I find it particularly ironic that only a few people point out, with severe reservations, that there really is no Israel or Palestine.
At least not a concrete body with known borders and some variety of federalized government. Well, that's a lie. David did unit the tribes of Israel but that lasted for a whole of 4 decades. Within less than a whopping of a century, the unified Kingdom of Israel was back into two pieces.
The only reason I bring this up is that the area was more or less "unified" ethnically as Canaanites. Along with Lower Egyptians, Aramaeans and Amorites, all of these people were frequently at war with Proto-Arab tribes and Europeans.
Proto-Arab conquests led to the formation of Nabatea [Arabia Petria] which controlled much of southern Israel and the Sinai Peninsula. This was a major source of contention the greater Levantine region.
This was set-up by a much earlier power vacuum caused by the Babylonian captivity.
There's a pattern here.
Country A whoops Country B's ass. Country C moves into Country B 'grazing lands.' Country A raises a stink because it hates Country C. Country A teams up with Country D to whoop Country C's ass. Country D doesn't notice that Country B has taken up their land while they were away.
And so on and so fourth.
The failure of the Ottoman State (and its successive defeat) lead to another power vacuum. Instead of the modern-day Canaanites [Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Egypt et cetera] maintaining that identity, other people have moved in.
And by other people, I mean the Arabization of the Middle East. Y'know, the exact thing this region has been pretty much fighting for thousands of years.
I have no idea why these people, and well everyone else, have forgotten the fact that they've existed in peace for quite some time for the sheer reason of resisting southern and eastern invasion.
not to politicize the issue here, but i wonder if what has happened here is that during the course of the afternoon the white house spoke too soon, and perhaps damaged the egyptian president's pride. there was some talk going around from the american side about "change" prior to any change having actually taken place. i would also wonder what effect of confidence this kind of message would have on the other autocratic regimes we support.
Thats a lot of whats being talked about now. Haaretz is reporting that King Abdullah is threatening to cover egypts 1.5 billion in aid if the US rescinds it. Its pretty clear at this point every autocratic bunch of assholes in the middle east is hunkering down for a major threat to their power, and see Mubarak as the last bulwark before the wave hits. I understand what a terrifyingly difficult chess game Obama is fighting right now, but holy fucking shit man. BALLS. WHERE ARE YOUR BALLS? How fucking hard is it just to tell Mubarak to get out? tell all these assholes they are dictators and this shit just isnt acceptable anymore?
fuck obama's opinion. hes not out there throwing fucking rocks, hes watching the jeffersons eating ice cream. its not our revolution, unfortunately just our entertainment.
free from what? mubarak? theonly thing special about mubarak is his circumstance as a president of egypt. there is nothing exceptional about everything else...or are you actually going to try and convince me that egyptians really know what they want?
oh please! every other arab institution is rife with some sort of corruption. the only reason egyptians are on the street is because they're fed up, they require catharsis. That, in itself, is not a desire to be democratic...as much as it might pretend to be.
now, this is from the arab side. from the western side, i suggest most of you churning analyses just shush up. really,please. you're architects, thats all. buildings...not politics. and especially if you have no idea of the nature of the region and country. and anyway, egyptians love drama, they relish it. the only thing they didt have was a chorus...and now with its pent up surfacing, it has culminated in mega catharsis. thats all, a nation taking a crap after a considerable period of constipation. no politics, just release. shush
Easy guys. I can pretty well understand people from the middle east being fed up with us. I dont take it personally. We dont mean offense Tammuz, its just cool to see kids doing things we couldnt imagine.
Whats weird is this is still kind of a military coup by the US. It was a day later than Obama wanted, and it probably cost them Sulieman, but I dont have much doubt the pentagon engineered the endgame on this one. All thats different is the impetuous and optics are driven by people in the streets this time. I still think theres huge room for hope. Whats cool is the people who hopefully will be shaping the next step dont give a fuck what we have to say about anything.
