Black Lives Matter uses social media to advantage
By Meghan Brown, Staff Writer//
From powerful newspaper articles and soulful music to radio news stories depicting events and televised boycotts, media has always had some part in civil rights movements.
Movements like Black Lives Matter are using media to their advantage to bring together thousands to unite against a common injustice by connecting with people from across seas and spreading their message of courage and equality.
BLM is a movement that was born and raised on social media. It is one of the fastest growing and most effective movements to date, with close to 68,000 followers on Twitter. They are also responsible for over 1,048 demonstrations, according to elephrame.com.
“The [Black Lives Matter] movement is just a different variation of multiple movements that have been happening since slavery,” said Mayeesa Mitchell, the president of High Point University’s Chapter of The National Association for Black Journalists. “The movement’s goal, like many other civil rights movements, is to bring awareness that black people’s lives are valued less than other lives in America.” BLM aims to bring awareness with hopes of inciting change in new ways.
BLM uses platforms and resources, like social media, that were not available before. Originating as a hashtag on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr after George Zimmerman’s acquittal for the murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, #blacklivesmatter became so popular that in 2014 the American Dialect Society voted it the word of the year.
Following the slaying of Michael Brown, activists quickly turned that hashtag into peaceful protests, using social media as a way to organize the protests around the country, while the BLM Twitter account continued to gain more followers.
While newspapers such as The Washington Post and The Guardian have cited the BLM movement’s founders as Opal Tometi, Alicia Garza, and Patrisse Cullors, many BLM followers would argue that the movement has no leader. The names mostly associated are those of the victims for which the movement advocates, from Trayvon Martin to Michael Brown to Tamir Rice to Sandra Bland.
Stefan Hall, department chair of Media Production and Studies at HPU, said the lack of a leader has become a “great equalizer” and has “put responsibility on everyone.” For Hall, not having a centralized leader to follow has really made this movement stand out from others. “It reminds people that they do have individual power,” Hall said. “They do have individual agency and when we combine that together as individuals, we actually can be a very powerful social force for change.”
“With BLM’s growing popularity on social media platforms and around the world, it has become impossible to ignore,” Shannon Campbell, department chair for Journalism and Strategic Communication at HPU, said. “Two decades ago, the media covered minority led movements like Gangster Rap and Hip Hop in a negative way without mentioning the legitimacy of the music and its lyrics. In this decade; however, BLM is receiving more media attention, as the movement’s big social media following is too undeniable for the media not to notice.” Campbell added that the media occasionally covers BLM in a negative light, such as news outlets blaming the movement for recent deaths of police officers, yet the overall attention has been mostly positive and objective.
Recently, BLM has expanded even more to grab legislatures’ attention. Campaign Zero is the latest branch of BLM. The campaign is a solution list that spells out a means to an end for the movement. The solution list includes demilitarizing the police, body cameras, more community representation in the police force and limiting the use of force among other solutions, according to its website joincampaignzero.org.
BLM has touched thousands without physically touching any. It has used the power of unstoppable connections through social media to become a widely supported and effective movement that speaks for millions around the world. BLM demonstrations have been held from Ferguson to Germany. People have led demonstrations while the movement’s lack of a leader has forced everyone to be a leader. All the while, drawing so much attention, that the media has done something it would not have done before – talk about the movement.
“[Black Lives Matter] shows we are making changes and advancing in America,” said Crystal Johnson, a junior at HPU. “Our voices are being heard.”