Yes, this is finally a post with some real comments about the situation in Egypt. Or, more exactly, comments inspired by the situation in Egypt, but extrapolated and seen as general issues. That’s because yesterday’s events have once again proven the point I mean to make, so there’s no better time for it. Then again, waiting longer could perhaps provide evidence to back my proposed solutions as well, but the situation is so fluid you really can’t tell what will happen next.
As you have probably noticed from the above paragraph, this will be a pretty rushed post, so I won’t be providing links for everything as I’d do otherwise. I’m trying to throw this on here while I still can and before the situation changes dramatically once again, or at least not too long after it will change, considering the news that are coming in just as I’m starting to write this. In case someone’ll read this, I’m sure you can find links and reports on your own if you’re so inclined. It’s hard enough for me to take a break from following the events to write this anyway, and in fact I’ll be writing it in bits and pieces, constantly throwing glances to see what else is going on. So expect it to make even less sense than my writing usually does…
In fact, I will start this with a few tweets that were just posted by a protester. One says: “Protesters in front of presidential palace are just standing around and socializing. This is what I get for protesting with the upper middle class.” The second says: “Not a single chant at presidential palace. Posh upper middle class tires easily. We need the Tahrir lot here!” While the third says: “Never protest with the rich crowd. They aren’t angry enough.” (I have slightly edited them, considering how you are pretty much forced to post on Twitter.)
What is described in those tweets is a completely pointless type of protest: People who just show up for the sake of showing up, unwilling to do pretty much anything, not even as part of a group. They are, therefore, very easy to simply ignore by those they claim to be protesting against. In fact, it’s pretty hard for anyone to take them into account and the real protesters, those who are actually willing to fight for their cause, are completely entitled to feel at least somewhat annoyed by them, if not completely outraged by their lack of willingness to actually, well, participate!
But mere chants don’t accomplish too much either. Yesterday’s events have proven that yet again, not that additional evidence was necessary in any way. Those who want to preserve the status quo can still do so in the face of mere words, no matter how inspired or loud they may be. They can just reply with their own words, as Mubarak and Suleiman did yesterday, or perhaps ignore the protests completely. Quite simply, mere words are not a real threat, they don’t directly endanger them in any way, so there’s no real reason for them to do what’s asked of them. I mean, if the rulers cared about what the people wanted, there would be no protests in the first place, so there’s little point for the protesters to simply express their demands in such a peaceful manner.
In truth, such peaceful protests inconvenience regular citizens far more than the rulers. As a result, under some circumstances they can backfire, causing people who don’t participate in them to take action against them, even though they don’t support the status quo. Such a development was a real danger in Egypt until only a few days ago. Luckily, in this one case, recently more and more workers have started going on strikes and therefore joining the protests in their own way, so this danger seems to have passed, but in many other situations things don’t work out like this and the “silent majority” can break away from only tacitly supporting the status quo by doing nothing and actually end up taking action against protesters, simply because they’re becoming inconvenient without truly accomplishing anything.
What works is direct action, violent if need be. Of course, there are more serious consequences to such actions, but nothing worthwhile’s ever easy and things often need to first get much worse before they can get better. You can sit and chant and shout for weeks or months and not achieve much of anything, and likely even end up turning the “silent majority” against you because you’re becoming a real nuisance for them, or you can take matters into your own hands and accomplish your immediate goals in perhaps a few days, or even hours. I think many such movements would have a much higher chance of success and we’d see the changes we need to see much sooner if people would understand this simple fact and do what must be done from the beginning.
For example, to go back to the current situation in Egypt, it seemed all too obvious to me from the beginning that protesters should have rushed to the presidential palace, the government building and other such locations and at the very least start something of a siege, preventing anyone from getting in and turning those who were already inside into their prisoners. Of course, that wasn’t too likely to work right away either, as such important prisoners were likely to be rescued by their loyal troops, not to mention that such buildings are likely to have underground escape routes as well, but it would have been a proper first step. Then, in order to actually achieve victory, they should have stormed inside those buildings and taken over, either as soon as the rulers would have made their escape, when loyal troops would have tried to clear away the protesters or simply after the siege would have stretched on for long enough.
That said, I’ll get back to following the developments, since Egyptians seem to have finally woken up and are gathering around the presidential palace today. The only question is whether or not it’s too late, as it would appear that Mubarak has already left and the army may have had time to pretty much take over, which could result in yet another military dictatorship, which would mean that the Egyptian protesters have waited too long before taking the necessary actions and will only be jumping from the frying pan into the fire.
Even though yesterday was a pretty calm day on all counts, I didn’t do much of anything, so here I am once again struggling on Sunday evening to write a second post for the week. It still won’t be about the situation in Egypt because, quite frankly, I couldn’t possibly say anything more about what’s going on there. I would have preferred this to have ended already, likely after the people would have marched towards the presidential palace in large numbers and forced the army to take sides, but as long as they’ll succeed it’s less important how they do it. What will happen afterwards remains to be seen, but currently what we see in Egypt and lots are lots of heroes the world should at least take one moment to bow down to.
