The Role Of Social Media Activism In The United States

With the rise of the internet and social media, many aspects of American life have changed, including how today’s important issues are handled. A new form of activism has emerged: one conducted mostly online, known as social media activism, or online social justice, using websites, like Twitter and Facebook, most commonly used to contact friends and create and share content. However, as social media activism rises, so too do criticisms of the movement. While these criticisms are valid and should be considered, social media is not often credited enough for its ability to aid the forward progression of the country. Online social justice in the U.S. is an effective form of social justice because it makes politics accessible to many people, lends

Because social media is so accessible, it has become easier to use it as a tool to become involved politically. A 2009 study released by the Pew Foundation reported that nearly 37 percent of internet users between 18 and 29 engaged with the internet as a form of political and civic participation (LaRiviere et al. 11). In addition, for students under 30, 39 percent reported using social media for political use. Additionally, the popularity and accessibility mean there are new forms of political participation that can be conducted mostly on social media. Users can post original content and have it find eyes immediately, and this starts important conversations and occasionally yields real-word results. Take Twitter hashtags for example: in 2015, journalist April Reign started #OscarsSoWhite, a thread criticizing the lack of non-white Oscar nominees in the award show’s major acting categories. It quickly snowballed on Twitter, garnering the attention of thousands of Twitter users and notable celebrities, in addition to making the news. It ended with tangible results: the Academy pledged to double the number of minorities in its ranks by 2020 (Wortham 22). For another example, in 2010, Sharon Joy Showalter started a movement on Facebook by posting about a letter from the Attorney General of Virginia, in which he mentioned his refusal to write protections against

For example, after five police officers were killed during a protest in Dallas, the Dallas Police Department tweeted a photo of an armed man they believed to be a suspect. Within two hours, Twitter users quickly corrected the mistake, providing alibis for the man, Tweeting photos of him without his gun at the time of the shooting (Wortham 22). Furthermore, after riots erupted in Ferguson, protesting the shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old, social media was where most people received their news, before media outlets even began to cover the story. Even then, outlets like MSNBC and CNN continued to rely on social media as their main source of information (Ross-Brown 15). Had it not been for Twitter and citizen journalism, the Black Lives Matter movement that grew out of these protests may not have mobilized in the first place, or reached the audience it did. Additionally, 56 percent of Americans carry smartphones that can take videos, and this fact is significant because it provides the general public with the opportunity to document and share instances of discrimination. Smartphones are what secured evidence of a police officer’s use of an illegal chokehold in the murder of Eric Garner, capturing videos that generated public outcry (Bonilla and Rosa 5). In this way, the internet allows Americans