Amazing kudos to the organizers and people of egypt. Shit is always fucked up, but there really is huge potential for good things to come.
i am not venting
i am not being pessimistic
i am not being optimistic
i am speaking with the knowedge of someone who works with a plethora of arabs, who is considered an arab by you lot, who understands the different nuances that differentiate the egyptian from the syrian from the lebanese from the saudi from the emirati..etc.
i tell you this...and its totally up to you to understand it or not. although they want it, egyptians do not know true secular noncorrupt democracy, perhaps the tunisians, in my opinion a people possessing a more refined sensisiblity when it comes to such matters, along with the moroccans, are perhaps better disposed to come closer to a democratic framework. but this, in my opinion, is because the french colonialists were more egalitarian in spirit, if not in fact, than the asshole british colonialists.
mubarak is an easy creature to dispose off compared to that inner reserve of biased "corruption" (favouring your friends and family over others in a professional setting, treating your subordinate's possessions as yours, treating your subordinate as yours...etc)
you want me to be hollywoodish like many of you? i can say this: this is the beginning of a fight, not the end of one. it is time to now fight your own self, your own individual and institutional corruption. but this is an "i hope" rhetoric; and who cares about what i hope.
and stop fucking with the ottoman empire; if anything, it furnished a cultural continuity that was so much more favourable compared to the sordid psychosis of the fragmented regional states nowadays. at least i'd be able to travel within the empire without having to line up in embassies. granted though, i'd be still subservient to the druze.
and OE, if you raised this up, for your info, it is incorrect to apply the term Canaanite to the people of the levant en masse. there is a huge section of the people of the levant who are actually arab in origin owing to migrations, especially from south arabia (which in itself contains multiple infuences) many others were turkomen, some of who even converted to christianity (for instance a part of the shihab family in lebanon).
ironically, the people who have most claimed that they were canaanite in origin are the least likely to be: i.e. lebanese maronite christians whereas some people who claimed most that they were arab, sunnis and shiites strewn across the southern lebanese shore, are the most likely to harken back to phonecians and their extended lot. then there is, of course, the greco-byzantine strain and the much less prominent european crusader strain...some families in the levant were at least partially european prior to settling in the lands.
so, yes lets hope aaaaall will be ok. but dont confuse wishful thinking with actual reality.
Trust me, Im not. Its still a good day when a dictator goes though, especially as the product of a largely peaceful revolution. I know egypt has mad problems, but they seem to be doing pretty well so far. I think thats worth taking heart in.
And just for reference, Im not making assumptions about you, Id prefer if you didnt make them about me. My girlfriend is egyptian, I have a huge number of friends from over there. Im not a total idiot about this stuff.
what i am waiting for is for egypt's ghandi or dr. martin luther king jr. to step forward to be a voice of compassion and fairness and guide this impressive swell of homegrown change. this movement needs ONE voice to consolidate the feelings of the common man; otherwise another dictator will fill the void.
this is a beautiful chance for a people to do the right thing and make a difference in the world. to step forward and move past the crimes and deceit and hatred of the past, from all sides. to put down the weapons of bigotry and fear and make a new day. and make a new future. a future that ALL people no matter where they live feel in the depths of their being. a future that has opportunity, peace and hope. is that to much to ask of humans?
i had hoped that with the election of barack obama the world would have a person to guide the change, but he is as corporate as the rest. and i was proven to be naive again.
the world has another chance to change and egypt could be the catalyst.
i bet the egyptians i know are more representative of a larger cross section of egyptians than the egyptians you know; and no its not about who has the larger one, oe :)
don't be insulted because i'm being honest, you start posiively by saying you won't take it seriously. well don't..but not because im a frustrated middle eastern person...but because i can't help but be more attuned to the regional consciousness. please dont patronize me by "empathizing" with me for being from th middle east. i speak your language...move one.
i have seen way too much corruption in this part of the world to even think its possible to cleanse oneself. too much, its like the phillipines. the poor pinoy suffer a similar vicious endemic and deep rooted system of corruption. mubarak is a figurehead, an instance, a giagantic one..sure..but still an example, a syntagm not a paradigm. from the smallest of companies to the largest i.e. a whole country, there is the problem...corruption, stealing from us, poor idiots, a more deserving dignified citizenry.
