By The Gen Z Times Creator and Editor-in-Chief, Catarina Vita
Follow the Gen Z times @thegenztimesorg
Whether you spend hours on end scrolling past your TikTok or would rather stick to your Snapchat story, information always gets to you — but to use it for the better or for worse is up to you. During quarantine, myself and many other politically-engaged members of the Generation Z decided to invest our time and passion in a political account on social media and inform people about what they need to know.
My account is called The Gen Z Times and it has the purpose of amplifying young voices through the art of writing: if you submit your writing to The Gen Z Times, you’ll get published on our website and the world will know about your craft. Besides that, my account has countless infographics of both known and disregarded world issues and are written in a concise, clear manner.
Making an activism account, however, is not as easy as it seems: it involves planning, commitment and, most of all, learning. There are certain lessons one can only learn on their own while making an activism account; nonetheless, here are some lessons I learned and will never forget.
Plan. Before launching my account and the website, I sat down, gathered my ideas, and jotted them all down in my Notes app. Even though these messy notes later turned into a Google document, writing down all your thoughts organizes your mind and, most importantly, calms it. Activism is a very sensitive subject, and if you’re impulsive like me, you need to think before you post.
As stated before, there are various different activism accounts, so growing is sometimes difficult. To attract people into your account, you have to have a “differential factor”: what makes your account different from others? Will this attract people into your account?
What I wish I did from the beginning of my account, however, is an organized plan from the start. Although it is likely that this plan would change, an organized plan is an organized mind, and an organized mind is an organized project. Before starting your activism account, I would compile all my ideas into a compartmentalized document or spreadsheet with all the information you need.
Promote, promote, promote! Your activism account may have one admin or a team of thirty people, but your account would be nothing without that follow, like, share, or save. Therefore, I knew that I needed to talk to people to make my account succeed. Before I launched my account or my website, I started reaching out to people I know to promote my account and to start writing for my website. In my first edition, I had over 10 pieces of writing, which already attracted people into my account. Please do not hesitate in reaching out to bigger activism accounts to promote yours! This is something that happens often in the activism community.
Keep in mind, though, that the purpose of your activism account is for the good, so please only promote your work and ask others to promote your work if you truly believe in it.
Manage your time! Your activism account grows with consistent posts. If you develop a calendar with when and what to post in whichever days of the week, your feed will be more organized and will attract more people into your account. Since my infographics often take a long time to complete, I like making infographics ahead of time and posting them on the day of the week I determined.
When your account has a dual purpose like mine — to amplify other voices of the Generation Z as well as inform others with infographics — try to balance these two purposes in your feed. Accept constructive criticism. To have people talk about your account, whether it is in a good or bad way, is a blessing. However, if your account gains a bad reputation, choose to listen to criticism instead of shutting it out. Keep in mind that the people that are criticizing you are often your target audience, and they would be more pleased with your account if it changed. Know how to distinguish constructive criticism from jealousy, though: if your criticism is entirely based on people hating your account and not proposing changes, please don’t listen to them and seek advice from experienced people, even in other activism accounts.
Politics being a part of your life (and connecting it to social media) is no easy road to take, but I wouldn’t change this for anything. The Gen Z Times taught me skills in marketing, research, and design that I wouldn’t learn anywhere else, besides giving me a platform to speak up about some issues that are not talked about in mainstream media. The activism community is definitely one of the most encouraging and supportive communities there are; if you are thinking of joining us, please be assured you’ll get all of the support you want and need. We won’t change the world, we already did.
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