Current Events Catch-Up

October 25, 2020

I went to the Current Events Catch-Up hosted by Samantha Zimmerman. It was a laid back environment where we learned about various topics and had the chance to respond after each short presentation was done. One issue that we discussed was the hashtag #endSARS going viral recently. Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) is a policing group in Nigeria that is known for abuse and has existed for three decades. A video of a shooting surfaced on October 4th, bringing light to this issue once again. Another related hashtag was trending: #LekkiMassacre. On the night of October 20th, protesters were singing the national anthem at the Lekki toll gate when the lights suddenly went out and Nigerian security forces began shooting, killing 10 and injuring hundreds more. Nigeria has been ruled by civilians for 21 years now and it is unclear where the country is headed, but it doesn’t look like the protests will end soon. I had never heard of SARS before this hashtag and I think it is interesting how widely it spread. I think it really speaks to the power of social media and how quickly it can raise awareness.

Some other topics that were discussed include Polish President Andrzej Duda testing positive for COVID-19. He isn’t experiencing symptoms but he apologized to everyone he had come into contact with in the days preceding his positive test result. In addition, Spain imposed a new curfew to try and stop the spread of the virus. The curfew is in effect from 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. and comes right as the country is experiencing a second wave of infections.

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