Most people don’t think about singing when they think about revolutions. But song was the weapon of choice when, between 1987 and 1991, Estonians sought to free themselves from decades of Soviet occupation. During those years, hundreds of thousands gathered in public to sing forbidden patriotic songs and to rally for independence.
“The young people, without any political party, and without any politicians, just came together ... not only tens of thousands but hundreds of thousands ... to gather and to sing and to give this nation a new spirit,” remarks Mart Laar, a Singing Revolution leader featured in the film and the first post-Soviet Prime Minister of Estonia. “This was the idea of the Singing Revolution.”
James Tusty and Maureen Castle Tusty’s "The Singing Revolution" tells the moving story of how the Estonian people peacefully regained their freedom--and helped topple an empire along the way.
An idea that time will bring again?
1 comment:
Estonia is a pertinent example of mass immigration deliberately being used to dilute the existing population's sense of nationhood.
As Wikipedia states:
At the end of the 1980s, Estonians perceived their demographic change as a national catastrophe. This was a result of the migration policies essential to the Soviet Nationalisation Programme aiming to russify Estonia – forceful administrative and military immigration of non-Estonians from the USSR coupled with the mass deportations of Estonians to the USSR.
The above passage could have easily read:
At the end of the 2000s, Australians perceived their demographic change as a national catastrophe. This was a result of the migration policies essential to the Federal Population Replacement Programme aiming to Asianise Australia – encouraged economic and humanitarian immigration of non-Europeans from Asia and elsewhere coupled with the mass white flight of Australians to Europe and North America.
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