#cyberactivism

Digital Activism: Enacting Ethical and Transformative Frameworks

In what ways do “neutral” digital games and platforms perpetuate real-world systems related to labor, ownership, and social identity?

In Animal Crossing, players often call the game “cute escapism” as many of the Americans were settling into quarantine, yet Ian Bogost argues that the seemingly harmless ideas of debt, property, and constant work are deeply political and economical, reflecting the structures of capitalism that we experience in the real world (Bogost, 2020, pp. 2-3). When customizing an island that personalizes your preference of the landscape, there are times that game mechanics can quietly undermine the creative liberation by enforcing a real-world cycle of grinding, accumulating wealth, and socio-economic inequality. This underscores the fact that digital play promotes the domination of real-world systems that models capitalism. These power dynamics are entirely immune to our personal experiences, even in digital spaces. 2. Explain the role of Black Twitter transforming a digital playground towards its creation of a space for Black resistance and cultural production?

Latoya A. Lee characterizes Black Twitter as a “digital homespace” for Black users to actively “(re)construct their bodies and identities” against dominant narratives (Lee, 2017, p. 1). It is not just memes that exist everywhere—it is about social action and community resilience to spread the resistance in response to addressing discrimination issues like #APHeadlines (p. 2). When scrolling down Black Twitter through some of the posts, Black users transform casual interactions into acts of empowerment as its creation of space for cultural production. Therefore, humor serves as a tool for Black resistance for political commentary, expressions of joy, and hashtags forge community solidarity. 3. Can online activism represent a sufficient condition of being materially disruptive to social change beyond symbolic hashtag culture?

Sandor Vegh argues that online activism can range from advocating public awareness “relevant to the cause” to the “media-investigated” forms of direct digital action—like online attacks, mobilization, and other proactive efforts to bring more about change (Vegh, 2003, pp. 2-5). The humorous, viral spread of digital content acts as the importance of its initial phase of the internet memes, fueling people towards an actual, organized political action. This disproves that digital protests are not merely “slacktivism” as there are pathways to represent a deeper, real-world organization for being material disruptive to social change beyond symbolic hashtag culture. Thinking about the #ArabSpring memes from street protests to government responses displays that online activism is not linear, but rather humor and information are the catalysts for driving action. 4. In what ways do indigenous activists use social media platforms to challenge dominant colonial narratives and the pursuit of land reclamation both digitally and physically?

Nicholet A. Deschine Parkhurst displays that #NoDAPL uses Facebook livestreams and hashtags to assert community sovereignty beyond simple awareness (Parkhurst, 2021, pp. 33-35). Water protectors repurposed “fun” digital spaces so it can utilize platforms for serious activism, effectively transforming online timelines for its cultural practice, education, and resistance efforts for the public movement. This reminds me how the digital world persists online oppression parallel to the efforts of the indigenous resistance or revitalization. Therefore, the contemporary world of indigenous activists requires digital belonging and physical land defense as the modern foundation of political power so communities connect and operate themselves both digitally and physically.

Word Count: 538

References:

Bogost, I. (2020, April 15). Animal Crossing isn’t escapist; It’s political. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/04/animal-crossing-isnt-escapist-its-political/610012/

Lee, L. A. (2017). Black Twitter: A response to bias in mainstream media. Social Sciences, 6(1), 1–17.

Parkhurst, N. T. A. D. (2021). From #Mniwiconi to #StandwithStandingRock. In Indigenous Peoples Rise Up (pp. 32–37). Rutgers University Press.

https://futurearchitectureplatform.org/projects/951b6a9a-6166-4bc1-b904-0f82aabb24bc/

Eat Veggies.