Black lives matter movement was started after George Zimmerman, the man who killed Trayvon Martin, was found not guilty in 2013, three radical Black activists, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi, founded #BlackLivesMatter, a Black-centered political movement-building initiative (Black Lives Matter, 2024).  Technology, particularly social media, played a huge role in this movement by conveying its message to a wide audience.Darren Wilson, a Ferguson police officer, killed Mike Brown in 2014. That same year, over Labour Day weekend, Darnell Moore and Patrisse Cullors organized the Black Life Matters Ride, a nationwide caravan(Black Lives Matter, 2024). 

                                                     (Black Lives Matter, 2024). 

I was an international student at that time and I took part in a local 

demonstration in June 2020 that was 

coordinated via twitter and instagram  platforms 

with the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter. It was so 

important for me bcause I experienced a 

sense of purpose and togetherness as I joined

 thousands of others. I heard remarks from community members and activists who shared their own stories of racial prejudice. This incident made me realize how urgent the movement is and how important it is for everyone to work together to promote racial justice.I was shocked by the powerful pictures and stories that activists posted as I browsed through my Instagram account. I was affected by the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter and was inspired to take up the cause of combating prejudice. 

According to the research (Ince et al., 2017), who conducted a groundbreaking study that looks at how people utilize hashtags to engage with the Black Lives Matter movement.According to their research, a phenomenon known as "distributed framing" occurs when the                    (Rachel Yang , 2020)

 community as a whole shapes how 

the movement is viewed and spoken 

about online.According to the study, 

which examined more than 66,000 

tweets from 2014, #BlackLivesMatter was 

commonly linked to hashtags that expressed solidarity, police brutality, and other campaign strategies.Hashtags like #BlackLivesMatter ,#JusticeForGeorgeFloyd became a way to connect and show support.  I found materials, participated in conversations, and discovered local protests via hashtags.

It is impossible to overestimate the influence of social media on the BLM movement. Social media sites are essential tools for raising awareness and rallying people. According ot the CBS Broadcasting Inc. (2020),Political leaders use controversial framing on social media to influence how the public views social movements like Black Lives Matter. By linking particular acts—whether or not they are truly representative—to larger political groups and their opponents, Trump's tweet serves as an example of how politicians can sway public opinion. By portraying the crisis as a direct result of the opposition's policies, his vocabulary not only dismisses the protesters but also associates them with                                                                                                         his political opponent. 

Social media is a powerful technical tool that can both magnify and perhaps distort the messages of social movements. On the one hand, protesters can broadcast unfiltered, real-time descriptions of their activities on social media sites like Instagram and Twitter, which helps rally supporters and raise awareness. Social media, on the other hand, can also support selective framing, in which targeted material or viral posts highlight tense or disruptive events ( Drakulich and Denver, 2022). As a result, technology simultaneously strengthens movements and exposes them to selective framing and misrepresentation.

                                                    References

  Ince, J., Rojas, F., & Davis, C. A. (2017). The Social Media Response to Black Lives Matter: How Twitter Users Interact with Black Lives Matter through Hashtag Use. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 40(11), 1814–1830. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2017.1334931