Tag Archives: what is socialism like

From Friday till Saturday morning, just over 200 people stood in the Mary’s Square, by the church, and didn’t say one word out loud. It was a mute protest. That silence was the expression of fear and the reflection of the psychological incapacity for people to connect to each other and form a mob. As far as people knew, everyone except the handful of people they came with could have been Informers or undercover Secret Police agents; starting the riot could have easily resulted in the agitators being swarmed and thorn limb to limb by the 200 undercover Police agents. Just because everyone was saying that they were there to protect Tőkés, that doesn’t mean it was true. In socialist Romania, nothing was true until it proved itself to be true. The fear of not knowing who you can trust, and not being sure that the other ones are with you or against you were so debilitating that the mob mentality was unable to kick in and take over the crowd. This is what extreme fear in a society looks like; people can become psychologically disabled and unable to rise up and protest. Continue reading →