Who is the main leader of protests and revolutions? Donald Trump? Kim Jong Un? I wouldn’t have got it right the first time if I was asked that question too.
The Kingpin of 21st century revolutions is…social media.
Yep, social media is one of the major reasons on how movements, revolutions and protests are started in this day of age.
There are 3 major ways of how social media can be interpreted into their role in these kinds of movements:
- Idealist
- Which started the movement to occur
- Idealist 2.0
- Revolutions enabled by social media, but happened at the right time
- Critical
- Mainly used as an organizational tool for protests, rather than sparking up the protest
In 2013, the movement “Black Lives Matter” came to surface after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin in 2012. The hashtag #blacklivesmatter was created by the African-American community due to this incident, which sparked up the American nation and created several protests around the country. Other protests were created in response to the movement such as “All Lives Matter”, but the Afrcian-American community saw this a misinterpretation on why they started the movement. This is categorized under the idealist 2.0, as the movement was sparked by with the hashtag after the acquittal of George Zimmerman.
From what I learnt in this lecture, it showed me how social media can create revolutions and changes to our world with just a tweet or a post. I should make a hashtag #Errylmatters and see what happens.
References
- Day, Elizabeth (July 19, 2015). “#BlackLivesMatter: the birth of a new civil rights movement”. The Guardian. Retrieved December 18, 2016.
The Erryl Classicz 