THE AGE OF PROTEST
DO WE LIVE IN AN AGE OF PROTEST
The development of the internet and the emergence of social media has acted as an enormous achievement in the era we co-exist in. This major shift from traditional media has not only constituted a base to network but has also made it much easier for collective action to take place in the protest space (Wessels, 2007; Segerberg and Bennett, 2011).
Social media and blogs make a big contribution in a cost-effective means of spreading credible information, and coordinate collective political action and diversity (Zhu, Skoric and Shen, 2017; Gladwell and Shirky, 2011; Johnson and Kaye, 2016). In fact, according to studies by Haciyakupoglu and Zhang (2015), while traditional media was quiet about the police attacks at Gezi Park in Istanbul in 2013, an uproar was caused on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Digital media has shown effectiveness through its ability to ‘organise without organisations’ or infrastructure (Kavada, 2015; Joyce, 2010). In terms of exposure, Kruikemeier, Gattermann and Vliegenthart (2018) have proved that social media provides the visibility that other media does not, such as women in power.
This, however, does not mean that we can completely rely on the internet to make changes in the system. Connecting with individuals on Facebook that hold similar beliefs creates nothing but frail alliances (Gladwell, 2010). It counts as a setback when not much attention is paid by internet users to a protest that requires awareness which can happen through pressure from suppressive governments (Barbera et. al, 2015; Trottier and Fuchs, 2015). Anderson (2020) gives an example of how one got blocked from using TikTok because they posted about the concentration camps for Muslims in China.
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When well-coordinated between activists, social media like Facebook and Twitter can be instrumental as it was for Austrian student protests in 2009 (Maireder and Schwarzenegger, 2012). Likewise, citizens of Zimbabwe showed their frustration with the rule of former prime minister, Robert Mugabe’s rule and took to social media with the hashtag #ThisFlag, prior the election period (Gukurume, 2017). When Americans were challenged with verticalists taking over physical spaces, they expressed their anger on digital platforms to institute new arrangements (Juris, 2012).
A contradicting example is the first globally influential struggle known as the Arab Spring, made strong use of cyber-activism through blogs that were at the time quite persuasive and made one view a different perspective. This, however, did not work out in their favor as the government cut off their access to the internet (Howard and Hussain, 2011; Tufecki and Wilson, 2012; Zúñiga et. al, 2013; Scherman, Arriagada and Valenzuela, 2015). Similarly, as per Smith, Men and Al-Sinan’s (2015) study, the Gezi Park protests that used social media as a means of activism, were disappointed when the Turkish prime minister decided to restrict their usage.
Protests such as London’s G20 protests in 2009 and the Black Lives Matter in 2013 to present day, are perfect examples of campaigns that have not only erupted from cyber-activism but also how participation on digital media assisted campaign participants to attain global attention and get closer to systematic change. Antonio Gramsci’s cultural hegemony (Ahmad, 2020) will be illustrated further to understand these two campaigns and the ideologies they developed to overcome the system they were used to, eventually bringing about change.
2009 G20 LONDON SUMMIT PROTESTS
The understanding of the purpose of the G20 summits is essential to fathom the aim of these protests in London. The reason why these annual meetings are held with powerful world leaders from countries like the United States and Saudi Arabia is from them to discuss global economy issues as well as concerns regarding climate change (The Washington Post, 2020; BBC News, 2019).
The G20 Meltdown protest in London took place on the 1st of April 2009. With the intent of bringing better outcomes to various social issues including poverty, climate change and jobs, protestors marched, claiming government to act (Liao, 2010; Zimbio, 2009). This protest, though lasted two days, marked the first time the global economic depression was addressed. Protests held near the Royal Bank of Scotland expected no more than 10,000 anti-capitalist activists to demonstrate. Fortunately, there were three times the campaigners including various trade unions and contributors such as Friends of the Earth (The Guardian, 2009; Zimbio, 2009).
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Some key moments that were precisely important during the protests vary from chants such as "Burn the bankers!", "There streets, our streets!" and terming the first day of the outcry as "Financial Fools' Day" inspired by the date it was held on (The Guardian, 2009; Rueters, 2009). This however was as aggressive as it got. BBC (2009) reported that it was more bloodless and placid than intense. Speeches by Mark Thomas, comedian and Tony Jupiter, a well-known environment activist, were delivered; celebrity, Russell Brand also took to streets to show support for the cause. Students from school and senior citizens also campaigned with colorful banners with interestingly worded messages (The Guardian, 2009). Thousands of economists and professors expressed their distress by sending letters regarding free trade, to the leaders at the summit too (BBC News, 2009). Alain Robert, a French protestor climbed the London building to put up a banner focusing on a powerful message - "100 months" urging the world to realise that we have a short time to 'save the world' (Independent, 2009).
