tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/online-activism-19624/articlesOnline activism – The Conversation2024-03-28T05:59:11Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2267562024-03-28T05:59:11Z2024-03-28T05:59:11ZInstagram and Threads are limiting political content. This is terrible for democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/584705/original/file-20240327-24-b0sz75.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=556%2C440%2C4940%2C3476&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/neon-signage-xv7-GlvBLFw">Prateek Katyal/Unsplash</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Meta’s Instagram and Threads apps are “slowly” rolling out a change that will <a href="https://about.instagram.com/blog/announcements/continuing-our-approach-to-political-content-on-instagram-and-threads">no longer recommend political content</a> by default. The company defines political content broadly as being “potentially related to things like laws, elections, or social topics”.</p>
<p>Users who follow accounts that post political content will still see such content in the normal, algorithmically sorted ways. But by default, users will not see any political content in their feeds, stories or other places where <em>new</em> content is recommended to them. </p>
<p>For users who want political recommendations to remain, Instagram has a new setting where users can turn it back on, making this an “opt-in” feature.</p>
<p>This change not only signals Meta’s retreat from politics and news more broadly, but also challenges any sense of these platforms being good for democracy at all. It’s also likely to have a chilling effect, stopping content creators from engaging politically altogether.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-curry-nights-to-coal-kills-dresses-how-social-media-drives-politicians-to-behave-like-influencers-190246">From curry nights to ‘coal kills’ dresses: how social media drives politicians to behave like influencers</a>
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<h2>Politics: dislike</h2>
<p>Meta has long had a problem with politics, but that wasn’t always the case.</p>
<p>In 2008 and 2012, political campaigning <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19331681.2016.1163519">embraced social media</a>, and Facebook was seen as especially important in Barack Obama’s success. The Arab Spring was painted as a social-media-led “Facebook Revolution”, although Facebook’s role in these events was <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/2012/11/28/role-social-media-arab-uprisings/">widely overstated</a>, </p>
<p>However, since then the spectre of political manipulation in the wake of the 2018 Cambridge Analytica scandal has soured social media users toward politics on platforms.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cambridge-analytica-scandal-facebooks-user-engagement-and-trust-decline-93814">Cambridge Analytica scandal: Facebook's user engagement and trust decline</a>
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<p>Increasingly polarised politics, vastly increased mis- and disinformation online, and Donald Trump’s preference for social media over policy, or truth, have all taken a toll. In that context, Meta has already been reducing <a href="https://about.fb.com/news/2021/02/reducing-political-content-in-news-feed/">political content recommendations</a> on their main Facebook platform since 2021. </p>
<p>Instagram and Threads hadn’t been limited in the same way, but also ran into problems. Most recently, the Human Rights Watch <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/12/20/meta-systemic-censorship-palestine-content">accused Instagram</a> in December last year of systematically censoring pro-Palestinian content. With the new content recommendation change, Meta’s response to that accusation today would likely be that it is applying its political content policies consistently.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person holding a smartphone displaying an instagram profile at a high angle against a city backdrop." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/584952/original/file-20240328-30-jfkoff.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Instagram has no shortage of political content from advocacy and media organisations.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/high-angle-photo-of-person-holding-turned-on-smartphone-with-tall-buildings-background-WUmb_eBrpjs">Jakob Owens/Unsplash</a></span>
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<h2>How the change will play out in Australia</h2>
<p>Notably, many Australians, especially in younger age groups, <a href="https://www.canberra.edu.au/about-uc/media/newsroom/2023/june/digital-news-report-australia-2023-tiktok-and-instagram-increase-in-popularity-for-news-consumption,-but-australians-dont-trust-algorithms">find news on Instagram</a> and other social media platforms. Sometimes they are specifically seeking out news, but often not. </p>
<p>Not all news is political. But now, on Instagram by default no news recommendations will be political. The serendipity of discovering political stories that motivate people to think or act will be lost.</p>
<p>Combined with Meta <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/mar/01/facebook-news-tab-shut-down-end-australia-journalism-funding-deals">recently stating</a> they will no longer pay to support the Australian news and journalism shared on their platforms, it’s fair to say Meta is seeking to be as apolitical as possible.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-will-metas-refusal-to-pay-for-news-affect-australian-journalism-and-our-democracy-224872">How will Meta's refusal to pay for news affect Australian journalism – and our democracy?</a>
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<h2>The social media landscape is fracturing</h2>
<p>With Elon Musk’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-elon-musk-is-obsessed-with-casting-x-as-the-most-authentic-social-media-platform-210956">disastrous Twitter rebranding to X</a>, and TikTok <a href="https://theconversation.com/if-tiktok-is-banned-in-the-us-or-australia-how-might-the-company-or-china-respond-225889">facing the possibility of being banned</a> altogether in the United States, Meta appears as the most stable of the big social media giants.</p>
<p>But with Meta positioning Threads as a potential new town square while Twitter/X burns down, it’s hard to see what a town square looks like without politics. </p>
<p>The lack of political news, combined with a lack of any news on Facebook, may well mean young people see even less news than before, and have less chance to engage politically. </p>
<p>In a Threads discussion, Instagram Head Adam Mosseri made the <a href="https://www.threads.net/@mosseri/post/CuZ6opKtHva">platform’s position clear</a>:</p>
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<p>Politics and hard news are important, I don’t want to imply otherwise. But my take is, from a platform’s perspective, any incremental engagement or revenue they might drive is not at all worth the scrutiny, negativity (let’s be honest), or integrity risks that come along with them.</p>
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<p>Like for Facebook, for Instagram and Threads politics is just too hard. The political process and democracy can be pretty hard, but it’s now clear that’s not Meta’s problem.</p>
<h2>A chilling effect on creators</h2>
<p>Instagram’s <a href="https://about.instagram.com/blog/announcements/continuing-our-approach-to-political-content-on-instagram-and-threads">announcement</a> also reminded content creators their accounts may no longer be recommended due to posting political content.</p>
<p>If political posts were preventing recommendation, creators could see the exact posts and choose to remove them. Content creators <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300264753/not-getting-paid-to-do-what-you-love/">live or die by the platform’s recommendations</a>, so the implication is clear: avoid politics. </p>
<p>Creators already spend considerable time trying to interpret what content platforms prefer, building <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444819854731">algorithmic</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/01634437221077174">folklore</a> about which posts do best.</p>
<p>While that folklore is sometimes flawed, Meta couldn’t be clearer on this one: political posts will prevent audience growth, and thus make an already precarious living harder. That’s the definition of a political chilling effect.</p>
<p>For the audiences who turn to creators because they are <a href="https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/26365/ada08-commu-abi-2015.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">perceived to be relatable and authentic</a>, the absence of political posts or positions will likely stifle political issues, discussion and thus ultimately democracy. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/C41CueKvYaF/?hl=en\u0026img_index=3","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<h2>How do I opt back in?</h2>
<p>For Instagram and Threads users who want these platforms to still share political content recommendations, follow these steps:</p>
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<li>go to your Instagram profile and click the three lines to access your settings.</li>
<li>click on Suggested Content (or Content Preferences for some).</li>
<li>click on Political content, and then select “Don’t limit political content from people that you don’t follow”.</li>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/social-media-apps-have-billions-of-active-users-but-what-does-that-really-mean-226021">Social media apps have billions of 'active users'. But what does that really mean?</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/226756/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tama Leaver receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child.</span></em></p>A new change to Meta’s apps will see users no longer recommended political content by default. The ramifications of this will be far-reaching.Tama Leaver, Professor of Internet Studies, Curtin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2235522024-02-15T02:49:22Z2024-02-15T02:49:22ZThe Jewish creatives’ WhatsApp leak was more whistleblowing than doxing. Here’s why<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/575762/original/file-20240215-30-wzbohm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=98%2C35%2C5829%2C3952&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/woman-in-white-shirt-holding-black-iphone-4-VGmgsDsck58">Miquel Parera/Unsplash</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Debate around doxing is raging in Australia after the <a href="https://theconversation.com/doxing-or-in-the-public-interest-free-speech-cancelling-and-the-ethics-of-the-jewish-creatives-whatsapp-group-leak-223323">leak of a WhatsApp chat group</a> called “Jewish Australian creatives and academics”. While the group was formed as a supportive space, some of its conversations focused on challenging media critiques of Israel.</p>
<p>The leakers have <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/C3MIOyySAfM/?hl=en&img_index=1">stated they acted in the public interest</a>, because they claim the chat group was coordinating actions to target pro-Palestinian activists.</p>
<p>The Australian government has reacted to this episode with a move to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-02-13/federal-government-to-criminalise-doxxing/103458052">criminalise doxing</a> and introduce jail terms for culprits. </p>
<p>But was this leak actually <a href="https://www.esafety.gov.au/industry/tech-trends-and-challenges/doxing">doxing</a>? Terms like this are always up for debate, but the government’s own definition throws up questions about this case. </p>
<h2>Personal information</h2>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-02-13/federal-government-to-criminalise-doxxing/103458052">Prime Minister Anthony Albanese</a> and <a href="https://ministers.ag.gov.au/media-centre/transcripts/media-conference-parliament-house-13-02-2024">Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus</a>, doxing is the “malicious release” of someone’s personal information without their consent.</p>
<p>The first question here is one of personal information. Was any personal information actually leaked? </p>
<p>Early <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/hundreds-of-jewish-creatives-have-names-details-taken-in-leak-published-online-20240208-p5f3if.html">media reports stated</a> the leak contained a transcript of chat discussions. A separate spreadsheet was reportedly circulated that contained a list of the group members’ names, workplaces, social media accounts, as well as people’s photographs.</p>
<p>Those who released the information <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/C3MIOyySAfM/?hl=en&img_index=5">say they scrubbed any details</a> that could be used to track people down, such as phone numbers and email addresses. They also say no private photographs were released, nor any photos of children. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-doxing-and-how-can-you-protect-yourself-223428">What is doxing, and how can you protect yourself?</a>
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<p>This is very different to other high-profile doxing events. For example, in 2018, men’s rights activists ran a campaign called #ThotAudit in which they tried to report online sex workers to the US Internal Revenue Service.</p>
<p>Some participants <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy7wyw/thotaudit-databases-of-sex-workers-and-reporting-them-to-paypal">compiled a detailed database of sex workers</a>, containing more than 166,000 entries, which included full names, locations, links to wish lists, types of payment processors and bios. This campaign <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2018/11/30/18119688/thotaudit-sex-work-irs-online-harassment">was part of a long history</a> of sex workers being publicly exposed, and resulted in significant, personalised harassment of those on the list. </p>
<p>Some will say that releasing a list of names is itself doxing. But this is very murky. If participants need to be anonymous to join a cause – for example, for their own safety – there might be a case. But many of the participants in this WhatsApp chat were already high-profile people. </p>
<p>Therefore, the WhatsApp chat leak seems less like a case of doxing, and more like a leak of how groups organise around their political agendas. Similar leaks have exposed the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-26/secret-recordings-show-one-nation-staffers-seeking-nra-donations/10936052">links between Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party</a> and the US National Rifle Association, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/did-the-morrison-government-change-the-relationship-between-religion-and-politics-in-australia-190650">connections between Pentecostal Christian churches and politicians</a>.</p>
<p>I would argue this action was more in line with whistleblowing, not doxing. Whistleblowing is the release of information revealing activities that are deemed to be illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe or fraudulent.</p>
<p>These terms are also very much up for debate, but the publishers of this list believed the activity within to be immoral, and therefore within the public interest.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/doxing-or-in-the-public-interest-free-speech-cancelling-and-the-ethics-of-the-jewish-creatives-whatsapp-group-leak-223323">Doxing or in the public interest? Free speech, 'cancelling' and the ethics of the Jewish creatives' WhatsApp group leak</a>
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<h2>Malicious intent</h2>
<p>This leads to the second question, which is one of intent. The government claims the leak was done <a href="https://ministers.ag.gov.au/media-centre/transcripts/media-conference-parliament-house-13-02-2024">with malicious intent</a>, and this claim has been <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/radionational-drive/one-third-of-australian-children-can-t-read-properly/103457018">backed by the opposition</a> and organisations such as <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/doxxing-laws-to-be-brought-forward-after-jewish-whatsapp-leak-20240212-p5f4cc.html">the Executive Council of Australian Jewry</a>. </p>
<p>Yet the malicious intent is also up for debate. The release of this chat cannot be isolated from its content. This was, by and large, not simply a group of people having friendly conversations.</p>
<p>Some people in the group were high-profile supporters of Israel in Australia. Members also used the chat to organise politically, with some conversations allegedly centred on ways to target pro-Palestinian activists.</p>
<p>This creates a clear political reason for the release of the information. There is of course a reasonable debate here as to which private discussions of political issues are fair game, and everyone will have a different view.</p>
<p>But the political nature of the chat moves this incident closer to being a political leak or whistleblowing rather than doxing. </p>
<p>This does not mean the leakers are immune to criticism, either. There were harms associated with their actions. Members of the WhatsApp chat <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/09/josh-burns-jewish-whatsapp-group-channel-publication-israel-palestine-clementine-ford">have reported</a> they have been subjected to harassment, including death threats. This includes some who <a href="https://twitter.com/GingerGorman/status/1754680956760543247">were not actively participating</a> in the chat, and have since disowned the group’s conversations.</p>
<p>This fallout can and should be pursued by authorities under current anti-harassment legislation. Yet we must be careful about blaming those who leak material for this behaviour.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-government-wants-to-criminalise-doxing-it-may-not-work-to-stamp-out-bad-behaviour-online-223546">The government wants to criminalise doxing. It may not work to stamp out bad behaviour online</a>
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<p>Other examples of politically charged doxing help to illustrate this point. In the wake of the 2017 white supremacist Charlottesville riots in the United States, many anti-fascist organisers <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/150159/doxx-racist">tracked down and released</a> the names and details of participants using photographic evidence. In some instances this included details of where participants lived or worked. </p>
<p>This clearly meets the first part of the government’s definition of doxing. But it is debatable whether the anti-facist campaign was malicious or not.</p>
<p>While there were problems with this campaign, particularly as some people were wrongly identified, there is an ethical case to be made: people participating in violent white supremacist riots should be exposed so their community is aware of their actions. This made the Charlottesville leak political, rather than personally malicious.</p>
<p>This is where the risk lies in banning doxing if the definition of what that means is left too broad. By the government’s current definition, the WhatsApp leak seems more like an act of whistleblowing.</p>
<p>A legislative ban could therefore have a much broader impact than criminalising the release of personal information. Instead, it could result in further crackdowns on political activities, and serve to weaken the accountability of people with power. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australia-is-in-desperate-need-of-a-whistleblower-protection-authority-heres-what-it-should-look-like-223295">Australia is in desperate need of a Whistleblower Protection Authority. Here's what it should look like</a>
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<p><em>Correction: This article has been amended to clarify that there were two separate reported instances of information being released about the chat group and its participants.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223552/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Copland has signed a statement of solidarity with Palestine from academics in Australian universities.</span></em></p>If doxing is the malicious release of someone’s personal information without their consent, publicising politically charged discussions in a private chat group may not qualify.Simon Copland, Honorary Fellow in Sociology, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2158822023-10-24T05:04:10Z2023-10-24T05:04:10ZIn times of war, digital activism has power. Here’s how to engage responsibly<p>As armed conflict continues to play out in the Israel–Gaza war, a separate battle is raging to control the narrative being presented to the world.</p>
<p>Eyewitness accounts, verified facts and culturally sensitive reporting are competing with <a href="https://www.reuters.com/fact-check/">misinformation</a>, political propaganda and irresponsible journalism. </p>
<p>This information warfare has real-world consequences. <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/16/mapping-protests-held-in-solidarity-with-palestine">Pro-Palestinian</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/gaza-israel-palestinians-hamas-photos-dbb56b035cad95b38e6036d6ec4f9512">pro-Israeli</a> protests organised through social media have drawn tens of thousands of people onto the streets, despite <a href="https://apnews.com/article/france-israel-palestinians-war-protests-banned-5626bafec480b32226dcb97d0c92a553">anti-protest measures</a> adopted in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/france-germany-palestinian-supporters-say-they-struggle-be-heard-2023-10-19/">some countries</a>.</p>
<p>The horrific events of the war, along with responses from across the world, underscore the dangers of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/17/left-on-the-shelf-how-the-world-failed-miserably-in-the-middle-east">diplomatic inaction</a>. They also raise questions about the role digital activism plays in shaping the power dynamics that govern war and politics.</p>
<h2>Irresponsible messaging fans the flames</h2>
<p>In the Israel-Gaza war, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/10/18/hamas-social-media-terror/">Hamas is spreading propaganda</a> on platforms including Telegram and X, while Israel’s broad propaganda efforts include <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/israel-social-media-opinion-hamas-war">paid ads showing images of brutal violence</a> on X and YouTube. </p>
<p>Nor can traditional media be blindly considered a reliable source of facts. Conflict reporting often <a href="https://kvinnatillkvinna.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/11-Peace-journalism-ENG.pdf">focuses on specific violent events</a> while ignoring their context, and news outlets have also <a href="https://twitter.com/BBCMaryam/status/1713954615618638135">made misleading and unsubstantiated claims in their reporting</a>. </p>
<p>At the same time, <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/atrocity-alert-no-369-israel-and-occupied-palestinian-territory-myanmar-burma-and-mali">access for journalists and investigators is extremely limited</a> and responsibility for events such as the <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/18/where-in-gaza-is-al-ahli-arab-hospital-the-site-hit-amid-war-with-israel">deadly al-Ahli hospital blast</a> is highly contested and requires more impartial verified <a href="https://www.channel4.com/news/human-rights-investigators-raise-new-questions-on-gaza-hospital-explosion">evidence</a>.</p>
<h2>Real-world consequences</h2>
<p>Violence has spread well beyond Gaza. In the occupied West Bank, many Palestinians have been killed in attacks by <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/10/19/middleeast/west-bank-settler-attacks-israel-cmd-intl/index.html">Israeli settlers and forces</a>. </p>
<p>In the United States, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/15/palestinian-american-boy-stabbed-to-death-in-gaza-war-related-killing-in-us">a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy was stabbed to death</a> and his mother wounded in an Islamophobic, anti-Palestinian attack. </p>
<p>In France, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/suspect-fatal-stabbing-french-teacher-pledged-allegiance-islamic-state-2023-10-17/">a teacher was killed and three students wounded</a> in an Islamist attack at a school, and <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/france-on-alert-louvre-versailles-major-station-evacuated-after-bomb-threats-20231015-p5eccd.html">the Louvre was evacuated after bomb threats</a>. The country has enacted its highest state of security alert.</p>
<p>In the United Kingdom, Jewish schools have been closed in London and Jewish institutions across the country have reported a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-pm-sunak-says-there-has-been-disgusting-rise-antisemitic-incidents-2023-10-13/">400% spike in antisemitic incidents</a> since the war began. In Berlin, violence broke out as petrol bombs were <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67145473">thrown at a synagogue</a> in an antisemitic attack. </p>
<h2>What is ‘digital activism’?</h2>
<p>“Digital activism” can be thought of as any digitally enabled form of activism and political participation. For scholars, digital activism is a conceptual troublemaker that is considered <a href="https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/51856/1/9783110740202.pdf#page=200">broad, ambiguous and contested</a>. But its function is especially significant in times of conflict and war.</p>
<p>So, does digital activism actually lead to change? What are its implications, and limitations?</p>
<h2>Digital activism as a productive force</h2>
<p>The impacts of digital activism can be varied. In the Black Lives Matter movement, digital activism was used to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1106571">articulate counternarratives</a> and <a href="https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/download/4947/3821">reframe major controversies</a> in ways that engendered social and political action. </p>
<p>In the Syrian refugee crisis, it helped galvanise the public into <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1369118X.2017.1290129">rapid action</a>. It was also used to coordinate <a href="https://www.routledge.com/International-and-Local-Actors-in-Disaster-Response-Responding-to-the-Beirut/Haddad/p/book/9781032119908">disaster response and financial assistance</a> in the wake of the 2020 Beirut explosion.</p>
<p>Digital activism helped <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1043319">build collective networks of solidarity</a> and resistance in social movements such as the 2011 Egyptian uprising and Occupy Wall Street. In the Russia–Ukraine war, it helped <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s42984-022-00054-5">shape participation</a> in conflict-related mobilisation. </p>
<p>And in the context of Israel and Palestine, research has shown digital activism can influence the opinions of both international and domestic audiences, which in turn directly affects events on the ground and the <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0022002716650925">dynamics of conflict</a>.</p>
<p>Citizens and public figures have taken to social media platforms to express outrage and solidarity, perform fact-checking, coordinate aid efforts and inject cultural and historical nuance into discussions. </p>
<p>Online accounts of events allow war to be studied using <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/17506352211037325">digital forensics</a>. They may also become evidence in open-source investigations into human rights violations, such as those conducted by <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/">Bellingcat</a> and <a href="https://forensic-architecture.org/">Forensic Architecture</a>. </p>
<p>Activists have also used platforms to counter state repression of information, helping them maintain political autonomy and control <a href="https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/13892/3236">how they are represented</a>. However, these platforms often also become <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2230260?scroll=top&needAccess=true">sites of control and censorship</a>.</p>
<h2>Digital activism as a weapon</h2>
<p>While digital activism can serve productive purposes, it can also have unintended and disastrous consequences. Digital activists on mainstream social media platforms must navigate a highly complex online landscape.</p>
<p>The battle to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369118X.2023.2230260?scroll=top&needAccess=true">control the narrative of war</a> in these spaces has become almost as intense as the physical acts that define war. </p>
<p>Digital rights groups monitoring regional social media activity <a href="https://theintercept.com/2023/10/18/gaza-hospital-instagram-facebook-censored/">say the censorship</a> of pro-Palestinian voices is at a level not seen since the May 2021 Israel-Palestine conflict. <a href="https://twitter.com/timothyjgraham/status/1714476333487861783?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet">Researchers say</a> the level of hate speech, mis- and disinformation on social media is at unprecedented levels. However, it can’t be studied systematically because tools to assess the impact are not available for independent verification.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/social-media-platforms-are-complicit-in-censoring-palestinian-voices-161094">Social media platforms are complicit in censoring Palestinian voices</a>
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<p>There’s no shortage of posts using dehumanising language and disinformation to delegitimise the suffering of Palestinians. People who rush to publish content without verifying it can end up doing harm.</p>
<h2>How to engage responsibly</h2>
<p>For those of us bearing witness to the events unfolding, there are ways we can act responsibly and humanely to maximise benefit and minimise harm.</p>
<p><strong>1. Develop critical media literacy skills</strong> </p>
<p>Before you share something online, verify whether the information is substantiated. Seek out sources such as <a href="https://www.reuters.com/fact-check/">Reuters Fact Check</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/FakeReporter">Fake Reporter</a> or <a href="https://twitter.com/marcowenjones">disinformation experts</a>, and develop fact-checking skills through <a href="https://toolbox.google.com/factcheck/explorer?authuser=0">tools</a> and <a href="https://www.poynter.org/ifcn/training-ifcn/">resources</a>.</p>
<p><strong>2. Build your cultural literacy</strong> </p>
<p>The history of the Israel–Palestine conflict is <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-gaza-strip-why-the-history-of-the-densely-populated-enclave-is-key-to-understanding-the-current-conflict-215306">complex and storied</a>. Digital activism based on ahistorical and culturally illiterate perspectives is unhelpful. </p>
<p>Before you share a post, take responsibility to educate yourself and reflect on your biases and knowledge limitations. The roots of this conflict have to be understood within a specific cultural, colonial and imperial historic context which dates back to the signing of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration#:%7E:text=The%20Balfour%20Declaration%20was%20a,a%20small%20minority%20Jewish%20population.">Balfour Declaration in 1917</a>. </p>
