The evaluation stage of the critical process is about making informed judgments. Building on description, analysis, and interpretation, you can better evaluate the impact of social media on its users.

Based on your critical research, what do you think about the ability of citizens to record events as they are happening and post the videos to social media? What do you think about the widening call for police dashboard cameras and body cameras? Although some police unions have resisted body cams for officers, 92 percent of Americans supported the idea of body cams in a 2015 national survey.6 Is our desire that all patrolling officers wear body cams justified? Could we, as the New York Times notes, “have unrealistic expectations” that the cameras will “provide a kind of impartial witness to every interaction?”7 Do you have concerns about who gets to see the video footage, and under what circumstances?8 Finally, instead of body cams, is there something about the training of police officers that needs to change?

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