Tag Archives: social media

Hey, White College Kids: Can the Ferguson Police Get Some of That Kony 2012 Outrage?

Posted on by Standard 6
Posted: Aug. 22 2014 2:56 PM
Originally Published at The Root

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A woman gestures during a peaceful protest Aug. 19, 2014, along a street in Ferguson, Mo., regarding the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown.MICHAEL B. THOMAS/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Remember #Kony2012? Of course you do. The social media campaign by Invisible Children against the war criminal leader of Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army is impossible to forget because of the way so many Americans—including many white Americans—came together and amplified the cause in the name of justice and human rights.

Invisible Children’s video was viewed 100 million times within six days. In a showing bigger even than the one for the ongoing “ice bucket challenge” for Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS, 3.7 million people committed to joining the Kony 2012 struggle. While ultimately unsuccessful in its stated goals of “ending war,” or “stopping the LRA and their leader,” #Kony2012 was effective in galvanizing deep support from white youth throughout the nation.

So, why not #FergusonPD2014?

In other words, why aren’t the same people who called out Joseph Kony demanding accountability from the Ferguson Police Department for its killing of Michael Brown when he was unarmed, and for its violation of peaceful protesters’ constitutional rights to assemble? Yes, it’s true that people of all backgrounds, including some young white activists, are actively involved in the protests in Ferguson. But why aren’t white college students latching on to this and revealing the same overwhelming “commitment” they did to the Kony “cause”?

As a college professor, I remember clearly that during the #Kony2012 campaign, they wanted the world to know that they were outraged by the atrocities going on in Uganda, or at least the atrocities said to be going on at some point in recent history. Why not a similar response to the atrocities going on outside St. Louis?

Because, sadly, this American tragedy doesn’t seem to have the right ingredients.

Besides using social media wisely, Invisible Children deployed a narrative of good versus evil and created enthusiasm around the power of young people in stopping a man intent on turning young men into soldiers and young women into sex slaves. With a click of a button that led the video to be shared on social media, a donation, or putting on some Kony apparel, one could seemingly purchase penance for past inaction and buy peace.

Second, the video and the campaign played upon the long-standing concept of the “white man’s burden” —the idea that white America has a responsibility and a duty to help oppressed elsewhere.

Third, the primary platform of the campaign limited the chance of cross-racial challenges. Facebook, marked by its insular communities, segregation and siloed realities, was the central engine for Kony 2012. This, and the nascent status of “black Twitter,” created conditions under which the “white savior” mentality thrived. While white Americans who participated in Kony 2012 were purchasing a tool kit or contributing to “justice” with their clicks and dollars, they didn’t have to inconvenience or challenge their privilege or identity.

Movements to address injustice when the victims are African American don’t have the same formula. So it’s no wonder that since 2012, there has not been a #Trayvon2013, a movement for #Renisha2013 or a #Ferguson2014. It’s no wonder there have been no viral videos on #Every28HoursABlackManIsKilled, or mainstream efforts to galvanize national attention for Eric Garner or Marissa Alexander or countless others.

Continue reading at The Root

In Defense of Dirty Laundry | Vitae

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In Defense of Dirty Laundry

By David J. Leonard

January 15, 2014

We lament, vent about, and dissect student interactions all the time. From hallway conversations to conference sessions, from publications to dinner parties, shop talk is commonplace. And it’s generally accepted.

But now, of course, that talk is moving to a new space: Facebook. To some observers, this is a thing to be bemoaned. In a post on The Conversation, Chad Abushanab spells out this view: Facebook, he argues, is not an appropriate place “to air your classroom’s dirty laundry.”

“What makes this approach problematic,” he writes, “is that you are essentially having a conversation about the decisions of a student in your professional care in a public forum without inviting that student to participate.”

Sounds reasonable enough, right? But there are two problems with this line of thinking.

The first is that the technology isn’t the issue; the way we make use of it is. Facebook can be used for good or evil—as a source of power or a source of harm. Irrespective of the technology used, shouldn’t we question the nature of the conversations we have, rather than the tools we use to have them?

Which brings me to the second problem with Abushanab’s denunciation: Why reduce all faculty conversations on Facebook to “airing dirty laundry,” “putting it out there,” and “venting”? Sure, that stuff happens. But there’s more than narcissistic grousing going on here. These social-media spaces exist in response to the very real isolation and individualism that permeates academia. And these online conversations can be helpful, cathartic, and empowering.

To dismiss them as nothing more than cattiness erases the pedagogical importance of discussions around classroom dynamics. Are teaching forums merely spaces for venting? Should we dismiss the deluge of journal articles and books dedicated to real-life classroom scenarios as inappropriate? No, these communities are about self-care, about preservation, and about growth. They are about education and the desire of so many teachers to continue to improve inside and outside the classroom.

Abushanab suggests that it would be more advisable for me to raise student issues with a colleague who may be teaching that same student, rather than chatting with a larger group that has no direct knowledge of the situation. But that presumes that face-to-face conversations and discussions among campus colleagues are possible.