<p><strong>3. Foster tolerance</strong> </p>
<p>Pluralism and healthy debate are essential for democracy. We should find ways to have difficult but respectful conversations with people who have different views to us. It is important to have a media diet that exposes you to different perspectives. Without tolerance, we can’t recognise and reinforce our collective humanity.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=115&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=115&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=115&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=144&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=144&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498128/original/file-20221129-22-imtnz0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=144&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em>The Conversation is commissioning articles by academics across the world who are researching how society is being shaped by our digital interactions with each other. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/social-media-and-society-125586">Read more here</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/215882/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kelly Lewis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Accurate and fair information is critical in times of conflict such as the ongoing Israel-Gaza War. What is the role of digital activism in this context, and how does it shape real-world events?Kelly Lewis, Research Fellow in the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADM+S), and the Emerging Technologies Lab at Monash University, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1908362022-09-27T20:10:03Z2022-09-27T20:10:03Z‘Protestware’ is on the rise, with programmers self-sabotaging their own code. Should we be worried?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486674/original/file-20220927-21-j7bai9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C153%2C6024%2C3589&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/KgLtFCgfC28">Alexander Sinn/Unsplash</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In March 2022, the author of <a href="http://riaevangelist.github.io/node-ipc/">node-ipc</a>, a software library with <a href="https://www.npmjs.com/package/node-ipc">over a million weekly downloads</a>, deliberately <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/27/protestware-code-sabotage/">broke their code</a>. If the code discovers it is running within Russia or Belarus, it attempts to replace the contents of every file on the user’s computer with a heart emoji.</p>
<p>A software library is a collection of code other programmers can use for their purposes. The library node-ipc is used by <a href="https://vuejs.org/">Vue.js</a>, a framework that powers millions of websites for businesses such as Google, Facebook, and Netflix.</p>
<p>This <a href="https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2022-23812">critical security vulnerability</a> is just one example of a <a href="https://research.unimelb.edu.au/research-updates/the-emergence-of-political-protestware-in-the-software-ecosystem">growing trend</a> of programmers self-sabotaging their own code for political purposes. When programmers protest through their code – a phenomenon known as “protestware” – it can have consequences for the people and businesses who rely on the code they create.</p>
<h2>Different forms of protest</h2>
<p>My colleague <a href="https://raux.github.io/">Raula Gaikovina Kula</a> and I <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.01393">have identified</a> three main types of protestware.</p>
<p><strong>Malignant protestware</strong> is software that intentionally damages or takes control of a user’s device without their knowledge or consent.</p>
<p><strong>Benign protestware</strong> is software created to raise awareness about a social or political issue, but does not damage or take control of a user’s device.</p>
<p><strong>Developer sanctions</strong> are instances of programmers’ accounts being <a href="https://www.jessesquires.com/blog/2022/04/19/github-suspending-russian-accounts/">suspended</a> by the <a href="https://github.com/">internet hosting service</a> that provides them with a space to store their code and collaborate with others.</p>
<p>Modern software systems are prone to vulnerabilities because they rely on third-party libraries. These libraries are made of code that performs particular functions, created by someone else. Using this code lets programmers add existing functions into their own software without having to “<a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.12574">reinvent the wheel</a>”.</p>
<p>The use of third-party libraries <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2112.10165">is common</a> among programmers – it speeds up the development process and reduces costs. For example, libraries listed in the popular <a href="https://www.npmjs.com/">NPM registry</a>, which contains more than 1 million libraries, rely on an average of <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2205.13231">five to six</a> other libraries from the same <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-13-7099-1_6">ecosystem</a>. It’s like a car manufacturer who uses parts from other manufacturers to complete their vehicles.</p>
<p>These libraries are typically maintained by one or a handful of volunteers and made available to other programmers for free under an open-source software license.</p>
<p>The success of a third-party library is based on its reputation among programmers. A library builds its reputation over time, as programmers gain trust in its capabilities and the responsiveness of its maintainers to reported defects and feature requests.</p>
<p>If third-party library weaknesses are exploited, it could give attackers access to a software system. For example, a <a href="https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=cve-2021-44228">critical security vulnerability</a> was recently discovered in the popular <a href="https://logging.apache.org/log4j/">Log4j</a> library. This flaw could allow a remote attacker to access sensitive information that was logged by applications using Log4j – such as passwords or other sensitive data.</p>
<p>What if vulnerabilities are not created by an attacker looking for passwords, but by the programmer themselves with the intention to make users of their library aware of a political opinion? The emergence of protestware is giving rise to such questions, and responses are mixed.</p>
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<em>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-log4j-a-cybersecurity-expert-explains-the-latest-internet-vulnerability-how-bad-it-is-and-whats-at-stake-173896">What is Log4j? A cybersecurity expert explains the latest internet vulnerability, how bad it is and what's at stake</a>
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<h2>Ethical questions abound</h2>
<p>A <a href="https://blog.opensource.org/open-source-protestware-harms-open-source/">blog post</a> on the <a href="https://opensource.org/">Open Source Initiative site</a> responds to the rise of protestware stating “protest is an important element of free speech that should be protected” but concludes with a warning:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The downsides of vandalising open source projects far outweigh any possible benefit, and the blowback will ultimately damage the projects and contributors responsible.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>What is the main ethical question behind protestware? Is it ethical to make something worse in order to make a point? The answer to this question largely depends on the individual’s personal ethical beliefs.</p>
<p>Some people may see the impact of the software on its users and argue protestware is unethical if it’s designed to make life more difficult for them. Others may argue that if the software is designed to make a point or raise awareness about an issue, it may be seen as more ethically acceptable.</p>
<p>From a utilitarian perspective, one might argue that if a form of protestware is effective in bringing about a greater good (such as political change), then it can be morally justified.</p>
<p>From a technical standpoint, we are developing ways to automatically detect and counteract protestware. Protestware would be an <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/1710.01943">unusual</a> or <a href="https://arxiv.org/abs/2204.07363">surprising</a> event in the change history of a third-party library. Mitigation is possible through redundancies – for example, code that is similar or identical to other code in the same or different libraries.</p>
<p>The rise of protestware is a symptom of a larger social problem. When people feel they are not being heard, they may resort to different measures to get their message across. In the case of programmers, they have the unique ability to protest through their code.</p>
<p>While protestware may be a new phenomenon, it is likely here to stay. We need to be aware of the ethical implications of this trend and take steps to ensure software development remains a stable and secure field.</p>
<p>We rely on software to run our businesses and our lives. But every time we use software, we’re putting our trust in the people who wrote it. The emergence of protestware threatens to destabilise this trust if we don’t take action.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-does-the-optus-data-breach-mean-for-you-and-how-can-you-protect-yourself-a-step-by-step-guide-191332">What does the Optus data breach mean for you and how can you protect yourself? A step-by-step guide</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190836/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christoph Treude does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Major companies around the world rely on third-party code. What happens when a programmer has a political point to make?Christoph Treude, Senior Lecturer in Software Engineering, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1662532021-09-28T11:57:01Z2021-09-28T11:57:01ZSocial media gives support to LGBTQ youth when in-person communities are lacking<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423023/original/file-20210923-21-1fxtf5g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C4%2C3000%2C2991&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Social media can provide ways for LGBTQ youth to learn more about, and stay connected to, their identities.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/celebrating-pride-on-social-media-royalty-free-illustration/1250449474">miakievy/DigitalVision Vectors via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Teens today have <a href="https://theconversation.com/yes-online-communities-pose-risks-for-young-people-but-they-are-also-important-sources-of-support-158276">grown up on the internet</a>, and social media has served as a space where LGBTQ youth in particular can develop their identities.</p>
<p>Scholarship about the online experiences of LGBTQ youth has traditionally focused on <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1007%2Fs40653-017-0175-7">cyberbullying</a>. But understanding both the risks and the benefits of online support is key to helping LGBTQ youth thrive, both on- and offline.</p>
<p>I am a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ZuHbDP0AAAAJ&hl=en">senior research scientist</a> studying the benefits and challenges of <a href="https://www.wcwonline.org/Youth-Media-Wellbeing-Research-Lab/youth-media-wellbeing-research-lab">teen social technology and digital media use</a>. My colleagues, <a href="https://wellesley.academia.edu/RachelHodes">Rachel Hodes</a> and <a href="https://www.wcwonline.org/Research-Associates/amanda-richer">Amanda Richer</a>, and I recently <a href="https://doi.org/10.2196/26207">conducted a study</a> on the social media experiences of LGBTQ youth, and we found that online networks can provide critical resources for them to explore their identities and engage with others in the community.</p>
<h2>Beyond cyberbullying</h2>
<p>The increased risk of cyberbullying that LGBTQ youth face is well-documented. LGBTQ youth are <a href="https://www.glsen.org/news/out-online-experiences-lgbt-youth-internet">almost three times more likely</a> to be <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1016%2Fj.chiabu.2014.08.006">harassed online</a> than their straight, cisgender peers. This can result in increased rates of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/19361653.2011.649616">depression and feelings of suicide</a>: 56% of sexual minorities experience depression, and 35% experience suicidal thoughts as a direct result of cyberbullying.</p>
<p>However, the digital landscape may be shifting.</p>
<p>Our 2019 survey of 1,033 children ages 10 to 16 found <a href="https://doi.org/10.2196/26207">no difference</a> between the amount of cyberbullying reported by straight versus sexual minority youth residing in a <a href="https://transgenderlawcenter.org/equalitymap">relatively progressive part of the U.S.</a> known for legalizing gay marriage. Some social media platforms like <a href="https://theconversation.com/theres-something-queer-about-tumblr-73520">Tumblr</a> are considered a safer haven for sexual minorities than others, especially during the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-young-lgbtqia-people-used-social-media-to-thrive-during-covid-lockdowns-156130">COVID-19 lockdown</a>. This is despite past <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/twitter-blocked-searches-lgbt-terms-bisexual-and-called-it-error-703550">censorship of LGBTQ content</a> on certain platforms due to biases in the algorithm.</p>
<p>LGBTQ youth tend to have <a href="https://doi.org/10.2196/26207">smaller online social networks</a> than their straight peers. We found that LGBTQ youth were significantly less likely than their straight peers to engage with their online friends. Conversely, LGBTQ youth are more likely to have friends they know only online, and to perceive these online friends as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2014.08.006">significantly more socially supportive</a> than their in-person friends. </p>
<p>The LGBTQ youth we surveyed in our study were more likely to join an online group in order to <a href="https://doi.org/10.2196/26207">reduce social isolation or feelings of loneliness</a>, suggesting that they were able to reach out to and engage with social media networks outside of their in-person peer circles in supportive and fortifying ways.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Person lying down with rainbow sock-clad legs resting on the back of a sofa." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423024/original/file-20210923-17-8xjgek.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">LGBTQ youth are less likely to be friends with family members online and more likely to join social media sites their parents would disapprove of.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/teenager-lyiing-down-with-her-legs-resting-on-the-royalty-free-image/1324272422">Vladimir Vladimirov/E+ via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Despite living in an area with higher levels of acceptance toward sexual minorities, our study participants felt a need to keep parts of their identities separate and hidden online. They were less likely than non-LGBTQ kids to be friends with family members online and more likely to join social media sites their parents would disapprove of. And about 39% said they had no one to talk to about their sexual orientation at all.</p>
<h2>Not just surviving, but thriving online</h2>
<p>Despite the risk of online harassment and isolation, social media can give LGBTQ youth space to explore their sexual identities and promote <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.07.051">mental well-being</a>.</p>
<p>In 2007, Australian researchers conducted one of the earliest studies on how <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1363460707072956">internet communities serve as safe spaces for LGBTQ youth</a> who face hostile environments at home. Their surveys of 958 youth ages 14 to 21 found that the anonymity and lack of geographic boundaries in digital spaces provide an ideal practice ground for coming out, engaging with a communal gay culture, experimenting with nonheterosexual intimacy and socializing with other LGBTQ youth.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Illustration phone with rainbow heart on the screen, surrounded by positive reaction symbols." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=814&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=814&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=814&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1023&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1023&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/423031/original/file-20210923-23-ggu04o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1023&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Some LGBTQ youth use social media to engage with and support social causes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/diversity-on-social-media-royalty-free-illustration/1325416830">gobyg/DigitalVision Vectors via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>The internet also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1363460707072956">provides critical resources</a> about LGBTQ topics. LGBTQ youth may <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.06.009">use online resources</a> to educate themselves about sexual orientation and gender identity terminology, learn about gender transition and find LGBTQ spaces in their local community. The internet can also be a useful tool to identify LGBTQ-friendly <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69638-6_4">physicians, therapists and other care providers</a>.</p>
<p>Finally, online platforms can serve as springboards for LGBTQ activism. A <a href="https://www.glsen.org/news/out-online-experiences-lgbt-youth-internet">2013 report by the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network</a> surveying 1,960 LGBTQ youth ages 13 to 18 found that 77% had taken part in an online community supporting a social cause. While 68% of LGBTQ youth also volunteered in-person, 22% said they only felt comfortable getting involved online or via text. This signals that online spaces may be critical resources to foster civic engagement.</p>
<p>While social media is not without its dangers, it can often serve as a tool for LGBTQ youth to build stronger connections to both their local and virtual communities, and communicate about social issues important to them. </p>
<p>[<em>Insight, in your inbox each day.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=insight">You can get it with The Conversation’s email newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/166253/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Linda Charmaraman receives funding from the National Institutes of Health.</span></em></p>While online communities may not fully address the isolation LGBTQ youth face in-person, they can serve as an important source of social support and a springboard for civic engagement.Linda Charmaraman, Director of Youth, Media & Wellbeing Research Lab, Wellesley CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1633292021-06-29T15:18:43Z2021-06-29T15:18:43ZA decade since ‘the year of the hacktivist’, online protests look set to return<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408871/original/file-20210629-18-e1dmb4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3613%2C2400&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/mulhouse-france-17-january-2019-vendetta-1287142978">NeydtStock/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many of us vaguely remember the word “<a href="https://www.techopedia.com/definition/2410/hacktivism">hacktivism</a>” from a decade ago. This was a time before serious <a href="https://theconversation.com/ransomware-gangs-are-running-riot-paying-them-off-doesnt-help-155254">ransomware attacks</a> dominated current cybersecurity concerns, when certain hacking techniques were being used to send political messages to governmental and corporate entities.</p>
<p>Hacktivism has since <a href="https://www.darkreading.com/the-state-of-hacktivism-in-2020-/d/d-id/1338382">retreated</a> as a form of protest, in part due to the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/24/hacking-us-government-cyber-crackdown">prosecution</a> of prominent hacktivists, sometimes with what appear to be disproportionately <a href="https://theconversation.com/hactivists-arent-terrorists-but-us-prosecutors-make-little-distinction-45260">severe sentences</a>. But with the ongoing pandemic <a href="https://www.cityam.com/extinction-rebellion-cancels-london-protest-over-coronavirus/">restricting</a> physical protests <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)01239-3/fulltext">globally</a>, and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/22/curbs-on-protests-in-policing-bill-breach-human-rights-laws-mps-and-peers-say">new bills</a> being drawn up to curb offline protest, it looks as if hacktivism may be set for a return.</p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-030-55841-3_4">My research</a> into hacktivism and cybercrime helps place hacktivism in its historical context – from which we can understand how, where and why hackers may soon resort once again to digital protest across the world.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/beyond-hashtags-how-a-new-wave-of-digital-activists-is-changing-society-57502">Beyond hashtags: how a new wave of digital activists is changing society</a>
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<p>Hacktivism may have reached its peak a decade ago, but it’s been a feature of online activism since the <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/04/29/hacktivism-a-short-history/">early popularisation</a> of the internet. Major hacktivist groups, such as the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Electronic-Disturbance-Theater">Electronic Disturbance Theater</a>, the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20080226121652/http://www.networkworld.com/research/2000/0529feat2.html">Electrohippies</a> and <a href="https://www.hacktivismo.com/">Hacktivismo</a>, were already active in the late 1990s. <a href="http://oro.open.ac.uk/5089/">At the time</a>, they supported the <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexicos-masked-marxists-meet-the-zapatistas-21726">Zapatista</a> movement in Mexico, protested global wealth inequality and flagged security issues in popular software.</p>
<p>Even traditional activist groups – such as <a href="https://wayback.archive-it.org/9650/20200403205550/http://p3-raw.greenpeace.org/international/en/news/features/bhopal-protests-move-online/">Greenpeace</a> and the German anti-racist collective <a href="http://www.kein-mensch-ist-illegal.org/">Kein Mensch ist illegal</a> – were known to use hacktivist protest tactics long before its rise to global prominence. </p>
<p>In fact, Kein Mensch ist illegal led a “collective blockade” of Lufthansa’s website in 2001 to <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1399685.stm">protest</a> the airline’s cooperation with the German government’s deportation policies. <a href="https://edri.org/our-work/edrigramnumber4-11demonstration/">A Frankfurt Appeals court</a> would eventually rule that this hacktivist activity amounted to freedom of expression – not criminal activity – but this legal precedent was not followed by courts <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783319717579">elsewhere</a>.</p>
<h2>Hacktivism’s heyday</h2>
<p>Hacktivism began attracting global attention when <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/books/2027-hacker-hoaxer-whistleblower-spy">Anonymous</a> – a loose collective of hackers, politicised internet users, trolls and pranksters – decided to focus on political issues. The collective targeted the <a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/anonymous-hackers-take-on-the-church-of-scientology/">Church of Scientology</a> for censoring online content in 2008, and mobilised to protect whistleblower websites such as <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/deciphering-the-murky-world-of-hackers-supporting-wikileaks">WikiLeaks</a> in 2010, among <a href="https://resources.infosecinstitute.com/topic/a-history-of-anonymous/">various other</a> actions with national and international implications. The activities of Anonymous would eventually lead major cybersecurity companies to characterise 2011 as the “<a href="https://www.sophos.com/medialibrary/PDFs/other/SophosSecurityThreatReport2012.ashx">year of the hacktivist</a>”. </p>
<p>Soon, hacktivist groups were springing up across the world. Anonymous itself sported many national branches, and these groups contributed to common political struggles at the same time as weighing in during local uprisings. For instance, Anonymous took down dozens of the <a href="https://thehackernews.com/2012/12/anonymous-hit-egyptian-government.html">Egyptian government’s websites</a> in 2012 during the Arab Spring protests.</p>
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<p>This explosion in hacktivist activity did not go unpunished, despite the hacktivist claim that online protest is <a href="https://slate.com/technology/2010/12/pro-wikileaks-denial-of-service-attacks-just-another-form-of-civil-disobedience.html">as valid</a> as offline protest. Some hacktivists were found to violate cybercrime laws, such as the UK’s <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1990/18/contents">Computer Misuse Act 1990</a>, and various protesters were prosecuted and convicted in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/24/anonymous-hackers-jailed-cyber-attacks">the UK</a> and <a href="http://sip-trunking.tmcnet.com/news/2011/09/01/5747845.htm">the US</a>. </p>
<p>Perhaps the most high-profile prosecution was that of the American internet wonder-kid <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ">Aaron Swartz</a>, who’d bypassed university cybersecurity safeguards in an <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/112418/aaron-swartz-suicide-why-he-broke-jstor-and-mit">attempt to download</a> and make public an entire database of academic papers. Swartz <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/aaron-swartz-suicide_n_2462819?ri18n=true">died by suicide</a> in the lead up to his trial, bringing US cybercrime laws and their <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jan/24/hacking-us-government-cyber-crackdown">aggressive enforcement</a> into question. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, cybercrime laws have only <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-030-55841-3_4">intensified</a> in the years since, forcing hacktivists into a retreat. But their tactics remain effective and, given that the pandemic has restricted our capability to conduct physical protests <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/world/year-covid-19-pandemic-s-impact-global-conflict-and-demonstration-trends">worldwide</a>, hacktivism could soon be redeployed as an alternative way of expressing dissent in the post-COVID era.</p>
<h2>Hacktivist tactics</h2>
<p><a href="http://www.alexandrasamuel.com/dissertation/pdfs/Samuel-Hacktivism-frontmatter.pdf">Traditionally</a>, hacktivists have tried to mimic offline forms of protest and civil disobedience, but in the online space. They’ve used website defacements, often called “<a href="https://www.sitepoint.com/graffiti-artists-internet/">internet graffiti</a>”, to scrawl political messages on targeted websites. And <a href="https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/denial-service-dos-guidance-collection">denial of service</a> (DoS) attacks, which are designed to overwhelm a website with traffic in order to make it crash, are also common. Hacktivists often call these virtual sit-ins.</p>
<p>In contrast to internet graffiti, which can be facilitated by a single skilled hacker, virtual sit-ins require mass participation. That makes these protests far more democratically legitimate and impactful – as well as sharing the criminal liability among the virtual protesters. </p>
<p>I’ve highlighted the <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783319717579">positive aspects</a> of these tactics in my research, praising how they bring citizen dissent into the online environment while globalising important political causes. But virtual sit-ins also have financial implications for the attacked organisations and <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783319717579">systems</a>. Meanwhile, some commentators have criticised hacktivism as a form of empty “<a href="https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104302141&t=1624376009849">slacktivism</a>” which they say isn’t comparable to the political conscientiousness and resolution of street protests.</p>
<p>Although hacktivism in principle is all about promoting <a href="https://www.itpro.co.uk/hacking/30203/what-is-hacktivism">socially beneficial causes</a> while minimising harms, it can also become muddled with a less justifiable vigilantist rationale. For example, Anonymous members have in the past exposed the personal details of individuals such as <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/09/anonymous-goes-after-pepper-spray-cops-personal-info/337447/">police officers</a>, which puts them and their families at risk. Meanwhile, the hacktivist group <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/may/16/lulzsec-hacking-fbi-jail">Lulzsec</a> has been known to target big organisations for the sake of the challenge, rather than for a political purpose. Finally, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/27/india-pakistan-online-war-includes-hacks-social-media.html">nationalist hacktivists</a> have historically been involved in cross-border hacker wars which has, in some cases, escalated into real-world violence.</p>
<h2>Hacktivism’s revival?</h2>
<p>Irrespective of these criticisms, one can’t help but think that in the new post-pandemic era, with all of us spending much <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-55486157">more time online</a>, these political tactics could become popular again across the political spectrum. In fact, there have already been <a href="https://redrevolution.co.uk/2019/04/19/anonymous-declare-support-for-extinction-rebellion-in-italy-data-leaked-from-6-organizations/">activities</a> that indicate hacktivism may be becoming a side-tactic for groups such as <a href="https://extinctionrebellion.uk/2020/04/29/history-corner-how-murder-in-mexico-birthed-online-civil-disobedience/">Extinction Rebellion</a>, which has been reconsidering its future tactics in light of restrictions and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jun/26/12-arrested-raids-extinction-rebellion-london-protest">preemptive arrests</a>.</p>
<p>Hacktivism never went away entirely. Anonymous did in fact reemerge during the summer 2020 <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-52879000">Black Lives Matter</a> protests, targeting police forces’ websites with hacks. But we’re still in a transitional period, with organised hacktivist efforts far less common than they were a decade ago.</p>
