History is replete with such examples when student activism was the voice against every injustice, brutality, and violence not only in the campus environment but also targeted other national issues and played a great role in shaping the countries may it be in humanitarian and educational aspects or economical and political ones. Riots over hunger to the ones over the failings of the system have been lead efficiently by the youth and the outcomes were positive and fruitful.
But today, in such crucial times when every second this student activism is needed, for the sustenance of the privileges of some oligarchical classes, certain obstacles are hurled upon this, and many times, the voices are curbed. The portrayal of certain incidents below reveals how student activism is been put at stake in an obscured way by the authorities.
Table of Contents
Social Media Suppression
Social media has always been one of the major targets of every revolutionary movement led by the students to depict pain and exhaustion. Every issue is first addressed in life, then the social media aid is taken as protests and riots are the last options left. But presently, social media platform is being snatched from activists and they are compelled to opt for protest as the very first option to make their concerns heard.
It’s been a ritual of this society to inflict violence upon the controversial speaker. The arrest of Hong Kong students for speaking up on social media shows how afraid these weak powers are of a mere post. Again, the incident of how students of Foreman Christian College in Pakistan are being threatened with expulsion from the educational institute for raising their voices against the failings of their institute on the social media platform. Such insecure powers had made it difficult for youth to express their views freely without monetization.
Police Assault and Student Activism
When nothing was able to stop this student activism, the only option left for the powerful authorities to mute their voices was assault. This brutal behavior is bravely encountered by the students just to stabilize the vulnerability of the circumstances they are facing. The way students were attacked in Atlanta by the police forces to stop their protest against the murder of George Floyd. And then this all happening was then justified under the tag of COVID-19.
Similarly, in Pakistan, the peaceful protest by the students for the leniency in fees during the online education and the availability of the internet in Quetta resulted in the arrest of those students. This all is not new this assault happened back then when in 1986, university uprisings were on fire in the United Kingdom, and even now. Every other recent situation permitting assault to stop gatherings is just another excuse for their already piled-up lies.
Murdering Student Activists
All this had not been kept to censorship and assault but resulted in the ruthless murder of not only the potential of several student activists but also their lives like the Caleb, in America, who faced this wrath for speaking about his traumatic experience because of the presence of police in Chicago Public Schools and resisted against their presence in the educational institutes. What he faced was not a positive response but was his own extinction.
This all is done just to stop students from joining such an active and revolutionary platform that can put the authorities at stake. But authorities these days are not ready to accept the criticism in a positive way and are putting this student activism at stake. These inhumane tactics are used to hinder student activism when we all know history is full of such examples when this all brought positive changes.
