Divergent discourse between protests and counter-protests: #BlackLivesMatter and #AllLivesMatter

• DOI: 10.31235/osf.io/t426r
• Publication Date: 2018-07-02T10:56:10Z
• Authors: Ryan J. Gallagher; Andrew J. Reagan; Christopher M. Da...; Peter Sheridan Dodds
• Keywords: FOS: Computer and information sciences; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Collective Behavior and Social Movements; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Politics and Social Change; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication|Social Media; Social and Behavioral Sciences; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication|Social Influence and Political Communication; Computer Science - Computers and Society; Law Enforcement; 0508 media and communications; 0302 clinical medicine; Sociology; 5. Gender equality; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Linguistics; Computer Science - Computation and Language; Communication; Q; 05 social sciences; R; Computer Science - Social and Information Networks; Peace, War, and Social Conflict; 16. Peace & justice; Dissent and Disputes; Police; FOS: Sociology; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Linguistics|Computational Linguistics; Computational Linguistics; Medicine; Medicine and Health; Human Ecology; Computation and Language (cs.CL); Research Article; Human Rights; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Linguistics; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Human Rights; Science; Political Economy of the World System; Altruism, Morality, and Social Solidarity; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology; 03 medical and health sciences; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Altruism, Morality, and Social Solidarity; Computers and Society (cs.CY); Collective Behavior and Social Movements; Humans; Social and Information Networks (cs.SI); SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Peace, War, and Social Conflict; Linguistics; Health and Well-Being; Social Influence and Political Communication; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication|Social Media; Black or African American; bepress|Social and Behavioral Sciences; FOS: Languages and literature; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Linguistics|Computational Linguistics; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Sociology|Political Economy of the World System; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences; Social Media; SocArXiv|Social and Behavioral Sciences|Communication|Social Influence and Political Communication

Since the shooting of Black teenager Michael Brown by White police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, the protest hashtag #BlackLivesMatter has amplified critiques of extrajudicial killings of Black Americans. In response to #BlackLivesMatter, other Twitter users have adopted #AllLivesMatter, a counter-protest hashtag whose content argues that equal attention should be given to all lives regardless of race. Through a multi-level analysis of over 860,000 tweets, we study how these protests and counter-protests diverge by quantifying aspects of their discourse. We find that #AllLivesMatter facilitates opposition between #BlackLivesMatter and hashtags such as #PoliceLivesMatter and #BlueLivesMatter in such a way that historically echoes the tension between Black protesters and law enforcement. In addition, we show that a significant portion of #AllLivesMatter use stems from hijacking by #BlackLivesMatter advocates. Beyond simply injecting #AllLivesMatter with #BlackLivesMatter content, these hijackers use the hashtag to directly confront the counter-protest notion of "All lives matter." Our findings suggest that Black Lives Matter movement was able to grow, exhibit diverse conversations, and avoid derailment on social media by making discussion of counter-protest opinions a central topic of #AllLivesMatter, rather than the movement itself.