In a world of small and squeezed-together departments, officeless adjuncts, 4-4 loads, “road scholars” teaching on multiple campuses, and growing service and scholarship demands, weekly meetings to discuss classroom dynamics aren’t necessarily possible. The weekly lunch at the faculty club—where professors supposedly gather to process class happenings—seems like something out of the Hollywood imagination, if it ever existed.

Beyond the question of feasibility, there’s another question: Would you actually rather talk about this stuff with your campus colleagues than with your social-media peers?

Within my social-media community I see all sorts of descriptions of student behavior. There are posts about students who miss class, yet come to office hours to ask, “Did I miss anything important?” There’s a status update bemoaning yet another incident of plagiarism. There’s a post lamenting an essay that doesn’t distinguish between the Civil War and the civil-rights movement.

Venting and commiserating aside, though, many more posts seek advice and help: “I have students that are using their computers in class and instead of paying attention, they are on Facebook. What should I do?” This is the type of question for which it may make more sense to seek support and advice from colleagues at campuses across the country, from colleagues who teach at different types of schools and within different disciplines, than from those who share your own classrooms, students, and academic culture.

More importantly, Facebook and other social-media platforms provide a space where academics can discuss issues that might otherwise be dismissed by colleagues. How many faculty of color have turned to Facebook following a conversation with a white colleague that ended with “I think you are reading too much into the fact that students refuse to address you by Dr. or Professor”?

How many female professors have used Twitter to discuss sexual harassment or sexism within the classroom or on their evaluations? Might an audience of friends and social-media peers respond differently than male colleagues on campus, whose privilege and misogyny may preclude them from even hearing these issues? In other words, every faculty member doesn’t have an equal ability to share and process the inequality she or he may encounter inside and outside the classroom.

Continue reading at  In Defense of Dirty Laundry | Vitae.

NewBlackMan (in Exile): Social Media Saved My Life

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Social Media Saved My Life

by David Leonard | NewBlackMan (in Exile)

Q: What happened after hackers shut down Twitter for a day? A: Twitterers were relegated to communicating the old fashioned way, through Facebook!

Q: Why is Facebook a great site for loners? A: Because it’s the only place where they can talk to a wall and not be considered a loser!

Q: Why is Facebook like a refrigerator? A: Because every few minutes you keep opening and closing it to see if there’s anything good in it! (Source)

It has become almost commonplace to mock social media. Whether describing it as a distraction, as a waste of time, or a world that is otherwise detached from reality, there is almost a cottage industry at scoffing at social media. Steve Tobak is indicative of this line of thinking:

Instead of living our lives, we’re watching our timelines on a two-dimensional display. Instead of doing, we’re content to observe events and post milestones on Facebook (FB). We’re becoming a society of watchers.

Sure, I know you’re all intelligent adults who understand there’s a world of difference between watching and doing. But that doesn’t change the reality that the vast majority of you are doing way too much observing and a whole lot less doing than you used to.

What’s the impact of our crazy obsession with gadgets and social media? It turns each of you a little more into a poor, lazy, lifeless drone every day.

Irrespective of these jokes and the constant disparagement of social media as the demise of “civilization,” social media saved me.

A couple years ago, I often wondered about my career in academia. Many nights (and early mornings) I contemplated other jobs, pining for anything, something other than my current existence. I lamented going to graduate school, I lamented the academic culture, and I even fantasized about a world where I could have traded my Ph.D. for something else. If it hadn’t been for student loan debt, financial obligations, my family, and my colleagues, I would have packed my books and bounced. While partly a fantasy, and partly the result of the intoxicating belief that the job is always enjoyable on the other side, I genuinely considered leaving academia. I thought long and hard about turning in my Ph.D. so I could become an ex-academic.

Between budget cuts, campus politics, disengaged students, societal disrespect for education and the stresses of life, I found myself continually asking, “does this matter;” I found myself hating the job. Maybe it wasn’t even the job but faced with tragedies, when witnessing so much pain and suffering, none of it seemed to matter. Whereas I spent so much of my life with freedom dreams, I found myself confronting nightmares.

This wasn’t just about hatin’ the job since a job “ain’t nothing but work,” but suddenly loathing everything that meant so much to me: reading, teaching and writing. I wanted out. I wanted to do something; really anything else. And that is why it hurt so much. I was slowly beginning to hate myself. For so long, I had seen myself, my identity, and my very existence in relationship to being a teacher, a scholar, a writer, and commentator—working to dream the world anew. In a sense, I hated myself because my identity was wrapped up in the “work.” Since it has never been just a job for me, my growing frustration and anxiety about the “job” was very personal. As a writer, teacher, scholar, and person committed to fostering conversations about equality and justice I felt as if I was betraying myself, betraying those who sacrificed so much for me, and otherwise taking advantage of my privileges by not using them in the pursuit of justice. I was being selfish. With these feelings and emotions, I couldn’t imagine another year, much less a lifetime on the academic grind.

Continue reading @ NewBlackMan (in Exile): Social Media Saved My Life.