Extreme Muslim “Salafi” activists and the Tunisian government have reacted strongly to a video of Tunisian secondary school students performing the infamous “Harlem Shake”, prompting student protests.
Following a string of homemade videos worldwide of groups attempting the “Harlem Shake” dance – which features a single dancer performing the move joined by a crowd of people in fancy-dress gyrating wildly – Tunisian secondary school students from a school in Mendah, a Tunis suburb, also produced a video.
A student performs the dance alone, and is soon joined by a crowd of fellow students dressed in Salafi attire and as Gulf emirs, while some wear only underwear.
The video – which went viral – prompted a stream of similar videos across the country, angering the extreme Muslim Salifi group, which lobbied the government and launched violent attacks on teenagers participating in the trend across the country.
Acceding to pressure, the Tunisian Ministry of Education suspended the headmaster of the school in question, with education minister Abdellatif Abid announcing an investigation into the headmaster for allowing the filming of “indecent” material within school grounds.
Students have hit back by hacking the Ministry of Education’s website, with calls going out across social media proposing a mass “Harlem Shake” be performed outside the Ministry on Friday.
The fad has also hit home in Egypt, where students have formed the “Satiric Revolutionary Struggle”, with the mission of making political statements through humourous methods, including performing the dance in front of the Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Cairo.
Young people across Northern Africa see the light-hearted videos as a way of protesting against the regimes being implemented in the countries, the jubilation of the videos set in direct contrast to the oppression of certain political regimes.
