{"id":3404,"date":"2015-11-21T08:00:56","date_gmt":"2015-11-21T13:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thediplomaticenvoy.com\/?p=3404"},"modified":"2021-01-22T18:18:35","modified_gmt":"2021-01-22T23:18:35","slug":"clicktivism-in-gender-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/thediplomaticenvoy\/2015\/11\/21\/clicktivism-in-gender-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"Focus on Clicktivism: Gender Issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Leah Cerilli<\/a><\/strong>
\n Staff Writer<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the most widely scrutinized instances of social media activism\u00a0in recent events is the #BringBackOurGirls\u00a0movement. The basic idea behind the hashtag\u2014advocating for the freedom of\u00a0276\u00a0Nigerian\u00a0schoolgirls\u00a0from militant Islamist kidnappers\u00a0who have promised to sell\u00a0girls into sex slavery\u2014seems like it would be a well-respected cause met with little resistance.\u00a0Yet it is not the cause that bothers critics;\u00a0it is the way the cause is promoted.<\/p>\n

People retweeting the hashtag and posting pictures of themselves\u00a0holding signs with the hashtag\u00a0are accused of\u00a0bandwagoning\u00a0and making themselves appear noble by supporting a\u00a0“trendy”\u00a0cause. As outlined by The Washington Post, Nigerian-American writer\u00a0Teju\u00a0Cole argued that the sudden interest in the #BringBackOurGirls\u00a0movement is hypocritical\u00a0as people are only interested in supporting well-known causes for the sake of others seeing them support it.\u00a0He raises a valid point in an NPR interview with\u00a0Mausi\u00a0Segun, the Nigeria researcher for Human Rights Watch:\u00a0Boko Haram has\u00a0repeatedly used\u00a0kidnapped girls between ages 11\u00a0to\u00a015 as suicide bombers, yet there are no trendy hashtags or photo movements for this\u00a0so it is a fact that remains largely unknown. Nigerians such as Cole\u00a0argue\u00a0that nothing is being done because it has fallen out of fashion to care about young girls being kidnapped, gang raped, and killed in order to commit mass murder and spread terror across Nigeria.<\/p>\n

\"tweet1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

According to an article released by Time Magazine, Nigerian forces rescued 200 girls from Boko-Haram about a year after the #BringBackOurGirls\u00a0campaign was created. However, the girls rescued were not the Chibok girls so\u00a0many had been tweeting about, and\u00a0the event\u00a0prompted a variety of questions regarding the purpose and execution of the movement. Many\u00a0supporters of the\u00a0movement were disappointed to hear that the girls whose safety they campaigned for were not rescued. This calls\u00a0the purpose of the movement into question:\u00a0did supporters care about rescuing young girls from Boko Haram\u2019s captivity, or did they\u00a0merely want to see a singular\u00a0goal of their\u00a0own\u00a0accomplished? Critics of the movements, particularly Nigerians, accused supporters of rallying behind them because it made them feel and look good\u00a0rather than because they\u00a0genuinely cared about the freedom and well-being of the many young girls kidnapped, raped, sold and murdered by Boko Haram.<\/p>\n

In an article for Naij.com,\u00a0Peregrino\u00a0Brimah\u00a0summarizes\u00a0the outrage at his country\u2019s own ability to bring the girls back alive. He brings attention to a viable reason of why the girls haven\u2019t been rescued: the corrupt and untrained Nigerian military. He calls on international organizations to \u201cinitiate and enforce strict sanctions against Nigeria\u2019s government and military personnel who have demonstrated indignant dereliction of duty to protect life and defend the nation.\u201d At the very least, some of the blame lies within Nigeria\u2019s government and military. However, there are no trendy hashtags or catchphrases about this\u00a0fact.\u00a0Fighting corruption, building a democracy, and properly training soldiers is difficult, messy, and unappealing, likely entailing years of effort, time, and money.<\/p>\n

\"tweet2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Critics say that clicktivist\u00a0feminist movements would be more effective and well-received if they featured native citizens of the countries in question\u00a0rather than public figures\u00a0with little firsthand knowledge of the culture and politics. During World Day\u00a0Against\u00a0Trafficking in Persons, law students from multiple Caribbean countries contributed to #igivehope, a hashtag dedicated to showing solidarity to victims of sex crimes. According to Global Voices, students from the Hugh Wooding Law School in Trinidad and Tobago distributed learning materials and delivered presentations about human trafficking to schools, created a public service announcement broadcasted on local television, and advised victims of rape and domestic violence.\u00a0The\u00a0campaign featured native citizens attempting to raise awareness in other native citizens\u00a0and\u00a0focused on concrete, direct action\u00a0rather than just generating interest and likes.<\/p>\n

Flaws aside, clicktivism is a useful tool to spread awareness\u00a0for different\u00a0movements. The problem\u00a0within clicktivism\u00a0is\u00a0in the lack of effort it often brings about;\u00a0clicktivists\u00a0are quick to mold movements into what is convenient and understood by them and their society. It oversimplifies issues that are complicated and will not be solved as easily as reaching a given amount of retweets. Clicktivism must be viewed as one of many stepping stones to\u00a0solving a problem\u00a0and must be accurately customized to reflect political and cultural nuances of the society\u00a0clicktivists\u00a0are trying to aid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Critics say that clicktivist feminist movements would be more effective and well-received if they featured native citizens of the countries in question rather than public figures with little firsthand knowledge of the culture and politics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3090,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[604,5,1095],"tags":[496,631,632],"class_list":["post-3404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-november2015","category-focus","category-1095","tag-social-media","tag-gender-issues","tag-clicktivism"],"yoast_head":"\nFocus on Clicktivism: Gender Issues - The Diplomatic Envoy<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.shu.edu\/thediplomaticenvoy\/2015\/11\/21\/clicktivism-in-gender-issues\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Focus on Clicktivism: Gender Issues - 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