The Impact of Social Media on BlackLivesMatter

Running head: THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON #BLACKLIVESMATTER
THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON #BLACKLIVESMATTER
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THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON #BLACKLIVESMATTER
The aim of this paper is to focus on the power of social media in terms of driving the very
chief social media inquiries of an activist crusade regarding racial discrimination “Black Lives
Matter”, as it plays the most vital role in supporting and promoting the socio-political
movements on a universal level. In terms of the broadly used social media, sites named, Twitter
and Facebook, are linked to the crusade. The criminal justice contribution towards the inequality
among black and white people has gathered a renewed of the nation in all over the world.
Following the incident where the exoneration of George Zimmerman in the demise by shooting
of a teenager who was black named Trayvon Martin, in 2013 in Florida, three black communal
organizer, Patrisse Cullors-Briganc, Opal Tometi and Alicia Garzi begins an activist movement
using the hash tags on social media as such, #BlackLivesMatter. The key people behind the
hashtag of #BLM are Shaun King, Johnetta Elzie, Erica Garner, DeRay Mckesson, and Tef Poe.
In the process of drawing the case study of movement of BLM, a method has been used for the
research design explores the potential of social media (Freelon, Mcllwain & Clark, 2018). The
members who belong to the places with high rates of black victimization because of violence
spread by police force is in the verge of expressing more negativity and cause even more loss of
life. It is evident that the attributes of social media language, affect and behaviour can trace the
future protestors on the ground, the role of social media platforms is inevitable when it comes to
collective action regarding this movement and how this media triggers the fire in terms of
understanding the perceptions in terms of this sensitive issue based on racial inequality.
Social media provides the possibilities of mobilizing the participants of the movement,
building connections, along with alliance of building, palpable resources and intensifying
alternative narratives. Although it can create various risks and challenges for the activists as well,
however it can be easily dealt with by managing the online media platforms, also it gives various

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THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON #BLACKLIVESMATTER
opportunities at the same time, which strengthens the internal strength of any movement that
further strengthens the external force of the crusades (Taylor, 2016). This particular movement
raised on a social media juggernaut in the path of following deaths of 2014 in Ferguson of
Michael Brown and Eric Garner in New York. During the period of time, the movement has
expanded its revolt against racial violence police in order to position itself as a political and
ideological intervention, which endeavours to finish systemic appearance of racial
discrimination. Due to the persuasiveness and broad adoption of social media all over the world,
the fundamental infrastructure of the activist crusade has been fuelled to a great extent. One of
the co-founders of this racial crusade has reported to the news channel CNN, that only because
of the help of the social media it has become possible to reach every corner of America, as just a
hash tag is enough to gather around and support such movements for the betterment of the
society and further for the world and our new generation (Freelon, Mcllwain & Clark, 2016).
The Black Lives Matter crusade or movement arose anticipating to eradicate systematic
injustices regarding racial inequality that has prevailed over the community of the black people.
A vocalized narratives wave was triggered in the year 2013 right after the evident brutality by the
police, which resulted in the assassinations of black people in US. This movement floated
throughout the world as a social media trending hashtags #BlackLivesMatter, and the movement
is working on the black lives validation and their right in the society. The interlinking of the
movement with the social media platform makes it stimulating this investigate this connection in
depth. The positive influence of social media platform is extracted from an extreme techno-
optimistic viewpoint (Garza, Tometi & Cullors, 2014). This platform is a surface for solving
social issues is a framework of analysis, which is positioned by McIntosh and Kidd in the year
2016. The growth of the age of information through the platform of social media has as an

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THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON #BLACKLIVESMATTER
inevitable rational mode of awareness, a mode of information exchange, along with
communication. The usage of social media as an aid to all social movements is a thought that
emerged from the techno-optimism field. Such advantages are explored by observing the
‘Networking social movement’ categorized by Castell in 2009 and the aids provided by the
online movements, regarding issue framing resource coalition building and mobilization
(Schuschke, & Tynes, 2016). However, not all impacts are positive in terms of social media, this
paper also researches the counter-argument regarding the offering of the techno cynics, which
includes a discussion on the trending open and online platform social media and integration of
incoherence, slacktivism and misinformation, which can mould and shift the entire movement
situation from healthy to unhealthy state of affairs which can further resulted into extreme
conflict and end up giving no solution to the problem for which the movement is originally
positioned. All such affairs has been explored and witnessed in the case of BLM movement as
well. Still the advantages can take over the section of disadvantages (Dixson, 2018).
The matter that revolves around this BLM hashtag are law enforcement, race, violence,
and most precisely deaths by police violence of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling and further
the firing of police men in 2016 in Dallas, Baton Rouge, Texas, Louisiana (Hooker, 2016). The
Black Lives Matter hashtag with some other hashtags or movements or crusade also came up,
like, #MeToo, makes the discussion about the social media even intense, by helping in
proceeding the movement it is extremely essential for the running and succeeding a movement.
A survey has been conducted to accomplish the goal of changing people’s mind set. The defined
group of Hispanic or black people who are on social media consider this particular platform as an
essential instrument in terms of their political engagement (Sawyer, & Gampa, 2018). Half
amount of people who belong to black community, which is like one third in comparison to the