Social media apologetics after Trump

There is no doubt that social media and online platforms have provided opportunities for public witness and evangelism like never before.

In February 2004 Mark Zuckerburg launched Facebook, originally as a way of keeping in touch with friends; it quickly became a tool for sharing news, information and ideas.

In 2006 what was called a ‘microblogging’ service was launched. Called Twitter (originally Twttr) it encouraged short, snappy comments. The name was taken from the sounds of birds and defined as ‘a short burst of inconsequential information’.

Instagram launched in 2010 and gained 25,000 users in a day. Since then we have been surrounded by a host of similar online applications to share ideas, recipes, political opinion, family news, and pictures of cats.

Online media has now eclipsed mainstream TV, radio and newspapers as the means of gaining information. The numbers say it all. Facebook now has 3 billion active users, Instagram 2 billion and X (formerly Twitter) has 600 million. YouTube, where so much of the relevant video is hosted, has 2.5 billion monthly users – that means half the world’s entire population access YouTube.

Christians online: prolific and variable in quality

Christian media content, apologetic and otherwise, is prolific, with the usual variable quality. An American survey revealed that nearly half of the adult population see someone else share their faith each week. During Covid lockdowns, every church I know of moved to some form of online activity and most have kept that going since.

I don’t need to rehearse here the downsides of this cultural shift – Jonathan Haidt’s book The Anxious Generation (2024) has identified some of the most important. But the upsides for evangelism and apologetics are clear – we can get Biblical content and perspectives straight to viewers without being filtered by secular agendas. Sifting the Evidence, in which I explore the archaeological evidence for the Bible, was unlikely to be screened on terrestrial TV channels but has had 4.7 million views on YouTube (I don’t keep checking, honest!).

The power of this new media

The American elections have highlighted the power of the new social media for communication, along with the inherent weaknesses. During the campaigning between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, it seems one of the most strategic decisions was whether to appear on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Both had the opportunity, but only Donald Trump did so. The show has reached 52 million, most of those within days of release, and gave Trump unprecedented reach.

In three hours of discussion Trump was able to share opinions on everything from UFOs to the Ukraine war. There is nowhere on traditional media where that would have been possible. Harris was only willing to take part in a Rogan podcast if it were for a shorter duration and at a venue chosen by her; the host declined. Many commentators have said that it was a factor in her losing the election.

On the face of it, social media is a great gift for apologetics and evangelism, but perhaps there is a dark cloud on the horizon. We are now seeing the rapid fragmentation of that media – accelerated by the Republican win – that could dramatically reduce the value of these platforms.

Elon Musk bought Twitter, rebranding it X, and in the interests of free speech removed some of the censorship controls. Many accounts that had been excluded during the Twitter period were reinstated and Musk’s own support for Trump has made X much more amenable to his views. In the wake of the Democrat loss, many of those on the political left have migrated from X to a new social media platform, Bluesky.

What does the social media fallout from an American election mean for the rest of our global village? It is clear that we are witnessing the rapid fragmentation of social media. We have always been aware of the echo-chamber feature that is created by the hidden algorithms. We tend to see more of what we like. The multiplication of social media sites (I have not even mentioned Threads, TikTok and Telegram) means that people are likely to be drawn to sites that only share the kind of content they want to see.

A place for us to be

What does this mean for online Christian witness? We must not abandon this profound public space. But we need to communicate across political, cultural and ideological divides. The polarisation of views that marks political debate should not cloud the generosity of spirit among us as Christians. Let’s not all congregate on favoured social media platforms where we end up only talking to ourselves or sharing the same Christian perspective on the latest social issue.

We shouldn’t be fooled by ‘view counts’ either (of the 4.7 million who saw Sifting the Evidence I have a sneaking suspicion that 4.6 million were my mum). Christ-honouring, fair-minded, and creative content is needed. And, yes, you can sometimes post a picture of your cat.