According to the Oxford Dictionary, a protest is a statement or action expressing disapproval of or objection to something. But put in the context of a democracy, it can help achieve so much more than just that.
When we think about our participation in a democracy, the first thing that comes to our mind is Universal Adult Franchise and Elections. While that is a fundamental aspect of representative democracy, freedom of expression is also a key feature.
Protests are one of the means to accomplish this. They allow people to communicate their disagreement with the government and its policies. Especially in a country like India, whose demographics are diverse in so many ways, the government needs to make sure that it is not making laws that might end up handicapping a faction of the population.
Protesting also helps keep a tight rein on the power of the government. It serves as a reminder of the fact that, at the end of the day, the government is obliged to work for the people.
Throughout history, we have witnessed various protests, some of which earned more attention than others. For example, multiple demonstrations in the 20th century demanding suffrage rights, gender and racial equality, etc., were supported by huge audiences. What’s more important is that these protests have made a significant impact on the lives of countless generations of people. If we give it a thought, we realise that all the rights and freedoms we have today exist because of people fighting for them in the past. People who made sure that their voices were heard and their needs were addressed by the governing bodies.
A more recent Indian example would be the CAA-NRC protests held in December 2019 have also received a lot of attention across the country. The protestors were successful in telling the government that discrimination towards any community would not be tolerated.
But this was in a world where the pandemic hadn’t struck. The threat of getting infected by a deadly virus didn’t exist back then. Protests are perhaps one of the most effective ways of expressing disagreement. But it has become unrealistic and almost impractical to gather in huge numbers, the way we did in pre-COVID times.
The farmer bills protest in India was one of the first protests that happened after the pandemic. But it was just the farmers who had congregated physically. The general public could not support the farmers by physically being there due to the fear of getting infected. Sure, many people showed support through social media platforms, but it wasn’t as effective.
While something like a Twitter storm can be advantageous to those who support a cause from another part of the world, this sort of activism is manipulative. More often than not, the government has tried to tell apps like Twitter and Facebook to take down posts that go against the ruling party.
Many people have also called social media activism ‘lazy’, and such posts have been dismissed by the authorities and society alike, stating that people who have typed a message from the comforts of their home don’t care about the cause but have decided to go with the tide. People’s voices need to be heard for the message to get across!
But the thing that we need to understand here is that it doesn't have to be just one solution to this. While it is crucial not to let anything stop us from communicating our opinions, we can't overlook our safety. The solution has to be a combination of various means that might not be as effective individually, but they do the job when used together. For example, small protests spread across different cities, where people follow pandemic safety guidelines, can be used. Others who cannot join them can help by crowdfunding the rallies, as we saw during the farmer protests. Twitter storms, too, with the help of proper use of ethos, can also coerce the government to pay attention.
In conclusion, we must adapt our strategies to our needs in this pandemic-struck world, and we can all be part of the solution.
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