Seaspiracy and the Impact of “Made For Social Media” Documentaries
Will Netflix’s Seaspiracy convince us all to stop eating fish?
The term “Slacktivism” has been coined in recent years to describe the activity of amplifying worthy causes online. “Hashtag Activism” is another way to describe people engaging in activism on social media through use of a hashtag. These forms of activism require minimal effort and critics say they have very little impact beyond making those who get involved look and feel good about themselves.
This has led to an increase in what I would describe as “Made for Social Media Documentaries”. They’re made with the aim of going viral online with their shocking message. This ignites a dialogue on social media feeds that increases the reach of the message and therefore the documentary itself. They’re incredibly well made and usually have a clear message or response that they want from the viewer. The response is generally for us the viewer to do something aspirational and heroic like “make a change”, “be the change” and most importantly spread the word.
Impactful documentaries on global issues are not a new thing, they’ve always been around but the way that we engage with them has changed. Word of mouth is now digital and even those with small numbers of followers can convince people to at the very least watch a programme and feel they should react to it in a similar way. The first real example of this in the digital world was the phenomenon of Kony 2012.
For those who don’t remember Kony 2012, it was a Youtube Documentary by Invisible Children Inc that detailed the way in which viewers could put pressure on the International community to capture the Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony. Kony had been recruiting child soldiers for years to fuel ongoing wars in the region. On April 20th of that year, those who signed up and donated $30 to the charity could get their own “Kony Action Kit” and “Cover the Night” by putting posters and banners of Kony up in their city. This would make him so famous that governments would come together to end his cruelty once and for all.
Sadly this didn’t really pan out as there were quickly many criticisms of the films claims from both the media in the US and Uganda. Everything about Kony 2012 was suddenly under the microscope and in the middle of all this, the now celebrity filmmaker was caught on video tape running around the streets of San Diego naked. At this point most people switched their attentions away from Kony and April 20th of that year passed with very little fan fare. Perhaps unfairly, I’ve taken every slickly produced activism themed documentary since with some skepticism.
“Seaspiracy”, from the creators of “Cowspiracy“ is the latest of this genre and is the reason why you've seen people online declare that they'll never eat fish again. These plant based docs are created with the aim of altering consumer behaviour away from meat and fish consumption. Having previously given Veganuary a try back in 2019, I feel no amount of vegan propaganda (as this has been called) would convince me to switch and go green full time.
Vegan motive aside, this is a brilliantly made expose into global commercial fishing and its devastating environmental and human impact. Netflix, who seem to exclusively produce content related to serial killers, death and missing persons, have managed to produce something that’ll make you lose even more faith in humanity with “Seaspiracy”. Despite the already published critiques of its findings, has all the hallmarks of a great viral documentary - a strong emotive leading narrator in Ali Tabrizi, dramatic music, time-lapses, powerful testimonies from key figures, data presented in beautiful bitesize ways and a simple “hashtagable” message. If you haven’t seen it yet, you’ll get the idea from the trailer below…
It’s so well made you’d imagine that if they released an Anti-Vax documentary (Vaxspiracy), then we'd all be ignoring that HSE text if it ever arrives. My issue with “Seaspiracy” is that like a lot of these types of films, it only presents us with an overly simplified or single alternative…in this case to stop eating fish entirely. It doesn't attempt to highlight any positive fishing practices and any of the talking heads at organisations they put the hard or simple questions to handle themselves like they’re being set up in a Borat movie. The remaining hour goes on to find more problems for every possible solution to the destruction of our oceans.
In the end this all or nothing approach could have the opposite impact and leave us feeling like if we give up the fish fingers, there'll always be thousands of shark fin soup connoisseurs over in China to make up the difference.
Surely there’s hope that big governments will stand up and take notice now that the documentary is making such waves (pun intended)? Well sadly this is also doubtful as it’s alluded to that government subsidies are fuelling it as much as the market demand. The shady government element means that the drama in “Seaspiracy” is ratcheted up to almost mockumentary levels at times as undercover agents and darkened out faces warn them to stop filming throughout. This of course, makes us only want to hear even more about it and see if we can help bring these systems down.
This gives us the feeling that by posting about it online we’re continuing a narrative that's being suppressed by powerful people across the globe. So if you let “Seaspiracy” wash over you and have signed the petitions, shared posts about it on your story or even binned the tuna cans from the larder…what's next? Well for those of us who became engrossed in taking down Kony back in 2012 learned, it could be absolutely nothing. A quick Google search of Kony doesn’t really give much in the way of an update nearly 10 years later but he seems to be still alive and I haven’t heard much about Uganda or the Invisible Children charity since. My interest in it was a flash in the pan much like the video itself.
The attention on these seemingly crucial causes can fizzle out and give way to the next emotive issue we see on our timelines or streaming services. For the people who make the documentaries however, it’s a win win. They may not be perfect or have all the answers, but they do shine a light on the issues. I wouldn’t be writing this today and highlighting the issues that “Seaspiracy” touches on if it wasn’t being promoted by Netflix and creating a buzz on major social media platforms.
If awareness is the goal of any documentary, then social media really is the best way to drive this and “Seaspiracy” has done its job by trending over the last week. What we as viewers do with the information in a documentary is where its real impact can be measured. “Seaspiracy” will make some of us more concerned about where our fish is coming from, even if that won’t prevent us from enjoying it with chips the next time that we’re in Howth.