Transactional vs. Transformative- The Difference Between Slacktivism and Activism

Social media activism is directly related to democracy in a very powerful way. Democracy invokes the importance of the masses in making political decisions. Social media’s power within the activism world comes from its ability to connect people from all over the country, or even all over the world. Social media brings the masses together. However, the problem with social media activism, as I have outlined in my previous posts, is that people choose to share a link or like an Instagram, rather than get up and actually participate in a demonstration. In order for social media activism’s power to truly be shown, it’s participants must participate in real life and not just on social media. So the question is: What would this look like? How big of an impact could we have on social issues if our online participation translated to real life participation?

Hahrie Han, a Political Science professor at UC Barbara, has researched the shifting model in which civic groups derive their power. Han argues that recent social change is fueled more by “transactional” than “transformative” forms of organization. This transactional organization is exactly what is inhibiting social media from creating real social change. Han explains that transactional organization, which social media relies heavily on, asks participants to do stuff: share a post, create a hashtag, sign a petition, donte money, etc. While this kind of participation is crucial for spreading awareness, it does not cause the participants to have a deeper engagement with the cause. This deep engagement comes with transformative processes. Transformative processes ask participants to become leaders and organize in-person events. Research shows that in-person events are essential for creating social bonds and creating an environment conducive to reaching a certain goal.

The resignation of The University of Missouri’s president Tim Wolfe was a direct result of transformative student efforts. This event is a perfect example of what it looks like when people actively participate in creating social change. Students, faculty, and community members participated in demonstrations protesting the administrators handling of racism on campus. These efforts were brought to the forefront when thirty-two members of the football team vowed to not participate in any football-related activities until the president resigned. The threat of the University of  Missouri losing millions of dollars due to the lack of participation in football caused the President to resign and activists all over the country rejoiced with the members of Missouri. The University of Missouri’s students and faculty did not just share a hashtag or like a post, the participated in real demonstrations and sacrificed their college careers in order to create social change.

-Erin K.

The ALS challenge: A success or failure?

The ALS challenge was one of the largest social media phenomenon’s that took place primarily on Facebook. During the summer of 2014 Facebook’s newsfeeds were filled with videos of people pouring buckets of ice and water on themselves, it was described as “the largest chain letter ever”. Once the movement became viral there were countless celebrities joining in on the movement even President Obama joined in. The social media movement for ALS brought in over 100 million dollars to the ALS Association, which is a great improvement compared to 2013 which was 23.5 million. Therefore it is easy to look at this social media “movement” as a success.

 

Although Facebook and other social medias had helped to raise a great deal of money to the ALS association, there was a lot of backlash when looking at how it was done. As described in the “Times” article, they argue that the ice bucket challenge was not seen as a proper way of activism. By essentially awarding the individual who dumped ice water on themselves, meant that they were not contributing to the ALS association. Also the article discussed how once the ice bucket challenge was no longer seen as a trending topic online the donations had a significant decrease. Also when people were doing the ice bucket challenge many of the participants did not even mention that it was linked to ALS, but rather doing it for thesocial media aspect. The ice bucket challenge can be viewed as a social media movement that helped to raise a great deal of money for an association, however since social media is such a fast paced network, users are always looking for the next fad to get hooked on. Therefore once the ice bucket challenge was no longer popular users no longer cared about the ALS ice bucket challenge.

“Articles like this one, reductively titled “Stop hating on the ice bucket challenge — it’s raised millions of dollars for charity,” miss the point. In an age where hashtag activism and information-free awareness campaigns are becoming more and more common, we should be very conscious of how to make viral trends as useful as possible.”(TImes)

After analyzing the impacts of the ice bucket challenge on social media specifically Facebook, it makes me question social media being seen as an effective tool. Yes, social media helped to raise over 100 million dollars, but clearly the message of the ice bucket challenge got lost along the way. Most people did not even talk about ALS in their ice bucket videos. Social media is seen to be a very democratic space, where people can freely express their opinions and help to spread awareness. Social media allows for users to have their own “media house” meaning they have the ability to post and express their individual opinion and share it will thousands of other users. However, with Facebook there is a great deal of corporate control through the use of advertisements and unnecessary messages. In an ideal utopian online space there would be no corporate control dictating what is being posted to users newsfeeds.

