Bridging gaps: How Facebook brought Indians and Pakistanis closer
Mark Zuckerberg lauded the perspective shift among the people of rival nations
LAHORE (Web Desk) – ICC World T20 2016 is here and almost everyone who enjoys the sport of cricket has changed his or her profile picture through a new feature introduced by Facebook to indicate which team they will be cheering for in the mega event.
Usually, one would support the team of their own country irrespective of any circumstances or the team’s sorry performance in recent past or its almost non-existent chances of winning the tournament. But this time, Indians and Pakistanis stunned the world by breaking the stereotypes.
Despite the fact that the sub-continent region is renowned for the fervent sentiments of nationalism instilled in its masses, cricket lovers from both sides of the border openly supported rival teams by changing their profile pictures exhibiting their unorthodox or diverging views regarding the sport.
This incident caught the attention of none other than Facebook’s creator, Mark Zuckerberg, who seemed intrigued over the significant development and even posted about it. Zuckerberg promoted the hashtag ‘#ProfilesForPeace’ which he mentioned is being used by people of the neighbouring countries to express their support for one another’s teams.
“When we designed the profile frames feature, we just wanted to help people show support for their favourite teams or a cause they believe in. But this story shows that the more connected we are, the more we realise that what unites us is more important than what divides us.” wrote Zuckerberg in his post.
This move can certainly be seen as the increase in the acceptability level for each other among the people across both sides of the borders.
