Slacktivism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slacktivism

I didn't know there was a term for it!

I have been quite disturbed by the recent 'replace your profile pic with a cartoon character for child abuse' thing on facebook. Such as this:

Change your facebook profile picture to a cartoon character from your childhood and invite your friends to do the same. Until monday (Dec. 6) there should be no human faces on facebook, but an invasion of memories..(FOR THE FIGHT AGAINST CHILD VIOLENCE!)

 I didn't really get the link between cartoons and child abuse and thus posted a question, getting varied responses. It bothered me just as much as the 'put your bra colour as your status update' thing and the 'tell us where you keep your handbag as your status update' thing, all for breast cancer although I also found those meme's insulting as a woman (I'm no girl!). It wasn't the causes themselves, I am no fan of breast cancer or child abuse, I just really don't get how this aids those causes in ANY way.
I've heard the 'it increases awareness' argument and just don't agree. Do people *really* think about the issue? Probably some do, but I suspect the majority copy and paste, have fun funding a pic of their old cartoons and then don't really give it a second thought. And even if they did think about the issue, what is in the information there to give them food for thought? There's no link to give them further information so perhaps they'll be thinking about child abductions and murders, or those horrible cases you see on TV where the children are seriously harmed by their parents. Without going searching for themselves, they won't be able to think about the subtle signs children might exhibit when they are being abused. They won't know what to do about it if they do recognise these signs. It was the same with the two breast cancer campaigns. No link on how to check your breasts, to donate money etc. My point is it. does. nothing. The above wiki link even suggests that this arm chair activism can be harmful..

The acts also tend to dilute awareness campaigns

Interesting...so people think their at least increasing awareness but perhaps everyone just become more immune to the message? I know I usually just roll my eyes when I see the ones that proclaim '97% of people won't post this message, will you be one of the 3% that do?'. I don't even read the message. I'm sure the people who start these messages mean well, but I think they are wasting their time.

This is not to say I am not just as guilty. I sign online petitions and then delete the email that follows asking for money. I do donate when I can but can't possibly give money to all the causes I care about. I've joined facebook causes groups that probably do nothing. My hope from groups such as anti circumcision groups is the awareness thing but I guess people who are going to mutilate their baby boys would just eye roll at that too. I would probably still argue that the people on the fence might read more into it but I really don't know.I guess I could do more but I still donate hours a week to volunteering as it is, not sure I have much more to give!

So, what's the point? Well those status things annoy me :P Bigtime. It got me thinking about all these types of time wasting things.  There are so many things going on in our world that just get ignored. I briefly saw hundreds of people were killed yesterday in Columbia (I think, I'm not even sure, it didn't make headlines), an Australian citizen is about to be arrested via interpol, supposedly charged with having consensual sex without a condom. Seriously. Yet our media reports it as sexual assault and molestation and very few are batting eyelids. Nothing to do at all with him running an organisation embarrassing world governments of course. Why do so few people care? Could it be because they're too busy pasting cartoon characters to their facebook profiles? I know that's waaay oversimplifying matters, but it's happening all the time. Increasing awareness (well not really) while completely blissfully unaware ourselves. While I was going on and on about this to Mark the other night, it struck me as very similar to his favourite quote

Religion is the opiate of the people

By Karl Marx. Maybe a modern version of that would be social networking fluff? I'm sure it still rings true with fundamentalist religious types but maybe that what the rest of us are doing? I'm no conspiracy theorist, I don't think this is the work of the 'new world order' or anything :P Maybe just human nature to find some way of sticking our heads in the sand....

Just want to point out...I don't really know enough or have an opinion of wikileaks or the chap running it, I am quite troubled though by this arrest thing!