Overflowing Hashtags on Twitter: K-Pop Digital Protests within the Context of the 2021 National Strike in Colombia

Abstract

This study presents the results from an exploratory and empirical study about digital protests regarding K-pop held in Colombia during the 2021 national strike. A mixed-method approach was used to analyze a total of 134,144 tweets to investigate the dynamics characterizing this method of political and digital activism as well as the tactics used by the participants. Furthermore, the images and texts used to control the information flow and capture public attention on Twitter were characterized by analyzing multimodal content in a random sample of 1,840 tweets posted with the #RepudioAlVándalo [WeRepudiateVandals] hashtag. The results show that algorithmic resistance, hashtag hijacking, and spam were effectively deployed within K-pop activism, enabling sabotage of the hashtag publics that sought to stigmatize protesters and supported the use of force against them. To conclude, we reflect on the effectiveness of the global–local K-Pop movement, the evolution of digital political activism, and its problematic association with the ter-minology of information warfare. In addition, we consider the limitations and future developments of our research.