The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
4 — Wednesday, January 27, 2021

University
of
Michigan

social
media
experts
are

studying
the
influence
of

social
media
over
politics,

particularly through the rapid
spread of misinformation and
increased
access.
According

to these experts, social media
played a pivotal role in the riot
at the U.S. Capitol last week.

Sarita Schoenebeck, a School

of
Information
associate

professor,
said
former

President
Donald
Trump’s

presidency fueled the sharing
of misinformation on social
media by exploiting algorithms
designed to reward content
that’s popular, even if it’s fake
or wrong.

“Clearly
the
election
of

President
Trump
increased

divisiveness
in
the
U.S.,

and that kind of alignment
increased social media use
and misinformation, so these
things can’t be disentangled,”
Schoenebeck said.

She
said
the
future

impact of large social media
organizations banning Trump’s
accounts is that more sites
might take a second look at
posts and filter out harassment.
Following the Jan. 6 Capitol
riots, multiple social media
platforms — including Twitter,
Instagram
and
Facebook

—
announced
they
were

banning the former president’s
accounts to prevent the further
incitement of violence.

“I think the banning of

President Trump was a reactive

decision, it was too little too
late,” Schoenebeck said. “But,
it was the right decision given
the violence and I think going
forward sites need to consider
people and the content they
share in the broader context.”

Josh Pasek, an associate

professor
of
communication

and media, said social media
provides an opportunity to meet
people with similar ideologies,
resulting in incidences like
joining together to attack the
Capitol building.

“It makes it easier to do good

things, and it makes it easier to
do bad things,” Pasek said. “One
clear role that social media had
(in the riots) was in helping
a group of people that might
not otherwise find each other
easily get more coordinated.”

Because
politicians
and

elected officials have more
prominent
platforms,
Pasek

said
their
endorsement
of

falsehoods
helps
further

spread untrue information on
social media.

“In addition, you have an

elite situation where a number
of
elites
—
in
particular,

the
president
—
have
not

been
particularly
devoted

to ensuring that the official
information coming out was
accurate,” Pasek said. “So the
willingness of elites at various
different levels to buy into the
big lie that the election was
stolen and that there was fraud
and irregularities gives that
claim more power and makes it
far more pervasive.”

Pasek
also
acknowledged

the effects of the pandemic,
saying it has led to many people

wanting to take action at a time
when they feel out of control
and more dissociated from
society than usual.

LSA
freshman
Anna

Wilentz, an attendee of the
event, said she feels social
media influences young voters’
opinions before they are able
to fully process monumental
political events in the country,
such as the 2020 election and
the Capitol riot.

“Social media has caused

individuals to take their peers’
point of views on political
issues, which prohibits them
from
forming
their
own

educated opinions,” Wilentz
said. “This is one factor that
has led America to become
more polarized, and has led to
Americans speaking freely on
social media and expressing
extreme political beliefs and
attitudes.”

With the constant evolution

of social media, Cliff Lampe,
a
School
of
Information

professor, discussed the major
increase in the number of users
on platforms over the past
years.

“I think the biggest change

over time has been the number
of types of people who have
started using social media,”
Lampe said. “As the population
of use has grown, so has the role
of social media in society. It’s
easy to spread misinformation
on social media because there
are fewer gatekeepers.”

Historically, Lampe said the

general
population
received

their
information
from

established news organizations,

which have strict fact-checking
procedures.
With
the
rise

of social media, Lampe said
the media landscape is less
regulated, which has resulted
in quick and easy access to
spreading false information.

“In
a
traditional
mass

media
environment,
there

would be editors, and there
was 100 years of development
of
professional
journalistic

practices that determined how
you could tell if (information)
was true or not,” Lampe said.
“Social media does not have
the same kind of gatekeepers
and same kind of history that
mass media does, so anybody
can
share
anything.
Social

media also tends to flatten
hierarchies, so there’s no such

thing as expertise anymore.”

To
fight
misinformation

and
harassment
online,

Schoenebeck suggested social
media sites carefully monitor
a user’s collection of posts
instead of evaluating posts
individually.
According
to

Schoenebeck,
they
should

consider the information in
the context of the person’s
past history and the history of
people who are targeted by the
post.

Pasek said he has debated

whether social media is a
completely negative influence
in our society. While it has
caused many problems, he said
he believes it also has many
positive effects.

“What’s become increasingly

clear this year is that we’re
still working on figuring out
the right norms for how to
deal with social media,” Pasek
said. “The way it interacts with
our psychology is something
that makes that a particularly
pressing question, because (we
tend to believe) information is
more credible when you hear
it from friends than when you
hear it from somebody who you
don’t particularly know.”

Looking ahead, Lampe said it

is a vital and monumental time
for social media in our society
because… .

“It’s
an
interesting
time

for social media right now,
especially
as
we
see
the

platforms’ converging power,”
Lampe said.

U-M experts discuss social media’s role in politics, Capitol riot

University of Michigan social media experts are studying the influence of social media over
politics, particularly through the rapid spread of misinformation and increased access

KAITLYN LUCKOFF

Daily Staff Reporter

RESEARCH

U-M study reveals lack of coronavirus
aid for Black-owned businesses

A
national
study
on

coronavirus
aid
for
small

businesses led by University of
Michigan
researchers
found

that Black business owners were
about 30 times less likely to
receive government assistance
than white business owners
since the pandemic began in
March 2020. The study was
led by Felix Kabo, an assistant
research
scientist
at
the

Institute for Social Research’s
Survey Research Center.

