Online Activism
Q: — Provide an example of an online activist campaign (eg. A link to a news story, website, online petition, FB group or something similar) & briefly explain the goals of the online action. Do you think your selected action has the potential to result in real-world change or is it merely an example of “slacktivism”? Why?
The meaning that social activism entails has changed over time. In contemporary society, social activism has taken a new form through the implementation of the new tools of social media. Through various social media platforms, it has been relatively easier for the powerless to “collaborate, coördinate, and give voice to their concerns” without having to take to the streets and start a movement there.
(New World has proposed an online BagVote to let the public have their say on whether to keep the plastic bags or to have fees charged for the bags.)
The New World supermarket has recently put a vote online where customers all over New Zealand can voice their opinions in whether plastic bags should be kept. This action is an attempt to reduce pollution to the lowest level possible. Plastic bags have long been a controversial issue calling for solutions to protect the environment at threat. It has been revealed that plastic bags are a constant threat to living things in the sea in New Zealand. This is one of the reasons why New World decided to take action and move one step closer towards reducing, reusing, and recycling plastic in environmentally friendly ways.
(Regardless of the result, there will be changes brought about to protect the environment in the end. Particularly, New World will go plastic free in 2018.)
The results of the voting have proven to be a huge factor determining New World’s new policy in terms of plastic bags. On October 10th, a statement was released announcing that New World would go plastic free by the end of 2018 because the results of the BagVote only emphasised people’s strong opposition against bags. Although people were skeptic about the outcome of the voting as well as the measures New World will take, the online voting has resulted in drastic changes that stuck with what the majority of the people wanted. Rather than being an example of slacktivism which refers to activities that do not have an influence on real–life social outcomes, but “only serve to increase the feel–good factor of the participants”, this BagVote action has shown to change the way New World will operate in the future.