It’s no secret to those in my close circle of friends and family that I love Twitter. I love virtually everything about it. Generally, when I try to convey the appeal and importance of the site to others (of varying age groups), I’m met with a lukewarm response. Twitter is consistently treated like another flavor of the social media fad, something that happens to resonate with one demographic over the others, and not much more. I’m here to convince you otherwise. Twitter is so much more. Let’s discuss.

First up, activism. In my experience, there are two general camps of “activism” you encounter: in-person resistance (think, going to protests, campaigning for or against certain bills), and what’s been dubbed “keyboard activism” (sharing articles and viewpoints spreading a certain message, but leaving it at that). It may seem the logical conclusion to label anything existing on Twitter as the latter, but the reality is far more complex. Before I get into that complexity, let’s explore this whole “keyboard activism” thing, and whether or not it’s as measurably useless as it’s consistently framed.

In most cases, keyboard activism can’t get much done on its own, but we shouldn’t devalue its purpose. Firstly, there are countless causes and points of view I never would have been privy to, had it not been for someone taking to their laptop and getting the word out there. I’m a middle class white girl who went to a good public school and grew up in safe neighborhoods. I’ve encountered more diversity and ideologically challenging topics from Twitter than I ever would have dreamed of growing up.

Before I move onto how Twitter influences and interacts with more classical activism, I’d like to explore a kind of middle ground between the two varieties that Twitter helps manifest. Which camp does your activism fall in if you never leave your keyboard, but you’re still affecting real change? To give an example, let’s turn to the horrific events that unfolded in Charlottesville. A video from the event circulated on Twitter that showed protestor Deandre Harris getting beaten by a mob of white supremacists, several of whom were brandishing weapons. Along with helping spread the video, journalist and activist Shaun King shared the following Tweets, among many others like them:

Thanks in large part to Twitter users, two of the multiple men have already been identified and, thanks to the quality of photos of most of the other attackers, it’s likely only a matter of time before the names of the rest surface. There is nothing passive about this kind of activism. Shaun King and flocks of other users may have only wielded keyboards, but this particular instance sends a powerful message: There is a difference between what we think of as “keyboard activism” and using your keyboard for action.

This point leads me to the relationship Twitter has cultivated with activism more aligned with what we historically imagine regarding the word. As I said earlier, this generally manifests as going out to protests and sit-ins, rallying for votes, etc. The obvious way in which Twitter has impacted this variety is how well Twitter meshes with sharable information about rallies and protests. Tweets going out telling people to show up at a certain place at a certain time have proven to be very effective, and the importance of that shouldn’t be understated, but the site has gone even further.

You may have heard of this movement that’s arisen over the last three years, called Black Lives Matter. You can thank Twitter for that.

The largely youth-oriented demographic of Twitter, efficiency of a 144-character limit, and versatility of the platform’s structure (allowing “threads” of multiple tweets to connect into elaborate, eloquent essays, for example), all came together to create the perfect storm that helped cultivate the rise of Black Lives Matter.

Switching gears for a moment, activism isn’t the only thing magnified by Twitter. The same components that aided BLM in its rise aid journalists in their quest to share information. Obviously reporters share their articles on the site, but I make a habit of following countless reporters of varying political inclinations, as many take part in Tweeting micro-stories about topics they care about. Even further, Twitter allows these individuals to respond to each other efficiently and candidly, in a public forum. I can personally watch a debate unfold between intelligent, educated people I look up to, and learn from it! You’ve got to admit that’s amazing.

Now, let’s pivot once more to a final subject of Twitter’s influential gaze. I’m talking politicians.

Along with likely most of you, I remember learning about FDR’s fireside chats in history class. Politicians’ use of Twitter is like that, but on steroids. Let’s face it, Trump isn’t making headlines for his Facebook statuses or Instagrams. Obama’s response to the previously mentioned events in Charlottesville is now the third most favorited Tweet ever. Not only do we get to be closer to our politicians ideologically than ever before, but we are given another opportunity to hold them accountable. Reporters are more and more commonly questioning Trump in press conferences about his perpetual fumbling of his Twitter account.

Whatever you previously thought of Twitter, the site’s increasing role in activism, capacity to share breaking news, and spotlight monitoring politicians all go to show the website is more than just millennials posting about what they had for breakfast that morning. As we advance further into an unfamiliar and ever-changing political landscape, I advise those of you who haven’t, to open up your laptop and give the little blue bird a chance. You just may learn something.