It would have been a lot different if they were all merely off to see Justin Bieber’s new 3D movie. But the youth who took to the streets of Egypt – numbering in the millions at the height of the protests – were in Cairo’s Tahrir Square for more pressing reasons.
A generation forgotten and unseen originally gathered to commemorate the loss of 300 young people, all killed during Hosni Mubarak’s rule. When the Egyptian president and his cohorts brushed their pleas aside, however, the same generation suddenly discovered its power to overthrow the status quo. Over 18 exhilarating days, the demonstrations grew and its demands became bolder. The youth movement turned into the pulse of the nation, uniting Islamists, Christians, leftists, socialists, liberals and basically anyone fed up with autocracy. Since this rebellion found its roots online, it was unsurprising to see signs written in Internet-speak: “ MUBARAK Y U NO STEP DOWN?” Talk about a revLOLution.
As newspapers have pointed out, the revolution in Egypt is the second to hit the Arab world in a month. It came exactly four weeks after Tunisia’s Zein al-Abidine Ben Ali was toppled by a popular uprising. Both have inspired copycat acts of dissent: Yemen, Sudan, Bahrain and Iran saw homegrown protest movements apparently gaining momentum. I can only imagine what the headlines – and memes – will be when the unshakeable leaders of these countries finally resign.
Before the new year began, thousands of students participated in UK-wide rallies against increased university tuition fees. The scale of the central London demonstrations alone defied expectations, with an estimated 50,000 turning out to vent their anger at government plans to raise tuition fees as high as £9,000 while cutting teaching budgets by 40%. I assume this includes Hogwarts, which explains the students’ wrath.
Elsewhere in Europe, thousands of Italians took to the streets in some 200 cities across the country in protest of Silvio Berlusconi’s alleged behavior toward women. “Sunday’s demonstrations were the biggest anti-Berlusconi rallies since the most recent sex scandal broke in January, when Milan prosecutors said they were investigating whether the prime minister abused his power by helping an underaged woman, whom he had allegedly paid for sex, get out of jail on a theft charge,” reports CNN.
These political upheavals seem poignant in the light of this month’s 25th anniversary of the Edsa revolution. It’s something I’m sure the local news cycles will be focusing on in the coming days. As for me, I’m not so sure if I’ll be as enthusiastic about it as I should be. After all, I can’t be nostalgic for something I wasn’t able to experience myself.
Anyway, without hectoring everyone into becoming more politically literate, I’d like to put it out there that this series of events has made me even more aware of the power of, well, people power. It’s something so potent that it should only be used in extreme cases; to do otherwise would cheapen it and diminish its influence.
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