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OPINEWS

Why numbers don't dampen protest

Politiko 2026-07-20 13:01:26

Luciano Boçi
There is a diabolical enthusiasm among some representatives and bartenders of the majority media, who think that history is measured by a drone or a calculator.
They boast and broadcast that a protest is worth as much as the people counted in an evening and that an aerial photograph can replace the pulse of a society.
But protests are not a census, a population census.
Those who rush to declare the end of a movement because a rally has fewer participants confuse a moment with a process. Every protest, without exception, goes through peaks and troughs.
No important civic movement in the different countries and times when it has developed has maintained the same intensity every day. Even the protests that changed the history of their countries had empty days, fatigue, doubts but also stronger comebacks.
The real question about the protest on its 50th day is not how many people came out today.
The question is whether the reason why they came out has changed?
If corruption continues, the arrogance of power remains, the injustice has not been resolved, then the protest remains.
And it is there strong for these strong reasons.
It may change form or even pace. But the reason does not disappear why the number of people in a square falls.
The excited majority mistakenly confuse silence with reconciliation. The absence of a crowd with the absence of anger. And they forget the essential, because a protest is not measured only by the feet walking on the boulevard.
It is measured by the conversations that take place in families, by the fear that the government tries to hide, by the energy that forces propaganda to justify itself every day. It is measured by the fact that the government feels the need to deal with it even when it claims that it is over.
It is measured by the aggressiveness it shows towards those who support and reflect the protest.
If the protest were truly insignificant, the government would ignore it. It would not mobilize cameras, analysts, taxes, police, statistics and statements to prove that it has failed.
No one fights with what they consider dead.
But the opposite happens. The government is fighting with what is alive.
Therefore, numbers are important and they are not everything. They show how many people were in the square. They do not show how many people were disappointed, how much trust was lost and how long a society can be kept under pressure.
Often, revolts do not win when they reach the maximum number. They win when they reach the point where the government understands that it can no longer govern reality with propaganda alone.
The numbers can fluctuate. The cause, not.
And as long as the cause remains, the protest has not faded. It is simply taking a breath, to return whenever the government remembers that the picture of one day is the picture of history. History, fortunately for the citizens and unfortunately for propaganda, is not so easy to count.