<p>Yet the stage seems set for a third wave of hacktivism. New protest movements are gradually gaining traction with the public, and hacktivist activity could make for a popular alternative to in-person civil disobedience in a period when many of us are still concerned about COVID-19 transmission. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.undp.org/press-releases/worlds-largest-survey-public-opinion-climate-change-majority-people-call-wide">environmental</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html">anti-discrimination</a> movements grow internationally, and their underlying goals <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/george-floyd-protests-us-climate-change-strike-green-movement-a9544566.html">unite citizens</a> on a global scale, it’ll be fascinating to see whether hacktivist tactics can seriously contribute to galvanising change in an increasingly politicised world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/163329/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vasileios Karagiannopoulos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The hacktivist collective ‘Anonymous’ has become just that – but the hacktivism they espoused may be set to return.Vasileios Karagiannopoulos, Reader in Cybercrime and Cybersecurity, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1542872021-02-01T12:52:31Z2021-02-01T12:52:31ZIndia farmers’ protests: internet shutdown highlights Modi’s record of stifling digital dissent<p>The storming of the Red Fort in Delhi on January 26 marked an escalation of tensions between the Indian government – led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi – and farmers who have been protesting against agricultural reforms since August 2020. </p>
<p>With footage of the farmers clashing with police going viral, the Red Fort incident also marked a spike in interest in the farmers’ movement around the world, much to Modi’s embarrassment.</p>
<p>The authorities’ response to events at the Red Fort – a historic building symbolic of Indian independence, and located in the very heart of Old Delhi – was swift. Delhi Police shut down the city’s internet, affecting more than <a href="https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/farmers-protest-50-million-subscribers-hit-by-internet-shutdown-in-ncr-1763019-2021-01-27">52 million mobile phone subscribers</a>. The shutdown was <a href="https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/india-government-orders-shutdown-of-internet-services-in-parts-of-new-delhi-as-farmers-protest-turns-violent/">ostensibly in the interest of public safety</a>, but it’s also the latest episode in India’s long-running story of heavy-handed internet crackdowns – a strategy used time and again to quell swelling protest movements.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/indias-farmers-are-right-to-protest-against-agricultural-reforms-152726">India's farmers are right to protest against agricultural reforms</a>
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<p>India’s control over the internet is comparable to some of the world’s most authoritarian countries. While India ranks <a href="https://www.statista.com/topics/779/mobile-internet/">second in the world</a> in terms of mobile internet subscribers, the country also <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/global-5">leads in shutdowns</a>. They’re used with alarming regularity to disrupt protest movements and – in the case of Kashmir, currently under the world’s longest internet shutdown – to control entire populations.</p>
<p>During the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-50833361">Citizen Act protests</a> last year, shutdowns were used in Aligarh – home to the Aligarh Muslim University – one of the hubs of the protests, where <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/12/25/students-hand-amputated-as-violence-grips-citizenship-protests">severe police brutality</a> is alleged to have taken place. The Indian government implemented more than <a href="https://www.internetshutdowns.in/">106 internet shutdowns</a> in 2019 alone – the vast majority in response to protests.</p>
<p>This control is largely achieved via the Temporary Suspension of Telecom Services (Public Emergency or Public Safety) Rules, passed into law in 2017, which expanded the government’s powers for surveillance and connectivity suspension, empowering it to control dissent and opposition. </p>
<p>In Kashmir, where there are tight restrictions on the rights to free expression, speech and assembly, internet shutdowns function as an “<a href="https://www.dw.com/en/indias-internet-shutdowns-function-like-invisibility-cloaks/a-55572554">invisibility cloak</a>” to crack down on dissent and isolate Kashmiris from the rest of the world. Because India’s supreme court has ruled that “indefinite internet shutdowns” are illegal, India’s government instead downgrades or “throttles” Kashmir’s mobile connectivity from 4G to 2G, seriously limiting what can be loaded on phones.</p>
<h2>Tractors and tear gas</h2>
<p>The recent events at the Red Fort also presented an example of India’s disinformation ecosystem. At a pivotal moment, some protesters raised a flag sacred to Sikhs next to the Indian flag, even as movement leaders pleaded with them to climb down. Hundreds of cameras caught the moment the flags where raised, uploading photos to social media.</p>
<p>These images were immediately seized upon by social media influencers loyal to Modi, who began a disinformation campaign which spread across the country, claiming the flag to be that of Khalistani separatists. In Modi’s India, separatists are often depicted as enemies of the state.</p>
<p>Disinformation spreads particularly quickly in India, where mobile internet packages make it cheaper to access social media than to run a Google search. This lack of “net neutrality” – favouring traffic to certain websites over others – discourages users from fact-checking what they see on social media.</p>
<p>In response to the fast-spreading flag disinformation, social media activists sympathetic to the farmers were quick to point out that the flag was the Sikh “Nishan Sahib”. They showed how the same flag is flown at all Sikh gurudwaras, used by regiments of the Indian army, and had even been sported by Modi while he campaigned in Punjab. It’s unclear how successful these efforts to neutralise “fake news” have been in a country with powerful state-backed media companies.</p>
<h2>Angry anchors</h2>
<p>Television anchors on state-backed news channels regularly tarnish protesting farmers as Khalistani separatists, Pakistani spies, members of the opposition Congress party, or communists. Using abusive words such as “behuda” (impudent), “badtameez” (ill-mannered), and “gunda” (goons), these anchors are aware that their language will inflame passions when cut into shorter clips for social media. These images achieve virality on WhatsApp and Facebook via common channels of circulation, drumming up support for the state’s crackdowns on dissent. </p>
<p>As with the flag dispute, India’s activists also know how to use the digital space to achieve their objectives. They post videos, release their own memes and hashtags, and are particularly strong at satire, humour, music and art. </p>
<p>By positioning cameras at key protest sites, clashes are recorded and live-streamed on social media, capturing alleged police brutality and heightening the pitch of public debate. Unfortunately, such tactics are often nullified by the state’s common default to full internet shutdowns. </p>
<p>And in a further move to shut down dissent, the <a href="https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/twitter-helps-govt-block-accounts-tweeting-on-farmer-protests-withholds-kem-and-other-accounts-1764784-2021-02-01">government recently reportedly sent</a> a legal notice to Twitter that led to the blocking of several accounts linked to the farmers’ protest – revealing the Modi administration’s ability to censor groups and individuals on specific platforms, too.</p>
<p>Beyond signalling the authoritarian drift of the “world’s largest democracy”, India’s internet shutdowns are also expensive affairs. Even as Modi promises to build a “digital India” to boost the country’s economy, his internet shutdowns <a href="https://www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/global-cost-of-internet-shutdowns-4-bn-in-2020-india-share-at-70-report-121010600972_1.html">are costing India US$2.8 billion (£2 billion) a year</a> – which equates to 70% of the global cost of shutting off the internet in 2020. That he is willing to foot this bill is indicative of how much is at stake for Modi. It is time for the world to take notice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154287/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Subir Sinha does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the protests escalate, Modi’s grip on India’s internet communications remains as tight as ever.Subir Sinha, Senior Lecturer in Institutions and Development, SOAS, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1482132020-10-29T16:50:39Z2020-10-29T16:50:39ZThis Halloween, witches are casting spells to defeat Trump and #WitchTheVote in the U.S. election<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366296/original/file-20201028-13-1ckudj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C5%2C3671%2C2442&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Witch-identified folks are sharing spells online in an act of magical resistance in advance of the U.S. election.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>This Halloween, the witches are coming — to the ballot box.</p>
<p>Using the hashtag #WitchTheVote, witch-identified folks are encouraging others who have an interest in the occult to get informed about political candidates and cast their vote in the U.S. presidential election Nov. 3. </p>
<p>Originally launched by a group of witches from Salem, Mass., during the lead-up to the 2018 midterm elections, <a href="https://www.witchthevote.com">#WitchTheVote</a> is a cross-media initiative that identifies and promotes — as one witch tells us — “witch-worthy” political candidates: those who are progressive and social justice oriented. It’s fitting political activism in a <a href="https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/10/30/16560092/salem-witch-trials-magic-halloween-witchcraft-arthur-miller-crucible-past">town known for the Salem witch trials and contemporary witch tourism</a>.</p>
<h2>Witching movements</h2>
<p>More than a hashtag, #WitchTheVote is also, according to the group, a “collective intersectional effort to direct our magic towards electing candidates who will push our country and our planet forward into the witch utopia we all envision.” </p>
<p>Here, intersectional feminist politics work alongside magic and creative media production to engage in political activism that includes advocacy around issues like affordable housing, reproductive rights and #BlackLivesMatter. #WitchTheVote runs a regular <a href="https://www.witchthevote.com/podcast">podcast</a> and has also made and distributed zines with information for prospective voters, including how to register to vote and how to check to ensure your mail-in ballot was received. </p>
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<p>This collective effort illustrates the ways in which “<a href="https://www.vox.com/2017/6/20/15830312/magicresistance-restance-witches-magic-spell-to-bind-donald-trump-mememagic">magical resistance</a>” has become a popular, women-led form of mediated, political activism since the election of Donald Trump in 2016.</p>
<h2>The resurgence of the witch</h2>
<p>#WitchTheVote is situated within a resurgence of witches in popular culture over the past four years. Between Netflix’s teen drama <em>The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina</em>, beauty retailer Sephora’s Starter Witch Kit (which was eventually removed due to backlash), the revival of the cult classics teen witch movie <em>The Craft</em> and <a href="https://www.wired.co.uk/article/witchcraft-tiktok">TikTok spell trends</a>, the witch is having a cultural moment. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dressed-to-kill-6-ways-horror-folklore-is-fashioned-in-the-movies-147835">Dressed to kill: 6 ways horror folklore is fashioned in the movies</a>
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<p>Books such as Pam Grossman’s <a href="https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Waking-the-Witch/Pam-Grossman/9781982100704"><em>Waking the Witch</em></a> (2019) have attracted widespread media attention, while <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/astrology-tarot-cards-mental-health_l_5df7b210e4b03aed50f25c30">public interest in astrology and tarot readings has also grown</a>. </p>
<p>Esthetically, witchcraft and mysticism circulate easily on visual social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok, where colourful crystals and elaborate altars make for beautiful photos and videos. From a branding perspective, the witch’s popularity makes sense within a larger cultural interest in spirituality, wellness and mysticism.</p>
<p>But there is also a case to be made for the very political nature of the witch. The archetype of the witch has a historical relationship with feminist activism. As an unruly figure and threat to the patriarchy, the witch is resistant, and has been used in <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/43gd8p/wicked-witch-60s-feminist-protestors-hexed-patriarchy">feminist protest since the 1960s</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/sirens-hags-and-rebels-halloween-witches-draw-on-the-history-of-womens-power-149110">Sirens, hags and rebels: Halloween witches draw on the history of women’s power</a>
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<p>At a moment of regressive politics marked by a resurgence of white supremacy, xenophobia and anti-feminist sentiments, coupled with the uncertainty of a global pandemic and the looming climate crisis, it is unsurprising that women and other marginalized folks are turning to witchcraft as a way to make sense of — and act upon — our current political, social and economic milieu. </p>
<h2>The digital coven</h2>
<p>It is perhaps the collectivist sentiment of contemporary witchcraft — belonging to something bigger, together — that is appealing. Indeed, #WitchTheVote’s mandate as a “collective intersectional effort” suggests the force of doing something together, yet attuned to the different experiences, including those related to race, class, sexuality, age and ability, that participants may face. </p>
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<p>And while not the only tool for mobilizing a collective, technology has become a significant connector for covens in recent years. Social media platforms, in particular, provide what some witches refer to as “<a href="https://hauswitchstore.com/blogs/community/tech-spells">globally accessible magic</a>.” </p>
<p>By embracing technology while recognizing its limitations and inherent oppressions, witches are engaging in new rituals with the intent of keeping their channels clear for maximum revolutionary power on an individual and collective level. </p>
<p>For example, upon Donald Trump’s election in 2016, witches began a monthly ritual of <a href="https://medium.com/defiant/use-this-spell-to-bind-trump-and-his-cronies-a5b6298f5c69">casting a spell to “bind” Trump</a>, preventing him from pursuing his agenda that many witches believe to be harmful. Some witches used platforms such as Facebook Messenger and Twitter to connect with other spell-casting witches at a designated time each month, ensuring that the “mass energy of the participants” is harnessed. </p>
<h2>Spells and rites</h2>
<p>Historically, spells often required very little in terms of commercial goods. Instead, witches relied on basic household items like candles and feminized rituals such as sweeping to engage in witchcraft. #WitchTheVote’s “<a href="https://www.witchthevote.com/spells/2020/3/31/a-multi-tasking-spell-for-mutual-aid-during-covid-19">A Multi-tasking Spell for Mutual Aid During COVID-19</a>” lists a pen, paper and “anything else that makes you feel like a witch” as necessary materials. Other spells recommend candles of any size and colour and dirt from your backyard. </p>
<p>The emphasis is not on the materials themselves, but instead engaging with rituals that help witches feel empowered through practices that provide a sense of routine, stability and purpose in unpredictable times.</p>
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<p>In the digital age, using the Internet as another avenue to practice witchcraft seems like a natural extension to the tradition of making do with the resources available to you. We may even think of emojis, shares, likes and retweets as possible technologies of magic when used with energetic intention to manifest social change. </p>
<p>And these practices are extensions of activist use of technologies such as feminist listservs, e-zines, chatrooms, homepages, feminist blogs and now, social media.</p>
<h2>Casting spells and votes</h2>
<p>In a political, cultural and economic moment in which many people feel a sense of hopelessness about the future, #WitchTheVote encourages activists to ground themselves through ritual and magical resistance. </p>
<p>They remind us of girls’ and women’s lengthy history in subverting repressive politics through focused collective action. In casting their votes along with their digital coven on Nov. 3, Salem’s activist witches hope to #WitchTheVote, one ballot at a time.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/148213/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jessalynn Keller receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alora Paulsen Mulvey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the U.S. election approaches, various groups have mobilized to vote. But witches have taken it a little further, organizing online spellcasting meet-ups to engage in magical resistance.Jessalynn Keller, Associate Professor in Critical Media Studies, University of CalgaryAlora Paulsen Mulvey, PhD Student, Department of Communication, Media and Film, University of CalgaryLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1466142020-10-12T14:35:22Z2020-10-12T14:35:22ZHow young, queer Nigerians use Twitter to shape identity and fight homophobia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/362961/original/file-20201012-15-111yxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Nigeria continues to be <a href="https://africanarguments.org/2019/08/14/nigeria-survey-shows-decrease-in-homophobic-attitudes-kind-of/">largely homophobic</a>, mainly as a result of cultural and religious conventions. Negative perceptions of homosexuality led to the <a href="https://www.refworld.org/pdfid/52f4d9cc4.pdf">criminalisation</a> of same-sex relations in 2014. The Nigerian environment is therefore toxic for LGBTI people. They become <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/10/20/tell-me-where-i-can-be-safe/impact-nigerias-same-sex-marriage-prohibition-act">easy prey</a> to oppressive and exploitative state security apparatus. They are also vulnerable to public “moral police” who seek to make homosexual performance invisible and closeted. </p>
<p>One may assume that the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-do-nigerian-gay-and-bisexual-men-cope-this-is-what-they-told-us-117121">marginalised</a> Nigerian same-sex community and its allies have conceded to the widespread societal ostracisation. But that would be to ignore the vigorous advocacies that have been going on in the country’s cultural production and on social media.</p>
<p>Films and literary texts have been the more <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/622200/pdf">studied</a> genres where same-sex agency has been iterated and reinforced. In <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-nollywood-to-new-nollywood-the-story-of-nigerias-runaway-success-47959">Nollywood</a> – the country’s film industry – early <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/465728/pdf">depictions</a> were <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/10509208.2020.1714324">constructed</a> by non-LGBTI people who seemed to latch on public inquisitiveness for financial gains. </p>
<p>More recently, however, members of the Nigerian queer community have taken over the task of shaping their public image and identity, to reasonable success, in these creative ventures. They have done so through movies as well as a growing body of <a href="https://theconversation.com/nigerias-queer-literature-offers-a-new-way-of-looking-at-blackness-133649">literary</a> writings.</p>
<p>Social media, however, can be considered more potent as a medium which, to the authors of <em><a href="https://books.google.co.za/books/about/The_Alternative_Media_Handbook.html?id=AFCzBqqaw-QC&redir_esc=y">The Alternative Media Handbook</a></em>, gives voice to “the socially, culturally and politically excluded”. </p>
<p>By unpacking “live” data from members of the queer community, one can identify the challenges as well as advocacies in Nigerian digital queer discourse. That’s what I did in a <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13696815.2020.1806799">study</a> of queer Nigerian Twitter. To explore the diversity of queer agency, I analysed selected tweets by Nigerian queer men. As a linguist, my focus was on identifying and discussing how the performative use of language can achieve the functions of coming out as well as confronting homophobic cyberbullying.</p>
<h2>Twitter as a safer space</h2>
<p>Twitter has <a href="https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2019-nigeria?rq=Nigeria">grown</a> to become a very popular microblogging platform in Nigeria, accounting for about 1.75 million users, with an annual growth rate of 4.4%. Communities with shared interests are built online. The queer community in Nigeria is no doubt on the margins, but it has found <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00918369.2018.1511131">digital platforms</a> safe havens for collective queer voices. </p>
<p>The digital space, I found, has become a location for the representation and assertion of queer agency. What I found interesting in these narratives was that these commenters were not only ready to come out on a “public” digital space, they were also expressive in revealing their offline identities. This despite the possibilities of homophobic violence. </p>
<p>In expressing and owning their sexuality online, Nigerian queers, for instance through their Twitter names, spell out their sexuality as they incorporate vocabulary like “gay”, “homo” and “queer”. And they use the <a href="https://www.genderopen.de/bitstream/handle/25595/1489/cu16v8a14.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">rainbow</a> – a global symbol of LGBTI advocacy – in their Twitter handles and names.</p>
<p>They also own their profiles by either using their personal images or other suggestive queer-positive ones to indicate their sexual orientation. These realisations are central to queer agency, especially as the users I analysed live in Nigeria and are willing to challenge the existing normative sexuality structures. For example:</p>
<p>“This year I accepted the entirety of my sexuality and it’s one thing I’m very grateful about. I remember those days when I use to beat myself, cut myself, cry, pray and do all shits for being gay. Those days that I had to go to various priests for deliverance and guidance.”</p>
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<p>This Twitter user reveals their sexual orientation within a narrative which expresses the difficulties of their lived reality. What is striking is the conviction of self-acceptance and the roles played by the online queer community in the affirmation of this. </p>
<h2>Anti-homophobic advocacy</h2>
<p>Even more exciting is how these Twitter users engage in anti-homophobic advocacy. They turn the narrative around by exploiting online platforms towards positive self-presentation. They also respond to and challenge their cyber-aggressors and other homophobic commentators. They further acknowledge the necessity of support, like this tweet:</p>
<p>“Nigerian parents need peer support groups; especially parents with LGBTQ kids. I think one of the reasons they suffer so much is that they don’t know/talk to each other and they think they are alone. But there are lots of parents going through the same struggles across Nigeria.”</p>
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<p>This acknowledges the role of the family as a domain of socialisation in normalising same-sex relations. Or this: “I think that social media really helps our generation with this. I wonder if they’re too far gone to also take advantage.”</p>
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<p>This extends the discussion to the advantages of social media in queer outreaches. The tweets I analysed draw attention to, among others, the role of family relationships, homosexual allies and larger non-queer communities in helping Nigerian LGBTI people express and accept themselves. The advocacies are geared towards providing information concerning the naturalness of their sexual orientation.</p>
<h2>Rewriting the narrative</h2>
<p>The tweets have sociological implications as ways of creating meaning. They humanise the commenters as legitimate members of Nigerian society and attest to the naturalness of queer identities. The online discussions provide visibility for a marginalised community. </p>
<p>Since the tweets contest the normative portrayals of same-sex relations, they also constitute activist representations. These queer Nigerian males use digital platforms for the purpose of identity formation. In this self-assertion, they contest the monochromic representations perpetuated in popular culture. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nigerias-queer-literature-offers-a-new-way-of-looking-at-blackness-133649">Nigeria's queer literature offers a new way of looking at blackness</a>
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<p>The tweets I studied speak out against the bigotry and hate messages which are directed at them. They accentuate the human rights concern that a person’s sexuality is their personal decision. And they correct the perspective that problematises homosexuality as being the same as other social ills. </p>
<p>More crucially, I conclude, in view of the stifling and homophobic lived realities in Nigeria, these narratives engender conversations around the issue of queer visibility and acceptance within Nigerian society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/146614/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Onanuga receives funding from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany. </span></em></p>Despite same-sex relations being criminal, social media is a space to come out and speak back to homophobia for the Nigerian tweeters in the study.Paul Onanuga, Lecturer, Federal University, Oye EkitiLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1408972020-07-15T13:37:06Z2020-07-15T13:37:06ZBlack Lives Matter: decentralised leadership and the problems of online organising<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347676/original/file-20200715-19-12xlh1x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=26%2C53%2C5955%2C3925&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Black Lives Matter doesn't believe in hierarchal structures allowing anyone to take on leadership tasks.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://webgate.epa.eu/webgate">Nikal Hallen/EPA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the UK, one of the leading Black Lives Matter groups is <a href="https://www.instagram.com/blmuk/">BlackLivesMatterUK</a>. But while it is a leading voice, it is at pains to stress that it is not the movement’s “leader”. In fact, the movement <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rosalindadams/the-black-lives-matter-protests-no-central-leadership">does not believe in leaders</a>and aims to be non-hierarchical.</p>
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<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>There has been some confusion about this approach to leadership with activist <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/01/controversial-blm-leader-remains-defiant-support-ebbs-away/">Joshua Virasami</a> being wrongly named on occasion as the leader of the group. Virasami was wrongly targeted as leader in the fallout over the language used in a pro-Palestine tweet by the official BlackLivesMatterUK account. The post stated that “mainstream British politics is gagged of the right to critique Zionism”. These posts were met with anger by people and <a href="https://twitter.com/antisemitism/status/1277206972031479809">Jewish charities</a> who argued that it endorsed <a href="https://www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/article/black-lives-matter-antisemitic-tweet">antisemitic</a> stereotypes and was not in line with BlackLivesMatterUK’s message of anti-racism. </p>
<p>BlackLivesMatterUK’s founders have <a href="https://twitter.com/ukblm/status/1271874727410307072/photo/2">largely remained anonymous</a>. It is believed there is a core group of activists, of which Virasami is one of the only to be named. His <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/08/non-racist-isnt-enough-action-george-floyd-death">visibility</a>, paired with his profile as a <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/07/01/controversial-blm-leader-remains-defiant-support-ebbs-away/">controversial figure</a> for his opinions on policing, Palestine and capitalism, is arguably the reason he has been misindentified as the leader of the movement. </p>
<p>However, while Virasami is the most vocal and public member associated with BlackLivesMatterUK, he is not the leader. Calling him such can result in all his opinions being considered one and the same as BlackLivesMatterUK’s, including those that aren’t shared by the movement.</p>
<p>The Black Lives Matter network around the world is based around the idea that everyone involved should be encouraged to step up and become leaders. But while this adds an element of egalitarianism to the movement, it can create problems, too. Mass global online organising by many spokespeople taken to be “leaders” has, at times, led to confusion about what the movement stands for and what its messaging should be. It has even led to contradictory activity on occasion.</p>
<h2>Horizontal leadership</h2>
<p>Black Lives Matter emerged in response to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/14/us/george-zimmerman-verdict-trayvon-martin.html">the acquittal of George Zimmerman</a> for the shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in 2013. Its founding members are Alicia Garza, Patricia Cullors and Opal Tometi. The group’s first official organising came with the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/oct/13/cornel-west-arrest-clergy-ferguson-protest">Ferguson Unrest and Ferguson October protests</a> in 2014 in response to the deaths of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/recalling-the-protests-riots-after-fatal-police-shooting-of-michael-brown/2017/08/01/9992f044-5a8d-11e7-a9f6-7c3296387341_story.html">Mike Brown</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/recalling-the-protests-riots-after-fatal-police-shooting-of-michael-brown/2017/08/01/9992f044-5a8d-11e7-a9f6-7c3296387341_story.html">Eric Garner</a>. Eventually, individuals organising at Ferguson pushed the co-founders to create a chapter structure to continue to do this work together and to connect activists and organisers across the US. </p>