Undoubtedly, the police arrived at these main locations to act upon demonstrators. Former prime minister, Gordon Brown was proudly open about how the tactics used by the police were professional which kept 'criminal activity to a minimum' (BBC News, 2009). Opposingly, kettling is a term used to describe the position protestors were put in by the police at the scene. Bloom (2012) described kettling as 'open-air imprisonment' as people were left without food or water in cold conditions with no access to washrooms. Two years later, it was also discovered that 30 protestors who filed cases against brutality faced towards them, were being paid 117 thousand pounds by the Metropolitan Police. The actions displayed by the police was exactly how those peaceful protests turned into an openly violent and brutal lesson for the minority (BBC News, 2009).
#G20PROTESTS ON SOCIAL MEDIA
According to the analysation of Gramsci's theory about hegemony by Apple (2018), the term refers to dominance of one group, more specifically a ruling class that legitamises norms and ideas that benefit themselves while the subordinate group are manipulated into giving consent by working for the higher class. Using the theoretical lens of Gramsci's notion of cultural hegemony, a valid example is the G20 protests in London. Social unrest was seen amongst the victimised masses of the population who realised the need to break the social structure (Lears, 1985) created by the prestige fundamental class, and so a new ideology emerged, making it a mere attempt at counter-hegemony.
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Activist communication was seen most effective during the two-day protests as several photos and videos flooded social media. In fact, posting on YouTube and Twitter using the hashtag #G20report was encouraged by broadcast channels to get real-time updates (Poell, 2014; Poell and Borra, 2011). A whopping 30,000 tweets were posted regarding these protests while the G20 meeting was being held in Pittsburg and an enormous amount exposed cases of police brutality and how they used force to detain protest participants as well as the passers-by, between a wall of horses and the rioting mob, to "teach them a lesson" (Earl et. al, 2013; BBC 2009; Webologist, 2009). At the scene were present more than two thousand citizen journalists that fortunately recorded policemen who used violent methods of control on peaceful protestors, and criminal damage (Price, 2011). This surveillance footage captured by journalists was made visible on television and various social media platforms.
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From a theoretical point of view, considering the brutal methods of coercion, the police can be examined using Holub’s (1992) definition of agents of hegemony. These agents usually include intellectuals such as doctors, journalists, lawyers, military personnel, in this case the police who acted on behalf of a bigger system (law enforcement). Social media was an effective tool that helped in exposing misconduct especially in cases such as Ian Tomlinson, a bystander at the protest, who was beaten to death by PC Simon Harwood, a police officer (Rosie and Gorringe, 2009). Another case of an unjustified baton attack on Nicola Fisher, a protestor, by a police member was taken to court after footage of the incident was released on YouTube (Dutta, 2010). Credit can be given to social media platforms for creating awareness that could not have been possible in movements and protests of the past.
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#BLACKLIVESMATTER
Black Lives Matter, unlike the G20 protests, is an ongoing movement that is on a much higher parallel, which has created an unmatched impact, and a lot of this is because of social media. Veritably, the movement began in 2013, with the hashtag Black Lives Matter (2021), by three queer Black women - Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi in response to the death of Trayvon Martin, an innocent 17-yearold Black boy. The movement was not based off just one incident and it was not intended to focus on police brutality issues but also covers important matters such as migrant rights and healthcare restrictions (Edkins and Zehfuss, 2019).
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The movement gathered immense support from almost half (40%) of America between 2013 and 2017 as mentioned by Ransby (2018), which is a lot one can expect considering the nation is ruled by White supremacists. That, however, did not put a halt to the violent crimes committed by law enforcements. In 2014, Michael Brown, another unarmed teenager was fatally shot by a police officer along with inappropriate force, suffocation, used on Eric Garner, who was caught selling cigarettes (Riddle et. al, 2020). Spiraling into more awareness through social media, many across the globe learned about the immoral methods of conduct used by police in America towards the Black community. In 2015, Freddie Gray's spinal incurable and fatal injury was caused by police "dragging" his body while he limped and screamed incessantly (White et. al, 2018).
