Slacktivism: For Idiots and Those Unable to Cope with Their Lack of Drive to Help

For those people who have a profile picture of a cartoon character in response to either some form of solidarity against child abuse or believe they are doing something to help stop child abuse, please stop. The term slacktivism was coined a while ago and this is another classic example of slacktivism. Remember what color your bra is? Where your purse is? (Which was then followed by 6 guys telling the woman they would partake in a certain activity there with her in the comment section.)

This is not activism. It's a person not liking something (such as child abuse for December) and instead of doing the slightest thing about it, they passively think they are contributing to anything resembling positive actions. It's like the person who bought a pink ribbon bumper sticker for breast cancer, but never gave a penny to any fund, never ran any fundraised race, or never did any outreach for those affected by it. I believe the person who accidentally bought a bag of the Susan G. Komen labeled coffee beans has contributed far more than people have with his ten cents going to some fund from the pound of coffee.

Which leads us to what to do for support of abused children. What can you do? As previously noted, changing your profile picture to a cartoon does not help. It means you're lazy, so that doesn't count. Try something along the lines of volunteering at a youth group for children that have been abused. If you want to get even more involved, try something along the lines of volunteer at a non-profit that works with families. Want to get even crazier and become even more involved? Maybe help setup an after school program for abused children or children at risk at a local school.

Yes these are hard options. They require you to do something. They require you to spend money. They require you to put a face and personality to a problem as opposed to a quirky Facebook status. But keep in mind, people who actually do these things, like raise money, work in these non-profits, volunteer. These are the people who are activists and make change and the people who think a profile picture changes something, it only changes the opinion of the people who are trying to do something about their fellow lazy citizens.