you speak: mubarak, heeeey mubarak has gone halelujah joy to the world; it sounds retarded to me. not because i liked that old toad whom i never liked , on par now suddernly everyone who was nonchalant about him and egypt suddenly wanted to sing an ode of joy for his departure and the yipyipyipee liberty of egypt. no, i dont like him. it sounds retarded because he is not the disease, he is the symptom. the disease is in most people and institutions in not just egypt but the whole of the MENA region. there is a dichotomy, a schizophrenia that is abused....because it is a complex mishmash of traditional tribal/family centric mentality and common thievery. however, i give you that egypt has a developed sense of unifying nationalism, ridiculous though i might find it sometimes - partly because the country is largely sunni with a very small, relatively, coptic body. intra-national sectarianism might not be their biggest challenge...unlikein the case of iraq, lebanon, algeria...etc....but, still, that in itself is not a decree of tabula rasa for the onset of equal citizenry.
however, although i might be coming across as hating on the arabs, please do not think that for one moment i prefer these cold blooded protestants (by any other name-they still are so to me) who thrash you with god..whether in the form of jesus or state secularism. oh no.
so tmmuz, is corruption and favoritism so ingrained in the egyptian and "arab" culture that it is impossible to fix? i am not from the middle east and sad to say i know of only 1 person from that part of the world so your insight is helpful.
is sartre correct then that people will never change even when sent to hell as in his play "no exit"
another correction "don't take it personally". sorry, i havent written to pedantically minded architects for some time now. musicians are so much less anal and angelic; you always have to sound better than the message carried by your sound ; architects are too elephantic when it comes to language...boom boom...any uglier sounding terminology than "performative materialism" or "parametric urbanism"? yuk.
yes it is. in my opinion, they're no better than the jews they criticize, except the jews are better educated and better self organizers. the jews think they're god's chosen people...each arab thinks s/he's god chosen person.
i stil prefer the semites over the germans though, i can never fathom how a mother can scold a 2 or so month od baby for making a noise and disturbing the serenity of a cold stagnant silence outside a pub. horrible
"i stil prefer the semites over the germans though, i can never fathom how a mother can scold a 2 or so month od baby for making a noise and disturbing the serenity of a cold stagnant silence outside a pub. horrible"
So far you've covered arabs, jews, germans, cold blooded protestants. All horrible, of course.
But we need to know what you think of the chinese and the blacks. And polish people.
Who's the laziest race?
Archinect should pay you for dishing out all this great insight into this toilet bowl of humanity.
Yeah Tams, I'll be the first to grant theres a cultural element to everything, but easy on the ethnic generalizations. Every people on earth is corrupt, we are all fearful and nepotistic. People are paying bribes and lying from Beijing to Stockholm to Buenos Ares. Im well aware shit in egypt is complicated, but so is shit in New York. The difference is in New York people can vote. It may not be a panacea, but its a huge fucking leg up.
hi tammuz, i agree with you on the yipyipyipee and with most of what you say. altough it is to the north and turcocentric, i do have a mental and blood relation to levant. but you did sound a little self defeatist. this revolution came on right time and it will have global effect. i am elated it came from egypt much more than tunusia where we don't know much about let alone people involved.
i don't necessarily see this as mubarek centered uprising and subsequent toppling of the figurehead but all the wider conflict of emerging and global movement of have nots at a political scale, strategy, logistics and determination we have not seen in other revolutions. it is very complex yet very apparent in the same time.
to be honest, very fascinating and fruitful.
i posted a link to slovoj zizek and tarik ramadan program above where what i mean is very well described by zizek.
this is beyond an arab revolution now. it has already exposed many intricacies of favoritism, preferential treatment and policies in place by ruling class (read nations,) exposed vulnaribilities of iron fists, weaknesses and hypocrisy of political speeches, carefully hidden meanings behind political positioning and stupidity of western press.
i have been called names by some idiots here for recognizing al jazeera's integrity and value before and only now the people are starting to see what is what and these are all good changes in people's minds when they think of pan arabic and pan islamic culture, knowledge and wisdom. and you rightfully and wisely announce the work has just began. indeed. it has now a better start than ever, not limited to middle east but wider world. when and if this succeeds, the world will owe a lot to egyptian public who made this possible and show the way.
