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
social media and activism 
After researching the “Bring Back our Girls” campaign it is clear the campaign faced a lot of criticism due to their lack of physical action in bringing back the missing girls. Especially when looking at Twitter people did not understand how a hashtag on Twitter would solve the problem of bringing back the missing girls. It is clear from our posts that society seems to be getting fed up with social media being seen as a solution to our problems. When in reality we must come take action rather than relying on the Internet.
-Caitlin F
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It so sad to hear about what happened to the girls in Nigeria. It’s interesting to look at the social activism was done in the media. Social media helps enlighten people about issues going on in the world in ways that mainstream news cannot. The hashtag #Bringbackourgirls united a lot of people who felt sympathy for these young girls and wanted to see them return home safely. But was it actually effective in bringing about change? It’s clear that this is still an issue but will it still be treated as though its a current issue even though it is no longer trending on social media in the same way it was before?
-Faith H.
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The idea of “twitter activism” has always troubled me. While it’s something I engage in, I can’t help but feel poorly about sending a tweet then continuing on with my everyday life. I agree that these hashtags serve as an important bridge between popular culture and the rest of the world, and I can only hope that it’s served as a stepping stone for people to look further into these events. What do you guys suggest we do to take a step beyond twitter activism?
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You bring up a lot of interesting questions here. It is so terrible that these things are happening around the world and unfortunately just by tweeting nothing will be fixed. I think it is great that social media helps bring awareness to tragedies like these but more needs to be done. It is easy for someone safe in their country to tweet a hashtag and feel like they are helping but when people are dying simply for getting an education how can you not wonder what more should be done? -CR
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It’s frustrating to say but we are living in a world where people feel they have done something purely for a tweet, post or hashtag. It does spread awareness if you are someone with thousands of followers like some of the names mentioned. Take now and the attacks in Paris; there was the hashtag #prayforparis and people changed their Facebook profile pictures to show the colors of the French flag over their picture. Sure it shows you support them, but what does it really do?
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Despite the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls not physically bringing the girls back from their village, the campaign illustrated the power of social media in creating awareness and fighting for change. This tragic event should not go unnoticed. Twitter allows users to spread news and awareness at rapid rates and thus is an important tool in monitoring the world and gathering information. I think that it’s great that celebrities backed this campaign as it is an unfortunate reality that some noteworthy campaigns need popular figures before they can gain ground. Hashtag Activism is very powerful as we can see with #BlackLivesMatter. I am a fan of using media channels such as Twitter to spread awareness and attempt to make change.
Noah Carson
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Just the fact that you are looking at a very important and event that recently took place brings up the question on what we can do to spread the awareness around. I like the photo that was placed at the beginning of the post with the different gentlemen holding the sign saying “Real Men Don’t Buy Girls” has a lot of power to it. It reminded me of this video that I watched on YouTube. It was a social experiment dealing with public rape and at the end of the video, they showed a mirror with a caption above it saying “This is what a rapist could look like”. So much power and volume can be shown by doing photo campaigns. Awesome job.
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This article did an amazing job at examining the pros and cons of social media activism. I like that you concentrated on twitter in particular! Twitter is an important news source for many millennials, and news can be spread very quickly through a hash tag, as you demonstrated. I liked your concluding paragraph when you said that the media would move onto the “next big story.” I think this is a huge reason why the #BringBackOurGirls campaign was not very helpful. It was more of a social media fad than an actual form of activism. Great job overall!!!
Erin K.
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