Don’t Stop At Support: Showing support and “standing with” a cause isn’t enough, it requires effort and action to truly change anything

When I learned that East students organized a day where the whole student body wore black to stand with sexual assault victims, I didn’t question it at all. I woke up the next day, put on the carefully planned outfit — black joggers and a black T-shirt with the slogan “respect existence or expect resistance” proudly printed across the front — and went to school.

It wasn’t until the end of the day when I was talking to a friend that I started to truly think about the action the student body was taking. Yes, it’s amazing that East collectively stood with victims of sexual abuse, but how much does simply wearing a black shirt do to make a difference?

Throughout each class, no one I encountered even talked about the issue at all — nothing about the recent events relating to it, nothing about how to make a difference, not even recognizing the protest of sexual abuse itself. It seemed as if the student body simply wore a black shirt because they were told to and had little attachment to the message they were standing for.

I’ve noticed that in the past few years our society likes to “support” and “stand with” a cause or a group of people, but they never like to take real action for it. I’m not trying to say that we should never show our support for something, but support only goes so far when talking about significant problems in the real world. Support accompanied by an action — even just starting a conversation — would make a much larger impact on the affected group.

A way of protesting that East knows all too well is the infamous walkouts. It seems as if any miniscule discord, most often between the students and the administrators, prompts the student body’s immediate reaction of “let’s have a walkout.”

My knowledge of this trend started way back during my freshman year, with a walkout for teachers after the school board imposed a three-year unilateral teachers contract. During my sophomore year, it was succeeded with a walkout organized in support of Dr. Leonard. This year, I’ve heard discussions about wanting to hold a walkout for sexual assault victims, though I wouldn’t count on it happening.

For every “successful” walkout, there had to have been dozens that fizzled out before the idea could expand into anything useful. Reliance on this form of protest not only has furthered the rift between the students and district authority, it has made it extremely easy for people to align their moral compass without putting in the effort. 

Normally, I would be all for standing up for your beliefs and organizing a peaceful protest, but lots of students use it as an opportunity to get outside and skip class or hang out with friends. And most the time, it turns into a publicity stunt.

After major local publications like the Shawnee Mission Post wrote about the 2020 walkout for teachers, doing another one couldn’t hurt, right? Who knows, anyone could make it on the news by skipping class.

Online media in general has been a catalyst for starting movements and sharing opinions. We’ve all seen it, someone reposting a cute little graphic that has been circulating in the feed of millions on Instagram, one you can see on almost everyone’s story at some point. “No means no,” “the world is on fire” and “not just women get periods” are all watered-down phrases I see posted on every other one of my classmates’ stories.

I don’t disagree with any of those statements, but just stating the facts isn’t doing as much as you may think.

While there’s almost always good intentions in reposting these images, unless it’s reposting information that will bring attention to something — like a missing person — there’s almost never anything accomplished from it besides shoving your opinion down the throats of whoever follows you. Reposting the words “Black Lives Matter” in a cute font with bubbly flowers doesn’t spark any change.

Neither did posting a black square on June 2, 2020 in following everyone else on the internet. Sure, more posts equals more public awareness which could result in possible change, but what do numbers mean when all they accomplish is a bunch of black boxes?

Platforms like Instagram are a breeding ground for accounts that are created for a single event, taking it a step further than just posting about it on your personal account. But dedicating an account to hating a community you’re a part of is a step in the wrong direction.

An account I came across in my follow requests devoted to hating on East is a great example of this — someone thinking that they’re making a difference, but achieving nothing.

Posting one sentence with a black background, making a general comment that is way too vague to apply to one community, seems to be a running theme with not only this account, but with others like it. It also tries to instill a false sense of security by trying to open up their DMs for experiences people want to complain about and blame on East.

Throwing a digital tantrum about the things you don’t like about your school on the internet, on an account that looks like it was made by a seven-year-old, is in no way going to grab anyone’s attention.

If the goal of accounts like this is to create a difference within their community, specifically East in this example, then simply posting sentences like, “can East kids stop using slurs” with no context or argument is not doing anything. If you cared enough about the problem, you would go farther than that to attempt to create change.

Overall, these accounts are simply childish and social media has become an awesome form of doing the bare minimum. 

Almost every form of protest we see at East originates from something on social media, and some go beyond that into the real world. But none ever reach the threshold of change.