I also think that with the ALS challenge there should have been a more IRL connection seeing that majority of the challenge was not based around face-to-face communication. I believe that IRL connection is much stronger than the URL connection. If the ice bucket challenge helped to gather some of the users online their decline in donations would not have happened as drastically as it did. I think that social media can be seen as a useful tool when paired with a strong IRL bond. If the ice bucket challenge started as a face-to-face association it would have created a lasting impact on the people versus posting a video to Facebook. Therefore in a utopian world social media would not be seen as our first outlet to turn to but rather meeting with people in an IRL situation.

 

Caitlin F.

Social Media: Can We Change the World?

As new technologies come about and more and more people see the potential gain in using it, social media will continue to grow at rapid speeds in the coming years. Marketers want to see how they can further manipulate it to continue to exponentially gain consumers, broadcasters and news channels will try and incorporate more multimedia and shared-content, celebrities will continue to accrue as many followers as possible to shadow along with the goings-on in their lives. However an important question to ask is, how will social media activism evolve? It is enormously relevant in our society today, in making marginalized issues heard and mobilizing people to create change. As with most other things, there are critics of social media activism, and rightly so. A major argument is that while hashtag movements and social media increase awareness, often significantly, it does not help to find the root causes of the problem, nor the root solution. For example the topic of my previous post, #BringBackOurGirls. People globally were aware of the problem and calling for actions, yet a year and a half later and hundreds of girls are still missing.

 

How can we change this so that movements cultivated on social media translate into real, day-to-day life? Also, how can we bring to light the tragedies that occur world wide that we haven’t yet come up with a clever hashtag for? Social media can be one of the most democratic spaces that we have, in the United States at least. We are able to speak freely about topics and opinions, and debate and discuss with others from all over, all through a screen and some buttons. In a democratic system, this should stay that way, a forum and a space run by the people. In a utopian social media system, there would be no advertisements and no corporate gain through its use, just a place for people to speak and post freely. But also in a utopian social media system, activism should always have the URL-IRL connection. Slacktivism is a root cause as to why many of the social media campaigns are not taken to the streets. People believe by changing their profile picture, sharing an image or retweeting a tweet, they have done their duty. But imagine if everyone who participated in each of the movements, every person who liked a post, shared an image, etc., actually went out and did something to try and find a solution? Imagine if every person who poured a bucket of ice over his or her head in the summer of 2014 donated just $10 to help fund research, or help pay for medical bills for those with the disease who can’t afford the extensive treatment. 17 million people participated, which would have resulted in over $170 million dollars for the cause, in just a few months. At that rate, we could cure hundreds of diseases in the next few years. Right now, people believe that they are just one small person, and therefore can’t make a difference. I do not believe this to be true, and if we got every person in the world who participates in social media activism not to believe it either, we could be seeing an entirely different world.

LM

Can a Hashtag Save Them? #BringBackOurGirls

If you didn’t follow Kim Kardashian on Twitter, would you know that a tragedy occurred in Nigeria? If you did not see the First Lady’s messaged retweeted by dozens of your followers, would you be aware of the mass kidnapping of schoolgirls from the village of Chibok? Even if you did, did you bother to further explore why this tragedy transpired?  The news exploded over social media worldwide, inciting the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls. As of July of 2014, over four millions tweets contained the hashtag, hoping to spread awareness and get governments to take action in order to find these missing girls. Celebrities, politicians, and everyday people all were tweeting furiously to spread the news. Even First Lady Michelle Obama joined; her tweet alone generating over 57,000 retweets. Celebrities such as Kim Kardashian, Kerry Washington, Justin Timberlake, Bradley Cooper and countless other celebrities tweeted and instagrammed showing their support for the cause. Because of the hashtag, almost everyone in the world knew what happened in the small village of Chibok. The question is however, did it even help?

It has often been argued that no; the Twitter campaign to save the kidnapped girls was not successful. Around 50 girls have since escaped, however that means that there are still over 200 girls ages 15-18 missing, all because they wanted to get an education. It has been almost two years since this tragedy has occurred, however it seems to have fallen off of the map. Where is the support from the millions who cared so much in the spring of 2014? There are a few issues at play in this situation. The first, and most important, is that a terrorist militant group was able to kidnap hundreds of girls right under the governments’ nose, because they did not like the “Western” educations and ideals they were learning. The other major issue is that this could be swept under the rug and forgotten about around the world, while in Nigeria it is still a continually devastating event. While the celebrities succeeded in spreading awareness, did they donate money, or call their representatives to see what our nation was actually doing about it? Did they have a definitive call to action, or a possible solution? And where are their tweets about it now, almost two years later? While everyone was retweeting the First Lady’s tweet, did people also take the time to ask what steps our government was taking to find a solution? Secretary of State John Kerry stated that they were “engaging and cooperating” with Nigeria and other nations, but refused to divulge much else.

