For good or for ill (mostly for ill), social media is here to stay. The social internet—all of the different ways in which we communicate with others online—is an unprecedented institution of socialization whose only comparable innovation in recorded history is the Tower of Babel. 

In 2013 I graduated from college with a biblical literature degree from a well-respected Christian liberal arts school, got married, and entered into a social media role at a large Christian organization. A family member remarked to my wife, “Are you sure Chris should be getting a job in social media? It seems like a fad that may be gone in a few years.”

That year Facebook boasted about 1.23 billion monthly active users around the world and 73% of anyone using the internet was using social media.

Social media wasn’t a fad in 2013, but it’s understandable why it may have felt that way for some onlookers. Social media did not occupy the same sort of mental and social prominence that it does today. World leaders weren’t using social media as an official line of communication in 2013 like they do today, social justice movements were still primarily organized off of social media, not on it, and plenty of social media platforms have been created and dismantled since our family member expressed some skepticism.

Babel 2.0

For good or for ill (mostly for ill), social media is here to stay. The social internet—all of the different ways in which we communicate with others online—is an unprecedented institution of socialization whose only comparable innovation in recorded history is the Tower of Babel.

In Genesis 11, we are told that the whole world shared the same language. With this same language came a form of corrupted cooperation that could only be the natural offspring of the conspiratory couple banished from the Garden of Eden. What did people do with their newfound shared lexicon? Genesis 11:4-6 tells us:

Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.

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