Do Black Lives Matter to You Every Day, or Just the Days Where They Count on Twitter?
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I am sorry to break it to you, but commenting #BlackLivesMatter or posting a black square isn’t supposed to make you feel better at night. It’s meant to make you angry. Angry that there is even a reason why you have to fight for someone to have the right to live, that there exists a reason to justify why someone's life matters. This movement, this revolution, was not born to validate your compassion, and a systemic crisis isn’t going to blow over by next month. You might be able to walk away from this a week from now, but that isn’t the reality for the Black community.
In recent years, participating in social movements has become synonymous with cultural relevance. Wokeness is an expectation. Showcasing your desire to stick it to the man is a simple standard of social media. When people wake up the day of a protest, their first thoughts are dedicated to a cute outfit, something that will photograph well in the inevitable Instagram post to come. Forget the statistics and facts of your cause, all you need is a quick “#notmypresident” or “#blm<3” caption and you’re set. It would not be unrealistic to assume that the same people who march with chants of equality and justice on their lips are the same people that cross the street when a Black teenager shares the sidewalk with them. While marching, waving posters and reposting is essential to creating traction in social movements, it’s the consistency that makes a difference in the long run. And, unfortunately, consistency isn’t something that exists in the movements fading in and out like annual fashion trends.
“It would not be unrealistic to assume that the same people who march with chants of equality and justice on their lips are the same people that cross the street when a Black teenager shares the sidewalk with them.”
Coverage of the Black Lives Matter movement has filled nearly every social media platform, and videos of the protests are blasted across every TV screen. The world seems to be watching, but it is unlikely that the world is learning. Performative activism and allyship run rampant all over social media, filled with people who express concern today but forget by tomorrow. Many seem to post about George Floyd and Black Lives Matter out of fear of losing social capital, rather than researching what his name and the movement represents. Posting a black square isn’t a box to check off on a to-do list; posting, and then continuing with beach pictures the next day, is incredibly insensitive to the political environment that exists right now.
Performative activism feeds into the desensitization that surrounds movements. Since the upsurge of the Black Lives Matter movement across the nation following the murder of George Floyd, this has proven itself to be true. Getting a hashtag trending for a week isn’t enough to bring change to a disease that thrives within our existing governing bodies. Remember the names of victims not just when it becomes relevant again — remember their names from now until a change is made and then beyond that, so that their unjustifiable murders are never forgotten.
The terrifying truth is that seeing a different name, a different Black life lost to police brutality each month, has become normalized. Petitions circulate for a week and by the next time a new victim is murdered, the previous one has been forgotten, and thus sustains a cycle of disaster that will not cease unless the institutionally oppressive system upon which it thrives has been stopped.
“Getting a hashtag trending for a week isn’t enough to bring change to a disease that thrives within our existing governing bodies.”
So yes — posting helpful infographics and retweeting crucial petitions are vital to spreading awareness, but this awareness is only the tip of the iceberg. We seek to dismantle a system that is solidified by legislation and current lawmakers, and supported by societal norms that have existed since the birth of the United States. As allies, we cannot begin to understand the Black struggle. However, we can read about autobiographies from slaves, study the ethically disturbed War on Drugs, and teach ourselves about the school to prison pipeline. The Black community bears no responsibility to teach us — this is a minimum act of solidarity that we must take upon ourselves.
Only when we ingrain the statistics and stories of Black oppression in our minds will we become true allies. Become truly informed on the issues at hand, research the historical prevalence of injustice, and note how you unknowingly contribute to it. Practice what you preach. What you paint on a poster needs to become what you think every day. There are countless threads flooding social media platforms that provide legitimate educational material to read, listen, and watch to expand your understanding of what is happening. Go back, and instead of just reposting it, actually take the time to learn. Ask yourself serious questions, and be brutally honest:
“Realize that while you may have the privilege to walk away, Black people cannot. Their skin is their skin: a poster that cannot be thrown away, a hashtag that means life or death.”
Participating in social media’s manifestation of the Black Lives Matter movement doesn't create space for you to live some revolutionary fantasy. Realize that while you may have the privilege to walk away, Black people cannot. Their skin is their skin: a poster that cannot be thrown away, a hashtag that means life or death.
We must remember why we are fighting a month from now and refuse to forget why we are so angry 10 years from now.