While some would argue that this event was a devastating occurrence of slacktivism, it could also be debated that this strong but short-lived uproar was still meaningful. “Hashtag activism is a gateway between politics and popular culture, a platform to educate the ignorant and draw attention to the operation of power in the world. And when it shines a spotlight on a burning crisis in Africa that has been raging for years, that matters.”

However, Boko Haram continues to produce destruction and acts of violence and terrorism, and the girls are still missing. While the hashtag may have faded away, and the media and other nations have moved on to the next big story, the people of Chibok will never forget.

LM

Facebook: #BringBackOurGirls

 

After the tragedy that struck on April 14^th 2014, 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped from a government secondary school in Nigeria called Chibok. Dozens of armed terrorists known to be an extremist Muslim group called Boko Haram believe that Western education is seen as a sin. The ages of the girls kidnapped were between 15-18 years old. 50 of the schoolgirls managed to escape however there are still many missing girls. Some of the girls have been auctioned off for $12 to militants to be their wives. Once this story went viral it blew up on social media, especially Facebook.

Shortly after the news went viral, a Facebook page was created called “Bring Back Our Girls” this was used to organize protests while also raising awareness to the devastating issue. Facebook was seen as a tool to democratize large groups of people in the U.S. to make a stance. The Facebook page currently is still counting the days the girls have been missing for and as of today it has been 583 days. By Following the Facebook page it is a constant reminder of the girls who are still missing
because they wanted an education. The Facebook page has links to the website which gives further information about the kidnapping and is still promoting the hashtag. Michelle Obama became a significant figure in The Bring Back our Girls campaign and is seen on the Facebook page holding a sign that says “#BringBackOurGirls.” The hashtag Bring Back our Girls also brought a lot of attention having over 1 million Tweets on social media there were also many celebrities that came together to join the campaign.

 

The Bring Back Our Girls Facebook page was encouraging users to change their profile picture to a red and white poster with the words “#Bring back our girls NOW.” The quote in the Facebook information stated, “People of Nigeria are marching in the streets to demand the rescue of the 300 school girls that were kidnapped. Starting now, let us march on social media.” They also asked for users to post the petition to their Facebook wall to help spread the word and get people on board. Facebook’s main tool for the campaign was to democratize celebrities to raise awareness to  U.S. citizens to get involved. This issue was seen to be very significant on Facebook by raising awareness through the use of petitions and celebrity action to get more people to support the missing school girls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These images are taken directly from the “Bring Back Our Girls” Facebook page and each day they post the number of how many days the girls have been missing. They do this as a way for people to stay engaged an not forget and give up hope for the missing girls. Above their is a photos that show a description of what happened to the girls for new Facebook followers to know the background to the story. Their Facebook page also has a lot of photos on the missing girls, and pictures from a TED talk that dealt with the issue of the missing girls. The Facebook page currently has 238,300 people that are following the page and still to date people are commenting on their posts.

Caitlin F.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

#BringBackOurGirls- Slacktivism or Activism?

In April of 2014, people of Nigeria were outraged after Boko Haram, an Islamic extremist group, kidnapped 276 Nigerian schoolgirls. Two weeks after this horrific even, the social media campaign #bringbackourgirls helped to spread this outrage across the globe. Unlike many social media campaigns that have the tendency to come and go, as well as have their fair share of people who do not support the movement, it seemed like the whole world was behind the message surrounding this campaign- to find and return all 276 girls. The hashtag was shared over 1 million times, even by the first lady of the United States who shared a selfie adorning the #bringbackourgirls hashtag. The hashtag undoubtedly raised global awareness and helped to educate the public about the issue and Boko Haram’s ideals.

Over a year and a half after the abduction of the Nigerian schoolgirls and the creation of the Bring Back Our Girls campaign, 219 of the girls are still missing. It seems that the Bring Back Our Girls campaign failed to actually bring back the missing schoolgirls, which left the families of these girls with nothing but hope. Many argue that the hashtag promoted slacktivism or clicktivism, rather than actual activism. The public believed that simply sharing the hashtag would be enough to create actual change, which has proven to be wrong as the vast majority of the missing girls are still missing. Others believe that the campaign put too much emphasis on asking the United States military to act on this issue, which in turn only emphasized the United States’ military legitimacy. When Ben Hewitt of A World at School was asked if the Bring Back Our Girls campaign was a failure or a success, he stated “The girls are still missing…that is the ultimate measure of success and we are not there yet.”

