By Breanna Prater
March 12, 2019
Social media changed advocacy forever. As the United Nations Foundation emphasized there has been a “rise of new and refreshing voices standing up for collective action and global progress.” Social Media’s allocation for international communication changes how individuals engage with humanitarian and social justice issues. As Amit Schejter wrote in an academic article titled “Seek the meek, seek the just: Social media and social justice” published in Telecommunications Policy in October of 2015, there are four characteristics of social media that set it apart from traditional media. They include, the “abundance of content, mobility, interactivity, and multi-mediality.” These characteristics allow social media to serve a unique function in social justice movements. Modern Americans are surrounded by social justice and advocacy movements, many of which have a very relevant and important message of advocacy.
A significant amount of this advocacy happens in the form of hashtags across Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Hashtags that have served in recent social movements include: #metoo, #churchtoo, #nomore, #wearezehour, #blacklivesmatter, and #stopforcedchildmarriage. These hashtags have a significant social impact. Foreign Policy reported last week that #MeToo’s global impact is undeniable. #Metoo is in regular rotation for the top twitter hashtag in 85 countries and counting, and it is not the only hashtag with a advocacy implication. Buffer wrote that “#BlackLivesMatter, has become one of the largest in social media history…. the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter is the third most-used Twitter hashtag around a social cause.” These hashtags enable ordinary individuals to change the world. But, is this change warranted? Some argues that it is not. National Review accuses these social justice movements of being “unjust crusades.”
Social Media changed the modes of advocacy forever; however, the plethora of online advocacy begs the question of legitimacy. According to the previous Buffer article, #BlackLivesMatter has been used over 12 million times on Twitter alone. 12 million times. At what point does our advocacy move from genuine concern to re-tweeting content for popularity? Hashtags and social media allow Social justice movements to claim the spotlight in 2019 as never before. However, this spotlight does not always have an impact. Bringing this issues to the public knowledge is the first step to change, but social media does not provide a method for the actual change to occur. The platform was not made for that. The increase in advocacy is good, but at best, it leaves the world searching for change that may never come, and at worst, it leaves the false impression that the change has already happened.
Social Media is not going away, and the world will never return to the pre-internet age. Which means that social media trends are an ever increasing part of society. Unfortunately, these trends oftentimes do more harm than good. To many of the individuals who retweet and share the message, social advocacy is just the newest Twitter trend. Which is why the platform has enabled great advocacy for social justice, but the hashtags often fall short of change. This is an unfortunate reality because social media could be used for so much more. As Aria Solar, a marketing strategist for Sprout social illustrates that authentic advocacy on social media can really pay off. Oftentimes this authenticness is lost when hashtags and causes are trending - increasing the reach but watering down the message. Which is why the trendiness of hashtags and advocacy, may lead to important problems never being solved.
The opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Infuse Student Media or Southwest Baptist University.
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