Social Media & Activism

This week we learned about advocacy and activism, and how how the tools of social media can be utilized to further a cause. Although I don't particularly see the challenge in differentiating "advocacy" from "activism," I found the "Why Social Media is Reinventing Activism" article interesting. I completely understand why the concept of "slactivism" has been brought up in the context of social media campaigns. It can be irritating at times, when you log into your chosen social media platform to find a feed littered with post after post of people seemingly jumping on a bandwagon to promote one cause or another. The recent "Ice Bucket Challenge" comes to mind as one of the recent culprits. It's clear that using social media to further a cause is an idea that's still in its infancy, and I look forward to the better refined techniques that are surely coming to us in the future.

The readings this week made me think back to a campaign I launched at work, in partnership with the Butte Humane Society. Animal welfare is a cause that's really important to me, and I wanted to use my job at the clothing company to help the BHS in any way I could. I launched a spring lookbook for our site, which featured our models with some of the dogs that were up for adoption at BHS. BHS also promoted our lookbook on their site and all their social media platforms. We also donated a percentage of all our sales for the month of February to them, and featured the lookbook with the dogs on the front page of our site. It was useful for us, as it prompted more sales from locals who wanted to support BHS, as well as helping show the business in a positive light, as one that was concerned with promoting local charitable associations.

I'd love to work again to help promote a local nonprofit, something like Catalyst or something along those lines. I think it's important to recognize the possibility of mutually beneficial campaigns that are helpful to all parties involved, as well as having a positive effect in our community.