geekandmisandry:

thatfeministkilljoy:

“It’s not real activisim if it’s only online”

Listen, I live a two hour drive away from my province’s only city, almost every protest I have seen happen has happened there. I currently have no job and I don’t own my own car. The internet is the only place I really can do activism. If I lived in the city, I might try to attend protests, but I don’t so I really can’t.

And lots of people have lots of reasons why they might not be able to get involved with irl activism aside from what I mentioned. Disabilities, time, money, maybe they have a job they fear will fire them, maybe they’re in the closet and are afraid they’ll be outed, maybe their family won’t allow it, etc, etc.

There are so many reasons why a person’s activism might be limited to online things. And it’s not as though it makes no difference in “real life” just because it’s on the internet.

Plus, just because they have never mentioned offline work, doesn’t mean they don’t do it. So maybe you should mind your own business.

I’ve done offline work, it’s not magically effective. In person work has a good vibe and has its benefits but honestly it’s sometimes just simply NOT effective. People can get more media attention on an issue by getting a hashtag trending and if people don’t think that is powerful then they aren’t paying attention.

I used to be involved in physically gathering signatures, I couldn’t collect as many in a week as an online petition can gather in an hour. The internet has given people a voice and a platform.

Anyone who tries that “Do real activism” thing is trying to silence you. They have no idea what they are talking about and they don’t care because all they are trying to do is make you go away.

Online activism matters.