Arabs are restless. They are breaking the invisible chains with great rebel. The world is changing rapidly. There is less and less tolerance for inhuman conditions. Surely there are organizations that guard these things or countries that claim to have an interest in freeing the oppressed, in different regions of the world. Still subjugation has lived on in various parts of the world.
Now the fortress built on fear, tradition, habit or whatever it might have been, is being pushed down with a flood of people on the street. It is a new era. Every action taken to stop it, makes it only stronger.
Globalization has had many side effects; some are bad some are good. It has ensured that people from opposite ends of the globe, have an idea on each other’s life styles. American movies have created a global awareness on certain American values.
This acknowledgement embedded somewhere in people’s subconscious, along with the Internet has had an effect on people that cannot be reversed. Whether it is the Far East, the Middle East, Eastern Europe or South America, people long for a comfortable life style. They would like to be able to consume and live at ease lives. Longing for a decent life, is a simple desire.
When one has no reference point to compare with, it is easier to keep people oppressed. In today’s world, it is impossible to deny access to information on different cultures. As long as anyone is connected to the Internet, they see the world while sitting in their room. The World Wide Web is very difficult to restrict. As soon as a website is shut down, people figure out a different way of accessing it.
One of the great heroes of this era is Julian Assange and his team. Through the leaked American cables, many of the oppressed nations, had the corruptness of their state, rubbed in their face. They might have been aware of it, but to have it rubbed in the face seemed to have had a tremendous triggering effect in Tunisia. A young man, who has a college degree, could find no work, therefore sold produce in a cart on the street. When the cops confiscated his cart, he felt so hopeless that he burned himself. His act symbolized all the suffering that the people were enduring, while their leaders were living an extravagant life. That is not acceptable anymore.
Times have changed. If one revolution fails, in a few years another one will happen until people are freed. Certain aspects of their cultures, was helping to keep the browbeaten places under control. It might not be the exact same thing in Tunisia and somewhere in South America. Still, it had to do with the “high power distance” existing in most of the subjugated places. Respect for authority was easily abused.
Yet, cultures are not pure anymore. Every culture is influenced by the other. Almost every American is very familiar with Eastern food. Almost every Easterner is very familiar with American movies. Different cultures adopt, what they feel they lack from other cultures.
Assange’s selfless act of letting the world know of any kind of injustice or game plan on certain nations, has given “the bound to happen act of rebel” a push in the right direction. The cables were very informative, on the twisted things going on in many countries.
It’s not like America has anything to do with the corrupt attitude of Ben Ali or many others. American diplomats’ observation has drawn a clear picture of some situations that were maybe known but not talked about. Tunisia was surely aware of the fact that Ben Ali and his family were taking whatever they felt like, living the life, while disregarding the rest of the nation’s needs. Anyone who dared speak up was probably silenced right away.
Who’s going to silence the diplomat, who did not want to share his thoughts in the first place?
Somehow the fact that the cables were private correspondences makes them only so much more reliable. Those words were not part of any agenda, but pure observations. Although some Americans feel disturbed that their diplomatic cables could be leaked “just like that” something good is coming out of it.
In many ways, America is possibly the most just civilization in the world, therefore American perspective on corrupt countries has just laid it out there for everyone to see.
Bluntly, without any sugar coating…
The rest of the world is focused on American military interest and the fact that they did not really free anyone in Iraq or anywhere else. At the end of the day it was Bradley Manning’s very American values that made him dare stand up against the world, as he felt something was off in Baghdad.
He realized that innocent journalists were being killed in Iraq and where he came from that was wrong, so it shall be wrong everywhere else as well!
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere… Simple as that!
Everyone has assumed that Arabs keep the same leaders for decades, because that is how it is for them.
It is a different culture!
They are like that….etc
Not really! Human are human. Everyone wants to be able to have a decent life. People seem to embrace certain values in oppressed situations and they may even appear to agree with the conditions. That does not mean they like it, but maybe that is the only way to live through it. It is part of human nature to accept what cannot be changed, until it can be changed.
Tycoons from everywhere have enjoyed the benefit of oppressed regions and the ability to easily take the diamonds, oil…or whatever it is that the land offers, through corrupt attitudes of unjust leaders. Times are changing, tycoons and their actions are being exposed, and we should all be happy for that.
After all the more people of the world live happy lives, the less fighting would be necessary. Living in a peaceful world, is a goal that has not been achieved yet.
Empathizing with others, regardless of their nation or religion, the way Bradley Manning or Julian Assange does, seem to be steps in the right direction for a peaceful environment.
After all, no matter where we come from, what we all have in common is that, we are all human beings with basic needs.
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Hi Banu,
as well as allowing a platform for organizing dissent(s). These things take time, so it is interesting that rater than in the ’90s they appear now, exactly with the generation who in most cases spent all its life under the current governements, and with the Internet.
as usual I like your analysis and points of view, opinionated but well documented. The wind of change is great to see, and I agree with you that globalization plays a key role, this is the generation that grew up with it.
I also believe there are a few other factors in play. Demography is one – a large young population has been behind the Romanian revolution not so long ago, and others in the past. And the Middle East today has a very high percentage of young people, in particular in the age range between 23 and 35. Also, in spite of exceptions we could say that at large young adults are more cultivated than ever in the past – and to an extent better off, as many countries put at least the first foot on the development ladder. So the lack of jobs and infrastructure becomes more evident to them as a driving force of society.
Culture plays a big role and my view is that while we cool down from the hyperenthusiasm for globalization (see also reactions in much of the western world), people start to realize that we actually CAN preserve local identities in a more open world. Thus, it is no longer trus that national government are the barrier defending “us” against things like the so called American imperialism, or any other perceived or real external threat. In fact, many national governements have been growing incredibly distant from their own people and more or less openly supported by and bound by a network of international alliances with those very powers they claim to defend their countries from. In that respect, the tranquillity that the Cold War is really over and neither NATO nor the ex-communist block are in willing to interfere helps significantly. Think of the difference between the Tunisian revolution and the Iranian one.
I do not totally agree with your point on Julian Assange, to the extent that in spite of some revelations, a lot of the corruption was actually well-known. And that I believe that some privacy is requited for diplomacy like for individuals – corruption has to be exposed but negotiations such as the ones around Gerusalem may require some margin for manoever. What would even office or family life look like if everyone should tell their honest mind, all the time?
But I believe there is no doubt that the disruptive power of the internet is at play – by setting more and more precedents of open speech and the ” long tail” of communications and information of which your blog is an excellent example
This really gives me hope. That people will take their future in their hands – not leave it with local governements or foreign interventions. And other countries and governements will have to trust that the change is for good in the post cold-war world. It also makes me hope that there is a way other than the shock of cultures, if more democracy and multilateralism takes hold. That unlike some people fear, the Middle East and the Muslim communit(ies) are not deemed to extremism but to openness driven by their own hands and desires. I have had the privilege to see this with my eyes in Tunisia, Pakistan, Egypt and elsewhere in the last years and I have no doubts. I am holding my breath.