It’s not what you post, it’s about what you do
One thing is for certain in the digital age. However tragic, complex and gutwrenching the week has been, and however angry, embittered or exhausted you are, you’ll be able to find your favourite mascara brand posting a ‘‘thoughts-and-prayers’’ social media tile about it.
As was the case this week, when our Instagram feeds filled with black squares on Tuesday for #BlackoutTuesday. What started as a move by two black music marketing execs, to make the industry reflect on its relationship with black musicians, quickly ballooned into a social media movement of black squares anywhere and everywhere with anyone who wanted an easy way to sympathise with Black Lives Matter and the horror of America’s race relations.
And no doubt, as you sat and scrolled this week through everyone from your bestie’s ex’s flatmate to your favourite mid-range slutty dress store’s squares, you were confronted by the inevitable question, ‘‘Should I also be posting something?’’
I know I did. This was quickly followed by, ‘‘But isn’t this just clicktivism?’’ And then, after a few more posts saying silence in the face of injustice is choosing the side of the oppressor, ‘‘Oh God, do I have a moral duty to . . .?’’ And then inevitably, ‘‘If everyone else is, will I look like an idiot if I don’t?’’
Such is the insidious way Instagram messes with your head that you go from being genuinely moved to worrying about your personal brand within two clicks.
And it’s insanely easy to do. When you’re mad, you want to talk about things – and many of us are genuinely outraged over the murder of George Floyd and worried by the potential threat of our own armed police trials.
Then you add in the sparkly Sith Lord of Instagram, which turns us from humans into living, breathing personal brands, and suddenly you’re in a marketing meeting with yourself going, ‘‘We feel we need to signal our brand position on this . . .’’
But for most of us, we’re asking the wrong question. Your personal brand is not the key concern here. The question is not, what should I say about this? But rather, what should I do about this?
In all reality, for a lot of people like me, ‘‘saying something’’ probably isn’t going to be that revolutionary. Largely because many of us don’t have anything particularly powerful to say.
There are many eloquent, poignant voices on police brutality, institutionalised racism and civil rights movements in America and New Zealand. People who have campaigned consistently and vocally, who’ve got their own stories of racial profiling and injustice, and can speak with either first-hand experience or a lifetime of knowledge and depth on these complex injustices.
They’re not me. Nor any other Lycra-clad, kombucha-sipping, young white professional woman sitting on her phone in a cafe and scrolling in horror.
Have I got genuine sympathy? Sure. Real wisdom? Nope. And in situations like this, the most power comes from people with insight speaking out, and people like me sitting down and shutting up.
That’s not to say that I can’t or shouldn’t say anything about it. It’s just that, if I want to post, I shouldn’t kid myself that my Insta stories will have much impact. Especially if my motivation is only so I don’t look bad to my woke friends.
No, the real place that the kombucha-clan and I can actually make an impact is in our actions. And anytime we think, ‘‘Should I post about this . . .?’’ we need to first rephrase that as, ‘‘What can I do about this?’’
There are very many unsexy, unbranded but highly effective ways we can be a force for good right now. Like writing to our MPs and our police force to end the armed police trials. We’re lucky to have feedback processes baked into our systems of democracy, and MPs are still attuned to the gathering thunder of public pressure.
We can donate to many of the civil rights causes currently campaigning in America. Or we can start reading some of the iconic civil rights literature from the US. Or works of our own Ma¯ ori rights activism. Or even just start with reading an unbiased history of our own country.
And only after we’ve done something should we start posting about it.
Otherwise we’re just posting because we’re worried about our image. And not only is it blindly obvious when that’s happening (cough, Glassons, cough) but nothing smacks more of faux-woke insincerity than a black square followed by sweet FA afterwards.
Have I got genuine sympathy? Sure. Real wisdom? Nope.