Perhaps, once that revolution will end with the victory of the people, I will manage to extrapolate and write a more generic post about such issues, however. Probably not just about the effects this should and likely will have on the Arab world, and perhaps even beyond, but about what the whole world has to learn from it and where should we go from here. Because there are many lessons to learn and quite a few issues to act on now when the time appears to be right, so it would be a terrible waste not to make use of this moment. Who knows when will there be another.
But, as I said, that’s not the point of this post. Then again, this post doesn’t really have a point other than being the second one written this week, in order to stick to my rule, but something did happen recently and I wanted to point it out. That’s because it can end up having something to do with Global Population Speak Out, as it could help me prepare for what I mean to do this month in order to fulfill my pledge.
What I mean to say is that, as a result of some recent discussions with a couple of people, I was reminded of that sex education forum I was a moderator on for a few years, while being with Andra. In fact, I’m still a moderator on it despite not logging on in some five years, as the administrators never demoted anyone, in fact hardly ever logging on at all. Either way, I somehow ended up posting a message, since I was there, and was asked if I could decide to stay on, for old times’ sake. That prompted me to list the reasons why I perhaps shouldn’t, which included the fact that I’m so radically against having children and that the topic is likely to come up on such a forum, especially since I had already noticed that some of the regular users and even moderators already had children, which automatically meant that I saw them as “enemies” from the start.
Thing is that, though I just expected to be laughed at a little, cursed at a little more and then ignored, especially considering how inactive the forum appears to be, there seem to be a few who felt like starting a conversation on the topic. More surprising is that one appears to even agree with the general idea. The rest, of course, don’t, but I could practice with them, sharpen my claws a little, for the actual actions I have in mind for this month, during GPSO. Which actions really should at least happen next week, since at first I meant to do something this week and obviously didn’t. But those plans of mine will tax me quite a lot, so I could really use this practice first… If I won’t find it too taxing in itself and become even less likely to do anything more.
The plan was to write about the situation in Egypt today, but shit really hit the fan there now, so I’m pretty much glued to the Al Jazeera English live stream and The Guardian’s live coverage of the Egypt protests, following the battles and developments. No way to write something now, since I’m not a reporter who can follow a situation and report on it at the same time. Plus that I’m not keen on reporting situations as they’re developing anyway, instead giving my opinions on the general issue, usually either while things are still in the planning stage or after events have already reached at least a preliminary conclusion.
All I have to say at the moment is that this truly is major. If these protests will succeed, the wave will sweep all through the Arab world, possibly reigniting tensions even in Iran. If they’ll fail, all that momentum will likely be lost and few more things will happen. Of course, the question in either case is what will happen afterwards and what will the consequences be for the entire world. Obviously, if these movements will result in fundamentalists, of any kind, gaining power, as the case has been in Palestine, we’d all be far worse off than now, so some sort of international force should be standing by to make sure that won’t happen. But that same international force should also support the anti-government protesters now, while also looking into reasonable solutions for a temporary government to avoid a power vacuum.
I’m getting back to following the developments now, as this has been hard enough to write while listening to the reports anyway. Perhaps the situation will sort itself out soon enough and I’ll be able to say more then… And, on an unrelated note, also manage to figure out what to do this month for Global Population Speak Out, of course, since that should be my main concern. But there are far too many good fights to fight in this world…
With all the things going on in the world these days, most notably the Egyptian riots, I should be writing something about such issues. But I can hardly keep any track of them and perhaps post a few links here and there, so I won’t. I hope I’ll manage something next week, though there simply seem to be far too many good fights to fight in this doomed world we have created for ourselves. For now, I’ll just say that it’s a good thing that at least some people are starting to do something about a small number of them and leave it at that…
What I’m going to say is that all I could think about yesterday when I woke up was how much I wanted to take a long walk through the snow, before it’ll melt, with her, till we’ll both be all red and frozen. Proper winter days, with a decent amount of snow on the ground and temperatures below freezing, are the only moments when I actually want to go out, so I’d really like to take advantage of this… But it feels so pointless to go out alone, so I end up wasting the opportunity. Not that there’s much of an opportunity, since I’m alone, as I said…
Either way, that train of thought continued with us making it back in that state, then immediately having a quickie after only throwing our jackets off, unbuttoning or unzipping our pants and moving the underwear out of the way, to warm up a little. Which is something that basically never happened and I’m not even sure I’d actually want it if it was a possibility, but it seemed like the proper way to continue that little scenario. Yet that was only a small interlude, as then we’d go to our room, throw all clothes off, pick up towels and books and go take a bath. Or, more exactly, go soak in warm water while reading for a while, which is what usually happened when we took a bath together and would feel even better after such a walk. Then at some point I’d start playing with her, as it happened whenever she didn’t stop me, and we’d end up doing something, coming out of there perhaps a couple of hours later, clean, satisfied and perhaps a little tired. And each with probably another chapter or two read as well.
