Since its creation, social media has caused considerable changes in society. It allows people to connect, create, and learn. Since social media allows people from all over the world to connect, it allows people to share different ideas and promote important causes; social media has become a platform for activism. By sharing, liking, and tweeting all people have become activist for all sorts of causes. In recent years, scholars compared activism of this type to the activism that has occurred during the Civil Rights Movement. Recent debate has quite different views regarding activism through social media as an influential factor in publicizing causes. According to Malcolm Gladwell, social media may aid people in becoming aware of certain issues, but activism through social media does not solve any of the problems they try to fix. He also argues that social media create weak ties between people. I am of two minds regarding Gladwell’s claim regarding social media activism and the ties it creates. On the one hand, activism …show more content…
Social media activism has no sense of organization or leadership. According to Gladwell, “Networks don’t have a centralized leadership structure and clear lines of authority, they have real difficulty reaching consensus and setting goals (Gladwell).” Organizations find agreeing and establishing goals problematic. Not having the ability to set specific goals and complete them effectively leaves networks vulnerable. Using social media lacks the organization required to properly execute an aim for a group. It is quite obvious that since anyone can take part in social media sites and simply the vast number of people online; it would complicate anything that they were trying to achieve. Working even in small groups of people can create difficulty. Social media increases the number of people. So using social media as a platform for activism can prevent change from
Gladwell says that the difference between these two eras is that activism is less accountable. Back then, movements and causes spread like wildfire, and people who join feel personally involved in the furthering of their cause. With the internet, people spread the accountability among their fellow activists. For instance, there is no accountability if they don’t show up to a rally or protest. The lack of effort that results in more people joining a cause, could be called could be called “teamwork effect,” which Gladwell holds in high disregard. However at the same time of this “teamwork effect,” there are more people informed about movements than before. People who may never have been aware of a movement’s cause can now be made aware. During the 1960s people did not have the same access to information as they do today. This alone leads to more support and awareness which negates any concerns Gladwell has about social media accountability. Now there are more people, and also more power in current movements than there is in the
This is an aspect of social media sites that I see every day, but I have failed to previously recognize. "The platforms of social media are built around weak ties," Gladwell explains, "that’s why you can have a thousand 'friends' on Facebook, as you never could in real life." This statement makes sense to me, as I scroll through these weak ties on social media sites every day. There are always various posts for casting your vote on a petition, and with one simple click, one feels they have voiced their opinion. These polls, as Gladwell says, get people to sign up "by not asking too much of them". However, what these people fail to consider is that this clicking and retweeting does not change anything. These social media "activists" are not the ones creating change, they will not be wrote about in history books. They merely support a cause in the comfort of their own home, behind a screen name. Therefore, these causes are not truly supported, nor effectively acted upon. Gladwell's recognition of the weak ties in social media activism is sadly very
Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are essential parts of every individual in todays day and age. The article Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted declares that people do not need social media to unfurl peoples quarrels around a large group. for example when the students ordered sit ins during the war against segregation. The world now is not how it used to be in the past, were individuals did not have TV or computers to rely on for news. Malcolm Gladwell asserts that all of the new technology is unnecessary to keep people informed of a certain subjects. For example when Hitler was killing the jewish religion in Germany. Not only was that something of extreme importance, but if we did not have technology or social media could one have ever known about it. Malcolm makes comments about Facebook, MTV, and Google assuming that people could write whatever they want and consider it as news. Nevertheless if one ignores things that individuals alleges on the web and you think it’s a rip-off, could we be able to help anyone?.
He goes on to reiterate, “the platforms of social media are built around weak ties. Twitter is a way of following (or being followed by) people you may never have met” which makes it a much more feeble and fragile way of promoting change. Because social media is built on weak ties, people don’t have much to gain or lose by claiming to be a part of the so-called activism. Overall, Gladwell finalizes that social media “is simply a form of organizing which favors the weak-tie connections that give us access to information over the strong-tie connections that help us persevere in the face of danger…It makes it easier for activists to express themselves, and harder for that expression to have any impact”
Gladwell’s essay discusses the developments of the social media and how it has changed social activism.”The platform of social media is based on weak ties”(Gladwell, page 174). He discusses how the Civil Rights Movement was based on strong ties among people who knew each other.People would rise up and join the revolution if they saw their friends, peers or neighbors in the news or newspapers. There is not much of a risk
Gladwell strongly believes that activism was viewed in a much different way before technology took over the world. In the 1960’s protests, and boycotts spread rapidly but usually only among friends. Today, information spreads to thousands of people in seconds due to social media. Gladwell believes traditional activism formed strong-ties whereas today 's movements and protests form weak-ties because of social media. People are motivated when they have close friends with them in a movement, not just through a text message. As Gladwell states, “where activists were once defined by their causes, they are now defined by their tools.” (Gladwell 408) Gladwell believes these tools can’t really help a social activism movement, but he does acknowledge the speed of social media networks. But, without news and social media how will the information spread? Anything placed on the internet can be broadcasted to a large audience within seconds. Gladwell writes: “Social networks are effective at increasing participation—by lessening the level of motivation that participation requires.” (Gladwell 408) Gladwell makes a good point but how will the motivation ever be there without people receiving information? Nevertheless social media has many flaws, but with other tools
In my opinion, social media is a way to bring the world closer and an assertion of consumer choice can be used for promoting issues that matter. A human rights activist can make an unknown story reach hundreds of thousands of people by the ‘simple click of a button’.
