also how were revolutions started ?

No we can't have revolutions in this day and age. Just look about 12 or so years ago in Ontario. Unions tried to do something like this to protest agaisnt the PC goverment at the time. They called it "Days of Action" and shut a city down because the goverment was making too much cuts to welfare and other soical polices.

What happened? People cried, they complained, that thier life was being disrupted, and said the uninons and or people had no right to shut a city down to protest. This is basically like all over North America. Not too sure about Mexico so I should say Canada and United States. As long as it doesn't effect them, people don't want to do anything. Espically if you are Canadian. No matter what the goverment does, raise taxes, all we do is Cry, complain and do nothing about it. And if someone tires to do something about, us Canadians just complain about the people who are doing something about it.

So no, at least in North America you can't have a revolution. Now if you talk Europe, maybe. I like how in Greece and France, the people are not happy they can shut down the entire country, and then the goverment listens.

Why, what are you planning OP?

If you mean the kind of revolt along the lines of blowing up governement buildings and declaring war on the U.S. gov't then good luck. I'll be on the other side shooting at you, along with millions of other gov't and military people. But if you mean a revolution where you protest for a change in policy, well, that can happen any day.

There is always potential for revolution. Governments and media can play their part in keeping the lid on any potential unrest but if enough people have got the taste for revolution it can and will happen.

If you mean blood and guns and raising a different kind of flag on a 400 year old government building then no. It just won't happen. Technology and other factors have simply changed the way the world works.

Vive la révolution!

These days, a revolutuion would probably consist of a bunch of lawsuits (I won't discuss in depth, but there is an ongoing revolutuion in Tibet)

Give me 500,000 armed men and I'll come back with the answer in about two years.

If BSG announced Skyrim would be cancelled, yes.

In rich industrialized countries, most likely not. The problem is that people are too comfy with their bourgeois individual(ist) lives and they simply don't care for being directly involved in greater causes anymore. They'd rather nitpick about their corn flakes tasting funny than giving a flying eh thingy about their country, even if it was in great peril. From speaking to people I'm afraid they'd even go "ah well let's wait and see how this works out" if their country announced it wouldn't organize elections anymore. Where I live, people HATE to vote. A lot of people just keep jabbering about rights they just invented minutes ago, cry about being a victim, but all feeling of responsibility has gone MIA a long time ago.

Can a revolution happen? I think it's become almost impossible for small groups to overthrow a government like the Bolsheviks did with the Tsarist regime in Russia just because intelligence networks are so good at picking them up before they become a threat (just look at the terror attempts all over the West that are foiled from the beginning).

Populist revolutions are still possible. It depends who controls the army and how pissed off your average citizen is. If a corrupt regime has the support of the army and police then violent revolutions aren't really going to happen unless the people can arm themselves, which is almost impossible to do for the same reason as a minority revolution is impossible. However, if a government is so blatantly out of line that the only thing stopping the army and police from joining the party is the chain of command then that government's time is limited. If the vast majority of people are united in shaking up the status quo then it's going to be shaken up through sheer force.

However, I don't think that a smart dictator would look at the cyclical nature of revolutions in the past and decide to pull a Stalin on his people. The real danger to freedom is the illusion of democracy (although, despite what some conspirators would like to believe, capitalism =/= automatic oppression). The best slave is one who thinks he is free as they say.

Edit: to the poster above, I would say that all is not lost. Even young generations can be spurred into action if they think they're being screwed over. Just look at how students and students to be in the UK suddenly became interested in politics when it was announced that they would have to pay more to go to uni. Now if only they could direct that passion at something that's actually unfair...

I was delighted to see them rage through the city. If we were 150 years back, I think they would've pulled through. I like your optimism, good citizen.

They weren't going to do anything. I saw them up close, they were mostly posh kids, women and children under 20. Only the worst sorts had any intention of causing trouble for the hell of it. The rest went off after an hour or two to find a coffee shop.

I sure as hell hope so....

you-tube "Matt Maddox-You are the Resistance". good song, good album.

ha ha I'm with you comrade! Vive la révolution!

Seriously um probably not. In the 1960s it was extremely difficult to do, Fidel Castro had a lot of organization, support and backing and even then he had a tough time. Today I think its not really possible to overthrow a government.

I think it might be difficult in the US at this particular moment but the dynamic of population is very quick. In less than 2-3 years, a country can move from very quiet to unstable.
That being said, USA represents 4.4% of the world population. I believe that for the remaining of the world i.e. more than 95%, revolutions can happen.
With guns, with blood...

Very unlikely.

But revolutions still can happen in small African countries where warlords can outgun government troops.... I think...

If enough of the people get onboard.

Also, don't forget that the military are also people, so under the right circumstances it's possible that the people could get a sizable chunk of those guys on their side.

Even so, it's unlikely to have success. The military has tanks, ballistic missiles, Ray guns, choppers etc

I don't care how many gun nuts join the revolution with their handguns and rifles, the chances of success are slim at best.

In many cases, it doesn't make a difference. Take the overthrow of Reza Shah. He had one of the largest and lavishly equipped army in the world and was still overthrown.

I think the bigger issue is that in the west we are unlikely to reach the level of dissatisfaction required to end up with ~1% of the population wanting a revolution. (1% is a amount that works)

Assuming we're talking about North America and Western Europe here, I'd say that technology and ideology are completely irrelevant. Violent revolutions won't happen here because our lives are so damn good. If every Russian peasant had a nice house, a car, a television and enough food on the table to not starve, than the communist revolution would never have happened and Russia would still be ruled by a Tsar. The large mass of the population won't risk their life if they have something to lose.

If every Russian peasant had had that in 1917, Britain ought to have surrendered it's leadership to the Tsar.

There are ongoing revolutions in various countries around the world at the moment. But I presume you mean in countries like those of Western Europe and North America? In which case I think probably the time for large scale political revolution has passed, but there is still space for revolutionary acts in society.

Those tend to be characterised as "terrorism".

Nah, that's not what I was talking about. Contemporary terrorism isn't very revolutionary, politically speaking.

You get people angry enough, they'll do something.

Civilization is a surprisingly thin veneer.