For a major demonstration on Hungarian national day on October 23, 2011, a group of artists produced a music video entitled I Don’t Like the System! – in reference to the ‘Like’ button on Facebook. The video received nearly 900,000 views on YouTube. The singer in the video is Dorottya Karsay, a young sociologist involved in feminist and anti-racist groups. Since the success of the video, she has become the voice of the civil Hungarian opposition. In a country shifting even further to the right under President Viktor Orbán, resistance is forming primarily through mobilisation on the internet. The networking of civil initiatives and local groups into a pro-democratic movement is the aim, as well as the strengthening of the rights of the minorities who are being systematically marginalized by Orbán’s nationalistic policies. Digital activism understands itself here as the struggle for more democracy at the centre of Europe.
in English
Dorottya Karsay is an activist in Budapest. She works with a number of grassroots initiatives against oppressive measures targeting minorities in Hungary and the systemic destruction of rule of law, human rights, and democracy. She is also an LGBTQ activist and the Spokesperson of Budapest Pride. In 2011 she was active in one of Hungary’s pro-democracy movements aiming to strengthen civil society.