<p>As part of this structure, the co-founders waived formal leadership titles, unlike predecessors in the Civil Rights Movement – for instance, Dr Martin Luther King Jr. In this sense, the international Black Lives Matter website suggests <a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/herstory/">Black Lives Matter’s leadership structure</a> allows chapters to contribute independently and interdependently with others. As a result, the global Black Lives Matter network structure lets anyone step up and take responsibility for leadership tasks. It also enables multiple members to lead at the same time. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=722&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347607/original/file-20200715-27-120s8ha.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Alicia Garza, one of Black Lives Matter’s co-founders.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alicia_Garza#/media/File:Alicia_Garza.jpg">Wikimedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>There are <a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/how-to-become-a-chapter/">rigorous assessments for prospective chapters</a> to belong within the global network, including being registered as a legal entity and ensuring the alignment of their structure and principles. Membership provides access to other chapters, as well as the potential to receive funding from the global Black Lives Matter network.</p>
<p>Despite Black Lives Matter being a chapter-based nonprofit organisation, many individuals who have no ties to the global Black Lives Matter network have created structures online for community protest events under the name. This may be the result of the co-founders advocating for a horizontal structure of organising at the grassroots levels. A structure that favours <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/03/14/where-is-black-lives-matter-headed">democratic inclusion and forgoes hierarchy</a>. </p>
<p>As such, whatever individuals decide – to belong or not to belong with the global network – it is essential to understand how social media has encouraged people to gather around social issues that have led to protest activities.</p>
<h2>Social media confusion</h2>
<p>With the opportunity for anyone to lead, questions of trust and legitimacy have arisen around calls to protest and those organising under the Black Lives Matter name or hashtag.</p>
<p>A prime example of this is <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/52893017">#Blackouttuesday</a>. This was a symbolic “blackout” across Instagram where people were supposed to shared black squares alongside the hashtag #Theshowmustbepaused. The initiative was created by music executives Brianna Agyemang and Jamila Thomas to highlight racism within the music industry. It was intended to be a day of reflection while also platforming the voices of black people. However, as it grew, with high profile musicians like Rihanna and Cardi B taking part, it spread past the music industry and was taken up by people wishing to show support for broader issues of racial injustice.</p>
<p>This led to some confusion about what the initiative actually demanded of people, with some wrongly equating it with Black Lives Matter. As a result, many tagged #BlackLivesMatter instead of #Blackouttuesday or #Theshowmustbepaused. The <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2016/08/15/the-hashtag-blacklivesmatter-emerges-social-activism-on-twitter/">#BlackLivesMatter hashtag</a> has been an important source of information regarding protests and action. However, as more people tagged their black squares with #BlackLivesMatter this information got lost as it was drowned out by black squares. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1267844760347213826"}"></div></p>
<p>This incident is representative of the confusion about who Black Lives Matter is and what it stands for. In fact, BlackLivesMatterUK is not listed on the national Black Lives Matter website. However, their <a href="https://www.instagram.com/blmuk/">Instagram profile states that Patrisse Cullors</a>, a co-founder of the global Black Lives Matter network, endorses the chapter. </p>
<h2>Despite these issues …</h2>
<p>Social media has made collective action in the absence of physical togetherness possible. It also provides key advantages for organising and participation in social movement activities, including lower entry costs and more accessibility for a wider range of people.</p>
<p>Social movement scholars <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259925615_Digitally_Enabled_Social_Change_Activism_in_the_Internet_Age_by_Jennifer_Earl_Katrina_Kimport">Katrina Earl and Jennifer Kimport</a>, suggest that we should not only look at web protest as its own separate entity but how people’s use of technology changes the dynamics of protest as a whole. </p>
<p>While online protest and organising has resulted in some confusion, social media and Black Lives Matter’s decentralised leadership structure has also empowered what Earl and Kimpton call “parties of one” to spark social change in ways not possible before. So, while there are disadvantages to decentralised leadership and online activism, there are also many benefits. But if you are going to take part, it’s worth doing some research before joining in.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/140897/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Ashley Cole does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The structures of leaderful practices in online social media networking sites in the case of the Black Lives Matter Movement.Dr. Ashley Cole, Lecturer in Sociology and Criminology, Coventry UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1392722020-07-05T10:46:46Z2020-07-05T10:46:46ZGrassroots activists must consider the personal costs of digital campaigns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/337848/original/file-20200527-141295-14xjfe2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1599%2C898&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Attendees at the women's March on Edmonton, Alta on Jan. 21, 2017.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mylynn Felt</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Widespread use of social media has made it easier to mobilize collective action, yet citizen activists struggle to navigate these digital tools and increasingly report feeling burned out. Our research on grassroots digital activism in Canada has revealed some of the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2019.1618891">strategies organizers employ when dealing with the technological, interactional and personal barriers of digital activism</a>.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/leading-an-online-social-movement-requires-offline-work-132618">Leading an online social movement requires offline work</a>
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</em>
</p>
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<p>People’s use of social media for activist purposes clashes with the commercial goals of these platforms. For example, as these platforms prioritize popular and recent content, activist messages have to be constantly updated and liked or shared in order to remain visible to wider audiences. This places the burden to adapt upon activists, who must make the best of these tools within the constraints set by the platforms’ algorithms.</p>
<h2>Dilution or dissemination?</h2>
<p>Social media can enhance activist communication at the cost of loss of control over the message. This matters in collective action, because a clearly communicated set of demands and complaints is essential to obtaining political recognition.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"506893599297265664"}"></div></p>
<p><a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/1534959/b-c-teachers-strike-the-timeline/">During the 2014 teachers’ strike in British Columbia</a>, three parents came up with the idea of hosting playdates in front of the offices of members of the B.C. Legislative Assembly (MLAs). The parents wanted to pressure the provincial government to negotiate with teachers and end the strike. As they circulated the idea of <a href="https://mlaplaydate.wordpress.com/">#MLAPlaydates</a> on social media, they reflected on the possibility of message dilution:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It’s not the traditional command and control. It’s like: here’s an idea, why don’t you play with it and see what you can do. You share, you pass on stuff.… So, it’s a different framework of activism.… It’s like beta testing, you don’t know where it’s going to fly.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Their solution was a form of “open-source activism,” which entailed monitoring social media to reinforce the message and prevent it from being co-opted, while inviting supporters to adapt and personalize this message.</p>
<h2>Echo-chamber effect</h2>
<p>Filter bubbles of like-minded people make it difficult for digital activists to get their messages outside of individual networks. Yet, some platforms are more public than others, using different algorithms to make content visible to their users.</p>
<p>Organizers of <a href="https://safestampede.ca/">Alberta’s #SafeStampede</a> wanted to call attention to the rape culture around the annual Calgary Stampede. They found that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Facebook is far and away the best place to have actual discourse [around these issues], but again, you’re mostly talking to your own friends, so it does become a bit of a feedback loop.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>To combat this barrier, organizers created public profiles on more open platforms like Twitter and Tumblr to breach the echo chamber effect. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1017507402369753088"}"></div></p>
<h2>Popularity contests</h2>
<p>On social media, visibility is often enabled by the newness and reactions a message receives. Activists need to constantly monitor how algorithms push content to the top of other users’ newsfeed. This pressures them to think and act like digital marketers, strategizing their message production and circulation.</p>
<p>The digital activists in our research spoke to the necessity of adapting to platform-specific practices, as well as the learning curve of understanding these practices in the first place.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You have to be careful of the algorithms, so if you’re posting too much, you’re not going to get as wide of an audience.… With Instagram, if you posted three or four really good pictures with good descriptions and hashtags a week, you’re going to get more of a response than if you’re posting like, you know, five times a day every day. So, you want to be kind of conscientious in what you’re posting, and how often.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Allies and trolls</h2>
<p>Alongside algorithms, interaction on social media brings along its own challenges to digital activism.</p>
<p>For <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/safestampede-calgary-stampede-campaign-1.3659299">the #SafeStampede organizers</a>, social media platforms helped them find each other through their existing networks. Online connections grew into face-to-face meetings and relationships, facilitating critical backstage efforts to their public social media campaign:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I don’t think anything exclusively happens on social media anymore. There needs to be a point where things transcend social media and you end up having real conversations with people and you build relationships.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Social media also opened the campaign up for abuse and trolling. This was also the experience of another gender-related movement, the <a href="http://wmwyeg.org/">Women’s March in Alberta</a>. The organizers described how people searching terms like “transgender” and “pussy hat” launched a gender-biased calculated attack a few days before the march. To deal with the backlash, the organizers resorted to a strategy of “block, delete, report, repeat,” pointing out that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It had to be done, and we just tried really hard not to let all of our time and emotional energy get sucked up by that.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The camaraderie built online and offline helped mitigate the toll of these confrontations. Still, online attacks and trolling can easily deplete the already scarce resources that citizen activists have at their disposal.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/BWdts59D7yi","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<h2>Burning out and dropping out</h2>
<p>While our participants minimized the personal and professional costs of their digital activism during our conversations, they also spoke of burnout making long-term involvement unsustainable.</p>
<p>The emotional cost of trolls, backlash and hyper-aggression on social media was difficult for organizers to escape as social media tied their public names to their activism:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You attract negative comments on you … attract people who feel they have the right to attack you … I try not to think about this too much, having too much information out there leaves me open to potential stalkers, or people who want to harm me or my child.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Distancing one’s self, either from the movement or from the potential risks of your activities, seems to be the only possible strategy for organizers in these situations.</p>
<p>Furthermore, because social media algorithms display the messenger alongside the message, organizers also expressed concern that their visible activism may create potential career risks.</p>
<h2>Digital organizing strategies</h2>
<p>The citizen activists interviewed in our research employed various strategies to navigate barriers to digital activism. Here are some of their lessons for other activists:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>Stay up-to-date with how algorithms are designed and updated for the platforms you are using.</p></li>
<li><p>Use multiple platforms to reach different audiences and mitigate the effects of echo chambers.</p></li>
<li><p>Allow some for some change in your message, but monitor the conversation in order to maintain its core.</p></li>
<li><p>Connect with fellow organizers and supporters offline.</p></li>
<li><p>Join a local, regional or national collective so you have fellow activists to lean on and pass the baton to when you need to step away.</p></li>
<li><p>Anticipate the costs and risks of activism, and reflect on where you need to draw your own boundaries.</p></li>
<li><p>Build flexibility and adaptation into your tactics of action.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>While digital activism can be a crucial part of any successful campaign, activists needs to remain aware about the costs and limitations of social media.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139272/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Delia Dumitrica received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to study social media and civic activism in Canada (grant number 435-2014-0200).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mylynn Felt receives funding as a Vanier scholar. She serves as the Vice President of the Friends of the Weber/Morgan Children's Justice Center.</span></em></p>Online organizing is vital to the success of offline social justice campaigns. Executing digital campaigns exposes activists to attacks, but there are steps they can take to protect themselves.Delia Dumitrica, Associate professor, Department of Media and Communication, Erasmus University RotterdamMylynn Felt, PhD Candidate, Communication, Media and Film, University of CalgaryLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1399822020-06-04T05:51:34Z2020-06-04T05:51:34ZBlackout Tuesday: the black square is a symbol of online activism for non-activists<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/339662/original/file-20200604-130940-1e6u5jr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1815%2C1015&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/blackouttuesday/">Instagram</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Earlier this week, you might have seen your social media taken over by a stream of posts showing simple images of a black square. These posts, often tagged with #BlackoutTuesday, were gestures of solidarity with protests against the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/us/george-floyd-minneapolis-death.html">police killing of George Floyd</a> in Minneapolis. </p>
<p>There have been more than 28 million of these posts on Instagram, and online services such as Spotify and Apple Music also joined the movement. Social media activism is nothing new, but the scale of #BlackoutTuesday showed not only the cause but also the method of the protest were distinctly 2020. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-fury-in-us-cities-is-rooted-in-a-long-history-of-racist-policing-violence-and-inequality-139752">The fury in US cities is rooted in a long history of racist policing, violence and inequality</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<h2>What was Blackout Tuesday?</h2>
<p>Last weekend, two black women working in the music industry began a <a href="https://www.theshowmustbepaused.com/">campaign</a> asking the music industry, which they note “has profited predominantly from Black art”, to put its activities on hold for a day on Tuesday June 2. </p>
<p>Using the hashtag #theshowmustbepaused, they began making their case by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CA4S2c3nPRE/">posting an image to Instagram</a> of a black background and white text asking the music industry to pause and reflect on the ways it disenfranchises black employees.</p>
<p>The movement soon took off: as the week began, posts showing simple black squares quickly proliferated across social media. The hashtags varied, from the original #theshowmustbepaused to #blacklivesmatter and #blackouttuesday.</p>
<h2>Strange effects of the black squares</h2>
<p>The black square posts have come in many forms. Some show the square alone with no text, some with #BlackoutTuesday and others with #BlackLivesMatter, associating the trend with the <a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/">established political movement</a>.</p>
<p>Many captions and comments posted with the image express the poster’s desire to educate themselves and others about racial inequality, to stand in solidarity with the wider Black Lives Matter movement, or simply “to do better”. </p>
<p>While the trend gathered momentum with posts from US celebrities as well as ordinary people around the world, it also attracted <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/2/21277852/blackout-tuesday-posts-hiding-information-blm-black-lives-matter-hashtag">criticism</a>. </p>
<p>Criticisms include the use of the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag, which activists use to stay informed about demonstrations, for financial donations and to document racial violence by police. Filling the hashtag’s feed with black squares, some argued, obscured more direct activities associated with the movement, redirected attention and <a href="https://www.wmagazine.com/story/blackout-tuesday-instagram-post-why-you-should-think-twice/">“silenced” activists</a>. </p>
<h2>The current situation</h2>
<p>Despite the backlash, the sheer numbers of people around the world who have posted black squares indicates that #BlackoutTuesday is a form of political expression that has resonated with the particular moment of June 2020.</p>
<p>Several countries are just coming out of pandemic lockdowns that have lasted for weeks or months. These lockdowns have meant work, education, entertainment and political engagement have largely been experienced online. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-coronavirus-pandemic-is-boosting-the-big-tech-transformation-to-warp-speed-138537">The coronavirus pandemic is boosting the big tech transformation to warp speed</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The pandemic and the economic devastation in its wake have left millions of people feeling uncertain and helpless. And in this dismal environment, in the same week the US surpassed 100,000 COVID-19 deaths, George Floyd was killed by police like many other African-American men before him.</p>
<h2>Why not everyone is an activist</h2>
<p>From the <a href="https://www.plutobooks.com/9781849648011/tweets-and-the-streets/">Arab Spring uprisings</a> of the early 2010s to the <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/16/social-media-has-become-a-battleground-in-hong-kongs-protests.html">Hong Kong demonstrations</a> of 2019-20, social media has become an essential tool for political action. Activists use it to organise demonstrations, generate debate and facilitate social change. </p>
<p>However, for many people outside Western, liberal democracies, and in the “Global South”, visible political engagement can have severe <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/activists-forever/536CE4530EB87C3F9B1A601C1D1FB804#fndtn-information">consequences</a>. This is particularly true for those who are kept from freedoms and opportunities by <a href="https://academic.oup.com/socpro/article-abstract/42/2/252/1614014">systemic exclusion</a> based on race, class, gender or sexuality.</p>
<p>These consequences range from professional or social exclusion to harassment and intimidation to outright persecution and detention. As a result, many people in such societies may subscribe to “<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2056305117719627">non-activism</a>”. </p>
<p>Non-activism means explicitly rejecting visible involvement with political causes to focus on everyday concerns. People may reject activism even while they know doing so makes social change less likely.</p>
<h2>Activism for non-activists</h2>
<p>Blackout Tuesday was in some ways an ideal form of activism for non-activists, which may explain some of its enormous international popularity.</p>
<p>My own analysis of posts indicates users are based in countries including Ukraine, Brazil, and the Caribbean islands. Those who posted used visual social media to connect the experiences of one individual to structural violence and race-based exclusion that is pervasive in countries beyond the US.</p>
<p>The black square allowed millions of people to engage with a politically charged issue without having to seem too political themselves.</p>
<p>For many, especially those who would not consider themselves “political”, symbolism is a legitimate form of political engagement. </p>
<h2>Worlds colliding</h2>
<p>Algorithms, applications and automated systems play a significant role in what we see in online media. They affect how content reaches <a href="http://culturedigitally.org/2016/05/facebook-trends/">some audiences and not others</a>, and automated systems may also <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/06/03/1002589/technology-perpetuates-racism-by-design-simulmatics-charlton-mcilwain/">perpetuate racial bias</a>.</p>
<p>When activists turn to social media to further their cause, they too are ruled by the algorithms. We saw this in the criticisms of #BlackoutTuesday posts on Instagram, and particularly those using the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag, for preventing the hashtags (and the algorithms) from doing what protest organisers wanted them to do. </p>
<p>We may think of “social media users” as collective audiences, but they are made up of individuals embedded in a variety of contexts who do not necessarily have much in common. </p>
<p>For seasoned activists, #BlackoutTuesday was a moment in which popular support paradoxically made it harder to keep people informed. But for many others, it may have been a step towards political engagement through difficult terrain.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139982/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jolynna Sinanan received funding from the European Research Council 2012-2014 (ERC grant 2011- AdG-295486 Socnet). </span></em></p>A largely wordless social media protest allowed many to take a political stand who might otherwise have stayed aloofJolynna Sinanan, Research Fellow in Digital Media and Ethnography, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1326182020-04-02T13:44:41Z2020-04-02T13:44:41ZLeading an online social movement requires offline work<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/324111/original/file-20200330-174736-1jxfbwy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4321%2C2598&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In 2015, Canadians across the country organized in support of Syrian refugees arriving in the country; these rallies were planned online.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/mgifford/23432951530/in/photolist-2fHCVsi-BGG16G-2fNkkQd-BP7pwm-21u1zgQ/">(Mike Gifford/flickr)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Today, most social movements around the world are digital in some capacity. When <a href="https://www.siliconrepublic.com/enterprise/tanya-lokot-online-protest-dcu">a hashtag seems enough to start a movement</a>, social media promise to replace the role of leaders in setting a movement’s goals, coordinating action and inspiring a following. </p>
<p>Our research set out to test the belief that leadership was no longer necessary in online activism by drawing on the experience of several recent movements in Canada. What we found was more complicated and interesting than a simple vanishing act by protest leaders: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2018.1434556">social media enable new kinds of leadership to form</a>. </p>
<p>The ease with which messages spread through social media may be the most fascinating aspect of digital activism, but it hides the labour of message creation, curation and coordination required to transform chatter into action. </p>
<p>We studied Canadian movements over the past five years and found that leadership labour is performed by individual participants who aren’t necessarily identified as traditional leaders. These individuals work in the background rather than standing out in front lines and front pages. Day by day, hour by hour, they perform the painstaking tasks of articulating the message of the movement, connecting collaborators and supporters, or initiating action on the issue.</p>
<h2>Crafting messages</h2>
<p>During the <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/1534959/b-c-teachers-strike-the-timeline/">2014 teachers’ strike in British Columbia</a>, some parents started pressuring the government to negotiate with the teachers’ union. One idea caught on: parents with children at home because of the strike would organize playdates at the local offices of politicians. The <a href="https://mlaplaydate.wordpress.com/">#MLAPlaydate</a> initiative was born on Twitter and Facebook. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"506907783879348225"}"></div></p>
<p>The idea itself was the brainchild of three citizens who took notice of each other’s tweets at the early stage of the strike. Backstage conversations through tweets, email and phone calls led to the creation of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/mlaplaydate">#MLAPlaydate</a>. They broadcast their call through Twitter and a blog that described the format of their playful protest. What made the message powerful, they explained, was that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It’s a way that anyone could play. You could play by tweeting, what we and others did. You can play by taking a meme or photo and commenting on it, so by making it, sort of like, open source activism versus traditional command and control … you allow other people to get more involved.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323254/original/file-20200326-133007-4lt8dx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chalk drawing in front of an MLA office in British Columbia during an MLA Playdate.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Author provided)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While the three had crafted the message, they saw themselves as a coordination hub rather than as leaders in control. They created spaces for discussion of parents’ views on the teachers’ strike and helped translate these discussions into action.</p>
<h2>Online influencers</h2>
<p>Crafting the message is not enough. The message must be picked up and circulated.</p>
<p>When causes are embraced by social media accounts with many followers, their involvement amplifies the message and boosts the collective action. In other cases, such accounts grow in popularity due to the dense network of connections their owners have in the local community. </p>
<p>The organizers of <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/">Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW)</a> events in Calgary were already embedded in local Indigenous communities and had ties to other activists through past work with <a href="http://www.idlenomore.ca/">Idle No More</a> or <a href="https://womensmarch.com/">Women’s Marches</a>. They drew on these past connections and experiences to organize their own MMIW protests. They used Facebook to disseminate information and calls for action not only locally, but also to reach into the national network of Indigenous activists. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/323246/original/file-20200326-132974-1d058px.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chantal Stormsong Chagnon was one of the organizers of the MMIW mobilization in Calgary.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Mylynn Felt)</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These organizers were already in the thick of things locally and digitally. This leadership role consisted of spreading and sharing the movement’s goals and objectives, which they achieved through existing networks grown from involvement and commitment to the values behind the issue. Calgary Sisters in Spirit committee member Michelle Robinson captured it this way: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>… our locations and our numbers can change, but Facebook is kind of a constant. So that’s where we encourage and invite people and let people know this is happening.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Doing the work</h2>
<p>The word caretaker brings to mind the image of hands-on labour; with digital activism, this caretaking role describes a leader stepping up to do the work and investing time and effort in countless essential tasks. These leaders distinguish themselves by carrying out tasks such as making signs, sharing petitions or cleaning up after a gathering.</p>
<p>For citizens coordinating the <a href="http://www.yycsyr.ca/">Calgary network that assists arriving Syrian refugees</a> with donated household items, participation in <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/headlines/refugee-crisis-prompts-rallies-across-canada-1.3217636">the Refugees Welcome movement</a> took every free moment of the day as they did the heavy lifting online and offline. One organizer shared: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>we would finish work and, no dinner, just head down to the warehouse from the time the warehouse opened ‘till closing. … we were there pretty much every single day.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>These activities stretched them financially and personally, but their commitment kept them going. Nobody appointed or elected them. These individuals emerged as leaders when they stepped up to do the work that needed to be done.</p>
<h2>Online leadership matters</h2>
<p>What matters is crafting powerful messages, spreading this message across physical and digital networks and doing the heavy lifting of organizing work. In some cases, the same citizens performed all three leadership roles. In others, different participants stepped into one of them when needed. While the individuals playing these roles may sometimes appear interchangeable, transient and anonymous, leadership itself remains central to any form of activism.</p>
