In this day and age, our generation holds a lot of power.
This is quite clear.
I mean, come on. Closely examine how we’ve manipulate our resources (mostly in social media) to drive the exposure for Trayvon Martin’s death. We’ve banded together in a crucial time, expressing our extreme exhaustion with injustice and racial profiling. No need to persuade me: I respect it. Not just because I stood side-by-side with genuine protestors screaming, “I am Trayvon Martin,” but because I believe this issue, right now, matters the most in a divided world.
Even our President understands the severity of this hate crime. He understands that if he had a son, he’d look like Trayvon. But I like to play devil’s advocate, if only to start a healthy, eye-opening debate.
What happened to KONY 2012 and its viral movement? Have we stopped caring already? Sure, its leader, Jason Russell, has temporarily lost his marbles somewhere in San Diego (between running around naked and masturbating), but does that mean we are automatically done with bringing Joseph Kony and the LRA to justice? It’s not trending anymore–and we know that is a huge deal in this trending topic-obsessed era–so do we give up?
I’m convinced that, now, we’re so thirsty to get behind some movement, any movement, that we end up playing a role for the people around us. Do you really care about what’s happening to society or is it just the “cool” thing to do?
Admittedly, I’ve forgotten all about Occupy Wall Street. Hadn’t realized they were still going strong until headlines broke about a six-month anniversary (who knew?). And what about the other recent social movements that we’ve backed for a short time but really didn’t see through?
Our generational-imposed attention deficits paired with our inabilities to simply be patient (sprinkle in a tad bit of self-righteousness) often causes us to jump from one thing to another. Truthfully, we end up totally forgetting about our social responsibilities. It leads me to believe that we just want occupy a bandwagon (anyone heard of Jeremy Lin?) for as long as our buddies or music icons are into it. We’re all for changing the world, chanting and singing songs until the going gets tough or the hype fades. We tend to ease up or radical outspokenness when letters need to be written to councilmen and countless amount of hours have to be dedicated to raising awareness. Now, I’m not, in any way, counting out those who really go hard; those who indeed see the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. I just so happen to notice less of my peers being overly gung-ho once the tweeting stops and the real work begins.
I say all that to say this: I know how I feel about protesting, but what do you think, Vixens.
Are we just protesting for protest’s sake?