Blockout 2024 (stylized as the hashtag #Blockout2024), variously referred to as Operation Blockout or Celebrity Block Party, [1] is an online movement to block the social media accounts of celebrities and organizations, related to their silence over or support toward Israel in the war in Gaza.
The Blockout movement started through posts on Tiktok after the Met Gala on May 6, 2024. [2] The exclusive $75,000 per ticket fashion event attended by influential celebrities drew comparisons to the class disparity of The Hunger Games , [3] with USA Today columnist Nicole Russell calling it "a tone-deaf charade of excess and hypocrisy." [4] A post by influencer Haley Kalil (known as @haleyybaylee on social media) became widely viewed showed her saying "Let them eat cake" in the style of Marie Antoinette. [5] [1] [6] [7] After recent university campus war protests, [8] the ongoing Rafah offensive, and protesters outside of the Met Museum, [9] [10] [11] this contrast [12] became the subject of online posts and activism. [1] [13] The release of the song "Hind's Hall" by Macklemore on the same day as the Met Gala was notable, with the lyrics referring to: "The music industry's quiet, complicit in their platform of silence." [14]
Shortly after the event, a TikTok account @BlockOut2024 posted a video encouraging users to block celebrities at the Met Gala and others on social media [15] [16] while others have attributed the start of the effort to the account @ladyfromtheoutside. [17] [18] This resulted in the hashtags #blockout2024 and #celebrityblocklist starting to trend, alongside #AllEyesOnRafah. [19] [20] Because of the reference to Antoinette, the activism has also been referred to as a "digitine" or digital guillotine. [21] [22] [23]
Among the celebrities targeted in the movement include Gal Gadot, [24] Selena Gomez, Drake, Justin Bieber, [25] Hailey Bieber, Beyoncé, [26] Cardi B, Nicki Minaj, Zendaya, [27] Kim Kardashian, Harry Styles, Jojo Siwa, Ellen DeGeneres, Kevin Hart, Dwayne Johnson, Shakira, Kylie Jenner and Taylor Swift. [15] Various accounts dedicated to the movement have been created on social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, which compile lists of celebrities and link their accounts for activists to block. [28]
Some of those originally targeted in the block have since posted videos encouraging donations to Gaza support and relief efforts, including Lizzo and Chris Olsen. [25]
The campaign has also given rise to country-specific lists, such as ones in Malaysia. [29]
The Met Gala, formally called the Costume Institute Benefit, is the annual haute couture fundraising festival held for the benefit of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute in Manhattan. The Met Gala is popularly regarded as the world's most prestigious and glamorous fashion event. Fashion stars and models are able to express themselves by their fit according to the theme and social gathering and is known as "fashion's biggest night"; an invitation is highly sought after. Personalities who are perceived to be culturally relevant to contemporary society amongst various professional spheres, including fashion, film, television, music, theater, business, sports, social media, and politics, are invited to attend the Met Gala, organized by the fashion magazine Vogue. The entry price for one ticket has risen to US$75,000 in 2024, an increase from $50,000 in 2023, to attend the annual gala in the world's principal financial center and fashion capital, New York City.
Hashtag activism refers to the use of Twitter's hashtags for Internet activism. The hashtag has become one of the many ways that social media contributes to civic engagement and social movements. The use of the hashtag on social media provides users with an opportunity to share information and opinions about social issues in a way that others (followers) can interact and engage as part of a larger conversation with the potential to create change. The hashtag itself consists of a word or phrase that is connected to a social or political issue, and fosters a place where discourse can occur. Social media provides an important platform for historically marginalized populations. Through the use of hashtags these groups are able to communicate, mobilize, and advocate for issues less visible to the mainstream.
ByteDance Ltd. is a Chinese internet technology company headquartered in Haidian, Beijing and incorporated in the Cayman Islands.
TikTok, whose mainland Chinese counterpart is Douyin, is a short-form video hosting service owned by Chinese internet company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from three seconds to 60 minutes. It can be accessed with a smart phone app.
Celebrity influence in politics, also referred to as "celebrity politics," or "political star power," is the act of a prominent person using their fame as a platform to influence others on political issues or ideology. According to Anthony Elliott, celebrity is a central structuring point in self and social identification, per-forming as it does an increasingly important role in self-framings, self-imaginings, self-revisions and self-reflection. The influential people considered celebrities can be anyone with a major following such as professional athletes, actors/actresses, television personalities or musicians. Celebrities have two kinds of specific power: the abilities to shed light on issues and to persuade audiences. Social media is one of the most common areas for celebrities to discuss specific issues or current events that are being politicized; the individuals may also speak out in public forums such as television talk shows, events, or during their own widely attended performances. In the United States, most celebrities tend to hold liberal political beliefs, for reasons that are debated by social psychologists.