<p>There were no special qualities required to make an ordinary citizen a leader. What mattered was the degree to which they cared about the issue. For some, taking this kind of leadership role represented a peak in a long trajectory of activism and dedication to a cause. For others, the issue at hand struck a particularly sensitive chord or hit close to home. Then, the density of social ties, digital skills and communicative creativity turned into valuable resources.</p>
<p>This means that for activist organizations and social movements nowadays, it is not so important to focus on electing leaders, but on making available mechanisms and avenues for their self-selection. Build open channels for conversation, connection and work. Leaders will come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/132618/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Delia Dumitrica received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to study social media and civic activism in Canada (grant number 435-2014-0200).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Maria Bakardjieva receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Baltic Sea Foundation, Sweden and the University of Calgary, Canada. She has also held appointments as research fellow with the European Research Institutes for Advanced Studies and the Oxford Internet Institute. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mylynn Felt receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada as a research assistant to study social media and civic activism in Canada (grant number 435-2014-0200) as well as funding as a Vanier Scholar. She currently serves as vice president on the board of directors for the Friends of the Weber-Morgan Children's Justice Center, a nonprofit organization.</span></em></p>Online social movements are not leaderless. On the contrary, leadership duties are often assumed by identifiable individuals committed to doing leadership work.Delia Dumitrica, Associate professor, Department of Media and Communication, Erasmus University RotterdamMaria Bakardjieva, Professor, Communication and Media Studies, University of CalgaryMylynn Felt, PhD Candidate, Communication, Media and Film, University of CalgaryLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1312562020-02-25T20:07:44Z2020-02-25T20:07:44ZHow Tinder is being used for more than just hook-ups<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314866/original/file-20200211-146696-rnmhds.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C97%2C4790%2C3158&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A recent study uncovered a variety of surprising ways that people used Tinder in their lives.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The developers of the dating app Tinder recently announced that <a href="https://blog.gotinder.com/tinder-introduces-safety-updates/">new safety features would be added to its app throughout 2020</a>. These updates include a means to connect users with emergency services when they feel unsafe and more safety information provided through the app. </p>
<p>Given that many users, especially women, experience <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1461444816681540">harassment, sexism</a> and <a href="https://adanewmedia.org/2016/10/issue10-farvid-aisher/">threatening behaviour</a> on Tinder, these appear to be positive steps to addressing such issues.</p>
<p>Tinder also mentioned app updates will incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) to validate profile photos. <a href="https://blog.gotinder.com/tinder-introduces-safety-updates/">Their blog explains</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The [AI] feature allows members to self-authenticate through a series of real-time posed selfies, which are compared to existing profile photos using human-assisted AI technology.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Whereas Tinder’s connection to Facebook <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2016.1168471">previously served to validate user identity</a>, the app now lets users join without linking Facebook. Features like this AI-powered photo validation are intended to enhance users’ trust in each other’s authenticity.</p>
<h2>Authenticating users</h2>
<p>We already know that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1461444811410395">people tend to fib a bit</a> on their dating profiles to counter idealized perceptions of the desirable age, height and weight of a potential partner. Users of the app also selectively disclose details and elements of their appearance <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1440783319833181">to avoid racism, sexism and homophobia</a>. </p>
<p>People have long appropriated technologies to make them fit with their lives. This process is called domestication. It is achieved when we no longer notice technology because it works so well for us. For example, after setting up a smart speaker to play your favourite tunes after work, you may no longer notice the speaker at all when you arrive home and start humming along. </p>
<p>My <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01972243.2019.1685036">recently published study</a> uncovered a variety of surprising ways that people used Tinder in their lives. However, platforms and apps like Tinder are social technologies, and users take notice when members use them for something unexpected. Platform companies may also take note. Their updates to features or functions can make some of these innovative uses more difficult or even impossible. </p>
<p>Beyond dating, my study revealed a fine balance between how apps guide users’ behaviour and how people make this technology effective for a range of goals. </p>
<h2>Apps have labels</h2>
<p>When a doctor prescribes medication, it comes labelled with directions for use. Similarly, many apps have a stated purpose. In <a href="https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/tinder-dating/id547702041">Apple’s app store</a>, Tinder is described as an app for “meeting new people.” We can think of Tinder’s self-description as the app’s label.</p>
<p>Since Tinder’s launch, in its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/fashion/tinder-the-fast-growing-dating-app-taps-an-age-old-truth.html">popular coverage</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F2056305116641976">everyday use</a>, people have tended to think about it as an app for arranging dates and sexual encounters or hook-ups. We can think of this as Tinder’s expected use.</p>
<p>Sometimes people use medication for something other than what’s on the label. Pharmacologists call this “off-label use.” It’s a catchy term that <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2014/05/06/linkedin-for-love-tinder-for-business-and-other-off-label-technology-uses/#2dffcab02e41">journalist Jeff Bercovici</a> first imported into the tech world when reporting about lesser-known uses of platforms. </p>
<p>While Facebook and Twitter host a broad range of user activities, my study asked, what does off-label use look like on an app like Tinder, which has an articulated label? Further, how does off-label use play out when other users expect that the app has fixed purposes?</p>
<h2>Swiping for awareness, politics and money</h2>
<p>I examined a range of news articles reporting on how people were using Tinder for purposes other than dating and hooking-up. Since my research started in 2016, it didn’t take long to uncover <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/swipe-left-swipe-right-political-campaigning-invades-dating-apps-1541182048">several articles about</a> <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44606411">people campaigning on behalf</a> <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/49f19c76-3375-11e9-bd3a-8b2a211d90d5">of politicians in the lead-up to</a> <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/05/us/politics/bernie-sanders-tinder.html">the United States presidential election</a>. </p>
<p>I also found several <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2015/2/11/8017933/fake-tinder-profiles-aids-awareness-campaign-brazil">health</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35070858">awareness campaigns</a>, personal ads, promotion of local gigs, joke accounts and even <a href="https://www.engadget.com/2015/05/22/meat-your-match-with-this-tinder-swiping-steak/">subversive works of art</a>. </p>
<p>In select interviews with people carrying out these off-label uses, I found that they often complemented Tinder’s expected use for dating and hooking up. For example, an anti-smoking campaign focused on the message that smoking is unattractive. It involved two different profiles for the same model, who was smoking in the photos on one profile and not on the other. The campaign boasted that the non-smoking profile received many more right swipes (likes) than the smoking profile.</p>
<p>People also found creative ways of using Tinder’s features. The lead of an anti-sex trafficking campaign constructed profiles warning users to watch for signs of non-consensual sex work. This campaign re-purposed profile photos in a storytelling manner, getting across the message in a way that Tinder’s new photo validation software may be unlikely to allow.</p>
<p>Not all matches were happy to encounter off-label users. Several users told a Bernie Sanders campaigner that she was using the app the wrong way and threatened to report her. Both the political campaigner and a woman selling nutritional supplements spoke of frequently receiving hostile messages from men who were frustrated that these women weren’t looking for a romantic or sexual connection. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/B8y_r2FHG4c","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<h2>A delicate balance between users and apps</h2>
<p>While Tinder seemed to take little notice of individual off-label users, the app has been updated over time to deal with high volumes of disruptive activity. In response to spam bots — deceptive automated accounts running phishing scams — Tinder introduced a reporting mechanism. The company also associated the introduction of a swipe limit, a constraint on the number of accounts that a user could swipe right on (like) over a given period, with a <a href="https://blog.gotinder.com/keeping-tinder-real/">reduction in spam bots</a>. </p>
<p>These changes also affect the development of off-label uses. A swipe limit that can only be surpassed through a premium subscription poses financial barriers for non-profit organizations, such as those running health and awareness campaigns. </p>
<p>Similarly, people looking to sell items or promote their music, creative endeavours or favourite politician may be subject to higher rates of reporting now that Tinder has articulated restrictions on commercial activity, allowing only officially approved advertising.</p>
<p>Platform changes like this may be reassuring for those only wanting to use the app for meeting romantic and sexual partners. However, the range of uses I uncovered demonstrate that Tinder is a social ecosystem where multiple activities co-exist. </p>
<p>This reflects findings by historian Andrew DJ Shield that some <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315625812/chapters/10.4324/9781315625812-26">Grindr users establish friend networks, and housing or employment opportunities</a> while also using the app to identify potential partners. It seems that the division between these aims is not so clear cut on what are generally thought of as dating and hook up apps.</p>
<p>People are paying attention to each other on Tinder, and this presents opportunities for political, economic and social activity beyond dating. While Tinder’s attention to safety is absolutely needed, the company should ensure that its new features are not shutting down creative, productive and self-protective uses that make the app meaningful in people’s everyday lives.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131256/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was conducted during a PhD internship at Microsoft Research New England.</span></em></p>Tinder was developed as a dating app, but research has found that some find it useful for promotional campaigns and artistic purposes.Stefanie Duguay, Assistant Professor, Data and Networked Publics, Concordia UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1274312019-11-28T19:09:23Z2019-11-28T19:09:23ZOn the Battle of Seattle’s 20th anniversary, let’s remember the Aussie coders who created live sharing<p>Twenty years ago, a group of Australian activists invented open source online publishing, by creating a website that went on to be pivotal in the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-LfN3V3id8">Battle of Seattle</a> protests. </p>
<p>The violent clash, which took place on November 30, 1999, between anti-globalisation activists and Seattle police, caught the world’s attention. It was also the first large-scale use of technology that allowed anyone to upload stories, photos, and video in a live feed to a website.</p>
<p>Today, online publishing allows multiple people to post text and multimedia content simultaneously to websites in real time, and have others comment on posts. </p>
<p>But this format, used on sites like Facebook and Twitter, was first conceptualised, coded and adopted by a handful of Sydney-based activists back in the 1990s. </p>
<p>These individuals were pioneers in kickstarting the digital disruption of mainstream media, and their actions enabled the world to openly and easily share content online.</p>
<h2>Street-based activism</h2>
<p>Just days before the events in Seattle, two software programmers, Matthew Arnison in Sydney and Manse Jacobi in Colorado, posted a <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20141203013029/http://seattle.indymedia.org/en/1999/11/2.shtml">message</a> on indymedia.org, a new website they had developed. </p>
<p>It read:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The resistance is global… a trans-pacific collaboration has brought this web site into existence. The web dramatically alters the balance between multinational and activist media.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Seattle Independent Media Centre (Indymedia) website coordinated the protest and allowed reporters to share events to the world, live. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=78&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=78&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=78&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=98&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=98&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304163/original/file-20191127-176624-1sh78q1.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=98&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The original Indymedia logo used on the website in 1999, in all its 90s low-pixel glory.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Matthew Arnison</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The site received 1.5 million hits that week. Arnison had <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZptFu7DC64">created a movement</a>. </p>
<h2>The lead-up</h2>
<p>Indymedia’s model was developed by activists in Sydney, several months before it went live on November 30 from a small shopfront in Seattle.</p>
<p>Activist collectives Reclaim the Street and Critical Mass <a href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/230437836">regularly took over public spaces</a> in Sydney during the 1990s.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1112&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1112&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/304220/original/file-20191128-178083-hxh3ni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1112&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Reclaim the Streets protest on November 6, 1999, at the corner of King and Wilson streets at Newtown, Sydney.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Private collection)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It was the protest-related needs of these collectives that spurred coders’ efforts to find solutions. Programmers including Arnison began writing code that allowed the sharing of stories, images, and live webcasting.</p>
<p>They built a website (<a href="https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20020524154900/http://j18.cat.org.au/">j18.cat.org.au/</a>) to allow global coordination and sharing of live video – what Arnison at the time called “<a href="http://purplebark.net/maffew/cat/imc-rave.html">frozen media nuggets</a>”.</p>
<p>When the adapted and fine-tuned model went live in Seattle on November 30, word got out. </p>
<p>Wired Magazine <a href="https://www.wired.com/1999/11/taking-media-to-the-wto-streets/">covered a scene</a> that foreshadowed the digital newsrooms of today. Arnison and his colleagues had created the first <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20000818021603/http:/www.active.org.au/sydney/">open sharing internet platform</a>. </p>
<p>Arnison told me that before then, “it was very difficult to share photos and post text and stories online, it was impossible to do in real time and without technical skill and special type of access”. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/death-on-smartphones-in-a-world-of-live-streamed-tragedy-what-do-we-gain-62769">Death on smartphones: in a world of live streamed tragedy, what do we gain?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0mg9DxvfZE">Imagine a world</a> where sharing a photo or a story online required complex computer skills and often took up to a day. And a “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-e3HXrDm8sw">Kids Guide to the Internet</a>” (in VHS) was required for “all that cybernet stuff”. </p>
<h2>The start of Active Sydney</h2>
<p>Arnison was also part of the groups Community Activist Technology (CAT) and Active Sydney, which prompted the development of software code that let people upload multimedia media stories, links, photos, video or sound material anywhere, anytime, to go live.</p>
<p>In January 1999, the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20000511092436/http:/www.active.org.au:80/">Active Sydney</a> website was launched. </p>
<p>Active Sydney inspired the Seattle site in the way it created an online space for activists to share information about events and actions, using open source code that Arnison made available to anyone around the world wishing to do the same.</p>
<p>Sydney resident and cofounder Gabrielle Kuiper described the site at an Amsterdam conference in March that year as: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>…an online interactive forum for information and inspiration about social change in Sydney… It’s the only website which is linked to an email list operating at a city scale.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Political motives</h2>
<p>These days we’re used to the idea of information as a commodity owned and exploited by global online corporations. </p>
<p>In the pioneering days of the internet, the beginnings of data commercialisation existed alongside the notion that “information wants to be free”. Hackers and cyberpunks created open source software that enabled the free flow of online content.</p>
<p>In a <a href="http://purplebark.net/maffew/cat/openpub.html">post</a> written just two months after Wikipedia went live in 2001, Arnison said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Open publishing is the same as free software. They’re both (r)evolutionary responses to the privatisation of information by multinational monopolies. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Looking back <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/global-rebellions-inequality/">today</a>, this seems ironic. But in 1999 there was a feeling that information and self-expression would tip the scales towards protesters.</p>
<p>Arnison notes there’s “a different type of asymmetry” at play now. He echoed theorist <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/books/3056-capital-is-dead">McKenzie Wark</a> by saying that in today’s world, political economies rely on the asymmetry of information as a form of control.</p>
<p>Twenty years after the Seattle clashes, the roles of protester and politician are reversed. </p>
<p>In 1999, protesters used new online tools to challenge free trade. They deployed a form of citizen journalism that countered mainstream reporting, in a bid to share and obtain authentic messages.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-punishing-of-anonymous-11824">The Punishing of Anonymous</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Today, populist politicians want to be perceived as authentic, so they use live platforms like Twitter to get messages out directly and avoid the filter of mainstream media. </p>
<p>Back then, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-globalization_movement">protesters challenged</a> world leaders beholden to the decision-making power of multinational free trading bodies. Now, some leaders seek to exit large trading blocks and pursue nationalist trade wars.</p>
<h2>What we didn’t see coming</h2>
<p>When Arnison spoke to me, he noted that one thing early activist communities didn’t predict was the proliferation of online trolling and hate speech. </p>
<p>Hateful and toxic posts were rare in those eventful early days, when a core activity drove content sharing. </p>
<p>Kuiper said at the time they “had no problems with people writing inappropriate or even boring news”. </p>
<p>“Twenty years ago we didn’t envisage how (the internet) could be corporatised or how personal data could be monetised,” she said.</p>
<p>Perhaps the internet will continue to mature and flip on its head yet again. </p>
<p>Arnison hopes so: “I am hoping … there will be a third stage … where we figure out how to manage that toxic behaviour which made this network so wonderful in the first place.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-facebook-and-google-changed-the-advertising-game-70050">How Facebook and Google changed the advertising game</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/127431/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Sear does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In 1999, ahead of World Trade Organisation protests, a group of Australian activists created the first open internet publishing platform. This technology is the basis of the internet we know today.Tom Sear, Industry Fellow, UNSW Canberra Cyber, Australian Defence Force Academy, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1108482019-01-31T16:19:54Z2019-01-31T16:19:54ZLGBTQ teenagers are creating new online subcultures to combat oppression<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256663/original/file-20190131-42594-oew5e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C4%2C2991%2C1989&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Taking pride.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/woman-using-smart-phone-206199061?src=WYLX88cB5M62eGquo8MHQA-1-27">Shutterstock.</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The internet can be an ugly place, especially for young people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans or queer. Cyberbullying is difficult to combat, because the bullies are often anonymous. And toxic debates can fester on social media: the <a href="https://www.stonewall.org.uk/news/stonewall-school-report-2017-anti-lgbt-bullying-down-lgbt-young-people-still-risk">2017 Stonewall school report</a> found that “two in five LGBT young people are bullied online”. </p>
<p>Then came Harry Brewis. The young YouTuber – also known by his handle, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClt01z1wHHT7c5lKcU8pxRQ">Hbomberguy</a> – raised £265,000 for the <a href="https://www.mermaidsuk.org.uk/about-mermaids.html">UK charity Mermaids</a> to support gender diverse young people, by streaming his 57-hour Donkey Kong 64 marathon online. </p>
<p>Public figures including US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and activist Chelsea Manning <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/games/2019/jan/25/success-for-me-wouldve-been-three-grand-the-gamer-who-raised-340000-for-a-trans-charity-hbomberguy">reportedly attended</a> Brewis’ stream via online platform <a href="https://www.twitch.tv/">Twitch</a>, which allows viewers to chat and cheer on their favourite gamers while they play. </p>
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<p>Aside from blowing his <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/games/2019/jan/25/success-for-me-wouldve-been-three-grand-the-gamer-who-raised-340000-for-a-trans-charity-hbomberguy">£3,000 funding goal</a> out of the water, Brewis’ actions have shone a light on how young people are breaking new political ground on the internet – and especially in the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/14/the-only-guide-to-gamergate-you-will-ever-need-to-read/?utm_term=.efb945130d20">male-dominated sphere</a> of online gaming – by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/games/2019/jan/22/how-a-57-hour-donkey-kong-twitch-stream-struck-a-blow-against-gamergate">carving out space</a> for the marginalised voices of LGBTQ young people. </p>
<h2>Measuring what matters</h2>
<p>My <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0966369X.2017.1396204">own research</a> has uncovered a huge diversity and abundance of social media and online forums, where LGBTQ young people are creating new civic and community spaces from the privacy of their bedrooms. </p>
<p>There’s been very little investigation into these emerging forms of online activism, in part because researchers and journalists are fixated on mainstream social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and are all too often directed by the data generated by these sites’ own analytics tool.</p>
<p>In other words, they often assume that the most-clicked YouTube video or the most shared tweet is particularly meaningful to users. But if you talk to young people directly, a very different picture emerges. </p>
<p>The LGBTQ teenagers I spoke to in my research explained how they explored issues around trans identities and queer sexualities through subcultural online community websites. These included <a href="https://www.furaffinity.net/">Fur Affinity</a> (a fan forum with an interest in animal fantasy writing and art), trans community subreddits on Reddit, Sherlock fan fiction and online comics. These platforms are not widely recognised as online activist spaces, as such. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=287&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=287&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=287&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256635/original/file-20190131-108351-1fefujf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Screen shot of trans supportive artwork from Fur Affinity.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.furaffinity.net/view/27717437/">Saikky/Fur Affinity.</a></span>
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<p>LGBTQ teenagers also made use of Facebook and YouTube, of course, but they were very aware of how the values, interests and opinions of straight, cis-gendered people prevail on these platforms, as in society at large. </p>
<p>They used a range of strategies to negotiate this, including turning to online counterpublics – alternative public spheres where challenges to dominant views can be expressed, shaped and shared (Tumblr would be the place to look for queer and trans counterpublics). </p>
<p>They also took a creative approach to overcoming the built-in constraints on sites such as Facebook – for example, the highly structured process of setting up and maintaining a user profile, which limits the way people can construct their online identity (for example, the rule that people must use their real name) – and creating their own content such as YouTube vlogs and humorous political memes, gifs and mashups. </p>
<h2>Calling out the haters</h2>
<p>In these ways and more, young LGBTQ people are pushing the frontiers of what’s recognised as activism and creating new strategies to combat oppression. One fascinating example of this is the way new categories are emerging in online social media culture. </p>
<p>Take, for example, the term “hater”. It’s used to describe those posting hyper critical or hurtful comments on Facebook posts, blogs or YouTube videos, typically involving homophobic, racist or sexist attacks or bullying. Labelling these people “haters” makes it possible to name them, talk about them and open up their behaviour to critical analysis. </p>
<p>As young people increasingly talk back to “the haters”, this creates opportunities for those targeted by hate speech to form alliances and develop new strategies for dealing with homo and transphobia. Indeed, addressing haters is emerging and evolving as a whole genre of social media activity in itself. </p>
<p>An example of this might be reading out haters’ comments and meeting them with your own experience, as teen vlogger Brendan Jordan does, using humour to call out the stupidity of the online hate. </p>
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<p>It’s important to recognise how young people negotiate – and sometimes subvert – the values and norms incorporated by online platforms, to explore issues around gender, sexuality and identities through activism and community formation. </p>
<p>They are aware that the very DNA of the social media and digital technologies at our disposal are coded straight and cis – and this hidden fact has real-life consequences. Imagine being young and gender questioning, and googling “trans” to explore alternative gender expressions - the image that the internet will reflect back at you is not a bright or positive one. </p>
<p>The Mermaids charity has been under attack lately, not only in the tabloid press but also online. So much so that the Big Lottery Fund announced it would review its decision to award a £500,000 grant, after Father Ted sitcom writer Graham Linehan <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-46961883">rallied opposition</a> to the charity on parenting website Mumsnet. But Brewis’ efforts offers significant funds and a much-needed counterbalance to transphobic rhetoric, and proves that online subcultures should not be underestimated as a space for social activism.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/110848/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Olu Jenzen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New activist communities are fighting back against haters to make the world safer for LGBTQ teens.Olu Jenzen, Principal Lecturer in Media Studies, University of BrightonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1100292019-01-29T19:11:03Z2019-01-29T19:11:03ZNot another online petition! But here’s why you should think before deleting it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/255096/original/file-20190123-135148-8hmc8s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">It's a lazy form of activism, but that doesn't mean signing online petitions is useless.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">from shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Online petitions are often seen as a <a href="https://uncommonculture.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/3336/2767#p3">form of “slacktivism”</a> – small acts that don’t require much commitment and are more about helping us feel good than effective activism. But the impacts of online petitions can stretch beyond immediate results.</p>
