Social Media for Activist movements
The evolution of social media and the impact it now has on our everyday lives is pretty incredible just how fast it has taken over. Social media is used for so many different things nowadays like news updates, sports scores, tweets, etc. It can be used for just about anything you want, and in our day and age technology could allow us to use social media to lead activism movements. But on the other hand Malcolm Gladwell stated "Social networks are effective at increasing participation—by lessening the level of motivation that participation requires"(Gladwell). Gladwell does not believe that social media is an effective way to get these movements across and he states many quote throughout to support his argument. Not to say that I agree with everything he wa saying I would say myself that he is making sense in his statements. "Facebook activism succeeds not by motivating people to make a real sacrifice but by motivating them to do the things that people do when they are not motivated enough to make a real sacrifice. We are a long way from the lunch counters of Greensboro"(Gladwell). During his time of course he is analyzing civil rights movements and he is saying that those were the real type of activist movements, not online, but rather in action really happening with sit-ins and protest. "The civil-rights movement was high-risk activism. It was also, crucially, strategic activism: a challenge to the establishment mounted with precision and discipline"(Gladwell).
Gladwell's central argument was that these activism movements should not be held through or pushed through social media. Back in his day I may have agreed with him but in our day and age today I would not only push an activism movement through social media but its so big in our society today that it could really help a movement get recognized because information moves so fast on the Internet. Gladwell definitely made some really good points in his essay and that one that really stood out to me was "Enthusiasts for social media would no doubt have us believe that King’s task in Birmingham would have been made infinitely easier had he been able to communicate with his followers through Facebook, and contented himself with tweets from a Birmingham jail. But networks are messy: think of the ceaseless pattern of correction and revision, amendment and debate, that characterizes Wikipedia. If Martin Luther King, Jr., had tried to do a wiki-boycott in Montgomery, he would have been steamrollered by the white power structure. And of what use would a digital communication tool be in a town where ninety-eight per cent of the black community could be reached every Sunday morning at church? The things that King needed in Birmingham—discipline and strategy—were things that online social media cannot provide". He broke down his whole argument in this one long quote and although I would not agree with him in our time period I do agree with his statement that he was making.
Aside from Gladwell's point that he does not believe social media should be used for
activist movements I think that an very popular movement that just happened and is still relevant would be the #BlackLivesMatter movement. This movement was very popular on social media and I saw no negative effects of having this movement being popularized through various platforms. It was very big on Twitter and it helped keep people aware and up to date on all the various marches, activities, and just everything and everyone that was participating in the movement. A lot of celebrities and other famous people participated in the movements and posted their duties on social platforms. The Black Lives Matter movement was very huge and it spread all over the world at a very fast pace and I think that is some what attributed to social media. Gladwell wouldn't agree of course but he lived in a different time that us. He made some valid points that I could agree with but overall Social Media has helped movements in our world so I would have to disagree with him if I had to choose a side.
Works Cited
Gladwell, Malcom. “Small Change.” The New Yorker, October 4, 2010. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell.
Mckesson, Deray, and Opam, Kwame. Building Tools for Digital Activism, November 29, 2016. https://www.theverge.com/a/verge-2021/deray-mckesson-interview-black-lives-matter-digital-activism.
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