Yesterday, Capetonians gathered to protest Russia’s Ukraine invasion outside the Russian embassy at Thibault Square Plaza. They were not the first, and will likely not be the last protestors. Protests have been sparking up across the globe, from London to Tokyo, like a wildfire breathing civic discontent.
Many of the Cape Town protestors were expats from Ukraine and Russia. Some were those who simply care about innocent lives impacted. The scenes were emotional as people urged through protest signs and pleading calls for Russia to stop the invasion. The protest was peaceful, but the feelings were those of unrest.
These protest actions might seem admirable to some, and fruitless to others. What’s in a peaceful protest anyway? The cynic might think.
A form of civic culture that impacts social movements – from political to cultural, peaceful protests have prevailed since their widespread popularity in the 1960s. Civic culture was always something that fascinated me when I studied its impact in both my undergraduate and postgraduate years as a political science student before graduating, and still thereafter writes Cape {town} Etc’s Ashleigh Nefdt.
Peaceful protests rally mobilisation, the instrument playing the tune of the individual’s free opinions coming together. It’s people’s way of saying they stand against decisions that are not their own, fighting the consequences that become exactly that.
Big or small, peaceful protests, in particular, show the world one pivotal thing – many civilians are not on the side of harming the innocent. In the current climate, from what many of the worldwide protests indicate, this thread of thinking is present, and at its heart are those innocents impacted.
It applies to the Russians who have been sharing their discontent on social media with the actions they had no say in, to the Ukrainian civilians hiding in underground metro stations seeking shelter who also had no say, and to all those over the world holding onto their loved ones a little tighter.
Especially in the era of social media, the number of people hoping for peace on multiple topics can be seen in real-time, and often as numbers. If anything, social media protesting too, shows us the individualism present in the world, largely disconnecting those from the choices of their countries. This is something that wasn’t as easily shared in many other historic conflicts – the real opinions of people.
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Picture: Esa Alexander