<p>Whether they work to create legislative change, or just raise awareness of an issue, there’s some merit to signing them. Even if nothing happens immediately, petitions are one of many ways we can help build long-term change.</p>
<h2>A history of petitions</h2>
<p>Petitions have a long history in Western politics. They developed centuries ago as a way for people to have their voices heard in government or ask for legislative change. But they’ve also been seen as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13572334.2012.706057">largely ineffective</a> in this respect. <a href="https://www.aspg.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/11-PALMIERI-PETITIONS-1.pdf">One study</a> found only three out of 2,589 petitions submitted to the Australian House of Representatives between 1999 and 2007 even received a ministerial response.</p>
<p>Before the end of the second world war, fewer than 16 petitions a year were presented to Australia’s House of Representatives. The new political landscape of the early 1970s <a href="https://www.aspg.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/11-PALMIERI-PETITIONS-1.pdf">saw that number</a> leap into the thousands.</p>
<p>In the 2000s, the House received around 300 petitions per year, and even with online tools, it’s still nowhere near what it was in the 70s. According to the <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/House_of_Representatives/Powers_practice_and_procedure/00_-_Infosheets/Infosheet_11_-_Petitions">parliamentary website</a>, an average of 121 petitions have been presented each year since 2008.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/changing-the-world-one-online-petition-at-a-time-how-social-activism-went-mainstream-61756">Changing the world one online petition at a time: how social activism went mainstream</a>
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<p>Although petitions rarely achieve direct change, they are an important part of the democratic process. Many governments have attempted to facilitate petitioning online. For example, <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Petitions">the Australian parliamentary website</a> helps citizens through the process of developing and submitting petitions. This is one way the internet has made creating and submitting petitions easier. </p>
<p>There are also independent sites that campaigners can use, such as <a href="https://www.change.org/">Change.org</a> and <a href="https://secure.avaaz.org/en/community_petitions/start_a_petition/">Avaaz</a>. It can take under an hour to go from an idea to an online petition that’s ready to share on social media. </p>
<p>As well as petitions being a way for citizens to make requests of their governments, they are now used more broadly. Many petitions reach a global audience – they might call for change from companies, international institutions, or even society as a whole.</p>
<h2>What makes for an effective petition?</h2>
<p>The simplest way to gauge if a petition has been successful is to look at whether the requests made were granted. The front page of Change.org displays recent “victories”. These including a call to <a href="https://www.change.org/p/axe-the-tampontax-bloodyoutrage">axe the so-called “tampon tax”</a> (the GST on <a href="https://www.change.org/p/axe-the-tampontax-bloodyoutrage/u/23384992">menstrual products</a>) which <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-03/tampon-tax-to-go-states-and-territories-agree-to-remove-gst/10332490">states and territories agreed to remove</a> come January 2019.</p>
<p>Change.org also boasts the petition for gender equality on <a href="https://www.change.org/p/kellogg-girls-should-be-equal-to-boys-in-advertising-kelloggs-nutrigrain-that-s-the-problem">cereal boxes</a> as a victory, after Kelloggs sent a statement they would be <a href="https://www.change.org/p/kellogg-girls-should-be-equal-to-boys-in-advertising-kelloggs-nutrigrain-that-s-the-problem">updating their packaging</a> in 2019 to include images of males and females. This petition only had 600 signatures, in comparison to the 75,000 against the tampon tax.</p>
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<p>In 2012, a coalition of organisations mobilised a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_SOPA_and_PIPA">campaign against two proposed US laws</a> that many saw as likely to restrict internet freedom. A circulating petition gathered 4.5 million signatures, which helped put pressure on US representatives not to vote for the bills.</p>
<p>However, all of these petitions were part of larger efforts. There have been campaigns to remove the tax on menstrual products since it was first imposed, there’s a broad movement for more equal gender representation, and there’s significant global activism <a href="https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/4162/3282">against online censorship</a>. None of these petitions can claim sole victory. But they may have pushed it over the line, or just added some weight to the groundswell of existing support. </p>
<p>Online petitions can have the obvious impact of changing the very thing they’re campaigning for. However, the type of petition also makes a difference to what change it can achieve.</p>
<h2>Choosing a petition worth signing</h2>
<p>Knowing a few characteristics of successful petitions can be useful when you’re deciding whether it’s worth your time to sign and share something. Firstly, there should be a target and specific call for action. </p>
<p>These can take many forms: petitions might request a politician vote “yes” on a specific law, demand changes to working conditions at a company, or even ask an advocacy organisation to begin campaigning around a new issue. Vague targets and unclear goals aren’t well suited to petitions. Calls for “more gender equality in society” or “better rights for pets”, for example, are unlikely to achieve success.</p>
<p>Secondly, the goal needs to be realistic. This is so it’s possible to succeed and so supporters <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/7427430">feel a sense of optimism</a>. Petitioning for a significant change in a foreign government’s policy – for example, a call from <a href="https://www.communityrun.org/petitions/international-condemnation-of-us-lack-of-gun-laws-to-protect-its-citizens">world citizens</a> for better gun control in the US – is unlikely to lead to results.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-metoo-is-an-impoverished-form-of-feminist-activism-unlikely-to-spark-social-change-86455">Why #metoo is an impoverished form of feminist activism, unlikely to spark social change</a>
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<p>It’s easier to get politicians to change their vote on a single, relatively minor issue than to achieve sweeping legal changes. It’s also more likely a company will change its packaging than completely overhaul its approach to production. </p>
<p>Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, a petition’s chance of success depends largely on the strength of community supporting it. Petitions rarely work on their own. In her book <a href="https://www.twitterandteargas.org/">Twitter and Teargas</a>, Turkish writer Zeynep Tufekci argues the internet allows us to organise action far more quickly than in the past, outpacing the hard but essential work of community organising.</p>
<p>We can get thousands of people signing a petition and shouting in the streets well before we build coalitions and think about long-term strategies. But the most effective petitions will work in combination with other forms of activism.</p>
<h2>Change happens gradually</h2>
<p>Even petitions that don’t achieve their stated aims or minor goals can play a role in activist efforts. Sharing petitions is one way to bring attention to issues that might otherwise remain off the agenda.</p>
<p>Most online petitions include the option of allowing further updates and contact. Organisations often use a petition to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10361146.2018.1499010">build momentum around an ongoing campaign</a>. Creating, or even signing, online petitions can be a form of <a href="https://firstmonday.org/article/view/4653/3800#p7">micro-activism</a> that helps people start thinking of themselves as capable of creating change. </p>
<p>Signing petitions - and seeing that others have also done so - can help us feel we are <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15358593.2015.1089582">part of a collective</a>, working with others to shape our world. </p>
<p>It’s reasonable to think carefully about what we put our names to online, but we shouldn’t be too quick to dismiss online petitions as ineffective, or “slack”. Instead, we should think of them as one example of the diverse tactics that help build change over time.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/110029/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sky Croeser does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Even if nothing happens immediately, petitions are one of many ways we can help build long-term change.Sky Croeser, Lecturer, School of Media, Creative Arts and Social Inquiry, Curtin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/986102018-07-06T10:38:09Z2018-07-06T10:38:09ZSex and gender diversity is growing across the US<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/232182/original/file-20180815-2909-1m08q8s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Vermont Democratic gubernatorial candidate Christine Hallquist, holding clipboard, a transgender woman, during her election night party in Burlington, Vt., Tuesday, Aug. 14, 2018. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Charles Krupa</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.apnews.com/0f2dc85380ca4aabb0c8d8f3debe6a94">Christine Hallquist, a transgender woman from Vermont</a>, in 2018 made history as the first openly trans person to ever win the nomination of a major political party for governor.</p>
<p>Sex and gender diverse people were <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Beyond-the-Closet-The-Transformation-of-Gay-and-Lesbian-Life/Seidman/p/book/9780415932066">once only able to be their authentic selves</a> in gay and lesbian spaces.</p>
<p>Today, from <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/democrat-danica-roem-transgender-woman-elected-virginia-state-legislature-n818876">Danica Roem in Virginia</a> to <a href="https://www.intomore.com/impact/betsy-driver-is-ready-for-americas-intersex-tipping-point/f061b1e09eed44f4">Betsy Driver in New Jersey</a> to Hallquist in Vermont, they are running and winning major political posts throughout the United States.</p>
<p>While it might be a surprising to see sex and gender diverse candidates run and win in political elections, with sex and gender diversity growing across the United States, this is likely only the beginning.</p>
<p>More people of all ages are identifying as something other than male or female.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/mission/">Williams Institute at UCLA</a>, which studies sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy, the percentage of trans adults — an umbrella term used to describe those whose gender does not match with the sex they were assigned at birth — has doubled in the last 10 years from <a href="https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/How-Many-Adults-Identify-as-Transgender-in-the-United-States.pdf">0.3 percent to 0.6 percent</a>. </p>
<p>In 2006, a survey discovered that <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3707280/">1.2 percent of Boston high school students identified as trans</a>. </p>
<p>And in a recent issue of the journal Pediatrics, researchers showed that <a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2018/02/01/peds.2017-1683">2.7 percent</a> of Minnesota’s youth identify as trans and gender-nonconforming. Similar to trans, gender-nonconforming describes those who reject gender expectations that assume only females can do femininity while only males can do masculinity.</p>
<p>I’m <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=VaP-Q70AAAAJ&hl=en">a sociologist</a> and for more than 10 years, I have been <a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9781479887040/">studying sex- and gender-diverse</a> people in the United States. I’ve witnessed researchers analyze everything from <a href="https://eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-05/esoe-tba051818.php">brain differences</a> to the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29736184">hormones a fetus</a> is exposed to during gestation to explain the growth of sex and gender diversity. </p>
<p>Looking to human anatomy and physiology alone is inadequate in explaining the demographic sex and gender changes that are rapidly occurring throughout our society. Does culture also play a role?</p>
<h2>Evolution? Not so fast</h2>
<p>Historical accounts of sex- and gender-diverse people date as far back as the <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1363460714531270?rss=1">18th</a> and 19th centuries <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/bodies-doubt">in the U.S.</a> and <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674001893">elsewhere</a>. </p>
<p>But why is it that we are now witnessing a growth in the percentage of people publicly identifying as sex- and gender-diverse? Did human anatomy and physiology change overnight? Or is it that people are now more comfortable rejecting the simplicity of “We’re all just male or female”?</p>
<p>What the rising statistics likely reveal is that thanks to <a href="https://www.sealpress.com/titles/susan-stryker/transgender-history-second-edition/9781580056908/">activists and their allies across various movements</a>, more people, <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/where-the-millennials-will-take-us-9780199324392?q=risman&lang=en&cc=us">especially millennials</a>, are now aware that people are more complex than male or female. And they are embracing this complexity by not only choosing sex- and gender-diversity for themselves, but by also sharing their life experiences in stories across print media and on television.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225770/original/file-20180702-116117-l350c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">New York’s annual gay and lesbian pride parade, 1989.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP/Sergio Florez</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Activists are organizing in the streets and fighting in the courtroom for rights. This is not recent news: For example, earlier generations of activists demonstrated against police brutality in the 1960s in what is now known as the <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/the-stonewall-riots">Stonewall Riots</a>. But the activism has accelerated and spread. </p>
<p>Pride celebrations <a href="https://www.wbez.org/shows/worldview/the-global-growth-of-lgbt-pride/5044abbf-e671-4fe1-aed6-4cdb0b576990">seem to be everywhere</a> these days. And in the courtroom, transgender teenager Gavin Grimm is currently in the middle of a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/01/politics/gavin-grimm-board-appeals/index.html">lawsuit against</a> his Virginia high school that wouldn’t allow him to use the boy’s bathroom. That suit has raised Grimm’s profile and put him at the “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/gavin-grimm-just-wanted-to-use-the-bathroom-he-didnt-think-the-nation-would-debate-it/2016/08/30/23fc9892-6a26-11e6-ba32-5a4bf5aad4fa_story.html?utm_term=.1d24ba2dc5fa">center of the national debate</a>,” according to The Washington Post. </p>
<p>This activism lets the public know there is life beyond male or female.</p>
<p>People now have customizable sex and genders to choose from on everything from <a href="https://www.facebook.com/facebookdiversity/posts/774221582674346">Facebook</a> to the dating site OkCupid. On OkCupid, one can identify as male, female, transgender, nonbinary, genderfluid or genderqueer, or choose up to five categories from many other options. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/225544/original/file-20180629-117425-1i4muyk.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Which gender best describes you?</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It is not a coincidence that sex and gender diversity is also <a href="https://www.glaad.org/whereweareontv17">flourishing in the media</a>. There is <a href="https://www.emmys.com/shows/transparent">“Transparent,”</a> the popular award-winning dramedy series about a family patriarch who gender transitions from man to woman. And then there is the critically acclaimed film <a href="http://www.magpictures.com/tangerine/">“Tangerine,”</a> where we see a transgender woman navigate relationship turmoil. </p>
<p>Trans issues are at the center of these scripts, but the filmmakers also skillfully give us more. The main characters are trans, but the trans aspect of the characters are only one part of the storyline. This is a shift in popular culture.</p>
<p>There is no question that the internet’s <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/IT.NET.USER.ZS">expansion</a> has also <a href="https://www.sealpress.com/titles/susan-stryker/transgender-history-second-edition/9781580056908/">fueled the transgender movement</a> and <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/cardw12&id=257">other similar sex- and gender-diverse movements</a>. </p>
<p>The internet makes it easier for people to identify as something other than what they were assigned at birth. A teenager in the rural Midwest can use the internet to connect with similar people around the world. And they can learn strategies about how to navigate medical care, school, and even disclosing to their family if they choose to change their sex and/or gender identity.</p>
<p>The parents of sex- and gender-diverse youth who support their child are also able to find community and resources on the internet from home. New sociological research published by Ann Travers with <a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9781479885794/">New York University Press</a> as well as by Tey Meadow with the <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520275041/trans-kids">University of California Press</a> shows supportive parents do exist. They affirm their child’s gender identity by, for example, using their child’s chosen pronouns and new name if applicable, enlisting gender-affirming medical care and more.</p>
<p>This is not to say that those who identify as something other than a typical male or female person will have an easy road ahead of them. </p>
<h2>Navigating oppression</h2>
<p>It is possible the number of sex- and gender-diverse people in the population is <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5227946/">underestimated</a>. Not all will feel <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10612-013-9225-0">it is safe</a> to identify as something other than male or female. Many sex- and gender-diverse people are <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10964-010-9540-7">emotionally harmed</a> by societal rejection. And, as sociologists Lisa R. Miller and Eric Anthony Grollman documented, there are “<a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/socf.12193">social costs of gender nonconformity</a>.”</p>
<p><a href="http://www.thetaskforce.org/static_html/downloads/resources_and_tools/ntds_report_on_health.pdf">One study</a> specifically reported that 41 percent of sex and gender diverse adults have attempted suicide compared to 1.6 percent of the general population. Similarly, <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/sltb.12289">a 2016 study</a> published in the journal Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, found that 30.3 percent of transgender youth between the ages of 12 and 22 years had attempted suicide, with nearly 42 percent reporting they had tried hurting themselves, such as deliberately cutting their skin.</p>
<p>Sex- and gender-diverse people are at the battleground of political and legal debates across the country. Their access to public bathrooms has been challenged from <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/03/30/politics/north-carolina-hb2-agreement/index.html">North Carolina</a> to <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/08/16/texas-bathroom-bill/571671001/">Texas</a>. It is not easy, or in many cases even legally possible, for sex- and gender-diverse people to obtain <a href="https://transequality.org/documents">driver’s licenses, birth certificates or passports</a> that match their sex and gender identities.</p>
<p>Despite the challenges sex- and gender-diverse people face navigating their lives, I believe their numbers will keep growing. </p>
<p>This will happen as sex- and gender-diverse movements get stronger. More people will gain access to the internet and connect with other marginalized sex- and gender-diverse people. And with such demographic shifts, there will likely continue to be a growing representation of sex and gender diversity in popular culture. </p>
<p>There is no way to predict how large the sex- and gender-diverse population will get. But there is evidence that society is changing from the simplicity of male or female.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This is an updated version of an article originally published on July 6, 2018.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98610/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Georgiann Davis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Christine Hallquist this week became the first trans person to win a major party’s gubernatorial nomination. The percentage of trans adults has doubled since 2008. What’s responsible for that change?Georgiann Davis, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Nevada, Las VegasLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/924772018-03-01T17:05:10Z2018-03-01T17:05:10ZThe NRA’s video channel is a hotbed of online hostility<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208515/original/file-20180301-152587-1fo7lth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">NRA TV's content focuses on ideology rather than guns.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aq7jnowk0kk">Screenshot from YouTube.com</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As the <a href="https://home.nra.org/">National Rifle Association</a>, the most influential gun rights advocacy group in the U.S., comes under pressure from <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/technology/375556-groups-call-on-apple-amazon-to-ditch-nra-tv-channel">victims’ groups</a> and gun control advocates, internet companies like Amazon, Apple and YouTube are finding themselves uncomfortably close to the center of the controversy. These are among the companies that currently stream the NRA’s official video channel, <a href="https://www.nratv.com/">NRA TV</a>. </p>
<p>NRA TV has become a central focus in what could be a threshold moment in the national gun debate. In the wake of the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/15/us/florida-shooting-victims-school/index.html">school shooting</a> in Parkland, Florida, that claimed 17 lives, a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/23/business/nra-boycott.html">consumer activist movement</a> has worked to peel back the <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35261394">tight grip the NRA holds</a> over the country’s gun policy. The effort has driven some airlines, insurance companies, car rental companies and banks to <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/25/news/companies/companies-abandoning-nra-list/index.html">sever their commercial and professional ties</a> with the NRA. Now gun control activists are turning their full attention to the internet.</p>
<p>In the world of online politics, it’s not unusual to find videos <a href="http://video.dailymail.co.uk/preview/mol/2017/09/17/3149702971737159051/636x382_MP4_3149702971737159051.mp4">inciting hostility</a>. On Feb. 12, just days before the Parkland shooting, one such <a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/963128750857641984">YouTube video</a> featured a pundit smashing a sledgehammer through a TV set that featured liberal commentators, later declaring, “If we want to take back this nation from socialists who are out to destroy it … you better believe we’ll be pushing the truth on them.” But that video was not the seething production of an obscure far-right blogger. It was the latest episode of the official video channel of the NRA.</p>
<p>NRA TV is not merely a platform for promoting Second Amendment rights or engaging gun enthusiasts. As a <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9783319514239">researcher of online extremism</a>, I’d contend it has become one of the web’s most incendiary hotspots for stoking outrage at liberal America, attacking perceived enemies like <a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/">Black Lives Matter</a> and the <a href="https://www.womensmarch.com/">Women’s March</a>, and promoting the message that America is under threat from the so-called “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/895358165335789568">violent left</a>” – an especially alarming term, coming from a gun lobby.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208364/original/file-20180301-36671-gsiga5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">NRA TV presents itself as a part of a movement for truth and facts.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnPV7QPHfuwwPBn_mvI_Hzw">Screenshot from YouTube.com</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What is NRA TV?</h2>
<p>Given the channel’s association with the NRA, a newcomer to NRA TV might reasonably expect information on gun safety, Second Amendment rights and a community for firearms enthusiasts and collectors. Its focus is none of those things. Instead, visitors find a virtual hornet’s nest of hard-right politics. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9783319514239">In my work</a>, I came across NRA TV while tracking far-right and far-left groups’ activities on Twitter. One such group had retweeted a video from NRA TV featuring host Dana Loesch calling the mainstream media “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/801490119710621696">the rat bastards of the earth</a>” whom she was happy to see “curb stomped.”</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"801490119710621696"}"></div></p>
<p>The acidic tone of NRA TV represents an astonishing evolution of an organization that began as a rifle club to <a href="https://home.nra.org/about-the-nra/">promote marksmanship</a>. Even the NRA of the 1980s, which ran <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sr3tKACUBH8">TV ads on the right to bear arms</a>, would be hard to recognize as a forebear to today’s version. My study of 224 NRA TV videos and tweets over two months in 2017 found that only 34 dealt with topics related to direct gun advocacy or gun ownership. The remaining 190, or about five out of every six posts, were trained on perceived political enemies, trading the core mission of gun rights for incessant attacks on “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/895358165335789568">crazed liberals</a>” and “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/895487918701068288">hateful leftists</a>.”</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Sr3tKACUBH8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A TV ad from the NRA from the 1980s.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It is hard to recall an NRA that once viewed itself as a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/24/politics/nra-partisan-bipartisan-republican/index.html">bipartisan body</a>. Its current online hosts warn that opponents of President Donald Trump will “<a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2017/10/20/new-nra-ad-warns-trump-opponents-will-perish-political-flames-their-own-fires/218283">perish in the political flames of their own fires</a>.” Even more provocative is the portrayal of the NRA’s declared adversaries, framed not as political foes, but as ideological and even existential threats. The Women’s March is labeled “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/884490532168151040">a bigoted, fake feminist, jihad-supporting</a>” movement, while Black Lives Matter is described as “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/884505310022385666">a dangerous, hateful, destructive ideology</a>.” </p>
<p>The dystopian picture that NRA TV portrays includes government officials <a href="https://www.facebook.com/NRATV/videos/10155145665227898/">encouraging violent protests</a> against conservative groups, and a media-sponsored “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/889933589437009921">war on cops</a>.” The NRA believes it must be <a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/882731146550820864">ready to defend</a> itself and the country against these and other forces.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/208326/original/file-20180228-36683-iegxan.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=619&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In addition to publishing its own material, NRA TV also retweets others’ hostile messages.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://twitter.com/BreitbartNews/status/881491671237767168">Screenshot from Twitter.com</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In <a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/895358165335789568">a video that streamed</a> to NRA TV’s 260,000 Twitter followers in August 2017, host Grant Stinchfield asked his audience, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“What scares me more than the North Korean crazed tyrant? The violent left and the crazed liberals who lead them. They like North Korea also pose a clear and present danger to America … Make no mistake, the lying leftist media, the elitist cringe-worthy celebrities, and the anti-American politicians – who make up the violent left – don’t just hate President Trump, they hate you.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The insinuation that left-wing forces are out to destroy the country by sabotaging its institutions is a demagogic refrain with echoes of the <a href="http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/murrowmccarthy.html">anti-communist McCarthy era</a>. But it is particularly unsettling when it emanates from a lobby that simultaneously promotes the necessity of <a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/889598211492532224">gun ownership</a>. Which brings us back to Amazon.</p>
<h2>Pulling the plug</h2>
<p>After another shooting at an American high school at the hands of a <a href="http://time.com/5160267/gun-used-florida-school-shooting-ar-15/">19-year-old with an AR-15</a>, the gun-control advocacy movement has turned its attention to its chief opponent, the NRA. The strategy is to dislodge the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/23/politics/nra-political-money-clout/index.html">influence of the NRA</a> by going after its support system. That has led activists to Amazon, Apple, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nra-tv-roku-rejects-calls-to-cancel-channel/">Roku</a> and other services that stream NRA TV content. While other companies support the NRA financially, these internet giants provide perhaps a more valuable currency in their prominent platforms that allow the NRA to distribute its message. </p>
