#Hashtag

On April 12th, 2015 Freddie Gray was violently and wrongly killed by six officers. Another black man killed by an officer in an already uneasy time in the world. Just like the other incidents, this brought along protest and many angry people. The majority of the protesters were African American but many white folks wanted to stand against this police brutality as well. In a new age where social media has taken over the world many people, especially on twitter were talking about this incident. One of the things people love about social media are hashtags. Hashtags are usually placed at the end of a tweet, and it refers to what your tweet is about. For example one might tweet "its crazy out here #Baltimoreriots". The first hashtag to emerge was #freddygray. Then onto #baltimoreriots, #baltimoreuprising, #breakthecurfew, and #baltimorelunch. The most popular hashtag at first was #baltimoreriots, but it shifted to #baltimoreuprising as an effort to focus on the positive and rebuilding the city instead of the negative. As more and more people used the hashtags the trend was set and soon everyone was talking about it. It caught on like a wildfire and the buzz was insane. Everyone had something to say about the issue and it really showed us how powerful hashtags can be. All these hashtags taught us that in writing, it doesn't always have to be some really long article or book that can provide info to us, sometimes just a simple two word phrase can impact the whole world.