#EndSARS was a viral event. But away from the tweets and the hashtags, an offline culture of protest against the agency grew that was no less influential, writes Emma Etim.
The #EndSARS protest in Nigeria remains a landmark event in digital activism. A phenomenon characterised by its spread, viral imagery, and 280-character calls to action. However, beneath the digital frenzy lies another important, largely untold story of quieter, more sustained expressions of resistance flourishing away from the glare of trending hashtags.
The digital revolution in protest
Digital media platforms such as Twitter (now X) have taken the centre stage in contemporary social movements. The #EndSARS protests exemplified how social media can be used to offer real-time updates, galvanise people across geographical divides, and spark global solidarity. Through viral images, succinct messages, and rapid hashtag campaigns, #EndSARS thrust issues of police brutality and government accountability into the global spotlight.
The immediacy and energy of digital mobilisation can be powerful catalysts for change, drawing diverse voices and fuelling collective anger. However, at the same time, it also emphasises speed over accuracy, skews to an urban audience, and creates narratives that are often sensationalised. They are not a panacea for activism. While social media platforms spread words at an unmatched speed, they frequently overshadow slower but equally potent protest methods that emerge in less digitally connected areas. Digital activism is only one piece of a larger puzzle.
The overlooked power of the offline #EndSARS activism
In rural communities and areas with limited internet access, protesters have long relied on word of mouth, handwritten placards, and traditional forms of symbolic resistance.
During the #EndSARS protests, oral storytelling and chants like Soro Soke (meaning “speak up”) became instruments of protest, anchoring the movement in the local language and cultural memory. Handwritten placards carried raw, urgent messages, giving visibility to grassroots voices in town squares and along dusty roads. Symbolic acts, ranging from ritual performances to communal prayers, drew on ancestral traditions to deepen the moral legitimacy of dissent. Visual protest art and enduring symbols like the blood-stained Nigerian flag further connected offline action to shared national narratives.
These methods may not generate trending hashtags or capture global headlines overnight; however, they foster a deep-seated communal identity and ensure that dissent takes root in local communities. They capture expressions of protest embedded in local culture and tradition, and expressions that digital media alone, with its emphasis on immediacy and brevity, cannot fully encapsulate.
Bridging digital and offline activism
Social Movement Theory (SMT) provides a useful framework for understanding how collective action is mobilised and sustained. SMT illuminates the role of resource mobilisation, political opportunities, and framing in shaping protests. Through its lens, #EndSARS is seen not just as a digital phenomenon, but as a multi-channel mobilisation where emotional expression, community solidarity, and corporate activism come into play.
Digital platforms amplified the #EndSARS protests. It wasn’t a solely online phenomenon, but focusing on digital virality, the protests inadvertently marginalised slower, more reflective offline mobilisation processes. For example, in rural areas, protests are not measured solely by the number of likes or retweets. Instead, they are embodied in recurring community rituals and traditions, which create a deep sense of continuity and resistance to change.
In these places, rather than send out tweets, elderly people recounted personal experiences of police brutality, often invoking ancestral wisdom and historical resistance movements like the Aba Women’s Riot of 1929. These gatherings became ritual spaces where injustice was named, remembered, and spiritually confronted. These slower modes of protest remind us that dissent is as much about preserving collective memory as it is about making immediate calls for reform.
The emotional currents underlying collective action
Emotions play a central role in the mobilisation of protests. #EndSARS was driven by a complex cocktail of anger, hope, and fleeting joy. Digital platforms have the ability to capture and amplify emotional waves, transforming personal grievances into global narratives. However, the same narrative strength that makes them powerful also risks oversimplification.
The grief and outrage experienced by those physically on the streets created a depth of emotional resonance that tweets seldom convey. Emotionally charged offline moments, whether communal prayer or a local chant in a native dialect, attest to a shared struggle transcending the digital realm. They create a type of emotional authenticity that is difficult to replicate in the fast-paced social media world. Such expressions of collective sentiment sustain protests over the long term, transforming viral outrage into sustained calls for social change.
Rethinking the narrative of resistance
The story of the #EndSARS protests may be incomplete if we focus solely on digital aspects. Instead, a comprehensive narrative of resistance should acknowledge and integrate quieter voices. This duality between the explosive energy of trending hashtags and the steady pulse of traditional activism challenges the conventional wisdom that equates visibility with impact. As digital tools continue to reshape the protest landscape, it is crucial to remain vigilant about the lure of a one-dimensional narrative. The true power of a protest may lie in how it harmonises different modes of resistance by blending the immediacy of digital mobilisation with the depth of the local tradition.
#EndSARS captured global attention and nurtured a sustained and localised culture of dissent. Such a nuanced perspective is essential for designing policies and interventions that address not only the symptoms of state repression but also the deep-rooted social injustices that provoke protests in the first place.
It is necessary to look beyond the buzz of trending topics and viral memes. The enduring spirit of the #EndSARS protest resides in its quiet corners, where tradition meets resistance, and the pulse of offline activism continues to beat strongly, despite the shifting digital landscape.
This blog is based on the article Digital Activism and Collective Resistance to Police Brutality: Systematic Review of the Quieter and Less Visible Narratives of #EndSARS Protest.
Photo credit: Paul Becker used with permission CC BY 2.0
