Engagements and entanglements in LGBTQ+ hashtag activism: The case of online Pride celebrations in the Philippines
Article
LGBTQ+ pride celebrations in social media are opportunities for collaboration and broader participation. This study interrogates LGBTQ+ activism in X (formerly Twitter) as a functional platform for the LGBTQ+ community to mainstream its advocacy and responses to issues its members face. This research asks the question: How did X users participate in the LGBTQ+ 2021 Pride Celebration using #SulongVaklash? Guided by concepts of hashtag activism and the transnational LGBTQ+ movement, we argue that Pride Month celebrations in online spaces commemorate the event as a transnational protest movement. Findings show that X users utilized #SulongVaklash to join the global call for action to end LGBTQ+ discrimination. Further, the content of the tweets nods to the meaningful local contexts of the online protest, such as the mainstreaming of LGBTQ+ rights advocacy. Online pride protests have also allowed individuals from across the spectrum and social categories to post against discrimination and oppression in solidarity with the LGBTQ+ movement. The study concludes that X has not just become a site for protest through the discursive political appropriation of LGBTQ+ concerns but also a cyber dwelling where LGBTQ+ members recognize the value of their involvement in the fight towards recognition, acceptance, and freedom.
#MassTestingNowPH tweets as acts of citizenship: The rhetorical functions of tweets in pandemic-stricken Philippines
Article
Constrained physical mobility and oppositional action during the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines drove many Filipinos to turn to social media affordances, like Twitter’s hashtags, as sites of free speech, dissent, and collective action. One of which, #MassTestingNowPH, called for the implementation of mass testing for the vulnerable population and objected to Rodrigo Duterte’s militaristic pandemic response. This paper examined how #MassTestingNowPH tweets served as acts of citizenship and exerted their rhetorical functions in the digital space during this global medical crisis.
Using rhetorical political analysis, this research found that #MassTestingNowPH tweets manifested acts of citizenship by asserting citizens’ rights and responsibilities, and exacting government’s accountability in newly-formed ad hoc publics. Users criticized the country’s COVID-19 response and the injustices of VIP testing for some of its officials. These criticisms enabled them to generate collective grievances for medical frontliners and the marginalized. With these sentiments, netizens called on their audiences to act on their judgment and assert their citizenship in online and offline platforms. These tweets, as acts of citizenship, performed three rhetorical functions: forensic, epideictic, and deliberative. This rhetorical process shaped Twitter’s hashtag as an ad hoc public and the meaning of citizenship in our highly-networked world.