ethnicity is not of much substance in what i said; its contingent. there is an identifiable ambience that a people generate via a complicit code of conduct, common morality, shared attitudes...etc. as such, im not really being racist. i'm just an observer, my own interpretor, of 'my own' people and of others.
i also warn you against generalized individualism and that our individuality defines us. even that idea is a cultural communal construct of a capitalist mass world. we,mostly emanate a certain ambience that signals our cultural and, as you put it, ethnic belonging.
so please don't accuse me of generalizing when our observation of cultures is a necessary generalization. being silent about it and denying it in order to preserve political correctness is mutely unintelligent. let me go even further than the egyptians are probably the most melodramatic of the 'arab' people and i have yet to take their word seriously that they want a real democratic egypt with rights for lesbians and gays and people who can curse their clergy and their leaders and take active measures to defy traditions...and so on.
for me, this revolution is an expression of pent up wrath. its explosion is not a promise of better things to come necessarily. as above.
"egyptians are probably the most melodramatic of the 'arab' people"
This is a generalization. I dont see it much different than saying "The Irish are the drunkest and most violent of the european people." or "Texans are assholes." Im not bashing generalizations because they arent politically correct, Im bashing them because theyre easy and not particularly instructive.
Im also not arguing everything is perfect now and its smooth sailing from here on to utopia, or that all peoples in all places react the same way to political events. Im arguing that the peaceful assertion of basic human rights, the right to vote and have a collective say in ones own future, the right not to be scooped off the street and tortured, is still a tremendously positive step forward. I find it hard to believe you find that controversial.
i dont find that controversial. i'm saying that what happened is not NEECESSARILY a promise of better thing to come...there is more to be done to make it better!
and yes egyptians are pretty melodramtic people. the majority that i've met are anything but understating. that is not to say they were not nice...but ultimately trying to make you get my point without getting another point that is neighbouring to mine due to preset cliches is like making you go through a labyrinth so i will stop now. all the best.
it is also time for egyptians to say and relay the message to US. "we don't give a fuck what your president and politicians say or do in order to represent 'your' policies and 'interests'."
one thing i kept noticing during the egyptian protests was that americans (administration and to a degree, the public) was led to believe as if it was in our control or decision to shape the events according to what we wanted or supported. this made people think like, that we are the moral authority and/or inspiration of the events in american wider public eye (democracy chants again and over). nothing further away from the truth. in fact, everybody's pants are on fire in washington right now following the further decline of american stand and policy in the eyes of egyptian people and greater region. except israel who also is deeply troubled with the developments and with the uncertain future they might face and adjust their fisted policies. business as usual is forever ended, not for egyptians only..
I agree the protesters themselves dont give a fuck what Obama has to say, nor should they at this point. For the US to come out pretending like we were for democracy all along is absurd as Iran saying it. But on a purely mechanical level, it was up to washington whether Mubarak stayed or left. That is to say, protesters in the streets alone were not driving him out, they needed the military to make the final move. I have very little doubt that final order came from washington.
I also dont think there is exactly one mind over all this in washington. Theres a vested diplomatic class, and they have a huge amount of power, but that power is fading. There are a huge number of people now actively trying to find a way to cut Israel loose. Even Patraeus is sick of them. The less than subtle implication from that NYT article is that most of the reason for confusion and waffling was that Clinton and Gates were actively undercutting Obama the entire time. In the end though its pretty clear who Obama sided with.
i would go somewhere toward the middle. i don't think the US govt had much of a say in him leaving at all, although i think they've wanted him to reform the country for a long time, regardless of whether or not that meant true democracy. even bush called egypt his biggest disappointment while he was in office. they know it isn't sustainable in the long run to support unpopular regimes, even though they obviously do. they don't often publicly criticize them, for fear of stepping on toes. south korea and taiwan were once corrupt autocratic regimes that we supported. the fact that they became democracies was due to US influence. it certainly wasn't coming from any of their neighbors, and it didn't come from any dramatic policy shifts.
besides, that the egyptian people have demonstrated that they can change the world for the better (assuming it turns out that way) without US influence is for everyone's benefit. we spend more tax dollars propping up the rest of the world than we do taking care of ourselves. and the egyptians can still wear levis and play with facebook and twitter all day to their hearts content.
bossman, my opinion differs. just for the record, that facebook, twitter and levis are not our free gift to the world but commodities we profit from. this fact changes the meaning of your post completely.
we don't spend single tax dollar propping up the world without sucking up many times more in return in one way or another.
true. my point which i probably didn't articulate very well was only that there are other forms of influence (or perhaps profit) than the political and military.
