The age of arm-chair activism has arrived and is flourishing. That is especially true; it seems, in the USA. The evidence of this is quite clearly visible by the innumerable blogs that are devoted in their opposition to the war and the current President of the USA – George W. There are also, literally, thousands of online petitions doing the rounds asking for everything from impeachment of the President the Vice-President to pullout from Iraq, immigration and amnesty, the Jena 6 incident etc.

However the thing that stood out, for me at least, was the sudden explosion of pictures on flickr asking for a “Free Burma”. There is a feature on flickr which allows you to browse through the 500 most interesting pictures [link] of the week as determined by the flickr algorithm. I was browsing through and was astonished to see that every second picture was related to the Burma situation. There were pictures of red t-shirts, bed sheets, caps, carpets, paint – almost anything red with a caption saying ‘Free Burma”. I was amazed! The pictures were from all across the world.

So the question is what are those pictures supposed to do? Are they supposed to appeal to the Burmese junta on an emotional level? Are they supposed to put pressure on their own government to act on behalf of the helpless Burmese? Are they supposed to show solidarity with the Burmese people, a majority of whom don’t even have access to the internet to be able to view those pictures? What exactly is the purpose of those pictures?

I don’t know. But I certainly feel that these pictures are a way to satisfy ones own moral obligation and think and feel proud about you thinking you did something. In actuality, they do nothing. Nothing at all. Nothing will change by posting those pictures online. This situation and this descent into arm-chair activism really bugs me. It is just fulfilling your own feelings and making yourself feel that you care and you did something about it. I bet, not more than 1% of those people cared to write to their elected representatives or donated money to NGOs who might be involved and might, just might, be able to do something about it. But that is too much work. Taking a picture of a red t-shrit and posting it online is much easier. Yes, maybe, chances are that writing to your representatives or donating or organizing a physical rally in front of the Chinese consulate or to the City Hall too, might not ensure that anything will be done about it. But at the very least, that gets more attention in the media and to people that matter who can do something about it. Compared to what these pictures are supposed to do, surely a physical rally/march would certainly do more, don’t you think?

That leads to a larger debate. It has become very easy for everyone to post and rant online about their disgust with anything and everything. Gone are the days when there were huge rallies and marches against the war in Vietnam. Now we are just too busy to be bothered about all this. Do we see those marches and rallies against the war in Iraq right now? Certainly people are not any less disgusted with the war as they were in the past, but the way of protest certainly has changed. Would it have any greater effect if people actually tried to do something about it rather than just posting on their blogs. Would anti-war rallies help. I most certainly think so. A recent example was the Jena 6 march. Yes, people had been writing about the Jena incident on their blogs and forums ever since that incident, but what really got the attention of people was when these people decided to converge on the small town and hold a rally in support of the black student who is behind bars.

That could definitely be replicated on the macro level with this war or the Burma situation, but no, that is too much work. We are all living our busy contented lives. It is just much easier to satisfy our own selfish moral urge by posting a thread on a forum or make your case on the blog or take ridiculous pictures and post them to flickr. That makes you feel better. That makes you feel like you did something. That makes you feel like you contributed. Makes you feel compassionate and considerate. In reality, it does nothing, except satisfy your hollow moral responsibility.

As I said, the age of arm-chair activism is alive and well!