Social networking is used as a reference point in the movie Avatar directed by James Cameron for this system of energy running through the forest in which most of the movie is based. This system can be accessed by the Na’vi people through a biological connection. Through this connection, the Na’vi people can upload and download information, as Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) explains it, just like we can upload and download information to our Internet. The Na’vi’s connection is neural and seen as a positive force as it helps them to become “at one” with their natural world. Social networking, in allowing us to communicate and research to great extents, is also seen as a positive force, though it is in no way a natural thing. And unlike the Na’vi’s, our connection has a much darker and eviler side. This other side has one general evildoer and it is those who choose to abuse their newfound position in this brand new world.

Humans, I believe, have this desire to feel like they are wanted, needed, or loved. When this desire is fulfilled, they feel a sense of satisfaction and become more positive and optimistic. Also, we are a curious species. We want to learn, to grow, to expand our intellectual territories. Social networking opens up all these new roads for communication and research. All of a sudden, we have “friends”, people are talking about what we did the other night, all of the answers lay at our fingertips, quick fixes to all our problems just around the corner. It’s an amazing brand new world.

Then there are those darker roads, those alleys that few dared to travel, those few achieve a strange sense of enlightenment; those few who want to be loved but go about it in all the wrong ways, who hurt others to fill up the gaping hole within them that thirst for the pain and respect of others, those who twist their beautiful new power and corrupt it even in the smallest of ways. They see this brand new world in a different way: all of a sudden, they have “friends” who they can cling to and turn against, people talking about them and what they did last night to this person and that, all of the answers to their twisted questions at their fingertips, quick fixes to their problems just around the corner. It’s a frightening brand new world.

Why is there this darker side? Why is there an off switch to every on switch? There is a balance that must be kept between everything. All of those people who populate that darkness, it’s not that they’re not intelligent or anything, it’s that they’re the yin to our yang. The balance is kept. Thanks to the social network, we have become our own heroes. Thanks to the social network, we have become our own predators.