Needless to say, that little scenario was still in my mind when I woke up today as well, along with the associated sadness that it’s just a scenario in my mind and impossible in reality for well over five years now. In fact, what made it worse was that I somehow came out of a dream convinced that she was next to me and all I had to do was reach over and hug her, making it even worse when I realized that was just a dream. Been quite some time since the last time that happened. So I’m just moping around and feeling like shit, as always… Only even more so…
Yes, I know what happened yesterday, but today is a new day and the first things I saw on-line after waking up certainly make it look like a really good one. Of course, each of the things that make it a good day so far can still turn out bad and there’s plenty of time for other events, most of them probably very unpleasant, to take place, which is why I’m trying to write this early, before any of that will have a chance to happen. Good things don’t usually last in this world, after all…
You know it’s a great day for activism when you’re greeted by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society announcing that they have found the Nisshin Maru and now plan to “chase them through the frozen gates of hell if need be“. Unfortunately, a whale was just being butchered on the deck at the time, but they will certainly do their best from now on, no matter what the Japanese whalers will try or throw at them.
What will happen next is still uncertain, seeing as the ship that found the Nisshin Maru was the Steve Irwin, which is neither as fast as the Gojira nor as sturdy as the Bob Barker. In fact, the Gojira is currently more or less limping back to Australia for repairs after engine problems were recently discovered and, according to that article, the Bob Barker was close to a day away from the Steve Irwin at the time of first contact. But the Nisshin Maru is noticeably slower than any of the other ships involved, so the Steve Irwin should be able to keep tailing it long enough for the Bob Barker to catch up. Then we can only hope that they’ll manage to prevent any further killings, or at least save the lives of far more whales than during any of the previous seasons.
The next encouraging piece of news is linked to my last post: Law firm ACS: Law has decided to stop chasing illegal file-sharers, citing the “immense hassle” caused by a mix of hacktivism and more direct terrorist threats. Which may of course just be an excuse or, even more likely, a rather desperate attempt to gain public support by painting the file-sharers and their supporters in a vile light, especially since pretty much everything about the case was dubious to begin with, but this is good news nevertheless. And it also supports the notion that such tactics are effective in this battle, or in any others for that matter.
As the ruling is expected soon, it may all still go wrong, so we have to wait and see. And even if this case will go well, it’s unknown what, if any, effects it’ll have on the laws that keep being passed against “piracy” in more and more countries recently. But it’s a good sign that we’re still strong in this battle and can still push them back, no matter what they throw at us. It proves that piling up the pressure is effective, even if, or perhaps especially if, the tactics used are harsh and also quite illegal.
Last but definitely not least, today marks seven years since Opportunity landed on Mars, during which time it functioned without interruption and sent back a huge amount of data. (That article gives the date as January 24 due to time zone differences.) Admittedly, Spirit has been there three weeks longer, but she’s been silent for the past ten months and, though attempts to restore contact will continue at least until March, initial estimates said she should have woken up from hibernation in late October or November if everything was still operational, the continued silence making it more and more likely that she didn’t survive the Martian winter.
Granted that this event is very different from the previous two, as it has nothing to do with activism and in fact doesn’t even imply that anything actually took place today, not to mention that it doesn’t even happen on Earth, but it’s also very important and a very encouraging piece of news. Just knowing that humans were capable of creating a little rover that could keep obtaining data while traveling around another planet, powered entirely by solar panels, for seven whole years without anyone being around to do any maintenance work is utterly amazing! And when you add the fact that her sister also functioned for at least six years and two and a half months, though the original mission was only intended to last for three months… It sure seems that we can do a lot, if we truly want to.
Unfortunately, the future of space exploration doesn’t look particularly good, as this sector has been hit by the current financial crisis about as much as anything else dealing with science, research and development. After all, gaining such knowledge usually doesn’t pay right away, and right now everybody’s just looking for the quickest and safest way to make more money, only thinking of today and of themselves at the expense of tomorrow and the world. Not that this manner of thinking is in any way unusual, in fact it’s the norm for the vast majority of humans, but the current situation makes it that much more obvious and that much more damaging… Which is just why we need to be reminded of such accomplishments even more.
There were probably some other good news today, perhaps even on topics that I’d be interested in, but I’m sure there were lots of bad news as well. So I chose to only focus on these three, because they were the first things that caught my eye after I woke up today. Quite frankly, reading these things made me genuinely happy, at least for a while, and anyone reading this should know how difficult that is. It didn’t last, not even long enough for me to write this post while in such a mood, as other things conspired to return me to a more regular bad mood, but it was nice enough while it lasted… Such news, rare as they are, are proof that there may somehow still be some hope left for us.
