About revolution

Week 3

"In the end, this is a story about three crimes. It is also a story about the promiscuity of the Internet, the usefulness of images, and the ways in which they inform, inflect, and hijack how we understand suffering in faraway places."

When I read the article of Negar Azimi "Iran in Pictures - Social Suffering and Three Sets of Images" I was really taken in it. First of all, I haven't heard of all three cases that have been discussed there: the hanging of two gay teenagers called Asgari and Mahoni, the death sentenced Batebi who took part in a student protest and at least Neda Agha-Soltan who got shot during a street demonstration, everything taking place in Iran. All three became figures for the human rights movement in Iran through modern techniques like photo and video and the distribution over social networks. Apart from that I really liked the questioning viewpoint from that reading, that threw up questions like: what about the rape allegation towards the two gay teenagers, that apparently should have raped a 13 year-old boy? Or what if Neda didn't actually attend the demonstration, but was just driving through with her car? Nobody has really mentioned that in their distributed media. But the message at the end is clear: It doesn't really matter if they can change something to the good and if it is just raising awareness.

In this coherence I also really liked to watch the film about Gene Sharp "How to Start a Revolution" by Ruaridh Arrow. The ideas of Gene Sharp really makes one to hope and believe in a better future, the film itself is made up like a promotion and questionable with really dramatic music and a partial view. The trailer can be seen here: