Since the advent of social media, the public’s relationship with law enforcement has evolved into one in which the public can instantly call out abusive policing techniques and incidents in the hope that unlawful and inappropriate behavior can be stopped once and for all.

It may not be glaringly obvious, but the use of social media channels such as Twitter has been instrumental in garnering public support for reversing law enforcement’s military-esque and trigger-happy procedures that have become evident during several events throughout the years, such as the 2012 shootings in Anaheim, Calif., to the more recent shootings and calls for reform in Albuquerque, N.M.

While not every call for reform is answered or even acknowledged, many demanding widespread reform and an end to police brutality argue that posting concerns on social media and “call flooding” police departments are important steps in demonstrating to the law enforcement community that the American public will not tolerate abusive tactics. It also warns law enforcement that their abusive and unlawful practices are not going unnoticed.

For example, last month when the New York Police Department announced a Twitter campaign known as #myNYPD, asking New Yorkers to post presumably positive photos and interactions with officers, many police reform advocates used the campaign as an opportunity to showcase poor police tactics.

The pro-police campaign quickly turned into a PR nightmare for the department, as thousands of photos of NYPD officers demonstrating arguably brutal tactics such as beating restrained individuals, pulling the hair of a handcuffed woman, and shooting and killing innocent bystanders, flooded the Internet.

The way Internet users turned the campaign on its head was viewed as such a success that many police reform advocates took it as a chance to call out other departments for wrongful behavior. The Los Angeles Police Department, for example, got slammed under the hashtag #myLAPD.

Although the social media campaign didn’t go as planned, NYPD Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said he welcomed the bad photos, explaining that sometimes the work police officers do “isn’t pretty.”

However, Bratton didn’t have anyone post any of the “bad” photos on the department’s Facebook page, which is what officials decided to do with some of the “good” photos.

That’s the thing with social media — although thousands of people may have posted pictures of NYPD officers engaged in police brutality tactics, none are currently visible, since the police departments often delete posts that don’t paint them in the finest light.

Some are outraged to learn the police department actively deletes these negative posts, but some police reform advocates argue that deleting the posts is OK because someone at the department at least had to take the time to read the message and then delete it.

In other words, the message that it is time for a change was heard loud and clear, even if it was later deleted.

While not all Americans exercise their right to call a police department in order to report inappropriate behavior by officers, it’s completely legal to do so and is protected under the First Amendment — as is posting one’s grievances on social media channels.

But it’s important to remember that an individual is only protected so long as they remain calm. An angry tirade in which an individual mocks, condemns, accuses or judges officers is not protected, and it may result in an individual’s concerns not being taken seriously. A heated exchange with law enforcement that includes profanity and threats will also likely hurt other people’s attempts to reform law enforcement’s procedures and policies, as local police departments often report irate callers using abusive or profane language for harassment to other local law enforcement agencies and sometimes even the FBI.

Groups such as Cop Block, Honor Your Oath, the National Police Misconduct Reporting Project and Photography Is Not A Crime, have spent years educating the American public on a variety of police-related interactions — from what a driver should do if he or she is pulled over at a checkpoint, to what a citizen’s rights are when video and audio recording interactions with police officers.

Acting as a voice for the public, these groups have called directly for reform, but have also educated the public on why reform is necessary and how the public can participate. But like any other political issue, real reform likely won’t come until the public overwhelmingly demands change.Concerned about the emergence of a growing police state throughout the United States, groups are now calling for Americans to flood police departments with calls for police reform.

The public is asked to “call flood” not only law enforcement officials, but also local elected officials, such as mayors and city councils, local media outlets and even the local chamber of commerce, since as police reform advocate Mike Murphy wrote, “[I]f ever there’s a group sensitive to a community’s public image, it’s the local chamber of commerce.”