Delacroix showed it right: It’s not hunger or ideologies what guides revolt. IT’S NEED OF FREEDOM WHAT KEEPS LEADING PEOPLE.

Marianne in Tunisia – By Robert Zaretsky | Foreign Policy.

“Marianne embodies not just the form of ancient Greek models — Winged Victory of Samothrace is perhaps the most powerful inspiration — but also channels the many instances of (fully clothed) women in the streets who helped the wounded and hauled paving stones to the barricades. In fact, Delacroix was in part inspired by the contemporary account of Marie Deschamps, who took her fallen brother’s place on a Parisian barricade. Tunisian women have acted with similar courage. There is the example of Khaoula Rachidi, a university student in Tunis beaten by Salafists when she tried to prevent them from replacing the Tunisian flag with the black Salafi banner on her campus, and that of Besma Khalfaoui, the wife of Belaid, who declared that her husband’s assassination “gives us reason to hope” — hope, of course, that those who believed the revolution did not need to be defended will now wake up.” … inspirational.