Social Media the Invisible Sidekick

Social Media The Invisible Sidekick

Jessica Porter

Community College of Baltimore County

Abstract

The Arab Spring has been talked about a lot in the news the past few years. What was the Arab Spring? What do people mean when they call it the Bloggers Revolution? These are just a few questions most people ask about this amazing uprising.

The Arab Spring, a phrase most Americans have heard, but sadly many have no idea what it means nor do they care.  The Arab Spring was the uprising of many young Arabs who protested against their tyrannical governments.  Seeking a better life not only for themselves, but future generations.  They took to the streets and protested many tragically lost their lives for these actions.  Luckily, for the leaders of this movement the technology invented in America was much more empathic to their cause compared to the majority of Americans.

Social media sites actually acted as a “meeting place” where protester could communicate and plan their events.  It also allowed the protestors to show the world their plight by uploading video recordings to websites like YouTube.  It was a new kind of peaceful protest that the world had never seen before.  It was a virtual sidekick to all the protestors.  Many Arabs who were actually afraid to take the streets with the others could also participate by just posting on a website.

   Social media was such an effective tool the ruling governments in Egypt, Libya, and Syria actually shut down the internet.  In other countries such as Tunisia, the government employed people to actually hacked into private citizen’s Facebook accounts to monitor and censor posts. Perhaps, the most horrifying attempts at censorship happened in Saudi Arabia, where many bloggers were arrested and have never been heard from again.  Many believe they were actually executed for their online blog posts.

The Arab spring was the first time that social media was used to fight back against evil and oppressive governments.  It not only exceeded in one country, but many countries’ governments were reformed in result of the Arab Spring.  It was effective tool, but the true heroes of the Arab Spring who posted, blogged, twitted, and uploaded videos for the world to see.

References

_{Khouri, R. G. (2013). The Arab Spring Was Triggered by a Desire for Democracy and Social Justice. In M. Haerens & L. M. Zott (Eds.), Opposing Viewpoints. The Arab Spring. Detroit: Greenhaven Press. (Reprinted from Nation, 2011, August 24) Retrieved from http://ccbcmd.idm.oclc.org/login?ur=http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/ovic/ViewpointsDetailsPage/ViewpointsDetailsWindow?failOverType=&query=&prodId=OVIC&windowstate=normal&contentModules=&display-query=&mode=view&displayGroupName=Viewpoints&dviSelectedPage=&limiter=&currPage=&disableHighlighting=&displayGroups=&sortBy=&zid=&search_within_results=&p=OVIC&action=e&catId=&activityType=&scanId=&documentId=GALE%7CEJ3010832206&source=Bookmark&u=balt47855&jsid=a28063c473fe42729931e7bac4c6f78a}

  _{Kassim, S.} ( 2012, July 03). Twitter Revolution: How the Arab Spring Was Helped By Social Media [Blog post].  Retrieved from http;//www.mic.com/articles/10642/twitter-revolution-how-the-arab-spring-was-helped-by-social-media.