Ellie's blog!: blog post 6

Soo Young Lee

CAS 283

Dr. Frank Stec

4/15/2016

#HashtagActivism #hashtivism

Throughout the semester in this class, I have enjoyed most of the topics since I’m a very “CMC” person. Among all those topics, “hashtag activism” or “hashtavism” was one of the most interesting. By the definition of Wikipedia, Definition of Hashtag Activism, “Hashtag activism is a term coined by media outlets which refers to the use of Twitter's hashtags for Internet activism.” Not only Twitter, but also most of social networking services such as Facebook and Instagram started to use “hashtags.(#)”

What came up to my mind first but definitely not least was “Ice Bucket Challenge.” Ice Bucket Challenge is basically one of the most influential hashtag activism.

In this article, Ice bucket challenge: More than just "hashtag activism"?, the author suggests that ice bucket challenge was definitely more than just “hashtag activism,” because of the popularity and participation. This campaign was started to get donations to help patients who are struggling with Lou Gehrig’s disease. It was wide spread all around the world. Even in Asia, it became a very significant and charitable campaign. It’s basically nominating people to be doused with ice water “for the sake of raising money for research into that specific disease or else they will have to donate some money. Like the picture below, even Bill Gates accepted the challenge saying that it’s better to participate. Many of celebrities also participated in this challenge, which led other people to try out the challenge by nominating them.

However, what I really think it’s important is people’s honesty and responsibility. I was also nominated for this challenge, but I could not participate because of my part-time job. Anyways, Hashtag activism is such a powerful revolution that makes people easily be the part of something and great way to stop wrong social issues. So we should keep up the good work with good wills of this activism!