Public social media platforms expose protest strategy to adversaries
Evidence
The first has to do with the fact that you cannot strategize vis-à -vis other people if those people are present. Meyrowitz puts words to a feeling I sometimes have when watching protest movements unfold on Facebook, complete with event listings for protests where people voluntarily list themselves as “attending.” The whole process is laid out in the open. Sure, this makes it easier for potential participants to see, but it also makes it easier to find for police, detractors, and even just passersby derailing the conversation with irrelevant information. — Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing, 549
Categorization
- QUESTION: How does this claim hold up against the documented organizing value of social media in movements like the Arab Spring or BLM?
- FICTION: A thriller or heist-reversal plot could hinge on strategizing openly in front of one’s adversary, weaponizing what open platforms assume.
- XREF: connects to: Social media prominence did not track real-world influence in protest movements. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and…, 299; Large vocal protests can force mainstream media to platform dissenters; Digital grassroots platforms conceal inner-circle control within antipolitical movements — Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization…, 196 (+1 more)
- yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Social media prominence did not track real-world influence in protest movements. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and…, 299; Large vocal protests can force mainstream media to platform dissenters; Digital grassroots platforms conceal inner-circle control within antipolitical movements — Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization…, 196 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Digital grassroots platforms conceal inner-circle control within antipolitical movements
#complicates(0.72) — Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitics, 196 - Social media platforms simulate a public sphere they now merely exploit.
#complicates(0.70) — Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing, 580