Twitterholics Anonymous By Mona Eltahawy

Twitter is a social media platform where people can tweet about their lives and read about the news all over the world. In the story “Twitterholics Anonymous,” author Mona Eltahawy says that she loves and hates Twitter even though it has become an important part of her job as a reporter. Twitter has become essential for people to find new ideas, but to some it is becoming an unhealthy obsession. Author Eltahawy brings up how social media sites like Twitter are good for people because it gives them a chance to see what is happening around the world and to their friends. There are some people getting so addicted to Twitter that it is the only social media platform they use, and they end up becoming obsessed. Social media sites such as Twitter
News outlets report on stories from around the world, but some of the more important stories do not get reported because the news companies will not allow it. Eltahawy states that “Twitter has become part of my backbone . . . . It has broken more stories for me than any other news ”source” recently.” News companies will filter what they report on, and it makes it difficult to find out what is really happening around the world. Unlike the news companies, Twitter can not filter what their users post. “Thanks to a group of activists, journalists and bloggers I got not just the latest information from Tunisia blog entries, videos straight from demonstration.” Eltahawy uses Twitter to get information because of the amount of first-hand experiences she can get from people. Twitter helps her find new stories around the
News posted on Twitter is important to many people like Eltahawy, who believes “Twitter is my lifeline to the world. Twitter is the bane of my existence.” Using social media too much can cause people to get addicted to these sites. The constant use of these sites is harmful because when someone becomes obsessed with using these sites they will never want to get off: “I’m glued to Twitter for hours on end. It’s exhausting not just because of the amount of time I spend on it- I don't just read, I tweet too. . . . Just disconnect, you ask? I would lose a vital pipeline of information.” The amount of time that people go on Twitter, and the fact that they can interact with others can easily make people obsessed with the platform. Eltahawy uses Twitter to get the news for work, but using it constantly to interact is making her obsessed with the platform. A constant use of Twitter can be harmful because all the time people spend on there can be too much to