Understanding Laws and their Relationship to Nursing Practice

The Internet is increasingly growing in the world, and social media should be controlled next year; otherwise, there will be wrongful acts everywhere. Everything has its advantages and disadvantages, and the Internet is no exception. There is a lot that one can get from social media, like marketing strategies and learning online, but there is a dark side. Some people use social media to drive propaganda for their interests; some threaten people, while others insult their enemies just to destroy their image to the public. The public needs to be educated on social media use and the negative impacts one can go through in case there is false information or threats related to an individual. There was a post about a classmate threatening and insulting a lecturer on social media.

When news reaches social media, millions of people see those comments. Threatening a person is also against the law. Freedom of expression and speech is what people use to defend themselves, but it should not be used in the wrong way. Freedom of expression is to be used by pointing out the wrong things in society but doing so in the right manner. Some use this opportunity to gain false publicity by disrespecting other people who are a bit higher in their levels. However, there are certain occasions where people feel bad a particular person maybe because of something awful that somebody did and they decide to put it online. People need to act like adults and take every action carefully; otherwise, jail can be a friend.

Being a friend, one can take immediate action to help a person who posts insults about a lecturer. One of the first actions is to advise the culprit to delete the post as soon as possible from the timeline before it circulates further. It will help because it will not have reached far, hence reducing the impact. Another immediate action is to see if the post has already circulated to many individuals and is being shared. The friend should at least apologize. The apology should also be on social media, where all those people who see the bad comments will see the apology. The second apology will be by calling the lecturer, apologizing and asking for forgiveness, and then reconciling. Those will make the best immediate actions since after the actions; everything will be solved regarding publicity and the partial relationship between the lecturer and the friend (Simon, 2013).

Immediate actions explained above are not enough, there must be subsequent actions too. The friend originally had some good reasons for the post but used the wrong method of solving the problem. There has to be a mediator between the student and the lecturer. One of the best actions is approaching the lecturer as a mediator and trying to solve things by knowing the cause of the dispute between the two parties. After identifying the cause, try to solve the issue while both parties are present, and the student should apologize physically at this point. After the meeting, the parties can agree on whether there are consequences or not. Then, there should be a sitting down with the students and explain all the consequences of his/her actions. There is also the need to explain how one can use social media on the good side instead of wasting all the energy on abusing and threatening others.

Being a friend, one of the best pieces of advice that one can give is on time management. Studying nursing is very important, and fewer people have such opportunities. There is a lot of reading to do to become a certified nurse. There is a lot of research to do, so there is no time to waste. Instead of the student abusing the lecturer, he/she can use that time to read so that he/she can pass the exams and become a real nurse. There are also other things that can be done on social media, such as being involved in nurse groups that share research and work experiences. There is a lot to do in order to brainstorm the mind. Instead of engaging the lecturer in a bad way, why not use his/her page to ask a question or an explanation?

Influence in school within the scholars has a very great impact on the student’s life. A bad company leads to bad decisions and vice versa. The student should leave any company that motivates bad intentions and join student groups that use their time effectively to do something productive. In school, there are also other activities like the Christian unions, music groups, arts, science, and many others. During free time, these groups meet to perform a certain activity. If such a student joins such movements, there would be less or no time for misuse.

Guidance and counseling are movements that are present in almost every institution (Patton, 2013). They are responsible for giving advice to students in their respective schools. It can be a good subsequent action to bring the student to such people. Guidance departments have individuals who are highly trained and can help a person solve matters that are unknown to the world. They practice confidentiality, and anything discussed in that office is never discussed anywhere. The student may have posted such a comment because of pressure or depression from the lecturer or any other cause. In counseling, the student will eventually speak about what is in the heart, and after some time in the healing process, he/she will end up being a very responsible person.

Nurses or midwives in Australia have a code of conduct that governs their general behavior in their field (Edge, 2013). According to the content, the code of conduct is an action that is lawful and professional behavior. In dealing with lawful behaviors, a nurse should not be caught on the wrong side of the law. Such unlawful acts include disrespect towards others irrespective of who they are. They should also respect other people’s decisions and do things according to the law that follows protocol; otherwise, there are consequences.

