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| Volume 12 |Issue 07| February 15, 2013 | |
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Photo Feature
A STARTLING AWAKENING TEXT: ZAHIR HASSAN NABIL
Many arguably say that social media played the part of a catalyst behind the myriad of protests, known as the Arab Spring, against the rulers across the Middle East two years ago. Even in 2011, London rioters utilised the social network as a tool for stealthy assemblage, vandalism and safe retreat. In the wake of the Shahbag protest, already dubbed “The Shahbag Mass Movement,” social media have already been a gateway to a peaceful mass uprising. The bloggers and members of Online Activist Network did their part that reached people across the country through the mass media. And soon people from all walks of life began joining the crowd. The debate over the social media's role becomes significant because the protest, as many have termed, resembles many of our historical incidents like the language movement, six-point movement, the mass upsurge in 1969 and of course the spirit of the Liberation War. Yet there were two things, seemingly far more important than entities like 'social media' or 'mass protests'. One of these was a sense of belongingness to the nation, the notion of a collective identity, which exceeded the boundaries of the social media or the protest itself. It may be that social media and the mass media disseminated the message of the protest. But undoubtedly it was the togetherness people felt deep within that brought hundreds and thousands below an umbrella. Those of us who have not witnessed the Liberation War can now assume the real impelling causes behind the mass protests in history. It is not necessarily the mass media that flare such protests; the modern mass media did not even exist if we go back along the timeline; the real impelling cause turns out to be the sense of solidarity about a certain cause. It is the people's collective conscience that has, at such a critical juncture, reinforced the fact that law is for the people. It is their collective moral faculties that decided what 'should' be the justice and what 'must' be done. As events unfold only time will tell whether the expectations meet the rule of law or not. But the Shahbag Mass Movement has proved without doubt that our collective identity, shared feelings and expectations, sense of belongingness to the nation have not withered away. In brevity, eminent author Muhammad Zafar Iqbal said the above exposition in his apologetic speech at Shahbag, “I am here to offer my apology to you. I wrote in newspapers that the new generation only hits 'like' on Facebook and writes on blogs, but does not take to the streets. You have proved me wrong, and I thank you all for this.”
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