The Bring Back Our Girls campaign did an amazing job at spreading awareness across the globe about the girls that went missing at the hands of Boko Haram. However, this global awareness was not enough to actually help bring back the missing girls, as 219 of them are still missing. In addition, over 6,600 people have been killed at the hands of Boko Haram, and many young men and boys have also been kidnapped. In order for the Bring Back Our Girls campaign to have a real impact on the horrific acts being committed by Boko Haram, a few things need to change. First, the campaign should raise awareness about the young men and boys that are being kidnapped and the thousands of people being killed by Boko Haram. All of the violent acts committed by this group should be exposed to the world. In addition, the Bring Back Our Girls campaign should be directed at journalists and activists, not at the United States Military. In directing the attention towards journalists and activits, the attention it taken off the United States’ Military, and brought to people who actually want to create social change. Lastly, the co-founder of the Bring Back Our Girls campaign, Obiageli Ezekwesili, urged world leaders that they need to do more. Ezekwesili stated, “But beyond staying hopeful, what needs to happen is that the leaders of the world need to find their strength. I really do not understand how leaders of the world sat around and watched a renegade group become monsters terrorizing the world.”

-Erin K.

Facebook: Black Lives Matter

Most people think of social media as a place to reflect their individuality through pictures, status and posts. However, the potential of social media activism is growing especially when looking at issues from
a global perspective. Some of the issues that were popular when looking at Black Lives Matter, the hashtag #BringBackOurGirl for the kidnappings going on in Africa, the Gay Rights movement and student debt protests. The main reason for using social media is its ability to reach a global network, which gives users the ability to raise awareness to a specific issue in hopes of making a change. Social media helps to give the youth a voice therefore it is seen as a growing tools to the younger generation. 

The millennial generation often turns to social media as a way to make a change; this is seen recently in the issues regarding Black Lives Matter. When looking back several decades ago to the Civil Rights Movement in order to get news out to the public the main media outlets were through the use of newspapers or the telephone. However with the rise of social media our generation has shifted to social media as a new form of communication. “Resource mobilization theory makes clear that both the availability of resources and actors’ efficacy in using them effectively are essential. Nahed Eltantawy & Julie B. Wiest states that “In addition to resources like a motivated citizenry and the availability of transportation to gather in mass,” this quote is referring to social media use of gathering large groups to protest. Specifically when looking at the Black Lives Matter campaign majority of their progress has been through social media. They have their own Twitter, Facebook and Instagram along with having a trending hashtags #BlackLivesMatter that has gone viral.

Black Lives Matter is especially significant when looking at Facebook due to the vast amount of resources it has to offer. Facebook allows users to posts photos, create groups, share status and recently has added hashtags to their format. The biggest movement for #BlackLivesMatter is the hashtag that spread all over Facebook along with Twitter and Instagram. This allows users to connect with one another through sharing similar stories and posts by hashtagging their experiences. In Black Lives Matter it has been seen as a very useful tool for gathering protests as well as sharing updates from the events. There are also several Black Lives Matter groups based on states to keep members informed with updates in their area. Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi were two of the first people to speak out about Black Lives Matter after the death of Trayvon Martin and how he was placed on trial for his own murder. The two member of the group spoke out about the social media movement that helped to carry Black Lives Matter,” I created the infrastructure for this movement project—moving the hashtag from social media to the streets. Our team grew through a very successful Black Lives Matter ride.”

Facebook’s main purpose for Black Lives Matter is to raise awareness to racial discrimination and create a discussion in the public sphere. The benefit of using Facebook is its large audience. “According to The Cultureist info graphics created in 2013, 500 million people log into Facebook every day and 175 million tweets are sent around the world daily”. This is just one example of how social media is continuing to grow rapidly making it a new public space. Facebook allows for all users to feel empowered about discussing their opinions on different issues. This is especially seen through our youth mainly in the range of 20s-30s. “Now, with social media, they feel empowered, like people are hearing their voice.” Social media is helping the youth feel as though they can make a difference in racial equality, especially with Black Lives Matter.

