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FREE RADICAL (SOCIAL MEDIA FARM EDITION): ON TWITS AND BRICKS …

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When hashtag activism happens, it seems to pour down all at once. A blip on the screen of a 24-hour news cycle, gone by the next day. For those craving real change or those just tired of the chatter, the response is uniformly harsh: Get off your computer and do something about it! When somebody invites 400 friends to a rally on Facebook and only 20 show up, it’s seen as proof that online activists are, for the most part, barking out of their asses.

Activism is inherently hard work, and hashtag protesters are hardly the first to come under scrutiny. Bumper stickers, for one, are a sort of comparably impotent grandparent to the political tweet. And there are other parallels. Tweeting is the new canvassing, except it’s far more effective in its reach. Access to political conversations is no longer necessarily barred by geographic, financial, or educational limitations. It’s free and open to anyone with adequate internet and computer access.

When the fight is convincing the masses that a problem exists, hashtag activism can be critically useful. We’ve seen particular success with projects like Everyday Sexism, an online campaign launched by a writer for the Guardian, and Hollaback!, a web-based group that publishes stories and leads online discussions—in large part on Twitter—on the subject of street harassment. Kate Ziegler, Co-Director at Hollaback! Boston, says that Twitter has been an ideal medium “to get people talking about what is happening as an accepted part of daily life and how it’s making people feel in their neighborhoods and communities.”

But while social media has done a lot to legitimize problems previously swept under the rug, the fight’s not always for visibility. Efforts like #YesAllWomen can help show, through empirical evidence, that all women everywhere endure sexism. But while pointing out pervasive sexism will at least make men feel uncomfortable, if not seriously reflect on their behavior, sometimes the threat of having a bad rep is not enough to sway the powerful. It might take something a little bit more IRL than URL.

Of course they’re not mutually exclusive. Take the recent appearance (and subsequent disappearance) of what people are calling “anti-homeless spikes” in London, which are essentially pointy concrete cones installed near storefronts. After a hashtag frenzy online helped publicize the issue, an activist group called London Black Revolutionaries, on a midnight mission, covered the the spikes at one store with concrete. Soon after, the supermarket chain announced they would remove the spikes.

Such direct actions and black bloc protests—like those underway throughout Brazil for the World Cup—are totally romanticized within some activist circles. But while nothing is sexier than throwing a brick through the window of a Bank of America, that’s probably not the best way to get the job done. Activists are constantly debating potentially effective forms of protest. In the process of that discussion—when a community is attempting to combat the invisibility of their experiences—Twitter and the like become valuable tools.

When the demands are different, well, sometimes you need to pour a little concrete.

 

FURTHER READING

#YESALLWOMEN? ON PROMISING HASHTAGS THAT FADE TOO QUICKLY

HOLLABACK! BOSTON RESPONDS TO THE DIG

A VERY SPECIAL SOCIAL MEDIA FARM: KILLING #MAPOLI

ON THAT CONTENT FARM HE HAD SOME CLICKS

DONNIE THE MASSHOLE DOES CHINA

LESSONS FROM YOUTUBE SEX SCANDALS

#1REASONWHY WE NEED #FEWMOREREASONSWHY


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