And now the Iranians and Bahrainis are getting into the act. This is simply awesome and more power to them.
And yes, I'm aware Bahrainian unrest will severely gimp U.S. military Gulf operations, probably cause gas prices to go up significantly and I sincerely don't care. This has all been a long time coming.
I'm waiting for someone to now claim that the revolutions or rumblings of revolution in the Middle East are secretly Zionist Occupation Government slash Protocols of the Elders of Zion conspiracies carried out by the Moussad.
Rusty she was rescued by a group of EGYPTIAN women and soldiers. Don't let a few rotten apples spoil the bunch.
I have mixed feelings about whether she should have been reporting from a mob scene. Please don't confuse this with my saying she deserved it. Going back to 2005 there was a report warning about sexual assaults against female journalists. 140 journalists have injured or killed reporting from Egypt since January. She put herself in a dangerous place. It is lousy because she comes across as extremely dedicated. She went back because she believes deeply in her work. Maybe there is a time and place for caution though.
Hopefully she is back on TV in a couple months as a big FU to everyone who did this to her.
Lastly WTF is with the stories mentioning rumors of her romantic life while she reported on Iraq? Very poor judgement by the editors. When someone is assaulted and robbed do they dedicate a paragraph to their past relationships?
The Middle East is Turning Over,
LOL.
I find it particularly ironic that only a few people point out, with severe reservations, that there really is no Israel or Palestine.
At least not a concrete body with known borders and some variety of federalized government. Well, that's a lie. David did unit the tribes of Israel but that lasted for a whole of 4 decades. Within less than a whopping of a century, the unified Kingdom of Israel was back into two pieces.
The only reason I bring this up is that the area was more or less "unified" ethnically as Canaanites. Along with Lower Egyptians, Aramaeans and Amorites, all of these people were frequently at war with Proto-Arab tribes and Europeans.
Proto-Arab conquests led to the formation of Nabatea [Arabia Petria] which controlled much of southern Israel and the Sinai Peninsula. This was a major source of contention the greater Levantine region.
This was set-up by a much earlier power vacuum caused by the Babylonian captivity.
There's a pattern here.
Country A whoops Country B's ass. Country C moves into Country B 'grazing lands.' Country A raises a stink because it hates Country C. Country A teams up with Country D to whoop Country C's ass. Country D doesn't notice that Country B has taken up their land while they were away.
And so on and so fourth.
The failure of the Ottoman State (and its successive defeat) lead to another power vacuum. Instead of the modern-day Canaanites [Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Egypt et cetera] maintaining that identity, other people have moved in.
And by other people, I mean the Arabization of the Middle East. Y'know, the exact thing this region has been pretty much fighting for thousands of years.
I have no idea why these people, and well everyone else, have forgotten the fact that they've existed in peace for quite some time for the sheer reason of resisting southern and eastern invasion.
Mubarak's time is very limited it seems
um........ apparently not....
ridiculous, the man needs to get a clue!
fucking unbelievable.
not to politicize the issue here, but i wonder if what has happened here is that during the course of the afternoon the white house spoke too soon, and perhaps damaged the egyptian president's pride. there was some talk going around from the american side about "change" prior to any change having actually taken place. i would also wonder what effect of confidence this kind of message would have on the other autocratic regimes we support.
Thats a lot of whats being talked about now. Haaretz is reporting that King Abdullah is threatening to cover egypts 1.5 billion in aid if the US rescinds it. Its pretty clear at this point every autocratic bunch of assholes in the middle east is hunkering down for a major threat to their power, and see Mubarak as the last bulwark before the wave hits. I understand what a terrifyingly difficult chess game Obama is fighting right now, but holy fucking shit man. BALLS. WHERE ARE YOUR BALLS? How fucking hard is it just to tell Mubarak to get out? tell all these assholes they are dictators and this shit just isnt acceptable anymore?
fuck obama's opinion. hes not out there throwing fucking rocks, hes watching the jeffersons eating ice cream. its not our revolution, unfortunately just our entertainment.