<p><a href="https://momsdemandaction.org/">Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America</a> is one organization leading the charge for internet companies to drop NRA TV, citing its “<a href="https://momsdemandaction.org/moms-demand-action-everytown-launch-dumpnratv-campaign-calling-on-google-amazon-apple-atts-directv-and-roku-to-stop-streaming-nratv/">violence-inciting programming</a>.” The group is joined by some of the survivors of the Parkland shooting, such as David Hogg, who is <a href="https://twitter.com/davidhogg111/status/968129989085421569">encouraging people to boycott tech companies</a> that carry NRA TV. A <a href="https://www.change.org/p/jeff-bezos-remove-nratv-from-amazon-s-streaming-service-website">petition on Change.org</a>, with 240,000 signatures as of March 1, is simultaneously calling on Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to purge NRA content from his site’s offerings. And on Twitter, <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/dropNRATV">#dropNRATV</a> is gaining steam, even as the channel continues to host controversial content.</p>
<p>The growing wave of consumer activists has effectively placed the internet’s biggest gatekeepers in the middle of America’s hyperpolarized gun debate. As web hosts, their power to amplify or quiet controversial messages is unmatched in the modern media landscape. But in many ways, this is not strictly a gun issue. Rather, a closer look at NRA TV suggests that this is also an issue of community standards, which are well within a web host’s domain. </p>
<p>And in recent months, YouTube and Twitter have each demonstrated a willingness to <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/12/18/twitter-is-starting-to-purge-its-alt-right-users/">enforce stricter terms of service</a> prohibiting hateful, dangerous or abusive material from their networks. So the real question that these internet companies now face is whether an NRA tirade about American liberals posing a “<a href="https://twitter.com/NRATV/status/895358165335789568">clear and present danger</a>” is legitimate gun advocacy, or barefaced incitement.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/92477/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adam G. Klein does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Gun control advocates want to shut down the National Rifle Association’s online video channel, NRA TV. A scholar looks at what its videos are actually about.Adam G. Klein, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies, Pace University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/864552017-10-29T19:11:05Z2017-10-29T19:11:05ZWhy #metoo is an impoverished form of feminist activism, unlikely to spark social change<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192174/original/file-20171027-13349-1l9nymi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Social media activism leaves women open to online abuse from men. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Using the hashtag #metoo, thousands of women around the world have posted on social media sharing their stories of male violence, particularly in the workplace. The posts are a response to the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/oct/15/hollyoaks-star-lysette-anthony-accuses-weinstein-of-as-abuse-claims-stack-up">multiple accusations</a> of sexual assault against film producer Harvey Weinstein, as women outside the film industry join in online to share their experiences of harassment, assault, and rape. As the stories continue to pile up, women undoubtedly hope that this mass of digital content will be a turning point for change.</p>
<p>Scholars such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/metoo-and-modern-consciousness-raising-85980">Lauren Rosewarne</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/metoo-campaign-brings-conversation-of-rape-to-the-mainstream-85875">Jessalyn Keller</a> have argued that hashtags such as #metoo are a modern-day form of consciousness raising. But the latter term is traditionally understood as a political process where women come together to share experiences and ideas without men. Hashtag activism is different because social media is a mixed-sex space.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"919659438700670976"}"></div></p>
<p>On social media, women have little room to progress beyond simply sharing individual experiences, and these platforms leave them open to online abuse. This means there’s little chance that hashtag activism will make a real dent in the ubiquitous experience of sexual assault among women. </p>
<p>Consciousness raising originated in the Women’s Liberation movement, coming to prominence in the 1970s in countries like the US, the UK, Australia and New Zealand. The movement was characterised by small, local face-to-face groups, women-only conferences and the regular publication of newsletters boldly proclaiming that they were to be read only by women. Recognising men’s ability to censor and misrepresent feminist speech in mainstream print media, women also set up their own press houses to distribute their ideas. </p>
<p>Consciousness raising involved women meeting regularly in small groups of around ten — sometimes for years on end — to talk about their experiences, find connections between issues, and understand the scope of men’s control over their personal lives.</p>
<p>For these activists, a male presence in either consciousness raising or the broader movement, was inconceivable. Men, they believed, would influence the direction of conversations and monopolise discussions with their own concerns. Many <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/466240">democracy theorists</a> stress that women-only spaces such as these are vital to successful movements for social change. They were non-negotiable for Women’s Liberation activists. </p>
<h2>Social media’s male problem</h2>
<p>Hashtag activism doesn’t have the same emancipatory effect as consciousness raising, because it takes place in public view of a mixed-sex audience of thousands. Social media also comes with its own problems for women. The platforms are male-owned, male-controlled corporations that reflect male values in their policies. </p>
<p>For example, Facebook and Twitter continue to do very little about the harassment of women online, yet <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/oct/12/banning-rose-mcgowan-shows-nothings-changed-twitter-weinstein">Twitter recently banned Rose McGowan</a>, one of the most outspoken celebrities regarding Weinstein’s offences, for her tweets.</p>
<p>It is also common for social media moderators to refuse to remove what women report as misogynistic posts, instead classifying this content as <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/10/the-unsafety-net-how-social-media-turned-against-women/381261/">“controversial humor”</a>. Social media allows men to watch, search for and intervene in feminist conversations, derailing feminism by harassing the women participating or by redirecting their focus. </p>
<p>If you are a regular follower of feminist conversations on Twitter, you will know that women have done this public confessional dance before. In 2011, it was under the banner of #mencallmethings, a hashtag used by women to recount examples of the abuse they had received from men online.</p>
<p>In 2014, we had #yesallwomen, a response to the killing of six people by Elliot Rogers at the University of California. A <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2014/05/24/us/elliot-rodger-video-transcript/index.html">YouTube video</a> revealed that the killer was driven by a hatred of women and the “girls [who] gave their affection, and their sex and love to other men but never to me … I will punish you all for it”. </p>
<p>The campaign #yesallwomen produced a similar catalogue of women’s experiences as #mencallmethings — harrowing, ordinary stories about what it is like to be a woman in a world where male power and entitlement remains unchecked. The mainstream media reported on both hashtags widely, and yet nothing changed. </p>
<p>The hashtag #yesallwomen was also met with #notallmen. Similarly, #mencallmethings was deemed offensive from men’s point of view, and when the discussion morphed into a general conversation about online cruelty it <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277539514001332">was depoliticised</a>. </p>
<p>Physical spaces for women, such as women’s centres and feminist bookstores, largely no longer exist. Face-to-face consciousness raising groups have also gone out of fashion. </p>
<p>In this cultural climate, hashtag activism represents an impoverished form of feminist activism, containing few possibilities for sparking real social change. Feminists need to recreate women-only spaces if they want to freely discuss ideas and challenge men’s dominance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86455/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jessica Megarry is affiliated with the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (Australia).</span></em></p>Thousands of women have shared their experiences of sexual abuse. But, unlike the consciousness raising activities of 1970s feminists, hashtag activism suffers in a space dominated by men.Jessica Megarry, PhD Candidate School of Social and Political Sciences, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/795002017-08-02T00:57:47Z2017-08-02T00:57:47ZMore than ‘slacktivism’: we dismiss the power of politics online at our peril<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174863/original/file-20170621-30161-12pwj92.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Political groups of all stripes recognise the enormous power of online mass persuasion, one meme at a time.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/fibonacciblue/32452974604/">Fibonacci Blue/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>This article is part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/democracy-futures">Democracy Futures</a> series, a <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/democracy-futures/">joint global initiative</a> between The Conversation and the <a href="http://sydneydemocracynetwork.org/">Sydney Democracy Network</a>. The project aims to stimulate fresh thinking about the many challenges facing democracies in the 21st century.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Log on to Facebook or Twitter and you’re likely to see a deluge of political posts – a humorous <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-donald-trump-won-the-2016-meme-wars-68580">meme</a> or viral video skewering politicians like Donald Trump, the latest hashtag slogan in response to breaking news, maybe even a social movement symbol as an updated profile picture. </p>
<p>The sharing of political opinion on social media is now ubiquitous. But what does it mean for democracy?</p>
<p>For years, debate has raged about the significance of symbolic, expressive political activity at the level of the everyday citizen. </p>
<p>Critics fear it is simply self-satisfying “<a href="https://theconversation.com/slacktivism-that-works-small-changes-matter-69271">slacktivism</a>”. It gives people an easy way to feel they’re contributing to a cause while substituting for more intensive political participation. </p>
<p>Conversely, optimists see a flourishing of civic engagement on the internet that gives people an accessible entry point into politics. If it helps them to develop a sense of political identity and agency, that enables more participation down the line.</p>
<p>These contrasting positions both have merit. Yet are those who take them asking the right questions in the first place?</p>
<p>By evaluating online political expression only in terms of possible impacts on traditional political activity, we risk sidestepping a far more crucial set of issues.</p>
<h2>Forget ‘slacktivism’</h2>
<p>Myriad organisations and institutions see this citizen-level expression on social media as being far from just a private or personal affair. It is increasingly valued for its aggregate promotional power. The marketing professions know this as <a href="http://www.buzztalkmonitor.com/blog/electronic-word-of-mouth-presents-a-window-of-opportunity-for-businesses/">electronic word of mouth</a>.</p>
<p>Political groups of all stripes promote social media participation to amplify the reach and credibility of their persuasive messages. Although each individual act of posting, linking, commenting and liking may look insignificant up close, at a macro level they add up to nothing less than the networked spread of ideas. </p>
<p>There is enormous power here for mass persuasion, one viral share at a time. We dismiss this power at our peril.</p>
<p>During the 2016 US presidential election cycle social media soared to new heights of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-relationship-between-social-media-and-traditional-media-has-shaped-this-election-61585">prominence</a> in the political media landscape. It appears we are finally starting to recognise this power for what it is. </p>
<hr>
<p><em><strong>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-the-wannabe-king-ruling-by-twiat-72269">Trump, the wannabe king ruling by twiat</a></strong></em></p>
<hr>
<p>For instance, <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/viral-fake-election-news-outperformed-real-news-on-facebook?utm_term=.sc0N0nwlP#.laLN2PYkM">controversy over fake news on sites like Facebook</a> has drawn attention to how peer-to-peer sharing can influence public opinion and even the course of elections (in this case by spreading false and defamatory messages about Hillary Clinton that consolidated her image problems). New <a href="https://datasociety.net/output/media-manipulation-and-disinfo-online/">research</a> has highlighted how:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… far-right groups develop techniques of ‘attention hacking’ to increase the visibility of their ideas through the strategic use of social media, memes and bots.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=358&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=358&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=358&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174873/original/file-20170621-30211-16o258g.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fake news stories from websites like End The Fed are designed to go viral on social media.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">End The Fed</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The so-called alt-right celebrates its “<a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/03/memes-4chan-trump-supporters-trolls-internet-214856">meme magic</a>” in propagating white nationalist ideology online in service of Trump. The pro-Clinton <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/correct-the-record-online-trolls/484847/">“Correct the Record” political action committee</a> admits to paying people to post on social media during her primary battle with Bernie Sanders. We are seeing the persuasive value of citizen-level political media coming into sharp focus.</p>
<p>We need to reflect on how we each use this power. That involves thinking through the consequences of what we share online and how it can both strengthen and harm democratic values.</p>
<h2>The citizen marketer</h2>
<p>Sharing political opinion on social media must be understood in no small part as participation in political <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-citizen-marketer-9780190658069?lang=en&cc=us">marketing</a>. Its practitioners have long circulated persuasive media messages to shape the public mind and influence political outcomes. </p>
<p>This understanding calls for a new kind of media literacy. It requires individuals to acknowledge their own position in circuits of media influence and take seriously their capacity to help shape the flow of political ideas across networks of peers. </p>
<p>We should no longer think of political marketing — or its conceptual forebear, propaganda — as something only powerful elites do. We must recognise that we are all now complicit in this process every time we spread political messages via media platforms that we personally control.</p>
<p>Many citizens are keenly aware of their capacity to persuade their peers through their online posting. They have embraced the role of social media influencer. Most often, they focus on trying to rally the like-minded or undecided, rather than winning over converts from the other side.</p>
<p>This <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-citizen-marketer-9780190658069?lang=en&cc=us">citizen marketer</a> approach to political action can be seen as an outgrowth of the more established concept of the citizen consumer. A citizen consumer deliberately uses their spending power as another way to influence the political sphere. </p>
<p>They may, for instance, buy only environmentally friendly products, or boycott companies whose CEOs donate to campaigns and causes that the consumer opposes. Similarly, we are seeing citizens use their power as micro-level agents of viral media promotion and word-of-mouth endorsement to advance a wide range of political interests and agendas.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ry-hqi9zRuM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">#BlackLivesMatter forced America to confront racism once more using the power of social media.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is an enormous opportunity to democratise the flow of political media messages and publicise causes that lie outside the mainstream. </p>
<p>Consider recent activist movements, often built around viral hashtags like #occupywallsteet and #blacklivesmatter. Here, citizens are co-opting the tools and logics of social media marketing to advocate for political ideas that are typically poorly represented in the corporate mass media.</p>
<p>By recognising the potential value of our own grassroots political marketing power, we can gain a foothold in a political media landscape that elite interests traditionally dominated. </p>
<p>Perhaps even more importantly, cultivating a sense of responsibility for what we share on social media puts us in a better position to navigate the emerging digital ecosystem in which these elite actors are capitalising upon — at times even exploiting – our electronic word of mouth.</p>
<hr>
<p><em><strong>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/not-so-grassroots-how-the-snowflake-model-is-transforming-political-campaigns-54166">Snowflake model is transforming political campaigns</a></strong></em></p>
<hr>
<h2>Know what you are posting, and who you are posting for</h2>
<p>Nowadays, major election campaigns and large-scale issue advocacy organisations have professional digital marketing teams. One of their tasks is to spur the promotional labour of everyday citizens to maximise the virality of their messages, whether these people are truly aware of their participation in political marketing or not. </p>
<p>In addition, for-profit political news sites like Breitbart and The Daily Kos have become dependent on social media shares to boost clicks and advertising revenue, as well as to advance their proprietors’ often-partisan agendas.</p>
<p>In this environment, it is crucial that we make informed decisions when we lend our promotional labour and word-of-mouth endorsement to institutional actors and the interests and agendas they represent. </p>
<p>At times we may be eager to act as “<a href="https://www.ignitesocialmedia.com/social-media-strategy/how-to-build-brand-evangelists-with-3-winning-examples/">brand evangelists</a>” for candidates, parties, advocacy groups or news agencies whose political goals align with our own. At other times developing media literacy might cause us to pause and reflect before we amplify the latest trending political message.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/174864/original/file-20170621-30177-1k2nd9j.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Human Rights Campaign logo that made the rounds on Facebook.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The Human Rights Campaign</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Back in 2013, Facebook users <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/technology/2013/03/what-is-that-red-equal-sign-on-facebook-all-about/">posted a red equal sign</a> as their profile picture to express their support for same-sex marriage. Some had <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-citizen-marketer-9780190658069?lang=en&cc=us">no idea</a> the symbol was the logo of the <a href="http://www.hrc.org/">Human Rights Campaign</a>. This organisation has had a <a href="http://transgriot.blogspot.com/2013/04/why-trans-community-loathes-hrc.html">controversial</a> status in the LGBT movement because of its past treatment of transgender issues.</p>
<p>Would these citizens still have posted the image if they knew they were participating in a viral marketing campaign for an organisation that was not universally supported by the LGBT community, and whose message of equality has drawn criticism for emphasising assimilation over radical structural change? </p>
<p>Or would they have chosen instead to amplify an image and an organisation with a different shade of meaning?</p>
<p>These kinds of important conversations can only be opened up if we start to develop a critical literacy of the citizen marketer approach and how it is transforming what it means to be an active participant in our media-dominated, postmodern political reality.</p>
<p>If we see our online political expressions as mere “slacktivism”, a simple private matter, or just having fun with friends, then we become more vulnerable to manipulation by forces that seek to exploit our citizen marketing power to serve agendas that we may not share.</p>
<p>If we become more aware of our position in these circuits of power, we will be better equipped to resist this manipulation. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Joel Penney’s new book, <a href="https://www.citizenmarketer.org">The Citizen Marketer</a>, is available from <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-citizen-marketer-9780190658069?lang=en&cc=us">Oxford University Press</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79500/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joel Penney does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Each individual act of posting, linking, commenting and liking may look insignificant up close, but they add up. There is enormous power here for mass persuasion, one viral share at a time.Joel Penney, Professor of Communication and Media, Montclair State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/762102017-04-14T00:49:41Z2017-04-14T00:49:41ZHow social media turned United’s PR flub into a firestorm<p>Recent PR stumbles by United Airlines and Uber illustrate the challenges for businesses in an age when citizen activism is amplified by social media. Incidents that not so long ago would have been relatively isolated are inflaming public sentiment at a breathtaking pace, catching companies wrong-footed and significantly raising the stakes of such missteps.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrDWY6C1178">Videos</a> showing security forcibly removing a United passenger from a flight on April 9 went viral before the plane had even taken off. It <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/11/travel/united-customer-dragged-off-overbooked-flight/index.html">sparked a furor</a> that caused United’s stock to drop and its CEO to apologize several times and <a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-united-apology-20170412-story.html">refund the fares</a> of every passenger on the flight. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.marketwatch.com/story/consumers-lash-out-at-uber-and-turn-to-lyft-after-ubers-immigration-response-2017-01-29">Uber faced a similar PR crisis</a> after it appeared to align itself with President Donald Trump’s <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/27/executive-order-protecting-nation-foreign-terrorist-entry-united-states">refugee ban</a>. <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2017/2/2/14493760/delete-uber-protest-donald-trump-accounts-deleted">At least 200,000 people</a> removed Uber apps from their phones. </p>
<p>As my research into online social networks shows, these incidents illustrate the challenges for companies in dealing with the fallout of bad publicity as social media amplifies both the reach and range of responses available to concerned individuals.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VrDWY6C1178?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>A massive shift</h2>
<p>Social activism has fundamentally shifted in the age of social media. </p>
<p>The main difference between what happened to United or Uber today and what would have happened 20 years ago is the speed, scale and spread of digital activism. </p>
<p>Back then, we would not have the means to either raise awareness or mobilize for a cause at this speed and scale. Outrage over the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989, for example, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exxon_Shipping_Co._v._Baker">eventually led</a> to an award of millions of dollars in damages, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1990/03/01/us/exxon-valdez-the-spill-the-cleanup-and-the-charges.html">but it took months</a> for the scale of disaster to become clear and years of protracted negotiations. </p>
<p>In contrast, United and Uber faced substantial damage within hours of the incidents, resulting in boycotts and <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/12/shares-of-united-fall-for-second-day-as-controversy-lingers.html">spooked investors</a>. </p>
<p>While some commentators say the companies’ weak responses <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/cherylsnappconner/2017/04/11/united-passenger-dragged-uber-blames-bad-pr-what-to-do-when-the-hits-keep-coming/#2b4284c435bf">reveal a crisis in public relations management</a>, the truth is social media’s fast pace is putting incredible demands on PR professionals.</p>
<h2>How activism goes viral</h2>
<p>As research I and others have conducted shows, there are two main mechanisms that are influential in shaping the virality of digital activism. </p>
<p>The first one involves how social media platforms like Twitter provide a leading opinion-making role to a few key (and connected) individuals, amplifying their voices and allowing videos and memes to spread. For example, the viral #DeleteUber campaign began with a <a href="http://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2017/01/31/the-viral-deleteuber-campaign-began-with-a-single-tweet-from-a-chicago-journalist">single tweet from a Chicago journalist</a> named Dan O'Sullivan. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://5harad.com/papers/diffusion.pdf">study of online social interactions</a> showed that a small set of “seed” users (with lots of followers) account for a disproportionately large share of viral phenomenon on social media. In other words, all it takes is a few retweets by celebrities or news personalities with sizable followings to share almost instantly a “call to arms” with thousands if not millions of users, many of whom will also retweet the video or hashtag. </p>
<p>The second mechanism involves how social media amplifies the visibility of viral phenomenon by turning more individuals into opinion makers as they easily engage with others like them (known as homophily, or a preference for like-minded others). </p>
<p>The resulting activism spirals into a large-scale online movement that is impossible for companies to ignore. In a <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07421222.2016.1172454?journalCode=mmis20">recent paper</a> I co-authored with business professors Yong Tan of the University of Washington and Cath Oh of Georgia State University, we showed how online conversations spiral into cascades. </p>
<p>As I found in <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1984690&rec=1&srcabs=1934172&alg=1&pos=7">another study</a> with Tan and Oh, once a hashtag reaches a threshold of visibility, subsequent online conversations between individuals only magnifies the influence and spread of the hashtag. This helps turn users from passive sharers into active broadcasters. </p>
<p>While the age of TV makes it possible that one person’s act of protest (such as <a href="http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2044723,00.html">self-immolation in public</a>) can be broadcast very quickly around the world, it is the opinion-making role of social media, when combined with its reach and speed, that makes digital activism compelling. </p>
<h2>Message for businesses</h2>
<p>So what does this mean for companies? </p>
<p>Because consumers often <a href="http://www.economist.com/node/4008642">consider themselves</a> to be in a “social contract” with businesses in which the latter are interested in their well-being, the biggest problems emerge when companies do something that appears to violate it. That’s what happened when United’s Muñoz <a href="http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/10/united-ceo-says-airline-had-to-re-accommodate-passenger-and-twitter-is-having-a-riot.html">described</a> dragging a passenger off a plane as “reaccommodating” him. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/geoffwilliams/2015/11/04/can-chipotle-survive-its-e-coli-crisis-pr-experts-seem-to-think-so-and-offer-advice/#7f2b8e663276">Some companies</a>, however, have learned how to manage the power of social media by being proactive in dealing with cultural and political issues that could trigger a backlash from consumers if poorly handled. For example, at the same time Uber’s CEO was scrambling, Starbucks’ chief executive <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-starbucks-idUSKBN15E05X">was taking to social media</a> to emphasize his company’s support for immigration. This reinforced the social contract that the coffee chain has with its customers. </p>
<p>This, however, might be of little use after an embarrassing incident like United’s. This situation illustrates the importance of being flexible with processes, as well as communications. In <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-jeff-bezos-united-incident-pr-fiasco-2017-4">his annual letter to shareholders released this week</a>, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos hit this on the nose when he noted how “it’s not that rare to hear a junior leader defend a bad outcome with something like, ‘Well, we followed the process.’”</p>
<p>This is exactly what happened to United when the <a href="https://qz.com/956964/the-lessons-of-united-ceo-oscar-munozs-failed-attempts-to-apologize/">CEO’s initial defense</a> of what his crew did on April 9 <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/united-boss-dragged-passenger-was-disruptive-belligerent-n745031">only exacerbated the problem</a>. </p>
