Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

About 1,000 demonstrators stage a sit-in protest against media monopolization on Ketagalan Boulevard in front of the Presidential Office in Taipei on New Year’s Day, asking President Ma Ying-jeou to respond to their demands.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times

During the year-end celebrations, Taiwanese youth and students showed they care about society and helping others by initiating rallies and lending movements their boundless energy and creativity, from picking up street trash and protesting against monopolization of the media to supporting laid-off workers.

This is a dramatic change from the recent past, when youth and students often gave the impression that they were self-indulgent, engaging in frivolous activities, thrill-seeking, all-night parties and shallow celebrity worship.

While tens of thousands of people rejoiced at various venues around the nation on New Year’s Eve to celebrate the arrival of 2013, a few hundred people, the majority of them students, huddled at Liberty Square in Taipei and later in front of the Presidential Office, to show their concern for the future of their country.

Braving cold temperatures and rain, the young Taiwanese held their fourth protest in little more than a month, and the fifth since September, against the threat of media monopolization and growing Chinese influence within the industry.