> You seem awfully confident about that without any data to back it up,

The Civil Rights movement comes to mind, given that is the sentiment that MLK was trying to promote and set it in motion, which subsequently made the US Intelligence apparatus turn into what it is now, which we are clearly still paying for to this day--and that's regardless of your skin colour.

Granted, this did inevitably have to occur again, a quote from Jefferson about Eternal Vigilance comes to mind, but it did advance the Rights of Black People in the US from systemic segregation and being deemed less than Human as an accepted cultural norm in the US back then to what is an (admittedly) entirely flawed but far more progressive situation Today.

And that could only be done with wide-spread Civil Dis-obedience, physical protests, and things like the March on Washington with MLK's 'I have a Dream' speech that eventually LED to the Million Man March that took place in the 90s as a result of the Civil Rights Movement for Black Americans back then, which clearly has had a much bigger impact on Society than any of the things you've mentioned thus far. You calling it 'Fire' or not is irrelevant to me, I just want to see how your claim has had the positive effects in Society you've mentioned as I'd ACTUALLY like to be proven wrong, and finally believe that Social Media isn't just the (mainly State benefiting) Panopticon I fear it has been since it's inception.

Also, it's worth noting that I'm not a Black History buff nor am I pretending to be one, and to be honest while I think that's something that needs to be addressed in the US I think this current situation encompasses something that far exceeds that issue: I still contend that this situation is mainly about indiscriminate and wanton State/Police violence due to the US having become a Police State since 9/11 and it responding in the only way it knows how to. Trump is a demagogue, but he is merely a symptom of the disease the US has been incredibly afflicted by since 2001.

Corona, Unemployment and the subsequent Economic despair those things have wrought have just magnified it for all to see, but these VERY SAME issues were seen in 2008.

It was just easier to ignore if you weren't directly affected by it, but they were there: in fact the H1N1 pandemic occurred in 2009, which the US was mainly spared from, and had severe consequences in many other places in the World.

> Not that it matters for this at all, but because of social media I have become aware of opportunities to go out and use my skills to observe and film protests and that film has been used as evidence of police brutality that has helped get officers doing brutalizing removed from their posts. I don't want to get more specific than that here, and again it doesn't really matter for the purposes of this.

Ok, see that just re-enforces my initially stated point that it can serve as a repository for video footage of State-sanctioned violence, which has merit, but has very clearly defined limitations:

> Claiming that Social Media's role to be anything but act as a source of the real-time video footage of these events would be really over-reaching its impact...

Using that footage to get involved in your local community's political affairs to justify 'de-fund' the police, and reducing their budget, would be the logical and more productive outcome of that footage.

Because in case you ever wondered what happens to those 'removed' police they often get paid administrative leave in most cases and 'disciplined' only to come back to their positions later on, or if its severe (as in they killed someone) they just get relocated to another precinct as they have some of the most entrenched Unions in the US that lobby for these accommodations--consider the officer charged with killing Floyd had a long History of violent complaints [1] against him prior to that murder. It happened in many cases of fellow activists and even my own where we 'won' our cases against the Police/Sheriffs departments showing them to be unjustifiably belligerent and unfit for their appointed duties/role in Society only to see them be re-appointed.

You have a chance to do more now more than ever I just hope more People decide to really get involved during this very limited opportunity. In fact, it's these critical moments in History that kept me optimistic while we were getting slammed and handcuffed onto the hoods of cop cars, or be illegally detained and interrogated for hours for non-crimes. I guess that's the part of me that just can't hide my disappointment if the bulk of People who can act just choose to speak in echo chambers Online instead of actually getting involved.

1: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/05/us/minneapolis-officers-backg...