In response to a recent comment from a blogging friend Joanie, from Allegiance and Duty Betrayed http://allegianceanddutybetrayed.blogspot.com/, I post a reminder of times when despots and regimes fell not only in response to external pressure but also the will of the people within.
This is Bucharest on 21 December 1989. President Nicolae Ceausescu is addressing a crowd to condemn an uprising in another Romanian city, Timisoara. The crowd starts out loyally chanting party slogans and clapping out of habit and out of fear. Then somehow, someone starts whistling and jeering the feared president. Like a fire through dried grass it spreads in seconds.
Ceausescu can't quite believe it as he has never been jeered in his life. The coverage is cut quite quickly but I find the spectacle moving of how people who have put up with so much suddenly turn and claim their freedom.
The outcome of this was speedy revolution and Ceausescu was controversially executed 4 days later on 25 December 1989.
This has to offer hope for those living in the several despotic regimes still in existence around the world today as well as all those falling victim to their actions.
True freedom can only be born within although it can sometimes be helped from outside.
(note the party apparatchik in the hat running behind Ceausescu when the crowd starts erupting)
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