Facebook and Arab Dignity (re: Tunisia)

[MattSh]

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Soon after — this at least is undisputed — Bouazizi set himself on fire in front of the modest governor’s building where protesters now gather around portraits of the martyr. Bouazizi would live another 18 days. By then, an Arab dictatorship with a 53-year pedigree was shuddering. Within another 10 days, it had fallen in perhaps the world’s first revolution without a leader.

Or rather, its leader was far away: Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook. Its vehicle was the youth of Tunisia, able to use Facebook for instant communication and so cyber-inspire their parents.

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The Tunisian revolution was that experiment on steroids. Castro spent years preparing revolution in the Cuban interior, the Sierra Maestra; Facebook propelled insurrection from the interior to the Tunisian capital in 28 days.

How could a spat over pears in Nowhereville turn into a national uprising? No Tunisian newspaper or TV network covered it. The West was busy with Christmas. Tunisia was the Arab world’s Luxembourg: Nothing ever happened. Some poor kid’s self-immolation could never break a wall of silence. Or so it seemed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/25/opinion/25iht-edcohen25.html?_r=1&ref=global

A few people around here like to badmouth Facebook and Twitter, but maybe this is the way to make our voices heard, not hoping that calls to congress critters and signing petitions will make a difference. Where has that gotten us lately?