Haley Kalil is a former American model and current social media personality. In 2018, Kalil was featured in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue as a contestant in the first ever Sports Illustrated Swim Search. As one of the two winners of the competition, alongside Camille Kostek, she officially appeared in the 2019 edition as a rookie.
Charli Grace D'Amelio is an American social media personality. She was a competitive dancer for over a decade before starting her social media career in 2019, when she began posting dance videos on the video-sharing platform TikTok. She quickly amassed a large following and subsequently became the most-followed creator on the platform in March 2020 until she was surpassed by Khaby Lame in June 2022. With over 151 million followers, she is the second most-followed person on TikTok, as of 2024.
Triller is an American video-sharing social networking service. The service allows users to create and share short-form videos, including videos set to, or automatically synchronized to music using artificial intelligence technology. Triller was released for iOS and Android in 2015, and initially operated as a video editing app before adding social networking features.
Many countries have imposed past or ongoing restrictions on the video sharing social network TikTok. Bans from government devices usually stem from national security concerns over potential access of data by the Chinese government. Other bans have cited children's well-being and offensive content such as pornography.
There is evidence that TikTok has down-weighted the posts of topics deemed sensitive by the Chinese government and Chinese Communist Party. Topics alleged to have been censored by the platform include the Persecution of Uyghurs in China, the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, the Sino-Indian border dispute, foreign political leaders, LGBTQ+ people, disabled people, and people of African descent. TikTok has also removed or omitted information from its services to comply with company policies, legal demands, and government censorship laws. A 2024 report found significant disparity between Tiktok and Instagram in relation to the ratio of hashtags on topics deemed sensitve to the Chinese government's interests. TikTok's responses to claims of censorship have varied, responding that the platform was attempting to protect users from bullying, arguing that certain instances were the result of human error, and stating that such incidents were the result of algorithmic mistakes.
In 2020, the United States government announced that it was considering banning the Chinese social media platform TikTok upon a request from then-president Donald Trump, who viewed the app as a national security threat. The result was that TikTok owner ByteDance—which initially planned on selling a small portion of TikTok to an American company—agreed to divest TikTok to prevent a ban in the United States and in other countries where restrictions are also being considered due to privacy concerns, which themselves are mostly related to its ownership by a firm based in China.
Filters are digital image effects often used on social media. They initially simulated the effects of camera filters, and they have since developed with facial recognition technology and computer-generated augmented reality. Social media filters—especially beauty filters—are often used to alter the appearance of selfies taken on smartphones or other similar devices. While filters are commonly associated with beauty enhancement and feature alterations, there is a wide range of filters that have different functions. From adjusting photo tones to using face animations and interactive elements, users have access to a range of tools. These filters allow users to enhance photos and allow room for creative expression and fun interactions with digital content.
In April 2024, US president Joe Biden signed into law the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which is an effective ban or forced sale of TikTok from its parent company ByteDance. The video-sharing platform had sparked concerns over potential user data collection and influence operations by the Chinese government. Previous efforts by the Trump administration to ban the app or force its sale were stopped by the courts and the Biden administration.
The 2023 Israel–Hamas war has been extensively covered by media outlets around the world. This coverage has been diverse, spanning from traditional news outlets to social media platforms, and comprises a wide variety of perspectives and narratives.
In the early 21st century, antisemitism was identified in social media platforms with up to 69 percent of Jews in the US having encountered antisemitism online according to the 2022 report released by "The State of Antisemitism in America". Jews have encountered antisemitism either as targets themselves or by being exposed to antisemitic content on their media page.
Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion is the 2024 high fashion art exhibition of the Anna Wintour Costume Center, a wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MMA) which houses the collection of the Costume Institute. The exhibition was announced on November 8, 2023. The exhibition is held at the museum from May 10 to September 2, 2024. It featured approximately 250 items from the permanent collection of the Costume Institute that were displayed using AI and CGI with themes of sea, land, and sky as a metaphor for the fragility and ephemerality of fashion and a vehicle to examine the cyclical themes of rebirth and renewal.
The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (PAFACA) is an act of Congress that was signed into law on April 24, 2024, as part of the National Security Act, 2024. It would ban social networking apps within 270 to 360 days if they are determined by the president of the United States and relevant provisions to be a "foreign adversary controlled application". The act explicitly applies to Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd. and its subsidiaries—including TikTok—without the need for additional determination. It ceases to be applicable if an app is sold and no longer considered by the president to be controlled by a foreign adversary of the United States.
All Eyes on Rafah is a phrase that became popular on social media in May 2024, especially Instagram. The phrase comes from Richard Peppercorn, the World Health Organization's representative for Gaza and the West Bank, who used the phrase in February 2024 in reference to the Israel–Hamas war.