In
March
2020,
Congress

passed the $2.2 trillion dollar
coronavirus relief bill (known
as the CARES Act) in an attempt
to help working families, small
businesses, people paying off
loans and a health care system
staggered by COVID-19. The
bill gave over $600 billion to
businesses,
states
and
other

municipalities
without
much

instruction on how to distribute
it, leaving workers unsure of how
to collect unemployment benefits.

The University’s study was

nationally administered from
May through June 2020 and
surveyed approximately 6,300
small
business
owners
and

entrepreneurs from around the
country. The business owners
were asked whether or not they
had received government aid
between March and May 2020.
While 6.9% of the total number
of
entrepreneurs
surveyed

reported receiving federal aid,
only 0.3% of Black entrepreneurs
said they received money from
the government.

The study does not examine

why this disparity between
Black-owned
and
non-Black-

owned
businesses
occurred.

However, in an interview with
The Michigan Daily, Kabo said
he suspected that pre-existing
barriers and unequal access to
credit might contribute to Black
business owners struggling to
receive funding.

“I’ve looked at work that’s

emerged
that’s
showing
a

phenomenon where business
owners and entrepreneurs were
much more likely to receive
stimulus funds when they had
pre-existing relationships with
financial
institutions,”
Kabo

said. “A Black business owner
or entrepreneur is … less likely
to get credit, and if they do, they
are more likely to be charged
higher interest.”

Kabo
said
Black-owned

businesses are often denied
loans because they sometimes
lack
the
financial
and

accounting structures necessary
to receive, process and account
for stimulus funds.

Many
Black
business

owners in Washtenaw County
expressed similar frustrations
with
accessing
financial

relief due to bureaucratic and
systemic obstacles. In the fall, a
group of local business owners
created
the
Association
of

Businesses of Color to provide
aid to businesses run by people
of color.

Melvin Parson, the executive

director of We the People
Opportunity Farm, a nonprofit
farm based in Ypsilanti that
mainly
employs
formerly

incarcerated individuals, said
there are a lot of bureaucratic
obstacles
that
grassroots

organizations and nonprofits
face when trying to receive
grants.

“The more you can cut out

the bureaucracy, the better
off things will be in terms of
money getting to organizations
that have the potential to really
make an impact,” Parson said.
“And (money won’t) just make
it into the hands of the few

organizations that are able to
dot their i’s and cross their t’s.”

Brian
Jones-Chance,

co-founder of the 734 Brewing
Company in Ypsilanti and one
of the founders of the ABC,
said while he applied for and
received Paycheck Protection
Program
loans
as
part
of

the CARES act, he has seen
firsthand how many Black-
owned businesses struggle to
access financial aid. Like Kabo
said, the lack of relationships
between Black business owners
and financial institutions deters
some
businesses
from
even

applying for aid, Jones-Chance
said.

“We are finding that one of

these issues is not having those
banking relationships,” Jones-
Chance said. “You just go and
you deposit your money, you
maybe run your payroll through
there, but there’s no actual
personal relationship.”

Other local Black business

owners said they chose not
to apply for coronavirus aid
because
they
weren’t
sure

exactly what it entailed. Robyn
McCoy, a partner at McCoy
and Associates, a law firm in
downtown
Ann
Arbor
that

specializes in estate and trust
law, chose not to apply for
the PPP because she found it
unclear whether or not the
program functioned as a loan or
a grant.

The PPP provided loans to

small businesses during the
COVID-19 pandemic, though it
was initially unclear whether
it would be classified as a grant
or loan when filing taxes. The
CARES Act, which the PPP is
part of, also includes programs
for small businesses grants,
such as advance payments for
the Economic Injury Disaster
Loan program.

In an email to The Daily,

McCoy
called
for
greater

education on the state, local,
and national levels to increase
transparency in the aid process.



“There
were
concerns

because it was set up as a loan
and I’m not eager to incur any

more
debt,”
McCoy
wrote.

“I wouldn’t rule out possibly
applying for something in the
future, I would just want it to be
clear — that if it’s a grant then it
says it’s a grant.”

Janice Johnson, the owner of

Clothes Mentor Ann Arbor, said
the responsibility of providing
aid to small businesses should
be shared by local, state and
national
governments.
She

said there were local grant
opportunities that could have
prevented her from having to
use personal savings to pay
her bills that were not well
marketed.

“There were other grants

available that I missed out
on that have since expired,”
Johnson said. “So even if Ann
Arbor did handle it directly, how
would they spread the news that
these (grants) were available?”

Kabo
proposed
several

solutions
to
the
disparities

between
white
and
Black

business owners’ access to aid.
He
said
local
governments

in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati
have
begun
initiatives
to

provide critical funding for
debt financing, such as using
government agencies to provide
information
to
businesses

owned by people of color. These
strategies can be adopted in
Ann Arbor and by other local
governments across the country,
Kabo said.

Music, Theatre & Dance

freshman Maya Boyd, whose
father owns Boyd Beauty in
downtown Ann Arbor, said it
was more important to support
local Black-owned businesses
rather
than
large-scale

corporations. She encouraged
U-M
students
to
explore

Black-owned
businesses

outside of campus and around
Ann Arbor.

“I think that students have

a lot of knowledge on how to
spread information and support
people,” Boyd said. “(They can
help) just by going and exploring
other businesses that aren’t the
classic white-owned businesses
and corporations.”

GEORGE WEYKAMP

Daily Staff Reporter

Design by Sam Turner

BUSINESS

Design by Cara Jhang