FROM HASHTAGS TO VERDICTS: HOW SOCIAL MEDIA ACTS AS A COURT WITHOUT JUDGES

Abstract

The rapid growth of social media has significantly influenced the public perception. Viral trending hashtags are influencing the collective emotions. Social media like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube are informally taking up a huge space to shape the public opinion. On one hand, social media acts as a voice of justice, exposing the wrongdoing, and it is also a place to demand the right; on the other hand, due to a lack of proper investigation and information, social media leads to misinformation. In this era of trending hashtags, people don't cross-verify the facts and only go with the trend. As a result of that, misleading information spreads easily, overshadowing the truth. Thus, social media's point of view influences the human mind like judges to make impulsive judgments. Social media often has a significant influence during the process of delivering judicial verdicts. Analysing the phenomenon through a socio-legal lens, this study emphasized how the rise of online collective decision-making impacts individual rights and harms reputations. This paper concludes with the proposal for implementing a regulatory measure and ethical structure to protect the freedom of speech along with necessary protection against the new challenges.

DOI - https://doi.org/10.65525/SVUP.9788199328655.2026.22-26