideas presented, the style and clarity of Mars’ speech effectively achieved his purpose of informing his audience of what design is all about as well as bringing our attention to what constitutes good and bad design.

Mars’ style was conversational: he incorporated personal anecdotes and questions the audience might have to get the audience to relate on a personal level. He also incorporated humor into the talk, though not in a gaudy way like through jokes or slapstick humor, but more of a subtle wittiness that enhanced the talk and held his audience’s attention. Despite being conversational, Mars remained professional and was clearly well-informed about the topic of vexillology, citing sources of his information in the talk and other expert vexillologists.

One thing I will mention about his presentation style was that in the beginning Mars explained that he would essentially deconstruct an episode from his radio show, playing bits and portions from it by pressing a button. Because he chose this format of presentation, he had to sit at a table that held a lot of technology related to radioing, which may have taken away from the level of engagement the live audience felt during his presentation. Also, he included some random sounds and music from his radio show, which I felt detracted from his delivery because they did not seem to have much purpose and were at times distracting, though I think if I watched his talk again but looked at it as if he were reenacting a radio show the sounds would have made more sense.

Rather than show the difference between a speech and a presentation, Mars’ talk showed how the two could be melded into an ambiguous form of both. While he spoke for the majority of the time, he often played recordings of others speaking and his talk relied heavily on visual aids, which would lead me to label it more as a presentation than a traditional speech.

As an American teenager who has experienced many of the same stressors and resulting thoughts and feelings as some of the teens mentioned in this New York Times article, I feel that I am qualified to give my opinion about this article and its analysis of some of the effects of social media without being seen as a distant outsider looking down on the lives of modern teenagers.

There is so much about this article that I’d like to address, but I will only deliver the pork and beans on a single topic: why we need to be listening when people say social media may not be good for us.

Fellow teens, let me be frank: social media and the Internet are large contributors to mental health illness. And also to narcissism, plagiarism and reinforcing bias.

I know you don’t want to admit that something that you do every day might not have healthy side-effects, but we need to stop confusing people telling us the truth with being personally attacked. And in general, we need to stop using others’ words to define our identities.

A lot of you who read the article will probably dismiss it as the trite rant of a middle-aged adult who doesn’t understand a thing about teenagers or social media. But just because they aren’t us doesn’t mean they can’t make observations about what is happening to us. In fact, they may be the ones most qualified to do so since they can observe from a third-person perspective, they have more life experience and also, they care about our well-being. It’s not like they just made this stuff up for the sake of making us feel worse about ourselves, and it’s definitely not their intention to say that we’re stupid or silly for using social media.

This whole adolescent mental health crisis affects them too as parents, guardians and teachers and they want to find out why it might be happening. Countless studies have pointed to social media as a contributor and chances are, if you’re really being honest with yourself, you’ve fallen prey to the allure of the “like” or “fave” or “retweet” as well.

I’ll be the first to admit that yeah, I always look at the amount of likes my tweet got or the amount of views my story got. I get a burst of happiness when that number is high and I’ve removed Snaps from my story when that number wasn’t. When I’m posting I’m thinking about what others might be amused by and not accurately portraying the ups and downs of my life. And I know I’m not the only one. In fact, I don’t even have it that bad compared to the majority of the people I knew in high school.

Addiction to social media is a serious problem that is all too real. It is contributing to the suffering of tens of thousands of young people nationwide and the growing mental illness epidemic. However, we can’t start fixing the problem if we won’t even acknowledge that it exists. So for our own sakes, let’s just be real and admit that yes, these old people have a semblance of truth in their words in that social media is fostering unhealthy mentalities and behaviors.

Since August 4, 1958, the Billboard Hot 100 has released a ranked list of the 100 most popular singles every week in the United States. Today, it is regarded as the “music industry standard record chart in the United States for singles” (Wikipedia). So it’s safe to say that if a song is number one on the Billboard Hot 100, it is rather well-known among the general popular-music crowd, which typically consists of younger people in their teens to late twenties. The fads and trends among this age group define the current popular culture — the clothes, political movements, social outlooks, and more define a rising generation’s ideals.

Popular music is one of the most telling aspects of a young generation’s culture. Since the advent of commercialized music, trends in popular music have evolved to reflect trends in a young generation’s culture.

What I have come to notice by observing these trends in pop music is that from the start of the 21st century, pop music has become increasingly vulgar. What do I mean by “vulgar”? I mean that more expletives and inappropriate language are used and there is an increase in the glorification of illegal or immoral things like drugs, sex, and violence. From 2000, more and more number ones on the Billboard Hot 100 feature such topics, indicating the greater prevalence of such amorality in pop culture.

What I would like to analyze is this paradigm shift in the increasing vulgarity of pop music that began roughly with the start of the new millennium and continues into modern day.

To give an example, let’s take a look at the current “most popular song” according to Billboard this week, the week of October 15, 2017. The current number one hit is “Rockstar,” by Post Malone. The lyrics of the song mention sexual promiscuity, drug use, gun violence, drinking, vandalism, drug dealing, money and defiance of authority, among other vices. The number 2 hit, “Bodak Yellow,” is equally, if not more, profane. The number one hit song for every week of October in 2007 was “Crank That (Soulja Boy)” by Soulja Boy. The lyrics of “Crank That (Soulja Boy)” describe a dance that became popular due to the release of the “Crank That (Soulja Boy)” song. The next number one after that, “Kiss Kiss” by Chris Brown feat. T-Pain is arguably vulgar. However, it does not include any expletives and talks almost exclusively about the appeal of a woman’s body without mentioning nearly as many topics of vice as “Rockstar.”

This trend is not isolated; it can be observed within an individual artist’s repertoire as well. Beyonce’s tracklist of number 1 hits feature a progression towards explicit profanity as well.

So, what significance does this trend have and why should we care? As I wrote before, pop music trends mirror the state of pop culture. Using this line of thought, increasing indecency in pop music corresponds to an increasing indecency in pop culture as well, evidenced in media and the behavior of those who follow pop culture. This trend is only proliferating, which means that the future seems to hold even more vulgarization of music and culture. As members of the generation that creates pop culture ourselves, we should examine the direction in which we are headed and be aware of the possible changes that we face as our culture and values continue to evolve.