David de Matheu

Paradigm Shift Essay 2

CAS 137H Robin Kramer
Page 1 de 7

#Revolution
On January 25th, 2011, the first of the Facebook Revolutions took place in Egypt. The protests
and manifestations were coordinated through social networks such as Facebook. The rebels used the
platform to create groups and pages that supported their cause and thus expanded the ideas throughout
the people of Egypt at an unprecedented rate. Egypt was the first of various revolutions and protests
directly coordinated and organized using the widely known social platform in conjunction to YouTube
and Twitter. Other cases include Tunisia, Iran and most recently Ukraine. These events propose a
reexamination of the paradigm surrounding social interactions and networking. Displays of social
uprising can be traced back to as early as the French Revolution, to later gain force with the use of
technology in the digital manifestations in the Philippines to finally reach the Egyptian Revolution,
where social networks like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter gave a voice and a method of connection to
silenced people, thus making it possible for them to share their ideals and organize massive
demonstrations inside an authoritarian and oppressive regime.
Before having social networks, social interactions were more personal and physical. Meeting
people and expressing your ideas to them required a high level of physical presence. In the context of a
revolution, organizing manifestations and people required for them to meet and talk. In order to transmit
your idea, you had to put up posters, call people and campaign in an open and public space. There was a
big dependence on the figure of media and newspapers to spread ideas, as it was the only way you could
really target large amounts of people. This form of getting your ideas dispersed did pose a problem in
relation to authority. The government or whoever you were campaigning against, could easily know
what you were trying to do or where were you meeting. Additionally, abuse and news rarely left the
local context as there were not many possibilities to share the message at a global level.
The French Revolution of 1789-99 presents a good example of an old-school revolution where
the spread of ideas was done through literature and physical interactions. Similar to our Middle Eastern

David de Matheu
Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
Page 2 de 7

examples, the French Revolution was catalyzed due to a strong social discontent with the authority and
the great inequality in the distribution of wealth. The French Revolutionary Army was confirmed by
mostly low class and oppressed people. The main ideals behind this revolution can be traced back to the
enlightenment social principles proposed by thinkers like Voltaire, Diderot and Rousseau. These ideas
were spread throughout the people as pamphlets and books that had to be distributed in secret due to the
overpowering monarchy. Slowly, the poor and oppressed started to organize with the goal of
overthrowing said monarchy.1 The question then, what would the French Revolution had been like if
they have had Facebook or Twitter? Even further all the revolutions that happened between 1799 and the
21st century? Would have the process of liberation been faster?
Before leading the Egyptian revolution, social networks had already left marks on protests and
manifestations around the world. The main antecedents in the Philippines were social networks and
technology were the main weapons of rebels to expose their views. The Philippines case was called the
Revolution by Cellphone where SMS were used to call protesters to manifest against the president at
that time. A massive SMS with the phrase: Go 2 EDSA. Wear Black was sent out by thousands of
people to call everyone to congregate in the EDSA Shrine in Manila to protest a Senate decision with
regards of the culpability of the president. This case happened in 2001, almost ten years before Egypt,
but presents the first case where technology was the main weapon of rebels to communicate their ideals
with people. Most importantly is how in that context SMS was the right form of communication to use
due to the poverty under which people lived, so SMS represented the only means of massive
communication.2
Both the French Revolution and the Philippian Revolution represent the antecedents to what
would be named the Facebook Revolutions. To further understand the paradigm shift that the Egyptian

1
2

The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica. "French Revolution (1787-99)." Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
Bociurkiw, Michael. "Revolution by Cell Phone." Forbes

David de Matheu
Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
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Revolution represents, first the tools that enabled this revolution must be analyzed to understand why
this revolutions was so successful and later inspired others to uprise.
On a deeper level, social networks make it possible for anyone to have a voice, as it is an open
and secure space to do so. Websites like Facebook and Twitter give people the opportunity to express
freely and have control over who can and cannot see their information. Social networks have been an
escape route for repressed minorities to express their views and opinions. Due to the intense control by
certain regimes who have banned forms of literature and physical publications, social networks presents
themselves as an appealing solution. Even if the internet is banned or filters imposed, it is still much
easier to access networks likes Facebook than circulate a flyer. The risk involved is less. Another idea
behind social networks giving a voice to those who dont have one is that people behind a screen
essentially have a mask. On social networks you dont have to be yourself, you can in theory be
whoever you want. A famous quote says Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give
him a mask, and he will tell you the truth. 3 This applies to social networks. Ultimately, people post
what they really think without fear of being exposed or discriminated, and that is exactly what gives
social networks power.
Once the ideas are put on a global network and are accessible to millions of people, connections
between them arise. When posts are put on the network they are accessible to your friends and the
friends of your friends, in an almost unlimited chain. If a comment is shared or liked its expansion is
even more exponential or viral. This makes it very easy for people to connect with it and comment on it,
ultimately with the idea that they might agree or disagree with it. This leads to the possibility that a
fairly large group of people can share a similar view and get connected, based on that original post. This
principle applies to almost anything, not only revolutions; how many times youre just sitting on
Facebook and you learn that someone got married because they shared their wedding pictures or
3

"Oscar Wilde Quote." BrainyQuote.

