Back to Basics

Today I am going to try something a little different. Rather than talking about a current social movement, I thought I would start at the foundation and analyze what a social movement really is by discussing a TED talk I found called "Social Movements- a primer"  by Toby Chow.

This TED talk was very interesting, and it made me question a lot of what I have been writing about here on this blog. It was a little intimidating actually, because I began to doubt the content of which my blog is based off of. I felt as though for the past however many weeks, I hadn’t actually been writing about social movements, but rather things that resemble social movements.

The speaker starts out his talk by touching on this subject. He pulls up this poster

 

and states that the definition of movement needs some brushing up. Chow feels as though too many people are misusing movement and don’t actually know what it means. Often people use the word to describe things which resemble movements but can not actually be defined as one, such as the unity “movement”.  

Now, I’ll be honest. I watched this whole talk and was still a little bit confused about what it means to really be a movement, rather than just have the elements of one. To be fair though, I was watching the video while wearing an incredibly itchy wig and the sounds of someone singing about groundhogs blasting through the speakers under the stage. Nevertheless, I believe the speaker articulated that the most basic and necessary element of a social movement was the process of the oppressed turning around and banding together to face their aggressor. He used this image to demonstrate the type of relationship he referenced.

   

I think the hardest part of this talk for me to grasp was the so what. Why does it matter that some people are confusing the difference between movement and faux movement? Even after watching the video in its entirety I am still unclear on this question. I understand where the speaker is coming from in terms of the radio station ad, that is a very obvious butchering of the word. But it seems to me, that if someone is taking the time to start a “movement” in the first place then something must be wrong. Some injustice must have occurred. I believe this unrest should be honored and discussed rather than being shut down as not really a movement, just something that resembles one.

Green Up Our World

What does it mean to go green? Is it simply recycling and carpooling to work, or is it something more than that? In recent years there has been a greater push from scientists and the environmentally minded to address the issue of climate change and face it head on. I remember when I was a kid channels like the Disney Channel would run commercials asking everyone to take shorter showers and drink from fewer plastic bottles. Whether or not they still do that I do not know, but as a little kid I was really moved by those ads and wanted to help the earth as mush as I could. However, during my adolescence I felt the charge to save the planet die down. I didn't know what happened, but looking back I believe it was because I became more involved in school and social activities. This I feel is a universal truth, as soon as someone begins to move deeper in to activities, they withdraw from the outside world and focus on how those extracurriculars dominate their life. In essence, people become selfish and stop thinking of anything other than themselves and how busy they are. 

But not all hope is lost, I promise. I felt this trend start to come full circle, and people are once again looking outward rather than inward. More of the population is starting to address and accept, because there and continue to be a lot of skeptics, climate change as the reality of our world. This is the movement that needs to keep growing, we can't go back to the way things were. We as a people must stand together and help save the world if we can ever hope for a better and cleaner future. 

This earth day, Wednesday April 22, please consider doing something nice for the planet. Bring a couple of friends along too, I promise you wont regret it.  

Rolling Black Outs Sweeping The Nation

I waste a good amount of time on tumblr. It really can't even be dignified with a "spend", the reality is that a great deal of the things on the website are honestly just a waste of time. Case in point the picture I saw this morning of a dog seemingly standing on water with the caption "the lord is my Shepherd" However, for as much stupidity as there is on tumblr, there is also a great deal of social discussion which, most likely, could not exist to the same extent on any other forum. One of the best examples of this was the recent "black out". To briefly explain, the day was devoted towards giving representation to black men, women, and everyone in between. The event was founded on the heels of the growing criticism towards modern media, which typically only shows attractive white people. This black out was a way of giving faces and voices to those who have gone without seeing people who look like them on tv, in movies, really in almost any sector of the entertainment industry.

People participated by posting pictures of themselves to any social media outlet they favored, but I saw the majority on tumblr. Overall the day was a great success, but there were some who tried to dampen the event's effectiveness. White champions of "equality" called out against the black out day and cheered on a white out day instead. These are the same people that change things like #blacklivesmatter to #alllivesmatter.

The most frustrating part about people like this is how oblivious they seem to be about the reality happening all around the globe. Yes, of course all lives matter, but that's not the point. The point is that for many people, and not just black people, anyone who isn't white has probably felt this too, they have not been given the opportunity to understand that their lives matter. In the same way that a little girl may look at a poster of US presidents and feel like she could never achieve their position, a person of color simply has to turn on a tv to feel as though they do not belong in the artificial world created by media sources. This is why things like black out days are so important. They enable the minority to feel represented and to feel like they matter. Obviously one day isn't going to solve racism, but it's a step in a powerful direction. The movement has been put in place, it's rolling, but it is going to need a serious push if this stone can ever hope to evade all the moss coming its way.