‘Start today’ to make an impact, Iowa State student activist says
| Ames Tribune
Anti-racism has been Marie Beecham’s passion for her entire life. “It’s just that nobody ever wanted to listen,” she said.
That changed in late May when Black Lives Matter protests spread nationwide after the police killing of George Floyd. As thousands of Americans took to the streets, Instagram — an app generally known for selfies and picturesque brunches — filled with nonprofit donation links and black squares. By June 2, when Beecham posted a graphic called “How To Ally” to her Instagram account @mariebeech, the usually apolitical app was primed for anti-racist content.
But Beecham did not expect the post to go viral with over 260,000 “likes.” Instead, the educational slideshow, which includes instructions on how to “act with urgency” and “talk about racism with other white people,” was deeply personal.
“I just started writing down my thoughts about what I wanted the people in my life to hear,” Beecham said. “(The response) was both frustrating and validating because I was only repeating the same things I have said my whole life.”
Since June, Beecham has devoted her online platform to racial justice — all while studying business at Iowa State University and working at a local youth shelter. The 20-year-old’s follower count is more than four times larger than Ames’ population.
Some posts provide statistics and historical context explaining how racism is embedded in the criminal justice system and health care. Others give practical advice like “How To Respond When You’re Corrected For Saying Something Racist” (“Shift your thinking: they aren’t fighting me, they’re helping me fight racism,” Beecham wrote.) or answer questions like “Should we say Black (or) African American?” (African-American is a correct term, not the correct term).
Beecham’s goal is to make daunting concepts accessible. Her language is conversational, and her graphics favor large fonts and high-contrast color schemes.
“I want to reach everybody, no matter where they’re at,” she said.
This strategic approach has always motivated Beecham’s online activism, even when she did not explicitly promote herself as an anti-racist educator. Her Instagram account was originally called @wastefreemarie, where she started posting about how to live a more eco-friendly life in June of 2019.
Her interest in environmentalism spurred from learning about how climate change disproportionately impacts communities of color. Racist housing policies have caused formerly redlined neighborhoods to be hotter in summer than predominantly white areas, a study published in January found. And hazardous waste facilities are more likely to be built where poor people and people of color live, according to research published in 2015.
But when Beecham talked to people in her life about environmental racism, they weren’t receptive. Rather, they were interested in Beecham’s tips on cutting out plastic, reducing meat intake and buying secondhand clothing.
“I saw talking about low-waste living as a means to help (people of color) in a way that a lot of people are excited about,” Beecham said.
Now, when Beecham posts about environmental racism, people listen. Her recent infographic on the subject has nearly 50,000 “likes.”
The variety of content that flourishes on Instagram has expanded since last year. A flurry of new accounts, like Beecham’s, that post “social justice slideshows” have racked up millions of followers this summer. While the Black Lives Matter movement started with a Twitter hashtag in 2013, now people can as easily go to Instagram to learn about critical race theory or the school-to-prison pipeline. Civil rights groups like the NAACP have used Instagram as an organizing space for years, but have seen record engagement this summer.
While some may dismiss online activism as “slacktivism,” the most widespread U.S. social movements of the last decade — Black Lives Matter and Me Too — started as hashtags. Facebook and Twitter were key to the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings. Occupy Wall Street and Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement also benefited from online information dissemination.
According to a 2015 study, even social media users who only “like” or share posts casually are key to collective action because they are still helping to spread protest messages.
“Even if you have a small minority of highly committed people, you still need their message to reverberate in society,” study author Sandra González-Bailón told The Chronicle of Higher Education. “Slacktivism is a way of allowing the wave to expand. I would never claim that it’s enough, but it’s an important part of the chain.”
Still, just as rapidly as Beecham’s online following amassed, she worries about holding people’s attention.
“Right now, voicing support for Black people is popular,” she wrote in an August post. “But what about when this moment passes? I’m afraid to find out.”
According to the Pew Research Center, support for the Black Lives Matter movement has diminished since June, remaining strong among Black Americans. Still, over half (55%) of U.S. adults support the movement, up from 43% in 2016. And a New York Times analysis shows that this summer’s demonstrations mark the largest social movement in American history, estimating that 15 million to 26 million people participated.
Beecham says she is dedicated to anti-racist work because she doesn’t want other little girls to experience what she went through growing up — being underestimated, being racially profiled, being harassed.
“It’s incredibly taxing to be the only Black person in your peers’ lives, to be the only Black student in your teachers’ lives, because subtle racism largely goes unchecked when you’re in a community that’s almost exclusively white people,” she said of her predominantly white Iowa town. “As a child, the burden fell on my shoulders to educate everyone around me.”
People from her hometown have reached out to congratulate her during the months that her account has grown.
“To a lot of them, I don’t know whether to thank them or ask for an apology, because they’re the reason why I’m so eloquent at speaking up against racism,” Beecham said.
Whatever direction public opinion takes, Beecham remains focused on encouraging her followers to take action — to be willing to speak up “when their social status is on the line, or their friendship status is on the line, or their job status is on the line — where they actually have to sacrifice something in order to get closer to justice.”
“You don’t need a PhD or Instagram followers to make an impact,” Beecham wrote in a post earlier this month. “Start with your sphere of influence, and start today.”
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