Nonviolent Protest

(Kaemmerlen) In the recent violent and nonviolent protest in the Arab world, the impact of social media was a major contributor to the political uprising as participants in these protests used social media as means of communication, to spread awareness about an ongoing event in a censored environment, and as a key for people in the countries to contact outside nations. Even before the actual event, a few years earlier in 2009, a cartoonist named Satoor sparked the idea of using the Internet for protest. He produced comical parodies of Gaddafi which made him an object of mockery.10 Eventually, starting in 2012, the Arab Spring began. It was a series of revolts and violent and nonviolent protest occurring in Northern Africa and the Middle East.

For years, many countries like Egypt were under oppressive rule by figureheads like Gaddafi and Mubarak, but arab spring protesters set to solidify their own rule of government. Protesters had had enough, and they realized the humiliation they faced while having bad leadership. They knew America knew, and they knew the populus of Egypt knew.14 The revolution started to become more violent and active, including Nile TV’s headquarters to be broken into and basically destroyed. Social media was a main suspect behind this heightening of activity, due to use of Twitter and Facebook being used more prevalently and internet being more accessible to more people after Mubarak raised the internet ban. Facebook specifically allowed groups to organize without government overview or worry of military personnel discovering their plans. Although people couldn’t actually fight with social media, it was essential in establishing a form of communication and organization in Northern Africa and the Middle East. The ultimate goal of the revolutions was to establish a form of democracy in these countries. In multiple blogs written in both Arabic and English, writers sought to get an “American-Styled” democracy to form.15 Clearly, the revolts main goals transferred over to social media where it was then accessed by anyone, anywhere in the world. Although democracy was not exactly established in any of the countries in the Arab Spring, social media created a permanent base for communication, organization, and as a tool to avoid government oppression and