<p>The old adage is that the customer is always right. Today’s fast-paced world means this idea is more important that ever, and companies need to communicate clearly and proactively to keep consumer trust when it’s violated.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76210/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anjana Susarla does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Incidents that may have been mere hiccups a few years ago today can go viral in an instant, causing a massive backlash and leaving some of the biggest companies wrong-footed.Anjana Susarla, Associate Professor of Information Systems, Michigan State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/692712016-12-16T03:19:53Z2016-12-16T03:19:53Z‘Slacktivism’ that works: ‘Small changes’ matter<p>In 2013, <a href="https://www.change.org/p/no-more-steubenvilles-educate-coaches-about-sexual-assault">an online petition</a> persuaded a national organization representing high school coaches to develop materials to <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/04/girls-tweeting-not-twerking-their-way-to-power/">educate coaches about sexual assault and how they could help reduce assaults by their athletes</a>. Online petitions have changed decisions by major corporations (<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/02/petition-bank-of-america-debit-card-fee">ask Bank of America</a> about its debit card fees) and affected decisions on policies as diverse as those related to <a href="https://www.wired.com/2016/06/funny-die-helped-congress-finally-agree-something/">survivors of sexual assault</a> and <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/digitally-enabled-social-change">local photography permitting requirements</a>. Organizing and participating in these campaigns has also been <a href="https://mobilizingideas.wordpress.com/2011/12/12/reflections-on-digitally-enabled-social-change-activism-in-the-internet-age/">personally meaningful</a> to many. </p>
<p>But, <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell">a nostalgia for 1960s activism leads many to assume that “real” protest only happens on the street</a>. Critics assume that classic social movement tactics such as rallies and demonstrations <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/29/the-fall-and-rise-from-we-shall-overcome-to-we-are-the-world.html">represent the only effective model for collectively pressing for change</a>. Putting your body on the line and doing that collectively for decades is viewed as the only way “people power” works. Engaging online in “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slacktivism">slacktivism</a>” is a waste, making what cultural commentator Malcolm Gladwell has called “<a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell">small change</a>.”</p>
<p>This amounts to a debate over the “right way” to protest. And it’s <a href="https://www.cnet.com/news/hillary-clinton-president-change-org-donald-trump-electoral-college/">bound to heat up</a>: The election of Donald Trump is pushing <a href="https://grist.org/living/environmental-organizations-see-an-outpouring-of-support-post-election/">many people who have not previously engaged</a> <a href="http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/politics/bs-md-trump-advocacy-20161112-story.html">in activism</a> to look for ways to get involved; others are redoubling their efforts. People have a range of possible responses, including doing nothing, using online connections to mobilize and publicize support and protesting in the streets – or some combination of tactics.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://mobilizingideas.wordpress.com/2015/11/13/informing-activists/">social movement scholar</a> and someone who believes we should leverage all assets in a challenge, I know that much social good can come from mass involvement – and <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/digitally-enabled-social-change">research shows that includes online activism</a>. The key to understanding the promise of what I prefer to call “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Net-Effect-Cyberadvocacy-Political-Landscape/dp/1879617463">flash activism</a>” is considering the bigger picture, which includes all those people who care but are at risk of doing nothing.</p>
<h2>Most people are apathetic</h2>
<p>Social movement scholars have known for decades that most people, even if they agree with an idea, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2095297">don’t take action to support it</a>. For most people upset by a policy decision or a disturbing news event, the default is not to protest in the streets, but rather to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2095324">watch others as they do</a>. Getting to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470999103.ch16">the point where someone acts as part of a group</a> is a milestone in itself.</p>
<p>Decades of research show that <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/digitally-enabled-social-change">people will be more willing to engage in activism that is easy, and less costly</a> – emotionally, physically, or financially. For example, <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-can-the-mass-check-in-at-standing-rock-tell-us-about-online-advocacy-68276">more than a million people used social media</a> to “check in” at the Standing Rock Reservation, center of the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. Far fewer people – <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38087180">just a few thousand</a> – have traveled to the North Dakota camps to brave the arriving winter weather and risk arrest.</p>
<p>Once people are primed to act, it’s important not to discourage them from taking that step, however small. Preliminary findings from my team’s current research suggest that people just beginning to explore activism can be disheartened by bring criticized for doing something wrong. Part of the reason people volunteer is to feel good about themselves and effective about changing the world. Shaming them for making “small change” is a way to reduce numbers of protesters, not to increase them. Shaming can also create a legacy of political inactivity: Turning kids off from involvement now could encourage decades of disengagement.</p>
<h2>‘Success’ takes many forms</h2>
<p>“Flash activism,” the label I prefer for online protest forms such as online petition, can be effective at influencing targets in specific circumstances. Think of a flash flood, where the debilitating rush of involvement overwhelms a system. Numbers matter. Whether you are a high school coach, Bank of America, the Obama administration or a local council member, an overwhelming flood of signatures, emails and phone calls can be quite persuasive.</p>
<p>Further, all that 1960s-era street-style protest is effective only in certain circumstances. Research shows it can be very <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/4495030">good at bringing attention to topics</a> that should be on the public or policymakers’ agenda. But historically protests are <a href="http://responsivegov.eu/images/documents/Caren.pdf">less successful at changing entrenched opinions</a>. For instance, once you have an opinion about abortion access, it is fairly difficult for movements to get people to change their views. And, while the protests we are so nostalgic for sometimes succeeded, <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9781107539211">they also often fail where policy change is concerned</a>.</p>
<h2>The glass can be half-full</h2>
<p>Online protest is easy, nearly cost-free in democratic nations, and can help drive positive social change. In addition, flash activism can help build stronger movements in the future. If current activists view online support as an asset, rather than with resentment because it is different from “traditional” methods, they can mobilize vast numbers of people.</p>
<p>Take, for example, the “<a href="http://invisiblechildren.com/kony-2012/">Kony 2012</a>” viral video campaign calling for the arrest of indicted war criminal Joseph Kony. Some <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/business/media/kony-2012-video-illustrates-the-power-of-simplicity.html">hated the campaign</a>; others highlighted its ability to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/15/opinion/kristof-viral-video-vicious-warlord.html">draw attention to an issue many thought Americans wouldn’t care about</a>. Think about the possibilities. Would Planned Parenthood be unhappy if 100 million Americans watched a persuasive short movie on abortion rights as civil rights today, and shared it with friends? Would the effort “matter”; would it help drive the direction of the public conversation about abortion?</p>
<p>And flash activism isn’t necessarily just a one-time game of numbers; MoveOn showed that with a big enough membership base, you could mobilize large numbers repeatedly. People who participate in one online action may join future efforts, or even broaden their involvement in activism. For example, <a href="http://ypp.dmlcentral.net/sites/default/files/publications/Participatory_Politics_New_Media_and_Youth_Political_Action.2012.pdf">kids who engage in politics online often do other political activities as well</a>.</p>
<h2>Many hands make light work</h2>
<p>Critics often worry that valuing <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/29/the-fall-and-rise-from-we-shall-overcome-to-we-are-the-world.html">flash activism will “water down” the meaning of activism</a>. But that misses the point and is counterproductive. The goal of activism is social change, not nostalgia or activism for activism’s sake. Most people who participate in flash activism would not have done more – rather, they would have done nothing at all. </p>
<p>Worse yet, when people denigrate flash activism, they are driving away potential allies. Critics of online efforts no doubt know that not everyone is willing to march or rally – but they miss the important potential for others to take actions that support and actually result in change.</p>
<p>Scholars and advocates alike should stop asking if flash activism matters. We should also stop assuming that offline protest always succeeds. Instead, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/1944-2866.POI357">we should seek out the best ways to achieve specific goals</a>. Sometimes the answer will be an online petition, sometimes it will be civil disobedience and sometimes it will be both – or something else entirely.</p>
<p>The real key for grassroots social change is to engage as many people as possible. That will require flexibility on how engagement occurs. <a href="https://mobilizingideas.wordpress.com/2015/11/13/informing-activists/">If people want larger and more effective social movements</a>, they should be working to find ways to include everyone who will do anything, not upholding an artificial standard of who is a “real activist” and who is not.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69271/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennifer Earl receives funding from The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the National Science Foundation. </span></em></p>Much social good can come from mass involvement – and research shows that includes online activism. The bigger picture takes in all those people who care but are at risk of doing nothing.Jennifer Earl, Professor of Sociology, University of ArizonaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/693082016-11-30T07:44:32Z2016-11-30T07:44:32ZKazakhstan jails activists, plans a Great Firewall to stifle online dissent<p>In Kazakhstan, the power of citizens to resist authoritarianism has been dealt a significant blow. On November 28, two major Kazakh land activists, Max Bokayev and Talgat Ayanov, were <a href="http://thediplomat.com/2016/11/terror-and-protest-2-trials-end-in-kazakhstan/">sentenced to five years in prison</a> on charges of organising unsanctioned protests and inciting social discord. </p>
<p>Bokayev and Ayanov were arrested following <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-36163103">large-scale land protests</a> in the country in April and May. Normally very cautious, in this instance, the regime failed to spot the potential threat of online activism in time, and therefore let protests unfold. </p>
<p>The jailing of the two men shows the government of President Nursultan Nazarbayev well understands that it can no longer underestimate the power of new forms of civic activism. </p>
<h2>The growth of online activism</h2>
<p>The Central Asian authoritarian state has not tolerated political opposition for years. It <a href="https://rsf.org/en/news/kazakhstan-protests-lead-wave-arrests-journalists">jails journalists</a>, frequently violates citizens’ civil liberties and stifles every other form of <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-oil-rich-kazakhstan-ever-embrace-democracy-67126">liberal democracy</a>. </p>
<p>The Kazakh people often watch the regime get away with this behaviour, partly because they <a href="https://theconversation.com/will-oil-rich-kazakhstan-ever-embrace-democracy-67126">enjoy the status quo</a>, and partly because they feel powerless to affect politics. </p>
<p>But beneath the surface, a new era of civic activism has been growing since 2010, coming to fruition in the land protests of April 2016.</p>
<p>Developments in technology, increasing access to the internet, and the growing popularity of social media equipped Kazakh civil society groups with tools to even out the battle against an overly centralised and corrupt government. </p>
<iframe width="100%" height="325" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" src="https://www.google.co.uk/publicdata/embed?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=it_net_user_p2&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=region&idim=country:KAZ&ifdim=region&tstart=849225600000&tend=1448755200000&hl=en_US&dl=en&ind=false"></iframe>
<p>Long gone are the days when there were a handful of civic activists in the republic; no longer is there a minority of people who use the internet only for entertainment purposes. Political apathy has been rapidly waning and being replaced with political cynicism. </p>
<p>Nowadays, you do not have to be affiliated with any organisation or social movement to defend your rights to freedom of information, protection of environment or access to public health. A computer with internet access and a social media account is enough for raising public awareness, articulating interests, and mobilising discontent. </p>
<p>People are more aware of the government’s limitations, and their own lack of rights. One recent survey showed that the majority of people in Kazakhstan evaluate the government’s <a href="http://tikazakhstan.org/lyudi-i-korruptsiya-kazahstan-barometr-mirovoj-korruptsii-2016/">fight against corruption</a> as poor. Another survey among young people indicated that more than 60% of respondents do not believe in their own <a href="http://www.kursiv.kz/news/obshestvo/molodezh_ne_verit_v_sposobnost_vliyat_na_vlast_eksperty/">ability to influence power</a>. </p>
<p>All of these developments mean that more and more people have become engaged in politics through signing online petitions or participating in protests. An anti-pension reform <a href="http://www.eurasianet.org/node/67046">movement in 2013</a> involved all of these forms of political participation and mobilised masses that were previously politically alienated. </p>
<p>Political memes have also boomed in Kazakhstan, making politics more accessible to ordinary people. The pension reform protests gave birth to numerous memes showing that government did not have a valid reason to increase women’s pension age from 58 to 63. These memes went viral and pension reform became the most discussed issue of the day.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=281&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=281&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=281&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147724/original/image-20161128-22727-1nr6bvo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=353&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">– ‘Why does my grandma have to work until the age of 63?’ - ‘Because, boy, because …’</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Land-reform protesters blaze a trail</h2>
<p>The success of this new form of activism was never clearer than in the wave of protests that hit Kazakhstan’s cities and towns in April and May 2016, and which have now landed two organisers in jail. </p>
<p>Protesters were concerned that amendments to the land code would let foreigners, particularly Chinese businesses, rent agricultural land for 25 years. Many perceived this as a threat to national sovereignty. Alarmed that the situation could get out of control as it did during the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/kazakhstan/8964991/Riots-in-western-Kazakhstan-could-destabilise-the-country.html">2011 Zhanaozen oil-workers’ protests</a>, the president intervened and announced a moratorium on land reform. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/147340/original/image-20161124-15344-1b1wti0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The government sent this message in May, informing the population that land code amendments had been put on hold.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Protest mobilisation began online and significantly benefited from WhatsApp. The use of mobile phones for civic activism expanded the movement’s support base by directly appealing to individual users. It’s telling also that the government announced its u-turn on the land reform policy by texting citizens directly.</p>
<p>The land reform protests were unprecedented in scale, taking place simultaneously in several cities, an unusual feature of demonstrations in Kazakhstan.</p>
<p>Ultimately, civil society celebrated a major victory when authorities officially responded by changing the policy, a very rare occurrence in Kazakh politics. Even the arrested activists admit that the <a href="https://regnum.ru/news/polit/2125194.html">protest campaign was successful</a> in making people’s voices heard. </p>
<h2>The regime strikes back</h2>
<p>But this new online movement could be under serious threat. </p>
<p>A set of amendments to the country’s <a href="http://medialaw.asia/node/11201">media legislation in 2012</a> and <a href="http://ru.odfoundation.eu/a/5443,kazahstan-reforma-ugolovnogo-zakonodatelstva-ugrozhaet-pravam-cheloveka">criminal code in 2014</a> has already put severe restrictions on material posted on social media and blogs. </p>
<p>The publication of materials libelling the president and his family members, and materials that could cause inter-ethnic and social discord are strictly forbidden. As a result <a href="http://www.fergananews.com/articles/8043">arrests</a> and <a href="http://rus.azattyq.org/a/kazakhstan-zhurnalisty-presledovanie-aktivisty-aresty/27457454.html">prosecutions</a> of bloggers and online activists have become the norm.</p>
<p>Now, following the land reform protests, the government has been devising <a href="http://www.fergananews.com/articles/9113">new legislative and technological barriers</a> to “clean” the Kazakh internet. The Ministry of Development and Innovation is <a href="https://iwpr.net/ru/global-voices/%D0%BA%D0%B0%D0%B7%D0%B0%D1%85%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B0%D0%BD-%D1%83%D0%B6%D0%B5%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%87%D0%B0%D0%B5%D1%82-%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%BD%D1%82%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8C-%D0%B7%D0%B0-%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1%82%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BD%D0%B5%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%BC">planning to launch a Great Firewall</a> (named after China’s Great Firewall) that will allow national law enforcement to monitor and block all internet traffic on desktop and mobile devices.</p>
<p>If these plans materialise, Kazakh internet users <a href="http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/12/03/kazakhstan-moves-to-tighten-control-of-internet-traffic/?_r=0">will not be able to access</a> websites such as Facebook and Google.</p>
<p>On the other side, the government has established a new Ministry of Information and Communications, with the novel responsibility of informing society of state policies. </p>
<p>Kazakh authorities have gone online, creating accounts on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/AkordaPress">Facebook</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/egovkz">Twitter</a>. Almaty City’s <a href="https://www.instagram.com/akimat_almaty/">Instagram account</a> tries to connect with its constituency by responding to citizens’ concerns and demands. Meanwhile, activists are under threat of jail for using these same platforms. </p>
<h2>The cycle continues</h2>
<p>Ultimately, it was a no-brainer for the Kazakh regime to sentence Bokayev and Ayan. </p>
<p>The government needed to save face after a humiliating defeat in passing the land code amendments. And the prosecution of activists is supposed to send a message to others that the authorities have no intention of opening up the political system.</p>
<p>With its Great Firewall initiative, the regime is only getting more serious about eliminating new forms of activism. </p>
<p>Supporters of jailed activists intend to protest the court’s verdict. But activists have not yet elaborated a strategy for coping with the Great Firewall. As usual in Kazakhstan, the cycle of protest and repression continues.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69308/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nurseit Niyazbekov does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The jailing of the two men shows the government of President Nursultan Nazarbayev well understands that it can no longer underestimate the power of new forms of civic activism.Nurseit Niyazbekov, Assistant professor, KIMEP UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/682762016-11-04T21:45:28Z2016-11-04T21:45:28ZWhat can the mass ‘check-in’ at Standing Rock tell us about online advocacy?<p>On Oct. 31, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/oct/31/north-dakota-access-pipeline-protest-mass-facebook-check-in">more than a million Facebook users</a> “checked in” at Standing Rock Reservation, on the border between North and South Dakota. Since last March, the Standing Rock Sioux and other tribal communities and activists have been blocking the construction of a crude oil pipeline, which <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-understanding-native-american-religion-is-important-for-resolving-the-dakota-access-pipeline-crisis-68032">threatens sacred sites</a> and the tribe’s water supply.</p>
<p>All those users who checked in had not actually traveled to the encampment. Rather, they’d been prompted by a <a href="http://www.snopes.com/facebook-check-in-at-standing-rock/">post that went viral</a>, claiming that the local sheriff’s department was monitoring online check-ins. It asked people to “overwhelm and confuse” this surveillance effort by using a Facebook feature to signal their presence at the protest. </p>
<p>This was the first time this check-in strategy appears to have been so successful. But as has happened other times online advocacy has gone viral, skepticism and derision followed. Snopes, a site dedicated to debunking internet rumors, quickly <a href="http://www.snopes.com/facebook-check-in-at-standing-rock/">posted an explanation</a>: <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/standing-rock-facebook-dakota-access-pipeline-protest">Police were not using Facebook check-ins</a> to track protestors. </p>
<p>Mother Jones magazine described the action as a “<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/standing-rock-facebook-dakota-access-pipeline-protest">waste of time</a>.” And by titling journalist Alexis Kleinman’s otherwise helpful guide for action “<a href="https://mic.com/articles/158162/standing-rock-facebook-check-in-dakota-access-pipeline-protest-isnt-helpful-what-you-can-do#.1GpHsJ8zR">Checking into Standing Rock isn’t helpful</a>,” Mic expressed its ambivalence toward online activism. The piece’s first sentence was clear about this doubt: “Clicking a few buttons on Facebook isn’t enough to make an impact.”</p>
<p>But that rapid dismissal was too quick. As a scholar of media and advocacy, I’ve noticed skepticism whenever activism has attracted lots of attention. In fact, online connections can help overcome obstacles of space, time, income and knowledge to share stories and information while <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/06/occupy-wall-street-social-media_n_999178.html">linking people to each other and to opportunities for action</a>. Indeed, Mic soon revised its article headline: “Checking in at Standing Rock on Facebook is cool – but here’s how you can actually help.” That signaled an important acknowledgment: While online action alone can’t solve a problem, it can be a very useful tool to mobilize people and focus attention on a crucial issue.</p>
<h2>Concerns about surveillance</h2>
<p>One element of the post that caught people’s attention was the claim that police were electronically monitoring the protest. It was tempting to think that faraway individuals could <a href="http://www.vox.com/identities/2016/11/1/13486242/facebook-standing-rock">help thwart that police effort</a> by overloading them with false data.</p>
<p>While police say that wasn’t happening in this case, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/12/technology/aclu-facebook-twitter-instagram-geofeedia.html?_r=0">online surveillance of activists</a> is a real and troubling phenomenon. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security <a href="https://www.aclunc.org/blog/government-watching-blacklivesmatter-and-its-not-okay">has used social media to track Black Lives Matter activists</a> and to locate vigils and actions.</p>
<p>Even decades ago, the practical potential of online communications for organizing and mobilizing was evident. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-0374.2004.00082.x">In the 1990s, the Zapatistas in Mexico used email listservs</a> to build support and update allies around the world. During the 2009 Green Revolution in Iran, activists used <a href="https://www.wired.com/2009/06/google-maps-track-iran-protests/">Google maps and related apps</a> to direct demonstrators to safe spaces – and the police used that information against the protesters.</p>
<p>The suggestion to check in gave people not directly involved in the Standing Rock protest a plausible way to show concrete support.</p>
<h2>Mobilizing support</h2>
<p>The Standing Rock Sioux and their allies who were physically at the Sacred Stone camp <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/10/facebook-is-overtaken-with-check-ins-to-standing-rock/505988/">do not appear to have called for</a> the mass check-in action themselves. But they pronounced the Facebook activity a “<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/10/facebook-is-overtaken-with-check-ins-to-standing-rock/505988/">great way to declare solidarity</a>.”</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144648/original/image-20161104-27947-ng8r6u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">All your friends went where?!</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Screenshot</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Indeed, the check-in identified more than a million Facebook users who cared enough about the Standing Rock protest to identify themselves publicly as supporters. Their numbers suggested a <a href="http://uahost.uantwerpen.be/m2p/publications/1267094069.pdf">growing critical mass of public sympathy</a>, in a size that could get the attention of politicians who could halt the construction.</p>
<p>In addition, check-ins could take advantage of Facebook’s algorithms to draw even more attention to the protest. Facebook location updates are designed to appear on the feeds of friends and to <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/social.media/08/18/facebook.location/">foster connections between friends</a> who may be physically near one another. For some, <a href="http://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet/tips/how-to-check-in-on-facebook.htm">this allows meeting up at a concert or sale</a>. But in this case, users could exchange information – whether about the Snopes item, ways to contact government representatives to urge them to halt construction or a donation link for the <a href="http://sacredstonecamp.org/">Sacred Stone Camp Legal Defense Fund</a>.</p>
<h2>Forcing news coverage</h2>
<p>The attention built to a point where the mass media could no longer ignore it. Before the check-in action, <a href="http://theantimedia.org/native-american-pipeline-media-blackout/">there had been minimal mainstream coverage</a> of the Dakota Pipeline protest. That left protesters and supporters dependent on social media – and alternative media sources like <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/topics/dakota_access">Democracy Now</a> and <a href="http://countercurrentnews.com/">Counter Current News</a> – to pass the word.</p>
<p>The use of social media and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2012/jun/11/rise-of-citizen-journalism">citizen journalism</a> to bypass media blackouts is nothing new. Twitter and YouTube allowed protesters to circumvent the mainstream media <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/06/evaluating-irans-twitter-revolution/58337/">during the 2009 Green Revolution in Iran</a>. In the summer of 2013, protesters in Istanbul took to Facebook and Twitter to report on the demonstrations and the <a href="http://civicmediaproject.org/works/civic-media-project/uptakecitizenjournalism">ensuing police brutality</a> – while CNN Turk aired <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jun/09/turkey-mainstream-media-penguins-protests">a documentary about penguins</a>.</p>
<p>The Standing Rock check-in did more than share news; it became a newsworthy event on its own. A million people had told Facebook – and therefore their friends – that they had gone to the Dakotas to protest a crude oil pipeline. What was going on? News organizations responded.</p>
<p>In the process, they had to explain what was happening in this remote camp that would motivate people to go there – even virtually. There was increased coverage, including from the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2016/10/31/why-facebook-users-are-checking-in-at-standing-rock/">Washington Post</a>, the <a href="http://www.statesman.com/technology/why-are-facebook-users-checking-standing-rock-indian-reservation/5ZzivqOeVVfmx4TBTHnalM/">Austin American-Statesman</a> and <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/11/01/standing-rock-why-are-thousands-of-facebook-users-checking-in-to/">London’s Telegraph newspaper</a>. In addition to boosting coverage, the check-in action provided a story about a rising tide of public opinion supporting the protestors.</p>
<p>By looking at whether the check-in itself was effective, it is easy to lose sight of the true picture. That single action was never meant to be a click to save the world – and I don’t think anyone actually thought it was intended to. Rather, it took place within a larger context of a growing movement seeking options for further action – particularly from supporters far from the actual protest site. </p>
<p>Most advocacy activities are not used in isolation. The check-in was, instead, a way to amplify the reach and urgency of an important issue, to connect people with each other and to offer them new ways to act.</p>
<p>Whether a similar mass check-in action could work in the future remains to be seen. Some may still view the idea skeptically, in part because in this case it didn’t actually mislead the police. And Facebook itself has been less of a site for action and more of a way to share and exchange information. But for the time being, social media continues to offer opportunities for useful political organization and mobilization.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68276/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leshu Torchin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While online action alone can’t solve a problem, it can be a very useful tool to mobilize people and focus attention on a crucial issue.Leshu Torchin, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies, University of St AndrewsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.