Too social politicians?

This past week the subject of political figures and the use of social media has been a topic of conversation in several classes. These conversations stem from a presentation by Jenette Martens, of the Winnipeg Foundation, to the Editing Online and Print Media class. Martens is in charge of social media for the foundation and she lead a discussion of how she uses social media to communicate with stakeholders.

The discussion led to an exercise of researching how the Winnipeg mayoral candidates have made use of social media. Sam Katz and Judy Wasylycia-Leis have made use of Twitter and Facebook in completely different manners. Katz has a presence on both platforms, but it is extremely limited, while Wasylycia-Leis has a much greater presence.

The discussion of Katz and Wasylycia-Leis social media habits continued into our Public Relations class. The question that was posed during this discussion was if it was better if politicians tweeted for themselves or if staffers did it for them. Obviously politicians pay staff to do a lot of communicating for them, so its not surprising that staffers often are the ones that produce social media items. At the same time, politicians making use of social media for themselves provides a more personal, unfiltered viewpoint.

This can backfire though. Case in point, is the current situation involving former Winnipeg mayor Glen Murray. Murray, now an Ontario provincial cabinet minister, posted tweets this week accusing Stephen Harper, Ontario opposition leader Tim Hudak, and Toronto mayor Rob Ford of being bigots. Controversy erupted, as to be expected, and Murray apologized in a written statement.

This is a major issue with politicians, and public figures in general, using social media. They're humans, they make mistakes. They're brain to mouth (or in this case fingers) filter malfunctions on occasion. Maybe they are better served by having their staffers communicate their messages through social media. What do you think?