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Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
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someone died because a friend liked an article. Social networks teach us both about our immediate
social world and our global community, alluding to the idea of globalization that they represent and is
what makes them an ideal platform on which to express ideas.
Two of the biggest tools through which Facebook enables users to engage in discussion and
share ideas are Groups and Pages. In the case of Facebook, groups can be created to be secret and
contain only people you choose should be there. It leads to the possibility of connecting people on a
more direct manner with the purpose of sharing a common idea. Another tool are Pages, which
essentially website directed towards a single topic. It has revolutionized the way people get to interact as
it shows the interests each person has. For the Middle East Revolutions, Pages served as the means of
showing people information, as once you liked it, it would send you updates on current situations around
the country4. Together, Groups and Pages present an ideal platform to connect people with a certain ideal
and engage in digital discussion and inform them about their surroundings. It makes the social
experience given by networks even more personal and molded to what you want out of your social
experience.
Focusing for a moment on the video side of social networks, the recent proliferation of
smartphones with cameras has had an important impact on getting ideas on the web. They say that an
image represents more than a thousand words, and it is true even more so when your cause is
denouncing an abusive government. Cameras have been used to film acts of violence and abuse, even
deaths. These videos are put on social networks and are viewed by millions of people around the world. 5
Once a video is uploaded and someone watches it, the problems stop being local and become global,
people intervene from the comfort of their houses to try and help those who are being hurt. There is not
an event that happens around the world where five minutes after it happens, there is not a video on
Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, which instantly starts to be shared by thousands of people. This
4
5

Vargas, Jose. "Spring Awakening: How an Egyptian Revolution Began on Facebook." The New York Times
Vargas, Jose. "Spring Awakening: How an Egyptian Revolution Began on Facebook." The New York Times

David de Matheu
Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
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definitely strengthens the power of information that social networks carry and has revolutionized our
social interactions to an even more globalized level. With new platforms like Snapchat evolving, where
now people are not only sharing their lives with words but video, we are now living other peoples lives
with them, making them our own. In the case of rebels, by watching what is happening from a first
person point of view, we make their cause ours.
Going back to Egypt, this revolution marked the first successful overthrow of an entire
government structure through the use of social networks as a main weapon. The main cause was
oppression in its different forms: police-brutality, fraud, low wages and financial crisis. The principal
cause can be traced back to a picture posted to social networks of a dead person victim to police
brutality. From that starting point, rebel groups created Facebook pages and groups with the purpose of
attracting national and international attention to the issues associated with police-brutality and start
peaceful manifestations in different cities along Egypt. As it has been proposed, the social platforms
gave the rebels the possibility of gaining a voice and being able to get the claims heard by an
international community. Videos were used to show the world what was happening and denounce real
situations around Egypt. Undoubtedly, they also were able to connect and create mas sive support to their
claims from people all around Egypt.6 Fawaz Rashad said on his twitter account, "We use Facebook to
schedule the protests, Twitter to coordinate, and YouTube to tell the world." 7 This further explains the
key role social networks played throughout the revolution.
The Egypt case is a solid example of a successful manifestation organized through
digital social networks, but a positive and evident outcome is not always the result such as in the Kony
2012 campaign. This campaign was launched with the intent of bringing attention to the crimes
committed by Joseph Kony against the children in Africa. The campaign was successful by spreading its
6

Shapiro, Samantha. "Can Social Networking Turn Disaffected Young Egyptians into a Force for Democratic Change?"
The New York Times.
7
Fawaz Rashed, Tweet

David de Matheu
Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
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ideas and content throughout the web in the form of a documentary. The campaign was received with
positive reception and was featured in news reports around the world. Where the campaign failed was at
actually doing something about what it was preaching. The campaign was catalogued as slacktivism
due to its inexistent impact on the issue as well as over simplistic and nave. The campaign lacked the
process of connecting people and bringing them together to fight against a cause. It merely presented
issues and invited people to be aware about was happening in Africa. 8 Compared to the Egypt case, this
campaign might have been even more successful at going viral and truly spreading throughout the
world, but was a failure at really making people connect with the issue to ultimately act and up rise
against Joseph Kony, even at a local level.
The paradigm shift regarding social networks is not necessarily that they have enabled us to start
revolutions, beyond that they have changed the way we interact with others. Ultimately, these networks
have become tools and weapons for means of expressing ourselves, communicating our ideas to others
and if needed organizing large groups of people with a single purpose. Social Networks can certainly
change the idea of what a revolution is; starting from the French Revolution and later the Philippian
Digital Revolution to later evolve into the Egyptian Facebook Revolution. Regardless, they have also
changed our social interactions in enormous ways. Now it is not as simple as to only pay attention to
physical interactions, we must be attentive to our social persona, someone we have created on a digital
world and is a big part of us, in some cases even bigger than our physical selves. Social Networks like
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have enabled this change by giving us a voice and means to interact on
a social-digital level even if we cant do so in our physical world.

Okwonga, Musa. "Stop Kony, Yes. But Dont Stop Asking Questions." The Independent.

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Paradigm Shift Essay 2
CAS 137H Robin Kramer
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Bibliography:
1. Bociurkiw, Michael. "Revolution by Cell Phone." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 10 Sept. 2001. Web. 30
Oct. 2014. <http://www.forbes.com/asap/2001/0910/028.html>.

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<http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/o/oscarwilde104298.html>.

3. Okwonga, Musa. "Stop Kony, Yes. But Dont Stop Asking Questions." The Independent. The
Independent, 7 Mar. 2012. Web. 30 Oct. 2014. <http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/03/07/stopkony-yes-but-dont-stop-asking-questions/>.

4. Rashed, Fawaz. "We use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter to coordinate, and YouTube to
tell the world. #egypt #jan25. 18 March 2011, 6:04 p.m. Tweet

5. Shapiro, Samantha. "Can Social Networking Turn Disaffected Young Egyptians into a Force for
Democratic Change?" The New York Times. The New York Times, 24 Jan. 2009. Web. 30 Oct.
2014.<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/magazine/25bloggerst.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0>.

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7. Vargas, Jose. "Spring Awakening: How an Egyptian Revolution Began on Facebook." The New York
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