It supports populist causes because it empowers the public and the masses. The company empowers anyone, anywhere and on any interest unless it promotes hate and violence. It gives the power to the people to voice their opinions and gain support, with the growth in internet and PR, the voice of the people weighs heavier than
One of the biggest distinctions between successful activism and unsuccessful activism is how the movement is organized. If the movement is just a group of interconnected people with no system of authority, otherwise known as a network, it is more likely to fail. However an activist initiative that has a system or organization in which some people are ranked above others, also known as a hierarchy, is much more likely to succeed.“Networks are the opposite, in structure and character, of hierarchies. Unlike hierarchies, with their rules and procedures, networks aren’t controlled by a single central authority. Decisions are made through consensus, and the ties that bind people to the group are loose.” (Gladwell 139) The reason networks do not work is because it is very hard to organize anything meaningful without a central authority to oversee it Sure a network can organize a small, low risk event that people can easily participate in, but when it comes to organizing high risk, well thought out protests, networks are almost completely worthless. That’s because high risk events need plenty of planning to carry out, something that a network is unable to do. In order to organize a high risk event, there needs to be someone of authority in charge, who will make the tough calls required to plan something of that magnitude. Networks don’t have this person. There is no person of authority in a network, everyone is virtually an equal. Since there is no person above everyone else, there is also no person who has the responsibility of someone in charge. Meaning that there is no person who will make the difficult decisions needed to successfully organize anything of note. Networks aren’t good at getting important things done. And important things need to get done for any movement to be successful.
In order to use social media to promote your advocacy, online activist need to know the effects social media has on activism. The first effect of communication is audience engagement is needed. Many of the issues that went viral like the ALS ice bucket challenge had some sort of audience appeal. The supporters were doing an action and challenging their friends to do it also. By doing that, it was raising awareness and gaining donations. On the word of an article about the ice bucket challenge stated, its playing on what you know young people do, and you are using that to create this awareness and raise money (Madison). This generation is always trying to outdo themselves, who is going to be the next big youtube sensation. The winners of this knowledge monopoly is all the groups whose activism worked and got recognition. The losers are the advocates whose issues got "liked" by slacktivist, maybe someone shared a post but it did not go viral. Secondly, putting activism on social media is a given, it is a place where the supporters are already at. In an article in Psychology Today, Pamela Rutledge, PH.D. says social media is changing public awareness by the word of mouth persuasion (Rutledge). Social media users often connect to those who have their same views, finding supporters of an issue or cause on social media should amplify the advocacy. For example, according to the article in the Sentinel, since the ice bucket challenge went viral, the ALS Association has seen more than one million new donors and received more than 80 million dollars in donations as of August 2014 (Madison). Even though the ALS ice bucket challenge was a success and proves activism on social media can work it can set up some advocates for failure. The unexpected consequences of the effects on social media activism is that people are thinking that they can do the next ice
For example, in Saleem Kassim views, “As a result of the many technological advancements and innovations that have revolutionized how individuals communicate, an abundance of information has become available to everyone.” Saleem Kassim’s point is that anyone and everybody can put out information that can be seen by everyone when you are an internet user. For example, the news can tell you that there’s nothing happening in a certain country; whereas, someone from that country can post on twitter and upload videos showing anyone that decides to see the truth of what is really happening in their country. Kassim also states, “Ultimately, public information supplied by social networking websites has played an important role during modern-day activism, specifically as it pertains to the Arab Spring.” In other words, Kassim believes that digital communication has brought people together to fight for something that is a good cause. To have people aware of the truth and to have someone do something about it. Indeed it is highly likely that we bring people together for a good cause but digital communication can also cause a downside through having no censorship on what you post. When more people are brought up of current events trending they decide to hope on board to see if there is anything they can do to help. Not to mention, Graff and Birkenstein view it the same way. Like I mentioned earlier, Graff and
The Arab Spring has impacted multiple countries in northern Africa and the Arab world and so far since the end of December in 2010, leading to the fall of the government in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen. Among the unarmed insurrections, social media and social networking technology functioned as a new strategy that empowered the protesters to gain successful uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt and inspired grassroots movements in other Arab countries.
The number of revolutions in the last 3 decades has increased, and seems to keep increasing. Civil unrest and protests brought many victims including civil and political figures throughout the world. In the era where technology is at the peak of its success, especially in communication technologies, mankind suffers from lack of communication. Problem is not caused by the technology itself, the problem is in human nature. I will continue with an analogy. Man invented the knife, which is very useful tool in our daily lives. The problem occurs when one thinks about the purposes that knife could be used. Story repeats itself with Newspapers and News Media. Technology improved the speed and the size that news can reach anywhere in couple of seconds. In a few seconds we can reach our friend at the other pole of the globe and receive pictures and live videos in response. We can send information, receive it and even create it in the artificial world. Life has become easier with technology. We can control our cell phones with voice command and reserve a table in the closest restaurant for dinner. Technology is everywhere in our lives, but if we think for a second the purposes we could use them for then the danger begins. In this short essay I will be talking about the struggle of mankind for freedom and the stages it went through. There are 3 parts to my paper. In the first part I will discuss the birth of World Wide Web and how the purpose of it went through changes. In the second part, I will be talking about birth of newspapers in the Web, precisely how it developed into an intermediate body that transfers information to people. Ultimately, I will discuss the Ukrainian revolution and the role of the news media in it and ho...
From the words of United States President Barack Obama "Call your members of Congress. Write them an email. Tweet it using the hashtag #My2K." (Coffee). Social media has played an increasing and larger part in today's government. Social media has the power to influence elections and connect the people to the policy makers in new ways.
On social media, each individual has the power to be influential and important. There is a freedom of expression on social media that we are allowed to express. A user on Facebook can post anything they want or anything they want for free.... ... middle of paper ... ...