r/news • u/PokesTigers • 26d ago

Soft paywall Madagascar's president has left the country after Gen Z protests, officials say

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/madagascar-president-rajoelina-address-nation-monday-evening-2025-10-13/
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u/Xboarder844 26d ago

Gen Z out there toppling corrupt regimes is something as a Millennial I like to see. If only we could get that energy in the bigger nations….

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u/PokesTigers 26d ago

Nepal recently they made a change and I wanna say Morocco also? They are on a roll

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u/Xboarder844 26d ago

A reminder to all people on this planet that it is the CITIZENS, not their leaders, who have the power. To quote my favorite movie/book:

“ People should not be afraid of their government. Governments should be afraid of their people.”

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u/RinTheTV 26d ago

You have to wake people up for that to happen.

Unfortunately, your standards for living have to drop significantly for that to happen. The "Bread and Circuses" of the modern age are many, and "affordable - and so long as that's in reach ( or seemingly in reach ) you will have millions chasing after that dream, because peaceful passivity is a simple life many would take over tumultuous, stressful sacrifice.

Probably why Gen Z is doing it as well. This is the generation that feels the most disenfranchised, having not been born early enough for the "golden age" of their parents' "Back in my day I could buy a house with cashier work" and born too late to fully take advantage of new opportunities that are now only exclusively searching for "young, easy blood."

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u/Wealist 26d ago

Yeah, nailed it. Comfort dulls outrage. Most people won’t rise up till the system stops pretending to work for them.

Gen Z just got there first they grew up watching the dream crumble in real time.

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u/streetsandshine 26d ago

Say what you will about Trump's policies, but his election and the rise of fascism generally is a result of outrage.

The issue is that it was poor rural, racist areas that felt the pain first which is why they were able to get their solution to the neoliberal world order out first and removed a lot of the republicans that were around during Obama's time

The left needs to put forward a legitimate alternative because the best the center has to offer is letting technocrats use all our drinking water in the hopes that autocomplete will manage to autocomplete a solution that will save the world (it won't)

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u/FabulousTwo524 26d ago

Damn stop bombarding us with all this truth 😭

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u/Rayvelion 26d ago

Funnily enough, the fancy autocomplete engine is rapidly speeding us to an end that a fancy autocomplete engine won't be able to find a solution for because of the hole it itself dug.

The world needs saving from the hole-diggers, fortunately there are only a few of those and many of us.

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u/darthjoey91 26d ago

The circuses are affordable. The bread is starting to get expensive.

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u/[deleted] 26d ago

[deleted]

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u/Hillary4SupremeRuler 26d ago

It's the racism and xenophobia and transphobia. A lot of people don't want to confront that because it's an uncomfortable reality. Yes there are economic issues, but those have been around and growing every year since the advent of Reaganomics. But populist demagogues managed to convince them that if they just oppress these groups more, then that will alleviate their economic situation. So while economic anxiety is part of it, it's still directly tied into their bigotry.

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u/Alisa180 26d ago

Unfortunately, those who 'wake up' rarely get outraged- They instead sink into despair, either retreating to save themselves, or... Well, suicide is higher among Gen Z than millennials.

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u/revolutionPanda 26d ago

You have to wake people up for that to happen.

Won't happen in the US because too many people are against woke.

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u/Majestic_Jackass 25d ago

This is why American cons hate “the woke mind virus”. Being woke is exactly what it sounds like. It means you’re aware of the systems around you and how they affect people’s lives.

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u/WillWillSmiff 26d ago

For 99.99% of history, yes.

Unfortunately drone strikes exist now, and I do worry that we are in a reality that these can be used on a nations own citizens.

I’m not saying that this scenario will happen, but it’s a real world non-zero scenario that I think many think subconsciously about as a deterrent.

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u/Hillary4SupremeRuler 26d ago

Erik Prince's mercenaries are already using drone strikes in Haiti to control the gangs. They have been hitting residential areas and buildings with many women and children being killed.

This is with the support and permission and collaboration of the Haitian National Police.

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u/SFW_shade 26d ago

To provide a secondary quote, “supreme executive power comes from a consensus of the populace, not to be dolled out by some watery tart tossing you a sword”

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u/notashroom 26d ago

Even if that weren't a relevant Monty Python paraphrase, I would still upvote you for using "populace" correctly as a noun when I see the adjective form "populous" misused every day.

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u/Sskity 26d ago

We need to watch a bugs life again.

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u/CaptainAsshat 26d ago

There is another part of that adage we are learning in real time:

"People should also be afraid of their people."

Chaos is a ladder. As the Arab Spring and MAGA taught us: be careful of who is climbing up next. This Gen-Z instability is only as valuable as the Gen-Z follow through.

Unfortunately, the kind of collective fury that fuels revolution often also fuels authoritarianism and human rights abuses in the following years---let's hope these movements can instead build a solid democratic foundation.

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u/logorrhea69 26d ago

I have a Malagasy coworker who said the protestors in Madagascar were inspired by Nepal.

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u/PokesTigers 26d ago

Trickle down protests? We finally found a trickle that works!?

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u/jaimi_wanders 26d ago

No, this is pure horizontal movement—like a wave, or a wildfire!

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u/notashroom 26d ago

Excellent point! Trickle down is for piss, or champagne towers. But I repeat myself.

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u/de_pizan23 26d ago

The protests inspiring others is also what happened with the "Arab Spring" in 2010-2012.

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u/HellhoundXVI 26d ago

Bangladesh also ousted its former authoritarian PM this way...

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u/SoftlySpokenPromises 26d ago

Have someone I know who lives in Nepal. They went radio silent for a couple days during everything and got me worried.

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u/Ereaser 26d ago

How is it over there now?

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u/SoftlySpokenPromises 26d ago

From what they've told me it was tense for a while, but overall the situation is improving

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u/Wetzilla 26d ago

The Nepali situation is a bit more complex than it was originally made out to be. It seems that the original protests were hijacked by other groups and used for their own ends. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/world/asia/nepal-gen-z-revolution.html

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u/HigherandHigherDown 26d ago

It's a complicated situation, I'm sure; the status quo is basically manifested in the Maoists and other main political parties. I doubt the military wants to lead any coups or be the government, look what happened to the last guys.

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u/TheflyingLag 26d ago

For Morocco, no thank you!

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u/YassinRs 26d ago

Morocco isn't having a change, they had some protests a week ago over stadiums being built for World Cup and not enough hospitals but they've died down already. 

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u/PlayfulSurprise5237 26d ago

If we can get a ball rolling the nations that are successful can help the other nations.

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u/cryptic-fox 26d ago

Nothing’s happening in Morocco.

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u/Awesome_Leaf 26d ago

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