Monday, December 23, 2013

"I am either out there, on barricades, or I am in Facebook."

http://boingboing.net/2013/12/23/euromaidan-a-facebook-revolut.html

"Now I am a rebel. Work, family, books, computer games - everything has been relegated to the backfround background. My wife supports me. Sometimes I am ready to start crying, reading a post on Facebook, and sometimes I shake with rage. I am either out there, on barricades, or I am in Facebook. It is the only news outlet I can trust. Sometimes it is nervous, sometimes depressive, or paranoid, sometimes full of romanticism, optimism, beautiful and tender stuff. Today it is angry.

It is Day 29 of #euromaidan. Imagine a medieval military camp on central square of a modern European city. It is cold, there is a central stage, there are free sandwiches and hot tea everywhere. Firewood is burning in oil barrels. It is clean and organised. Everyone is set, quiet, and free. Maidan at night.
Maidan is a Ukrainian word for square, or plaza, usually meaning the central plaza. Independence Square, Maidan Nezalezhnoti, where people went to prevent VFU from coming to presidency in 2004. Where people went to demand constitutional elections in 2010, when they were just about to be cancelled. So everyone knows where to go. I went, too."

   How Ukraine protests.  They seem to require a "leader" to organize on-the-spot protest tactics.  But they also simply rely on each other, for news, support, ideas.