It matters because thats what we fucking elect them for.
Egypt: Tariq Ramadan & Slavoj Zizek
The Muslim scholar and philosopher discuss the power of popular dissent.
http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2011/02/2011238843342531.html
Egypt is free! Egypt is free!
At least for today.
We'll do a full body recount tomorrow.
free from what? mubarak? theonly thing special about mubarak is his circumstance as a president of egypt. there is nothing exceptional about everything else...or are you actually going to try and convince me that egyptians really know what they want?
oh please! every other arab institution is rife with some sort of corruption. the only reason egyptians are on the street is because they're fed up, they require catharsis. That, in itself, is not a desire to be democratic...as much as it might pretend to be.
now, this is from the arab side. from the western side, i suggest most of you churning analyses just shush up. really,please. you're architects, thats all. buildings...not politics. and especially if you have no idea of the nature of the region and country. and anyway, egyptians love drama, they relish it. the only thing they didt have was a chorus...and now with its pent up surfacing, it has culminated in mega catharsis. thats all, a nation taking a crap after a considerable period of constipation. no politics, just release. shush
tummuz:"free from what? mubarak? theonly thing special about mubarak is his circumstance as a president of egypt. there is nothing exceptional about everything else...blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah . no politics, just release. shush"
You sound constipated.
agreed... what a silly rant...
LOL
Easy guys. I can pretty well understand people from the middle east being fed up with us. I dont take it personally. We dont mean offense Tammuz, its just cool to see kids doing things we couldnt imagine.
Whats weird is this is still kind of a military coup by the US. It was a day later than Obama wanted, and it probably cost them Sulieman, but I dont have much doubt the pentagon engineered the endgame on this one. All thats different is the impetuous and optics are driven by people in the streets this time. I still think theres huge room for hope. Whats cool is the people who hopefully will be shaping the next step dont give a fuck what we have to say about anything.
Amazing kudos to the organizers and people of egypt. Shit is always fucked up, but there really is huge potential for good things to come.
^ truth
Seriously can all these people just kill themselves so we can be rid of their fucking stupidity?
i am not venting
i am not being pessimistic
i am not being optimistic
i am speaking with the knowedge of someone who works with a plethora of arabs, who is considered an arab by you lot, who understands the different nuances that differentiate the egyptian from the syrian from the lebanese from the saudi from the emirati..etc.
i tell you this...and its totally up to you to understand it or not. although they want it, egyptians do not know true secular noncorrupt democracy, perhaps the tunisians, in my opinion a people possessing a more refined sensisiblity when it comes to such matters, along with the moroccans, are perhaps better disposed to come closer to a democratic framework. but this, in my opinion, is because the french colonialists were more egalitarian in spirit, if not in fact, than the asshole british colonialists.
mubarak is an easy creature to dispose off compared to that inner reserve of biased "corruption" (favouring your friends and family over others in a professional setting, treating your subordinate's possessions as yours, treating your subordinate as yours...etc)
you want me to be hollywoodish like many of you? i can say this: this is the beginning of a fight, not the end of one. it is time to now fight your own self, your own individual and institutional corruption. but this is an "i hope" rhetoric; and who cares about what i hope.
and stop fucking with the ottoman empire; if anything, it furnished a cultural continuity that was so much more favourable compared to the sordid psychosis of the fragmented regional states nowadays. at least i'd be able to travel within the empire without having to line up in embassies. granted though, i'd be still subservient to the druze.
and OE, if you raised this up, for your info, it is incorrect to apply the term Canaanite to the people of the levant en masse. there is a huge section of the people of the levant who are actually arab in origin owing to migrations, especially from south arabia (which in itself contains multiple infuences) many others were turkomen, some of who even converted to christianity (for instance a part of the shihab family in lebanon).
ironically, the people who have most claimed that they were canaanite in origin are the least likely to be: i.e. lebanese maronite christians whereas some people who claimed most that they were arab, sunnis and shiites strewn across the southern lebanese shore, are the most likely to harken back to phonecians and their extended lot. then there is, of course, the greco-byzantine strain and the much less prominent european crusader strain...some families in the levant were at least partially european prior to settling in the lands.
so, yes lets hope aaaaall will be ok. but dont confuse wishful thinking with actual reality.
