Lexington activist starts random acts of kindness social media trend

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT) - A Lexington activist is trying to reverse a social media trend in an attempt to get people to be a little nicer to one another.

Devine Carama is well-known for being an advocate for Lexington youth, and is also the director of One Lexington. Now, he’s starting a new hashtag on Tik Tok called “random acts of kindness.”

It’s a response to other trends we’ve seen on the platform, including the “devious licks” challenge, which led to bathrooms getting destroyed in several area school districts.

“I’m always thinking of creative ways to meet young people where they are. We’re not gonna get rid of social media and so if that’s our mentality, we’re never gonna make things better. So I said what’s a way to get them to engage in social media, but in a positive way,” Carama said.

With some help from Armani, a Winburn Middle school student, he’s hoping to change the narrative.

“We asked some of our mentees helping us do it and we’ll see if it catches. These are the type of things we want to see young people doing and spreading on social media and not the negative stuff that can lead to conflict,” Carama said.

Any act of kindness is welcome, big or small. It can be either at school or in the community.

“Picking a piece of trash up off the floor within school grounds, but then it can be in the community and be community service, like serving those less fortunate,” Carama said.

Carama said he wants kids to step up and follow their own path.

“Look, this generation is predicated on following. Whether it’s social media and how many followers you got, whether it’s these challenges where everybody’s following and doing the same thing. But at the end of the day, in order to build community, it’s about how many leaders we got,” Carama said.

If you want to post to the hashtag or just follow along, it’s called #randomactsofkindnessfcps. Carama said he’s hoping this will help make doing the right thing, the cool thing.

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