Activism/Slacktivism

What is Activism?

Activism is the action of using vigorous campaigning to promote political or social changes. 

What is Slacktivism?

Slacktivism is support of political or social causes by small actions and involvement.

The use of social media

Social media has always been used to spread awareness, address issues, and encourage action and engagement. How do they use it? They post and share the causes to spread the word, for example posting about a social cause on twitter. 

How does Slacktivism work?

Slacktivism works by posting about a cause on your social media and using hashtags to represent the cause. I think it is a good way to engage with social issues, because it spreads the word so that people are aware of the situation and you never know, it could make huge differences and changes. For example the #alsicebucketchallenge campaign. Everyone was posting videos of themselves dumping a bucket of ice water on their social media to promote and spread word about the als disease then you donate money after you do the challenge. Many people shared stories about their experiences with als and the stories were so powerful. They touched many. 

The spread of this campaign became so big, it got to famous stars who started doing it too! Kim Kardashian did the ice bucket challenge and it brought a lot of attention. The famous rich Kim Kardashian was getting a bucket of ice water dumped on her. Who wouldn't want to watch. Lol 

All because of this #alsicebucketchallenge, they raised over $100 million dollars for the disease and found medical cures for als!! Amazing what one hashtag can do :) 

Another hashtag campaign that proved slacktivism was effective was #thedress.

Everyone was trying to figure out if they saw a black and blue or gold and white dress. It became so popular and trendy that the Salvation Army decided to use the dress in their campaign for violence against women. 

What did you see though?

It was clearly black and blue.

The hashtag #thedress was used to spread this campaign. The salvation army posted a photo of a bruised woman wearing the dress and posted it on their twitter. Violence against woman is something that the salvation army is working to prevent. It was very smart of them to use #thedress as a campaign to spread word about violence against women, and the use of the image is very powerful. 

Slacktivism has helped to spread word about causes and make huge changes. 

With just one hashtag you can change the world. 

#slactivism

#activism

The Internet is leading to the evolution of human communication in positive ways: support

I 100% agree with the point that the internet is leading to the evolution of human communication in positive ways. Look where society is today. Even though we have our faces stuck to our phones more than the past, it has built stronger friendships. 

INTERNET COMMUNICATION IS BETTER
http://glenfarrelly.blogspot.ca/2008/10/why-internet-communication-is-better.html
This blog explains how internet communication is better than face to face. "The asynchronous nature of many Internet connections also opens up the possibility of communicating at a time that is convenient, opposed to the hassles of finding mutually suitable times for a face-to-face get-together." This point really stuck out to me, because when it comes to making plans with my friends, communicating online is the easiest, fastest, and convenient way to plan a date. Why go through the pain of finding a time to meet face to face to discuss plans about future dates when you can you can just text the plans in a few thumb movements and seconds?

http://www.campus-adr.net/ODRmodule/positive_effects_of_online_communication.html

The relate to this blog is real. The freedom of what you can say online, taking time to think about what to text back, and using emojis! I mean who doesn't love using emojis?😄😄
This blog just states all the positive things of online communication. A must read!!

   

Obviously, I have experiences with the internet and human communication. Two years ago, I went back to my home country and met a whole lot of new friends. They were the most kind and amazing people. I spent lots of time hanging out with them and having fun, but the day I had to leave came fast. I cried waterfalls when I had to go back to Canada.😅😅 However, what made me less sad was that I could keep in contact with my friends through the internet, aka social media. Till this day we still keep in contact and we plan to meet again in 2018. 



Thank you facebook.

Are we using the internet, or is the internet using us???

We use the internet. 

Whether it is for entertainment purposes, school work, or because you're bored, we definitely use the internet. 

Some might argue that the internet uses us but I disagree. The internet was first made for us to use and we are the ones who control the internet so how is the internet using us at all. 

We control what websites we go on.

We use the internet for 
Facebook
Youtube
Searching something we do not know
Research
Instagram
Snapchat
Games
Twitter
Tumblr
Entertainment
When we are bored
and the list goes on...
We use the internet for a vast amount of things. 
Like, you know, texting my friends from far away and from overseas. We keep in contact with each other and stay updated about each others lives. I have to say, we got closer through the internet.  

The internet does take our information from what we do on the internet, but we are the ones who chose to use the internet that way. 

As you can see, we use the internet way more than the internet uses us.
There is no question to how we don't use the internet. 

"We shape our tools and afterwards our tools shape us"-Marshall McLuhan

Marshall McLuhan has once quoted, "We shape our tools and afterwards our tools shape us." This is a pretty straight forward quote that we can all relate to. We create tools and technologies, and then once the tools and technologies have evolved, they control us and basically create us. 
How did Marshall McLuhan predict the future? His quote relates to the present 21st century so much that it kinda freaks me out.

We created tools because it makes our life easier.
Laziness is a humans best friend. We struggle to get out of bed in the morning and we wish for the ability to teleport. Because of our laziness, we started creating tools that could help us get through the day doing as little work as possible. Our creative brains have created robots that can help us go fetch an apple from the kitchen or even walk our dog.
They have evolved so much that they could understand what we say and do almost anything that we can do. I present to you "human 2.0". 

The tools control us.

Steve Jobs created the released the first iPhone on June 29 2007. You could zoom in and zoom out, download apps, take selfies, and do anything that an old flip phone cannot do. 
Citizens were crazy about the new iPhone and sales increased rapidly. As years went by, the apple company started evolving the iPhone according to what the citizens wanted. A higher camera resolution and new and better looking emojis. After that, people started buying more and more phones and becoming more and more addicted. We probably can't even live a day without our phones. 
When you walk through the park, you don't see children running around and playing tag, instead you see peoples heads buried into their phones. 
Phones are causing us to become antisocial screen addict people. 


The game Pokemon go was released 2016 and it became a huge thing. A location based augmented reality game that could connect you with people. This game has gotten people out of their houses, exploring their environments, exercising, and making new friends. 
Everything was great until news came out that a woman was killed because a guy was using his phone and playing Pokemon go while driving. 
Phones distract us from situations and start controlling what we do. 

People would risk a lot just for their phones, even if it means throwing away something valuable. 
In Illinois on the year 2013, a man accidentally dropped his phone into the buildings trash chute. He asked around for keys to the trash chute and eventually got access to, hoping to get his phone back from the trash compactor. After three hours of not hearing from the man, his wife filed a missing person report to the police. Investigators went to the trash room and discovered the mans crushed lifeless body. 
A man died all because of his phone. 

As you can see from these examples, technology and tools, especially phones, have controlled us some point in our lives.
It's quite sad seeing what technology has evolved to become in the world today.

Technology is taking over our lives.