It’s difficult to extol the power of protest without saintly praise of the godfather of grumble, Bob Dylan.
I remain a big fan of the man, despite his recent, bewildering shills, and the fact that ‘Blown’ in the Wind’ is pretty tepid by today’s standards, a song probably somehow more synonymous with the artist and the time than the infinitely superior ‘Masters of War’, but the truth remains the man could invoke a decent protest.
With his trademark warble and Martin dreadnought, Dylan — and I shudder at the thought of using such a hackneyed phrase — inspired a generation.
1963 was obviously a different time than 2009, one ripe with “change” (where have I heard that word before?) and “hope” (huh), but I daresay the problems facing the Love Generation® — Vietnam, Watergate, feminism and civil rights — in no way pale to the issues facing today’s.
Afghanistan/Iraq, the Bush-hangover, global warming, obesity and the economy, where the hell are our protest songs? Or protests? Even a little unchannelled anger?
You don’t have to look too far actually, just check out Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and the like.
Instead of swaying the masses with a few biting chords and with some hissing, angry lyrics, today’s Lazy Generation® has the click of a mouse, and the well, that’s about all. Oh sorry, I forgot, a smug feeling of unearned satisfaction.
Okay, Peta still does its thing, but it has become such a caricature of itself that I can’t take it seriously anymore. And, protests do still occur, in most recent in memory the much-ballyhooed break-in and sit-in of the Stansted runway in December.
Things got pretty hairy in Athens a while back I guess, but I’m willing to bet those protesters didn’t have broadband internet access.
Why risk your neck, enduring the cold, hard crack of the billy club and the steely temperament of a pair of handcuffs around your wrists, when you can inch that same supple wrist around a computer monitor and join the Facebook group ’100,000 strong for orphaned Gaza puppies’ and ‘The John Sargeant was hosed petition!’
Is this what settles for action in today’s generation? You can argue that these menial little groups and boycotts raise the profile for certain causes, but with our 24-hour news cycles, blogs, feeds, tweets, etc., I’m not sure how much higher the profile can be raised.
Being relatively media literate, I have a fair idea what’s going on the world. I’m vaguely aware of the stupidest, smallest issues decaying the dustiest corners of the world.
So the question is: has social media killed the protest? Are we really this lazy, or has oversaturation numbed the senses?
The latest example brought to my attention, and likely soon to yours, is the New Zealand Internet Blackout against the Guilt Upon Accusation law — a law calling for internet disconnection based on accusations of copyright infringement without trial or court sanctified evidence.
Yikes, serious stuff.
It is bullshit, obviously, don’t get me started on this whole copyright infringement, RIAA, ISP fiasco we have on our hands.
But what’s more concerning is the ‘Blackout’ part of the New Zealand cause. The directing website asks internet users to ‘blackout’ their profile photos, or avatars on various sites, including Twitter, MySpace and Facebook, until February 23.
That’s it. They even provide the black avatar, all you have to do is right-click, and save-as.
Oh sorry, and your supposed to say “(your name) is blacked out: Stand up against “Guilt Upon Accusation” for New Zealand” on whatever social vice your networking with at the time.
Okay, now that’s it. I’ve noticed a few of my Twitter followers have already complied, showing their support, likely, before taking another swig of their skinny lattes and changing pages to have a chuckle on Digg, forgetting about the issue altogether.
Really? That’s what passes for a protest these days? I’m shocked. I’m appalled. I’m blogging.
It’s a cause that I believe in, but really, this doesn’t cut it. I can’t imagine the shady heads-of-state, high in the cozy, ivory towers of New Zealand are going to be too badly shaken by such an act, a bunch of black pixels.
I understand the irony of complaining about a protest, saying it’s not protest-y enough, but it’s true. Get some guitars, some angry masses and go blockade some government institution, with the tear gas and the balaclavas, tear down some satellites, I don’t know, just don’t just click.
Where’s Mr. Dylan when you need him? Besides idling his Cadillac Escalade in the parking lot of the Co-op while shopping for baby seal-skins and low efficiency lightbulbs.
What we need, and what New Zealand needs, is a new anti-hero, and by god, we aren’t going to find him or her on Twitter or Facebook.
How do the two US presidential candidates fare on the various social networking websites that take up so much of our valuable time? Glad you asked, luckily the Scottish-based social media company, Yomego has compiled a list:
MySpace On its Impact Channel, where young voters can watch the live debates between the candidates and get questions answered, McCain has 55,000+ friends to Obama’s 700,000+ friends.
Winner = Obama
Facebook A partnership with ABC brings reporters’ articles, videos and blog posts from the campaign trail and voters can pitch their views and compare them against those of the candidates. Here Obama has 2.1m supporters to McCain’s 500,000+ supporters.
Winner = Obama
Second Life This site hosted a major music festival arranged by the Obama for President organisation in a drive to register hard to reach Americans.
Winner = Obama
Twitter Our new favourite microsite gathers public opinion about the presidential election, aggregating live ‘tweets’ about the election, including thoughts, reactions and observations. Here Obama has 98,000+ followers to McCain’s 2000+
Winner = Obama
YouTube Here the candidates every move is exposed, analysed, discussed and parodied. However, many successful clips are campaign-oriented, such as the ‘Yes We Can’ music video (10 million views) and Sarah Palin’s first ABC interview, which attracted as many online viewers as it did on TV
Winner = A draw!
Well, these results should be surprising to no one. If you need it hammered into your head just once more, the 2008 US Election will go down in history as the first political campaign to capitalise on the true power of digital communication. And as millions of Americans line up at the polls today to vote for their 44th president, in a pure utopian digital world, Obama is slated win by a landslide.
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In the past month EPL football clubs have amassed 3.3 million new Facebook Likes, 342,109 new Twitter followers and nearly 10,000 tweets. This works out as a 12% growth for Twitter followers and 9% for Facebook fans and it doesn’t like it will decline any time soon. With this in mind, who performed best in the last month?
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