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While #BlackLivesMatter was a standard base on which many learned about the injustices faced by the Black community, Szetela's (2019) research shows that many smaller unions aspired by BLM (Black Lives Matter) developed including Black Causus Foundation, the Innocence Project and the ACLU. Be that as it may, the barbarous video of George Floyd struggling to breathe and calling out to his mother while under a Minneapolis officer's knee enraged, not only the Black community, but the whole world. As a matter of fact, CBS News (2020) reported that the protests that followed this incident were at levels that have not be observed for half a century, in the United States.
Regardless of the COVID-19 global pandemic situation, people decided to take the case to the streets and stormed out with cameras and mobile phones (McCoy, 2020). Speaking of the universal coronavirus pandemic, the Black community faced a lot of difficulty in coping up during quarantine and lockdowns due to lack of access to healthcare as well as seriously poor-quality living conditions and unemployment but that remains incomparable to the spike of death and injury caused towards the minority by militarised police force (Sobo et. al, 2020). Getting into specifics, retaliation by police against the common public and protestors lead to more than a thousand cases including 500 instances of tear gas and pepper spray rounds, 60 unlawful arrests and 11 instances of kettling, which compared to the G20 protests, was on an extreme level, as reported by The Guardian (2020) and Forensic Architecture (2020).
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What made matters worse were the reactions and aggravated responses from the public that opposed the purpose of the movement by bringing up the hashtags #AllLivesMatter to emphasise that no one group should be empowered, completely disregarding police brutality cases against members of the Black community, as well as #BlueLivesMatter introduced by other groups, above all the White, who previously had positive encounters with law enforcements (Pillay, 2020).
HASHTAGS TO STREETS
Black Lives Matter was just a hashtag birthed to create awareness about the injustices faced by the community, but many took to streets for a mass struggle (Rickford, 2016). This social strife is known as collective memory, a subject that Polletta and Jasper (2001) talk about, refer to a common ideology that emerged through a particular means, in this case social media platforms like Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. This is used to bring members of the minority group together. Linscott (2017) in his study also compares how, if Civil Rights Movement were to take place in the 20th century, it would bring to light the things that required awareness, like it did for Black Lives Matter. Social media has urged public to form, or even get them thinking of new ideologies on various subjects.
During its initial years, Black Lives Matter was dependent completely on the public on social media forming opinions as most news publications would frame members of the Black community under the term 'thugs' - including Trayvon Martin (Ward, 2017). Twitter users also took to the use of many hashtags about cases, such as Michael Brown’s ‘#IfTheyGunnedMeDown'. The hashtag was popularised, speculating Black people to share images or words of them facing a similar experience with the police (Smithsonian Magazine, 2016). The movement, from 2013-17, observed around 30 million tweets that poured in primarily by the young users (Leach and Allen, 2017) but in 2020, Google searches in the U.S. were highest regarding Black Lives Matter while YouTube saw spikes in viewership of BLM-related videos (Mashable Middle East, 2020), being the period that it was most mentioned on the internet and in the news (Giorgi et. al, 2020).
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Generally, hegemony refers to nation over nation domination, but the Black Lives Matter movement saw occurrences that are clear cases of hegemony (Hasan, 2018). Coverage in the early years of the protests inadequately explained or were not elaborately spoken about in the news. Journalists would merely use the term 'alleged victims,' making them agents of hegemony under the control of White supremacists like the very president of America, Donald J. Trump, who claimed the Black Lives Matter movement was nothing but a symbol of hate (The Washington Post, 2020; Leopold and Bell, 2017). At a subconscious, eye-opening level, the evidence of police brutality acted upon George Floyd created a sense or open-mindedness that was originally invisible to the world, normalising a belief that replaced a hegemonic one, making this process easy through the availability of social media platforms (Carney, 2016; Thomas and Ashburn-Nardo, 2020).
CONCLUSION
Social media has not only aided as a means of communication, but it has also created a tendency to change certain opinions developed about a matter amongst, as close to 17% of adult users. Political and social causes are hence easier to talk or raise awareness about on social media (Pew Research Center, 2020). As an additional factor, digital media forms have allowed globalisation of social movements and campaigns granting a group to be exposed to new ideologies and see first-hand injustice entrenched in the social systems and institutions (Carroll, 2007).
To cite an instance, the Black Lives Matter protests were thriving in parts of Europe, Japan and sub-Saharan Africa taking the objective to a more global scale (Cornelius, 2020). The G20 protests also took place in the following year (2010) in Canada making social media credible for the ease of activist communication (Poell, 2014; Liebermann, 2020). Social media made it possible for marginalized or minority groups to validate their stories amongst the public discourse and decentralise narratives of the dominant.