By Caitlin Friel

 

Twitter & #BlackLivesMatter

Say you felt really strongly about a certain issue. Whether it it be that you and your cohorts weren’t getting the pay you deserve, or the food in your cafeteria isn’t good enough, or whatever it was that you felt so powerfully about, you wanted to see action. How would you get your message out? How would you mobilize your associates, your people? For most, the answer is social media. When people today think of social activism through social media, there is a percentage of people in our society who think they are just fleeting movements for “slacktivists” to make themselves feel good about getting involved in something bigger than themselves. While in some cases of social media activism, these people may be correct, however #BlackLivesMatter is not one of those instances. During the summer of 2013 three women joined together to create this movement that the New York Times would call the first civil rights movement of the 21^st century. Though it started out on the Internet, with a lot of traffic on social media site Twitter, the movement has developed into an in-real-life social movement with policy demands and political intentions, with individuals and communities alike determined to make these issues an important topic of the upcoming 2016 election.

While the movement has been taken off social media and into the streets, it is important to look at where it all began. Though people may have doubts concerning social media activism, there are plenty of reasons for how it can be successful. Supporters were able to get un-biased news out of what was actually happening in the streets in real time, not just the subjective, over edited footage and news that the mainstream media would broadcast out to the public during the six o’clock news. People at the rallies and protests were able to live stream as well as live-tweet what was going on as it happened. This is where the importance of the hash tag really came into play. All one had to do was search the hash tag #BlackLivesMatter and they could see people’s tweets from anywhere in the globe, and see what was going on at a protest somewhere far away from where they lived, or someone else’s opinion on what was going on. The use of the hash tag #BlackLivesMatter was one of the, if not the principal reason why their ideas were able to spread so fast across our nation, and even the globe. Though it moved from Twitter to all other platforms, and a social media movement to one IRL, the use of the hash tag on Twitter put this movement on the map.

Since the summer of 2013, the movement has grown rapidly. As you scroll through their Twitter page @blklivesmatter, you see retweets of twitter pages of Black Lives Matter chapters from across the country. Through this, followers are able to see issues that are happening in regards to the Black Lives Matter community across our country. On October 29^th there was a tweet in support of BLM413, which is close to home as it is Western Massachusetts’ chapter of #BlackLivesMatter. They were going to court as a result of charges of disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. While many of us, as UMass Amherst students, may already know about this as it may be directly related to us, or as it is happening where we live, through this one tweet now everyone across the globe is able to see what is happening here, now. Twitter was an essential part of the creation of the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and to this day remains an integral part of the movement today.

LM

Black Lives Matter: The Positive and Negative Impacts of Social Media Activism

Large civil rights movements are significantly shaped by the technology surrounding them. In the 1960’s, civil rights movements relied heavily on the use of the telephone and television to spread news and educate the public. As technology has progressed, so has the way we use it in relation to activism. The newest form of activism in terms of technology is social media activism. Black Lives Matter is an activist movement that campaigns against violence against black people in America. Black Lives Matter has set itself apart from other civil rights movements by being the first movement to rely almost completely on newly developed social media to spread its message and political agenda, as well as organize protests and demonstrations.

After the death of Michael Brown, Black Lives Matter was able to reach thousands of like-minded individuals across the country through posts on Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. The use of social media helped to organize a non-violent Black Lives Matter demonstration that involved more than 500 people from over 17 different cities across America. The wide array of people that were involved in this movement represents the power social media has in fueling activist movement.

While the power of social media has been demonstrated through its use in the Black Lives Matter movement, many argue that social media activism has also hindered real social change for black people in America. The critique of social media activism in relation to the Black Lives Matter movement was brought to the forefront when T.I., a popular black rapper, recited a poem against social media activism during an award show. Through his performance, T.I. argues that social media activism causes individuals to think that posting, sharing, or liking posts on social media is enough to create social change. T.I. says, “Our society’s issues are deeper than social media posts/There’s a long list/And if you think solely making them a trending topic is going to solve them/Well, then, you’re part of the problem.” The term “slacktivism” or “slacktivist” is widely used to describe people who think they are socially conscious and creating social change because they participate in sharing and liking activist posts.

            It is undeniable that the Black Lives Matter movement owes an enormous amount of its success to social media. However, it can be argued that social media activism reduces activism to simply sharing posts, and not actually participating in demonstrations and movements. In order to get these slacktivists off their mobile devices and into the streets, a few things about the Black Lives Matter movement need to change. In general, Black Lives Matter should argue, support, and highlight real commitment and the real activity that goes on. In shining a light on real activity, instead of replacing this activity with a social media post, people will be more likely to participate in real life and not just on the internet.

Erin K.