Social Media has grown substantially in the past few years. Facebook now has over 1 billion users. Many people have over 1,000 connections on Facebook. Twitter is rapidly increasing its user base; celebrities, politicians, and even the pope himself are using Twitter to get their message out. All around the globe, Social Media is being used to connect with childhood friends, reunite adoptive children with parents, and more importantly, get your message out.
Through social media, we now have the ability to make a global impact. You have the ability to raise awareness and communicate with fellow advocates. The ultimate question, then, is how do you use social media? Have you been to the Shared Hope International Facebook page or twitter feed? Have you ever engaged with the things that we post?
This is not a guilt-trip on my part, forcing you to engage on social media. I truly believe that social media networks have the power to connect and inform. Let me share a story to illustrate that. Some time ago, the Oregon House of Representatives nearly passed a very tough bill, which would have taken a huge step backwards when it comes to fighting human trafficking. If this bill were passed, minors who are trafficked wouldn’t have been as protected as they should be. Through social media, however, a change was made. In a little over a week, we had thousands of people from all over the world fighting for this dangerous bill to be changed before it got passed. Social media got the word out. Through social media, we made a local issue a global issue.
And to my surprise at the time, all of the fighting paid off. Because so many activists took action over social media and other media outlets, I watched the miraculous happen as Senator Floyd Prozanski stood up and made a movement to take the bill back to committee so it could be re-amended, making it a felony on the first offense to purchase sex from minors. Now, this bill has been passed, and as soon as it was signed, it was a felony to purchase sex from a minor in Oregon. Through social media, activists from all over the globe made a difference. More importantly, every one of us were connected to the cause. A miraculous act was performed because of social media activism and communication.
So I want to challenge you. Take action and learn the power of engaging on social media. We, at Shared Hope, strongly believe in communication, and social media is one of our many ways of doing that on a daily basis. So, I encourage you to go engage. Comment on our posts. Reply to our tweets. Share our posts. Join the conversation. Get the word out, and make a difference in the world. Together, we can change our culture.
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/sharedhopeinternational
Twitter Page: https://twitter.com/sharedhope
Defenders Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/defendersusa
Defenders Twitter: https://twitter.com/thedefendersusa
