When I was a kid growing up in Bradford I had one very memorable trip home from school that involved walking right through the middle of a riot. You see, some dude called Salman Rushdie had put pen to paper and written something called the Satanic Verses… and quite a few people were very unhappy that it was being sold in our city (which has a high Muslim population), so unhappy in fact that they decided to smash up the centre of Bradford.

History is littered with groups of people turning to violence, or drastic action, to both highlight their anger at something or demand change within society. From the Suffragettes burning their bras to the student protests in the US against the Vietnam War to more recent G20 protests around the world.

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Facebook, Twitter and YouTube… not what first springs to mind when you think about politics. But over the last few years, more and more politicians have started using the internet as a tool to drum up political support.

When the Presidential elections in the US got under way in 2008, Democratic candidate Barack Obama used the internet to great effect to raise funds and gain supporters in his race to be President. His success has seen UK politicians follow suit and with the current general election, UK political parties have been pushing their online activities more than ever. Below are some examples of what they’ve been up to:

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