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Black Women the Most Powerful or Exploited Group on Twitter


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Luvvie Ajay has a new book coming out in September, it should be pretty successful, as Ajay is a very popular blogger.  I was searching youtube for a good video of her for her webpage.  I found a really good video to use, but I also found the video below where Luvvie describes the "power" Black women have on Twitter.

I hear about the power Black women supposedly have on Twitter all the time.  The reality is that this so called power is a myth, because power comes from ownership, and Black women don't own Twitter.  

In fact, if Black women are truly the dominant users of Twitter; then they are being exploited because they are not being paid anything in exchange for the wealth the create for Twitter Inc.  

 

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I'm always intrigued by the "power" that people have. This power creates opportunities for the individual and this is good for that person who has the ability to parlay the traffic and interest they have in their brand. It's definitely a market owned and dominated by Black women. This market is what created the hair care products like Cara B and Miss Jessie so Troy they are really powerful. Curly Nikki was able to parlay her social media presence into a best selling book and multiple opportunities for sponsorships. I don't think ownership of Twitter is the power play. I get that you are saying they aren't powerful, but I don't agree. Black women actually grow their presence online like no other group in the country. That makes them amazing and powerful. Now if they were able to launch their own Twitter I actually think they could build it, but like many issues with us, we simply don't place the creation of the technology in the forefront. But Black women are definitely powerful.

 

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Power is also about influence, and influence doesn't have to involve ownership.  Power can be taking advantage of what is offered for public consumption and using it for your own purposes. There is power in numbers and owners are only as powerful as users and consumers make them, which is why  invoking a boycott can be a form of power.  Power is more than just a word; it's a dynamic.  And of course in comes in degrees IMO

Leslie Jones, is a SNL member who recently made her debut in the female re-make of "Ghost Busters".  She also appears in a commercial for AllState, and is a former stand-up comedienne, whose alter ego was a loud, overbearing  black woman which is also the type she usually plays on SNL  The fact that she is tall, dark and husky, wears her hair in a spiky natural and is given to threatening scowls, has offended a certain segment of black women who don't like what they consider her stereotypical way of representing them.  Anyway, after "Ghost Busters" came out, she was blitzed with a barrage of hateful racist insults via social media "courtesy" of white movie goers, which she admits hurt and demoralized her. When she took to twitter and answered her critics, a certain amount of power accrued to her and she was suddenly popping up on TV shows, stating her case to sympathetic hosts.  No, she probably didn't defuse the hate but she took proud ownership of who and what she is and cashed in on a popular outlet to squash her detractors, earning widespread results in the process. 

In the old days, people used to stand on platforms to vent their grievances and sell their wares.  They may not have owned the platforms but they made good use of them.  

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Excellent responses!

 

Exploiting Twitter to reach an audience is fine; owning Twitter is power.  

Why don't Black women start a new platform?  They could reap the financial rewards of their efforts, create jobs for other Black people, and help promote the business of even more Black Entrepreneurs.  Of course this has not happened, because Black women do not have the power to do this.  They are only as powerful as the owners of Twitter allow them to be.  Do you see the distinction I'm making?

You see, Black women serve because of the largess of Twitter.  Twitter could pull the plug on them tomorrow, but since Twitter Inc. is making so much money on the free labor Black women provide, there is no incentive for Twitter to do it; at least not today.  

There is also no incentive for Twitter to even hire a significant number of Black women.  The company's employees are overwhelmingly white men--especially at the upper levels.  But I'm sure no one is surprised by this...  

White men benefiting from the free labor of Black women, is this what "power" looks like to you?

Also lets not confuse the popularity or success of a few Black women with power.  In fact in video above Issa Rae, an internet sensation in her own right, asks if brands are aware of the force Black woman are, and Luvvie replies, "I hope they are."  The answer should be obvious.  They don't know because their names are not on the checks those brands are writing.  

I have my own opinion about Leslie Jones, but that is definitely worth a separate conversation.

 

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It's really about trade-offs.  Twitter profits from black traffic, but black posters are provided a forum that is free.  It costs them nothing, while providing them with a vast audience for their views and promotions. All they're spending is their time.

But, yes, it would be great if black women could create their own social media brand which would create jobs for other blacks..    

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Well @Pioneer1, that is actually the way I feel about the subject, but I need to hear the arguments, 

To me Black women claiming power because they use Twitter a lot is analogous to the slave who gets to work in the big house.  They defend the master and his property as if it was their own, because they derive some marginal benefits not afforded to the field Negroes.

Can you image white women running around proclaiming the "power" they have as a result of using a Black owned social media platform?

@Cynique, the tradeoff you've described is not "free." Time has value that is why Jack Dorsey is a billionaire and many of the users of Twitter are struggling to pay their cell phone bill.  

The time you spend here is valuable to AALBC.com.  That value serves readers and authors in more ways than you know, and certainly in more way that Twitter ever will.  

