Claudia

In this blog, I’ll give talk about the positives and negatives of online activism in regards to the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. And what change has been achieved from it.

Positives:

It helped with organising protests

It helps give voices to people who were victims of police brutality and sexual assault

It created a wider awareness to those who are normally apolitical

It helped grow system of support for victims of assault or made them aware that they were also a victim of assault

It helped destigmatise sexual assault

It made people more informed on the history and the systems that enabled rape culture and systemic racism

It can put elected officials under more pressure to make change

Petitions can be widely shared to make the views of people known to officials

Negatives:

People treat serious movements as trends

People often don’t put in the effort to actually help these movements and unpack their unconscious bias such as the performative ‘black square’ people posted in 2020 to show solidarity with the BLM movement

‘# Activism’ often drowns out the voices of those most affected and in most need of being heard

Not knowing the people you’re protesting with can lead to distrust and disjointed protest (You can see this with the protests for BLM in 2020)

Fake news can be spread rapidly to sow distrust in the movement and fear monger about those fighting for their rights

Achievements from Online Activism:

It helped hold some police officers accountable and got them to actually be charged with the crime they committed after much online pressure.Rev Wheeler Parker, a cousin of Emmett Till credited the Black Lives Matter movement with finally making lynching a federal hate crime. Derek Chauvin convicted of murdering George Floyd which was the spark from the 2020 Black Lives Matter Protests.

Today I’ll be discussing how Black Lives Matter and #Metoo started and what the organisation is about.

Black Lives Matter:

The #BlackLivesMatter movement started in 2013 by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tomeli because of George Zimmerman being acquitted for the murder of Trayvon Martin.

It is a global organisation that spreads across the United States, United Kingdom and Canada with the mission of fully getting rid of white supremacy and building local power to intervene in violence perpetrated by vigilantes or the State.

#Metoo:

The ‘me too’ movement was started in 2006 by activist and survivor Tarana Buke to develop the resources and supports for those who have experienced sexual violence that weren’t available at the time and to try to stop it from taking place in the first place. [The hashtag ‘#MeToo’ was only gained popularity in 2017]

Is an organisation that helps survivors heal, puts a wrench in systems that allow sexual assault to happen, holds perpetrators accountable and implements long lasting and sustainable systemic change. So, no one should ever experience something like that again.

Link to Theorist(s):

I’m going to be discussing more recent events that were caused by systemic racism before the Black Lives Matter Movement was created.

War on Drugs:

‘The War on Drugs’ is a saying used to talk about the government led initiative that aims to stop the illegal drug use, distribution and trade by dramatically increasing prison sentences for both drug users and dealers.

Background Information:

The rise of recreational drug use in the 60’s was probably a contributing factor to what led President Nixon’s focus on stopping some kinds of substance abuse but it’s not as simple at that. In June of 1971, Nixon declared a ‘War on Drugs’, stating that drug abuse was ‘public enemy number one.’ Nixon signed the Controlled Substance Act in 1970 helped officially classify and regulate dangerous drugs. Schedule 1 drugs are considered to be the most dangerous. Marijuana, LSD, Heroin, MDMA (ecstasy) and other drugs had this ranking.

“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the anti war left and Black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalising both heavily, we could disrupt their meetings, and vilify them night after night on evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course, we did.” - John Ehrlichman (domestic policy chief) (1994, Harper Magazineh)

Nixon increased federal funding for drug control agencies and proposed strict measures, like mandatory prison sentences for drug related crimes. President Reagan in the 80’s reinforced and expanded upon Nixon’s Drug policies. He passed severe penalties for drug related crimes in Congress and state legislatures led to large spike in the prison population in relation to nonviolent drug related crimes. Congress passed the Anti Drug Abuse Act in 1986, which established mandatory minimum sentences for certain drugs.

