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On the day after the terrorist attacks in Madrid, the Spanish people
came out in enormous numbers to demonstrate against the travesty. On
March 12th, something like 11 million people, a quarter of the
population, showed their solidarity
and their resolve to oppose terrorism by coming out for peaceful
gatherings in all the major cities. The demonstrations began at noon
with a 15-minute work stoppage for a silent commiseration. Public
figures including the prime minister invited people to gather in
peaceful demonstrations. News reports indicated that 75% of the people
in Zaragoza came out, and such extraordinary participation was evident
in other cities. A widely published photo shows the wide
streets and central
squares of Madrid totally covered in dots of color -- the umbrellas of
millions of people.
It is worth looking at the graphs for the previous day, when the attacks
occurred. They show a strong negative trend that seems symbolically
appropriate to the terrible negative event. In marked contrast, for
this day of demonstrations, with people coming together to share their
emotions and commitments, the trend is symbolically positive.
The formal analysis period was set for noon to midnight local time
(11:00 to 23:00 GMT).
During this time the trend is generally positive, with some extreme
spikes, as can be seen in the following figure. The trend culminates in
a marginally significant deviation, with a
Chisquare of 43686 on 43200 df and p = 0.049.
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