Yesterday Amnesty UK launched its "unsubscribe me" campaign, which aims to use social media networks to unite a new generation of human rights campaigners. Their hope is to set up a viral virtual campaign gathering as many names as possible from participants saying "I unsubscribe from torture, rendition, discrimination and unlawful detention".
In other words, Amnesty wants to be down with the kids and reach out to a young(er) audience using social network-inspired platforms to spread their message. [more...]
An event to launch the campaign at the Amnesty UK headquarters gathered a few bloggers, some press/new media people and four speakers: Johnny Chatterton (I blogged about his Protect the Monks Facebook campaign here), Paul Hilder from the activist site avaaz.org (also an openDemocracy author), Kevin Anderson (1) Guardian blogs editor, and Gemma Tumelty, president of the National Union of Students. Gemma was invited following HSBC's recent U-Turn on overdrafts charges, thanks to a successful Facebook-led campaign to rally students to the cause.
It's all about the "moment"
I found the talk to be predictable and slightly amusing as it seemed that nobody really knew how to grasp the power of virtual activism and mobilisations: there was a lot of talk about "turning points", "tipping points" and "catching the moment". A lot was said about the power of such tools and how quickly it is possible for activists to spark a popular interest to their cause, since Facebook (and other similar sites) are based on friendships and trust, rather than a top-down mechanism. There clearly was a lot of enthusiasm for new technologies, but few ideas about concrete actions to be taken beyond the collection of symbolic signatures.
The Facebook Protect the Monks group is 380.000 members strong. Protests were held around the world, Elie Wiesel wrote a really nice note to the participants, and the media talked about it. A lot. In fact, they absolutely loved it.
But do campaigns such as these really work? According to Chatterton, it won't make a huge difference to the core of the issue: he doesn't think Burmese generals are paying attention to his group, but simply hopes to show how much support there is for the current protests while pressuring local politicians to take action.
The future of protests lies in mobility and DIY options
What about the durability of said protests? They seem to only last for a few weeks, coming and going at a very quick pace. Furthermore, the platforms on which they are carried will not last.
Those of us old enough to have known Friendster adopt a knowing smile when hearing people claim that Facebook will last: like Myspace, Facebook will enter a phase of steady decline, and will be replaced by more mobile platforms with which information will be passed from hand to hand ever more quickly. With the use of mobile technology such as mobile phones, people will sign petitions which will no doubt reach an extravagant numbers of signatories - but we still haven't found a way to make them count, and capitalise on the discontentment they represent.
This might be what Amnesty is trying to do: as an NGO which will undeniably last, it is a platform, unlike Facebook, that will not fade away in the next few years. It's just a shame that they seem unclear how they will go about it, and how they will manage to put meaning back into a list of names.
Jon Bright (from OurKingdom) cleverly pointed out that unlike Facebook groups, Amnesty does not give the participants the means to extend the campaign outwards (minus a forwarding option to tell friends about it, and a few widgets to place on livejournals accounts and the like). This is perhaps why it is not a new radical breed of virtual campaigning as it doesn't open up the campaign for people to do work on it on their own and as a result it is simply an old-school petition adorned with an official Amnesty movie.
(1) personal note: Kevin Anderson was actually a pleasure to listen to, and as a blogger I was much relieved and happy to hear him address the competition between holier-than-thou journalists and looked-down-upon bloggers, about which he said: "The only difference between you [bloggers] and I is that I happen to be talking in this panel right now, not a fancy journalism diploma". He also mentioned that his love for blogging stemmed from his passion for "ordinary voices", which was nice to hear.
