ACTIVISM: THE NEED TO ACT WITH A NEW PERSPECTIVE

by Simeon Nkola Matamba ( Follow on Twitter )

From day one of our physical existence, either consciously or unconsciously, we have a drive to fight for rights bestowed upon us by the Almighty. And beyond the scope of our private lives, we oppose the ever increasing level of injustice in the world, claiming rights of the oppressed by denunciations, online activism, petition signing, and the like. Imperialism, dictatorship, human rights violations, terrorism and all vices trigger a humane reflex to the extent that it is impossible for one to hold their peace.

Famous human rights fighters and supporters remain unconstested examples and sources of inspiration. Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ghandi, or Martin Luther King Jr are among the most notorious ones in terms of recent history. Those were fighters of freedom, human rights and equality of all races.

But there is a disparity today when we consider methods they once resorted to for reaching their goals and win their battles compared to what we are doing. To them fighting meant sacrifice as far as to be rentrenched from the living. It is obvious that we are less effective. Activism that meant taking action and fully committing oneself for a cause is fading.

Today's battles are fought on sofas,  or behind computers as we relentlessly send thousands and millions of posts on social networks, sometimes in the comfort of an air-conditioned room. Our popular struggles though legitimate suffer from a lack of strategy and approach to have things moved ahead.

Not long ago the world was moved by the incident that took place in a stadium where the brazilian player Dany Alves was thrown a banana at. In a smart move, Alves ridiculed the person who threw the fruit by eating it. As a result, days that followed saw Twitter and Facebook being filled with pictures of people around the globe with peeled bananas in support to the player but mainly with the intent of fighting racism. But the question is: how does a banana picture tackle racism?

To mention another example, the more than 200 girls' abduction in Nigeria had a larger social network impact. The slogan "#BringBackOurGirls" went viral and became a meme which has seen a timid version of it, "#BringBackOurBoys", referring to the three boys kidnapped in West Bank by a terrorist organisation according to Israeli authorities. But simply showing sympathy towards grieved families of victims or spreading the word to get the world aware as said above cannot solve problems.

A cosmetic commitment is the least one can do and think they have done something. But more must be done. We cannot be proud of Mandela, Dr King, Ghandi or any other soldier of freedom and justice if we do not take solid action.

The Arab Spring despite its mitigated results was a great example of what can be done when the struggle ceases to be cosmetic and when one knows that they are risking their lives for a cause. Though social medias were used to raise public awareness, toppled presidents in Egypt and Tunisia resigned because of the people's resilience and no intent to give up, as they prolonged demonstrations.

Therefore, activists must endow themselves with a new perspective. Action must have an impact on the actor. Action cannot leave the actor unscathed. There is always a price to pay for what we do no matter how small it is. We look at scars with pride and see how strong we were to go through hard times and remain standing. And a work is valued when we run out of energy but reap benefits. It shows that our commitment must reach another dimension where we don't just tweet or pull an hashtag, but rather become soldiers in the battlefield.