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Equality and Social Media

Social media is more ingrained in our society than ever before. Because of this, social media is changing the way our nation, and the world, move forward.

Movements like #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo have found their momentum on platforms like twitter, politics have found their home in Facebook, and Reddit has prompted more discussions on freedom of speech.

However, social media has proven to be a double edged sword. For every movement there’s a troll to counteract it, for every real politician there’s a “fake” one twisting information, for every positive utilization of freedom of speech there is someone using that freedom to promote their hate speech.

This all comes together to show me the importance of using my voice and social media to promote positivity and equality, and the importance of understanding and promoting intersectionality.

Intersectionality has taught me that while one group of people is still marginalized or oppressed, all groups are still marginalized or oppressed.  In order to combat all of the hate speech and negativity, anyone who’s fighting for equality needs to band together and fight for and with each other.

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A look at the impact that hashtags and social media can have on social movements for gender equality and racial equality.

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This photo is an important visual example of Intersectionality, and incorporates various hashtags from social media and movements to show this.

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Does free speech mean literally anyone can say anything at any time?...Or is it actually more conducive to the free exchange of ideas if we create a platform where women and people of color can say what they want without thousands of people screaming, ‘Fuck you, light yourself on fire, I know where you live’? If your entire answer to that very difficult question is ‘Free speech,’ then, I’m sorry, that tells me that you’re not really paying attention.

Melissa Tidwell, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/03/19/reddit-and-the-struggle-to-detoxify-the-internet 

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An interesting read from the resource Medium, touching on how dependent our politics (globally) now are on Social Media; particularly on Facebook. It’s definitely worrying how much we now depend on social media in order to get our information, and how easy it is to change our minds and what we think we know because of this.