This morning I read an article in Foreign Policy about the YouTube effect and its “force for political and economic change” targeting teenagers. This article only confirmed to me how powerful the Internet is. The Internet has been the main tool in exchanging information for quite a few years, but now, with websites like YouTube it is taking the information exchange to the next level.
I discovered YouTube a few months ago. Mostly it was for me to keep in touch with my home country: Uzbekistan. I used it to mainly keep up with the latest movies, pop culture, and other cultural activities in Uzbekistan and in former Soviet Republics. Nostalgia and the fact that I cannot visit the place of my birth for now tortures me sometimes. However, as I started learning more about YouTube I found out that it is more than just music videos, movies, and other types of entertainment. I started finding news clips and opinions that you don’t see in the mainstream U.S. media or from other mainstream media sources around the world.
Unfortunately, I only came to realization of the real power of “YouTube” on a very sad day for any Uzbek. On May 13, 2005, in the city of Andijan thousands of peaceful demonstrators came out to Babur square (the main square in Andijan city) to call for better economic conditions. The Uzbek government released their version of the Andijan events claiming that 187 people died (including) soldiers from the Uzbek military and Islamic extremists. However, thanks to YouTube, I was able to find out that human rights organizations and the opposition in Uzbekistan believed that about 700 innocent civilians were massacred that day.
Such events as Andijan events, and the incident that the Foreign Policy article describes about Chinese soldier shooting Tibetan monks, make viewers see things in a completely different way. To see two or three different versions of the same event really gives people a perspective. In the case of countries where the media is controlled by the state YouTube allows people to often have access to more objective news sources. Just like the article states, it does give an opportunity for everyone to jump on the bandwagon and air their opinions. I think that YouTube could also help unite or improve the dialogue of mostly scattered democratic opposition to authoritarian governments such as Belarus, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan (the future of which is now in question). It can also be a tool for the youth to participate in the decision making process. We need to find ways to utilize this new technology such as YouTube to help people that want to bring about democratic and economic reforms in their respective countries.
Published Date: January 10, 2007