Under professionalism, a nurse or a midwife should carry his/herself with integrity (Daly, 2013). One should show respect, honor, and obedience to others. The world should see one as a nurse because of the way one behaves and through other actions. If nurses and midwives lack all these conducts, then one should be in that field. A code of conduct is important since it helps one display a professional figure and earn respect in the first place. The professional image also gives the public thought of the excellent services one can provide. Using social media to accuse others does destroy not only other people’s image but also their personal image. Professionals can check the posts and determine the account owner’s way of conduct. If the image displayed is great, one gets positive feedback while getting jobs, and vice versa, that is also true.

Using social media to abuse others can lead to very many legal consequences and other life consequences, too. It is against the law to threaten someone (Meloy, 2015). If in case the lecturer is threatened to end up dead or anything bad happens to him/her, the first suspect could always be the student. The student can end up serving a jail sentence due to the threats. There are other consequences; the lecturer can also decide to punish the student in other ways possible. If the lecturer has a good heart, he/she can decide to punish the student using the school techniques, but if the lecturer feels threatened, there can be a case to file. The lecturer can also decide to tarnish the student’s name by making bad comments on the certificates of school completion, making it hard for the student to acquire any jobs in the future. In short, the lecturer can lose but all the implications will fall on the student at last.

Research shows that people create fake accounts to do all kinds of bad things on social media (White, 2016). There are a lot of cases in the media to date where people are throwing words at each other, most likely in the world of politics. These fake profiles are responsible for driving propaganda about a certain issue. People have come to know that it is hard for one to know the owner of such accounts. This shows that the people who deliver the propaganda know that what they do is not under the law. However, under IT experts, the locations of such people can be identified through the use of IP addresses, and hence, they can be taken into custody.

In this new world, employers take the next option of checking their employee’s social media profiles before candidates are employed (Kangasniemi, 2015). It is a very effective method since from the posts that a person posts, employers can know the kind of person they are employing. Being a health scientist, posting things that are not appropriate can make a person lose a job and, at the same time, show a bad image to the general public nurses. Human beings have a tendency to remember something wrong more than right. The point that a mistake is made can be reversed. Bad news flows fast compared to good news. The negative posts can also damage the image of the nurse’s employers. It can have very serious implications because the institution may fail due to a lack of trust, which may lead to the firing of many employees as a result of a single mistake.

In social media, a high percentage of people appreciate bad things compared to good things (Harding, 2013). Some people become popular by posting things that are of no importance. For example, people who post motivational talks may be ignored and have fewer comments or likes compared to people who strike naked. That’s life in the media. The bad news has good taste. Some bloggers now tend to look for irrelevant information that has no proof, but since they want to attract people, they have to post propaganda. The friend could have posted the insult also to gain popularity from the other classmates, not purposely to threaten the lecturer. Furthermore, there is a very small probability that the lecturer saw the post. The security of social media like Facebook is far from enough. Some people even get through security passwords and access other people’s accounts and later leave a post or a video that is totally negative. By the time the account owner knows, the post is already public. Social media should also take responsibility by not allowing abnormal posts on their platforms. Every account owner should be evaluated well before being awarded an account on these social media platforms to eliminate pseudo-accounts. Before signing in, a person should provide useful and real details so that in case of any post, it will not be hard to identify the person and interrogate them.

In conclusion, social media can be a good thing or bad; it depends on how it is used (Cohen, 2014). Using social media to insult and threaten others is not the best way to deal with disagreements. However, there are different reasons why a person can bring an argument in the media. Although it is not advisable, guidance is a good method to deal with such people. The media generally tolerates such actions, and that’s why it’s hard to stop such practices. Nursing is a good profession and, hence, should be respected. Such professions should have people who respect themselves and others; otherwise, they can be fired. Research shows that people love bad posts more than important posts, and they may use the opportunity to become celebrities. There are serious consequences if one files a case about a threat from social media. The people involved in this kind of drama are the youths. People should avoid the bad use of the media and utilize it and the time to do meaningful activities.

References

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