The square-Fathia

The Square is a documentary centered on the 2011 revolutions that occurred in Egypt. This film shows an inside look into all of the things that were not publicizd for the world to witness. This film was told from the video camera of 6 individuals who believed that the Egyptian government should have the people's intrest at heart, rather than the politics. One important theme that continuously came up was perseverance. The revoultionaries were able to take down Mubarak, the military forces,then the Brotherhood. Throughout that time, they believed in their cause and didn't stray from the idea of having a government surrounded in the demands of the people. This documentary was very enlightening in that it showed the struggle that people were living with on a day to day basis. The revolution was not easy, and this film highlighted that by showing the brutality. In the first few minutes, there's pictures from the Facebook page of people who were beaten so badly that they look unrecognizable. One weakness I think was that the film didn't show what happened during that 6 month gap. It left me wondering why they didn't show anything, and what the people thought during that time.
I think that social media played an enormous role in the uprisings. During that time many people around the world didn't really know what was going on. I know that before the YouTube videos startated, it didn't seem like Egypt was such a mess, but once those videos were out it forced people to take a look and pay attention. All the negative attention that the Egyptian government was receiving was probably the catalyst that made them shut down the Internet. I think social media plays a big role because it gives people to show what's going on with it being filtered. In China, the government shut down the Internet after the riots that occurred in Hong Kong.
In The Square, there was a song that Ahmad was singing after the army came and kicked them out of the square. In it he sang " Egypt mother of the world, land of mine". It made me think of all the protests that are going on all over the world, and it made me realize that the protests in Egypt helped people see the injustice that was going on in their own country and want to change it.