It’s Affects:

The “War on Drugs” aimed to reduce drug use and help public safety however all it did was majorly contribute to the skyrocketing prison population. Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” campaign created a culture of public fear around drugs. Zero tolerance and mandatory minimums policies led to the growth of the US prison population. In 1972, 161 per 100,000 people were incarcerated, by 2007 the number had reached 767 per 100,000 and in 2021 the number had dropped slightly to 639 per 100,000 people. Even with that slight decrease the amount of people in prison is almost four times as high as it was fifty years ago.

46% of incarcerated Americans were convicted of drug related crimes and while 14% of the population is black, black people represent just over 38% of the prison population with higher proportions in some states.In 2019, officials noticed that 81% of those convicted of crack related offences were black. Many believe this is because of the disparity in sentencing guidelines between crack cocaine and powder cocaine and where powder cocaine is more associated with white populations.Five grams of crack cocaine trigger an automatic five year sentence where as it took five hundred grams to merit the same sentence.The result has left many in the black community“bared from a wide range of employment, educational, social security and other benefits”

Link to Theorist:

I will be discussing the further mistreatment of black people that lead to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Jim Crow Laws

Were local laws meant to segregate black and white people. It marginalised black people by withholding the right to vote, the ability to hold a jobs, to receive an education and other chances.

Brief Background Info:

Jim Crow Laws had it’s beginnings in black codes that started almost immediately following the 13th Amendment. These were strict local and state laws that created a legal way to force black citizens into indentured servitude and to control their lives. They found some freedom in the city’s from these laws in the early 1880’s, which upset white people who then demanded more laws to limit their opportunities. So, Jim Crow laws soon spread across the country with more force than before, depriving black people of what I mentioned earlier.

Pre-Civil Right’s Movement:

The legal system was stacked against Black citizens, with former Confederate soldiers working as police and judges. On top of KKK members being part of the lowest and highest parts of government. This made it hard to fight back against the Black codes which lead to unfair sentences to cruel labour camps. It was not much safer for those who fled the Jim Crow South with police officers being brutal and punitive in Northern cities.

The policing we know today started in 1909. August Vollmer refashioned the American police info the American military. His peers and Vollmer used military tactics, weapons and considered “[…] union organisers, immigrants and black people.”to be their enemies. Go reports in 1911 say that 11% of people arrested were black people but under James Robinson this grew to 14.6% in 1917. By the 1920’s, a quarter of those arrested were black people despite only making up 7.4% of the population.

The National Commission on Law, Observance and Enforcement in their investigation findings from 1931 - 1932, brought to light the realities of police brutality although it did not address racial disparities in it.In the Progressive Era, under Vollmer - style policing criminalised blackness by over policing their neighbourhoods, arresting and convicting them with longer sentences than their white counterparts. Policing grew harsher too. The introduction of State Police Forces and growing number of police during this time did not help the situation.

During the Civil Right’s Movement:

“We can never be satisfied as long as the N#gro is of the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality” - Martin Luther King (1963)

The aggressive tactics of using police dogs, fire hoses during peaceful protests such as the sit ins were horrific but it was the everyday violence and brutality of how they policed their communities that grew the rightful distrust of the police. The Freedom Riders also faced violence from the police as well as from civilians. It was only under presidential pressure that they gave them an escort but the police in Mississippi arrested them unfairly in May of 1961.

“The idea of police brutality was very much on people’s minds in 1963, following on the years, decades really, of police abuse of power and then centuries of oppression of African Americans” - William Pretzer (Senior History Curator)

Such as the ‘Bloody Sunday’ that occurred in Alabama in March 1965 where 600 peaceful protesters, protesting the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson by white police officer, were blocked on the Edmund Pettus Bridge by police sent by the governor of Alabama. They were viciously beaten and tear-gas was used by the police, dozens of protesters were hospitalised. Later that year, President Lyndon B Johnson started his ‘War on Crime’, he got congress to pass the Law Enforcement Assistant Act under which he supplied police with military grade which is a further militarisation of the police. It disproportionately targeted back neighbourhoods bringing things to how it was under Vollmer.

