Greece’s Great Fight for the Future

Blog post by Allen Bryan (Bryan.262)

(Image by psyberartist, September 11, 2013, Omonoia, Athens, Attica. CC 2.0.)

This is an article that was published in 2015 detailing the some of the economic issues Greece has had to face since their [economic] collapse in 2012. The article begins with a quick history of the last time the country came together as a whole to vote on a pressing issue, which, at the time, was one regarding the future of democracy within Greece. Now, nearly 41 years later, the country is coming together once again to vote to either reject or accept a referendum submitted by the European Commission. Without going into great detail about this referendum, if accepted it will essentially bail out the Greek economy in exchange for 2 new austerity measures. These measures are, and I quote: “reforms for the completion of the current program and beyond” and “preliminary debt sustainability analysis.” The remainder of the article was essentially different posts from various citizens and journalists on twitter regarding the incidents that were happening in the country such as pictures of people waiting in line to withdraw money from their banks. Along with these posts, there were also a few additional notes from the author of the article about Europe’s reaction to all of this, the turmoil within the Greek political scene, and lastly, a quick note on what the future may hold.

The evidence used in this article came mostly from the tweets from the citizens and journalists that were both detailing what was happening and also critiquing them as well. Most of the critiques came from the journalists, analysts, and foreign political figures, however, while most of the pictures of what was going on within the country were by the bystanders. The pictures and statements (tweets) made by the public should probably be taken with a grain of salt for a variety of reasons. The first is that I have no way of knowing where the pictures that were used came from, how old they were, or the validity of them, the second reason is that tweets could be photoshopped or edited to say whatever the editor wants, meaning that they may not even be real, and lastly, because many of the tweets were written in Greek and translated afterwards for use in this article, and not knowing Greek I simply have to take the word of the translator that the information given is what the originator of the tweet intended. That being said, they could also very well be valid but more research would need to be done. The journalist, analyst, and political figures, on the other hand, are more valid due to their credibility. The same skepticism applies in terms of the editing of the tweets, however, but the core information and reactions given within them are powerful and detail some of the emotions and criticisms of what was going on in this region a few years ago.

Lastly, when it comes to perspectives, I once more turn to the various tweets that were cited in the article. These tweets not only give us a range of information and possible evidence as stated previously but, if real, they also show a range of perspectives as well. The tweets by the public are more raw to me. By that I mean you can truly see (in the pictures) the sense of emotion people are feeling. In almost all of these pictures, people are waiting, either sitting on a set of stairs or they are in line for the ATM/bank. This sense of “waiting”, “longing”, etc, is prevalent in not only the article but within the entire country as well. After the economic collapse in 2012 many people have been in a sort of ‘limbo’, waiting to see what will happen to them, and I believe this article, and in particular, the tweets from the public do a good job at showing this side of the public. The other tweets by the journalists, analysts, and political figures serve more as a “critical perspective”, that being in the form of criticism of the government of Greece, and in some instances of the Prime Minister and the decisions he’s made. These tweets show more of the frustrations and political impacts rather than the more personal and emotional ones such as those from the public. I believe the inclusion and use of these tweets from the writer of the article was a very good use of social media and it also demonstrates how much of a gold mine sites such as Twitter can be for journalists who, otherwise, would have had to go out to the streets interviewing anyone who would allow it to gather information about the public perspective. I’m certain many reporters did this as well, but the ease of using Twitter to gauge public makes the job that much easier, efficient, and cheaper.