If everyone reading and posting on these discussion forums stopped today. AALBC.com would be hurt and my ability to promote Black books and culture would be diminished.  If all of these people then choose to spend their time on Twitter, then Twitter is enriched.  But in return for using Twitter we would get more of the stuff that makes Twitter successfull like the sharing of Leslie Jones gorilla jokes... and Black culture is marginalized even further.

The reality is that the so called power Black women are exerting on Twitter comes at the expense of the time they could be spending on and uplifting Black owned sites.  Do you see what I mean?

In fact, from a technology perspective, this forum provides more functionality than Twitter.  Leslie can post her pictures and videos here from her smart phone. Plus she would not have to worry about trolls because I ban them; and she would be directly supporting AALBC.com and Black authors.

So while everybody begs people to follow them on Twitter; I have to help people understand why linking to AALBC.com is helpful, and in their own self interest.

 

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I get what you're saying and while on the surface it seems simple that because they don't own it they don't have "real" power; you forget that the moment Black women remove their voice from Twitter it becomes an almost all white platform with the reach to 100 million people. 

I've always said that empowerment happens on many branches and it has to happen where we are and where we aren't. Some people march, some people raise their kids, these are both acts of empowerment of the group. Black women on Twitter bring balance, or attempt to, when other voices are speaking against Blacks. Now the obvious argument is that you don't have to bring balance if you aren't there in the first place because you wouldn't even know about the things that happen... but isn't that a bit naive and simple?

If Black women build their own Black twitter and it becomes haven where Blacks debate and discuss issues, it becomes like this message board. Like minded people share and build and more than likely those people are already conscious and they still don't reach the people who aren't interested. Does it empower them? Yes. Does it create the opportunity to expand and reach other cultures? Probably, but the idea that they aren't powerful because they don't own the platform is almost laughable. By this analysis no one will ever be powerful because no one is really self sufficient. We all work in the constructs of society. 

Troy AALBC exists because some hosting service grants you space. You own it, but you aren't powerful by your own definition because at any time that hosting service can get rid of you. Now if you owned your fiber optics and ran Cat5 wires for Ethernet and bought your server you will still be buying data from somewhere. There is always someone above you.

I get what you both are saying, but Issa and Awesome both have reached more people than they would have every been able to reach in their lives. That's powerful. Is it ownership? It is. Do I like the fact that we have to use other platforms to raise awareness about what we do?

No. I hate it. It sucks and it is frustrating, but in order to establish something you have to be where the people are because the people simply aren't educated enough to be where they can do the most good. I built an entire video series on what this topic is basically about.

 

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I don't think Black women need to be on Twitter--especially if there was a Black owned alternative.  

Just because the platform is Black owned does not mean that everyone will agree with each other.  There are people who have posted here that I disagree with to such an extent that I don't even try to engage them.  Man, I even disagree with you from time to time. 

You think Luvve and Black women bring balance to Twitter?  All I've ever seen on Twitter is Black women talking about how powerful they are as a result of being on the platform. I've never seen the statement challenged.  

In fact I posted a link to this conversation, on Twitter and tagged everyone on the video.  I rarely do things like that, but I wanted to hear directly from these ladies. 

This tweet got zero engagement (1 like, after two days). It is rare for me to create a tweet that gets this little engagement. Twitter like most of social media creates filter bubbles such that folks only deal with, or only see, the stuff that meshes with the world view.  Opposing views are easily ignored.  

You all have raised great points to counter my argument--this level of debate is impossible on Twitter.

Chris no one is completely independent, and no one truly owns anything.  Lets not get extreme; you know what I mean when I talk about business ownership. So I won't go down that rabbit hole.

The idea that Luvve or Isa would not have been able to reach the same audiences without Twitter is something we can never know.  The fact of the matter is that people reached large audiences long before Twitter or social media was even invented, it was just done differently.

The biggest difference is the we actually owned more of the platform that we used to reach each other, more magazines, newspapers, radio and TV stations.  We even had more websites with a far greater reach. Remember BlackPlanet?

Now Luvvie and the others are really just getting started, they may turn out to be very powerful women.  I just don't think is is possible for them to wield any real power as a result of using Twitter, all they can do is make more money for Twitter.

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LOL! touche... I do get what you're saying but playing devil's advocate creates a good discussion. No one will take the time to create a Black social network because no one is in the slightest interested in working that hard to educate the consumer. That really is the bottom line.

Now, in regard to the lack of interaction with your post, I've learned that people who are in "power" positions never respond to those who could potentially pull away from their audience. Your ability to move people to your platform is a threat to them because they honestly don't realize their real power is in building up platforms that aren't a part of the machine.

I've noticed people like the women in the video and men in comparable positions try at all cost to keep the lid on anyone who might be better at what they do (Know what I mean?) I've experienced this myself. It's a frustrating thing to deal with.

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"... their real power is in building up platforms that aren't a part of the machine."

True dat.

You know I have a good buddy who I have conversations with like this every so often.  During the last conversation he said, "If I agreed with you I'd be out of a job."  He is a social media manager for a not-for-profit.

 

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