The deadliest riot was caused by a police officer harshly beating John Smith, a black taxi driver in Newark in 1967. The riot killed 26 and many others were injured. This is just another instance of the police abusing their power being the reason for retaliation. The commission concluded that “police actions were ‘final’ incidents before the outbreak of violence 12 of the 24 surveyed disorders” In 1968, Johnson got congress to pass the Omnibus Crime, Control, Safe Streets Act which diverted money from social programs and into the police. This of course didn’t do that since social programs are what help prevent crime and increasing the police forces money only served to cause continued discrimination.

Link to Theorist(s):

So, I’ve chosen the prompt ‘Explore how online activist movements are contributing to political change in today’s world.’ And certainly the post influential two I can think of is the Black Lives Matter and the #Metoo movements, at least in my lifetime. But let’s start with some context as to why this movement occurred and was needed.

Slavery:

the practice or system of owning people

a condition of having to do very hard work without proper remuneration (payment) or appreciation

Background:

Many free and enslaved Africans were taken to aid with the establishment and survival of the colonies in America and the rest of the New world. Some historians estimate 6 - 7 million people were enslaved there during the 18th century alone. They were used for their cheap labor in mainly the agricultural industries. An industry that is not as integral to the North so they were more likely to be anti slavery although this did not mean they all viewed black people as their equals.

The treatment of enslaved in the south was inhumane, especially in regards to the sexual violence perpetrated by white masters onto black women. This links into the #metoo movement and why systemic issues of sexual and gender based violence has always been a major issue especially when it comes to the most vulnerable and marginalised women. The oppression of southern in slaved people in the south caused the abolition movement to grow further in the North. Free black people and other Northern abolitionists began to help enslaved people escape from southern plantations to the north by a loose network of save houses that lead to the Underground Railroad.

Abolition and Abolitionist:

The act of abolishing a system, practice of institution

A person who favours the abolition of a practice, or institution, especially capital punishment and slavery

This angered white slave owners who were loosing more of those who they had deprived of their freedom but they had a system of returning fugitive escaped slaves by this point…

[The 13th Amendment was passed on the 31st of January 1865, then was ratified in 1866. It outlawed slavery across the nation but it had a loophole:

“Except as punishment for a crime whereof the party shall be duly convicted”

This lead to the prison labour system that heavily effects black people who are more likely to be put in prison for minor crimes compared to their white counterparts.]

Slave catchers turned police officers:

Although America had watchmen to protect the King’s peace and militas to defend them/fight their battles. It was not till the creation of slave patrols that we begin to see something similar to the the police we’re familiar with. Slave catchers as the name suggests were people who were sent out to capture fugitive enslaved people. It was not a new concept, slave patrols occurred in Cuba in 1530’s and later occurred in Barbados.

Slave owners from Barbados’s authorised the first slave patrol in America in Southern California. Virgina and North Carolina followed later on. Slave patrol’s combined the role of the militia and watchmen. But none of these were called the ‘police’, that was a French concept at the time only appearing in places like New Orleans. It was noted in 1789 that it had entered the English language with a similar meaning to its modern one: to keep peace, justice and punish disorder. The creation of the police in Britain was inspired by slave codes and patrols, which the US then copied.

American urban policing started in Boston, Massachusetts in 1838 because of the mob attacks on abolitionists in an attempt to create order. Other city’s created their own police forces from the mid 1840’s to the end of the 1850’s. The increased policing was caused by the rise in crime during the Industrial Revolution due to increased population and poor quality of life. Unlike their British counterparts they fell under local jurisdiction with limited supervision which lead to corruption. They were also armed with guns unlike the other. Outside of these big cities law enforcement was severely lacking and was left to the federal courts and the army which shows the beginning hints of how it became so militarised.

Link to Theorist: