The Chicken Pox of Social Media Activism

My mother has never had chicken pox.

I was always told that it's "better to get chicken pox when you are younger because you only get them once, and if you get them when you are older, they are more deadly."

I believed this, because it doesn't matter anymore, I had chicken pox when I was 5 years old. But my mother has never had chicken pox.

So as to protect me from the "deadly-old-people-chicken-pox", she made sure I had a play date with every one of my acquaintance friends (I swear I met more people when my mom was trying to make me catch a disease than all the people I have met in college) who had chicken pox so that I would be exposed to it. 

Finally, it worked! I woke up the day of my sister's birthday party with red bumps all over my body and tear filled eyes. My mom couldn't be happier.

They went away, and I have no scars from my nails favorite poxes, so it was quite the success.

But sitting in class today got me thinking about how this story relates to social activism and the stances taken by Stone and Gladwell. And I realized that they are both right.

REAL activism is something you catch, like a fever or the chicken pox, but you also have a higher chance of catching it if you are exposed to it somehow, like through social media or a sick play date. 

No, Gladwell, the Revolution itself will not be Tweeted, but I think it's necessary for the hype to be built up so that everyone cares about the Revolution enough to come out and take a stand, and the fastest way to do that is through the use of social media. 

Expose yourself to the activist chicken pox, instead of following @YMCMB_BW (Bow Wow) because he tweets pictures of his adorable daughter (I don't really know guys, I'm not on Twitter), follow @craignewmark to hear his opinions on Afghanistan and form some of your own. 

Stand for something, so that when the time comes, you can go out and be an informed leader instead of a feed follower.