Victoria Lewis
COM6400
3/1/15
Malcolm Gladwell’s article echoes an angry old man telling kids to get off his lawn. He believes that social media supports the status quo and can’t be used to stimulate change. While he doesn’t outright use the term slacktivism, he postulates that social media creates weak ties between people and therefore will only be effective if they don’t ask too much of people. Gladwell holds up the activism of the Civil Rights movement as the only model to follow. He cites the life and death dangers that the Civil Rights activists faced and uses that to prove that since online activists don’t face death or assaults, then they are not real activists. However, I think media, to a certain degree, prevent events like murders and assaults of activists. The media create accountability. If a protester were to be killed the story would spread like wildfire. Even if the authorities in that area don’t want to investigate what happened to the activists due to their own beliefs, public pressure from outside would force their hand. Although the argument could be made that even with outside pressure, they don’t always cave in. While the authorities in Ferguson did bring the case of Michael Brown to the grand jury, they did not indict. However without the media pressure it may have not even made it that far. Without the “Black Lives Matter” social media campaign, there may not have been international protests protesting the verdict.
Gladwell comments that successful social media activism campaigns are those that don’t ask too much of people, but the one he sites is about donating bone marrow. He admits that it isn’t a trivial matter, but since it doesn’t involve financial or personal risk it doesn’t count. He thinks going through surgery and literally giving someone part of your body isn’t asking much. He doesn’t think of this as a sacrifice. Although I do admit that part of what makes this lesser activism is that the donor will be praised by everyone and activists will be condemned by half if not more of the population. Those who think of online activism as slacktivism believe that the actives that gain success through the internet are those who don’t have any impact on real-life political outcomes, but instead only serve to create a feel good factor among the participants. Examples of this would include the ice bucket challenge and a recent incident at Madison Social. Madison Social, a local bar, recently had a group walk out on a $130 tab. They posted a picture from their security camera and asked their followers to help find them. Many have since shared the image in the hopes of catching the group. Gladwell does have a point about the lack of hierarchy and organization. This could be easily seen in the Occupy Wall Street movement. Every member seemed to have a different reason as to what they wanted. The lack of a unified message may have been what led to this movement being unsuccessful in creating change.