Trust me, Im not. Its still a good day when a dictator goes though, especially as the product of a largely peaceful revolution. I know egypt has mad problems, but they seem to be doing pretty well so far. I think thats worth taking heart in.
And just for reference, Im not making assumptions about you, Id prefer if you didnt make them about me. My girlfriend is egyptian, I have a huge number of friends from over there. Im not a total idiot about this stuff.
what i am waiting for is for egypt's ghandi or dr. martin luther king jr. to step forward to be a voice of compassion and fairness and guide this impressive swell of homegrown change. this movement needs ONE voice to consolidate the feelings of the common man; otherwise another dictator will fill the void.
this is a beautiful chance for a people to do the right thing and make a difference in the world. to step forward and move past the crimes and deceit and hatred of the past, from all sides. to put down the weapons of bigotry and fear and make a new day. and make a new future. a future that ALL people no matter where they live feel in the depths of their being. a future that has opportunity, peace and hope. is that to much to ask of humans?
i had hoped that with the election of barack obama the world would have a person to guide the change, but he is as corporate as the rest. and i was proven to be naive again.
the world has another chance to change and egypt could be the catalyst.
i bet the egyptians i know are more representative of a larger cross section of egyptians than the egyptians you know; and no its not about who has the larger one, oe :)
don't be insulted because i'm being honest, you start posiively by saying you won't take it seriously. well don't..but not because im a frustrated middle eastern person...but because i can't help but be more attuned to the regional consciousness. please dont patronize me by "empathizing" with me for being from th middle east. i speak your language...move one.
i have seen way too much corruption in this part of the world to even think its possible to cleanse oneself. too much, its like the phillipines. the poor pinoy suffer a similar vicious endemic and deep rooted system of corruption. mubarak is a figurehead, an instance, a giagantic one..sure..but still an example, a syntagm not a paradigm. from the smallest of companies to the largest i.e. a whole country, there is the problem...corruption, stealing from us, poor idiots, a more deserving dignified citizenry.
you speak: mubarak, heeeey mubarak has gone halelujah joy to the world; it sounds retarded to me. not because i liked that old toad whom i never liked , on par now suddernly everyone who was nonchalant about him and egypt suddenly wanted to sing an ode of joy for his departure and the yipyipyipee liberty of egypt. no, i dont like him. it sounds retarded because he is not the disease, he is the symptom. the disease is in most people and institutions in not just egypt but the whole of the MENA region. there is a dichotomy, a schizophrenia that is abused....because it is a complex mishmash of traditional tribal/family centric mentality and common thievery. however, i give you that egypt has a developed sense of unifying nationalism, ridiculous though i might find it sometimes - partly because the country is largely sunni with a very small, relatively, coptic body. intra-national sectarianism might not be their biggest challenge...unlikein the case of iraq, lebanon, algeria...etc....but, still, that in itself is not a decree of tabula rasa for the onset of equal citizenry.
however, although i might be coming across as hating on the arabs, please do not think that for one moment i prefer these cold blooded protestants (by any other name-they still are so to me) who thrash you with god..whether in the form of jesus or state secularism. oh no.
move on,not one. why has archinect not yet introduced an edit function? even violinist.com has an edit option. tsk
so tmmuz, is corruption and favoritism so ingrained in the egyptian and "arab" culture that it is impossible to fix? i am not from the middle east and sad to say i know of only 1 person from that part of the world so your insight is helpful.
is sartre correct then that people will never change even when sent to hell as in his play "no exit"
another correction "don't take it personally". sorry, i havent written to pedantically minded architects for some time now. musicians are so much less anal and angelic; you always have to sound better than the message carried by your sound ; architects are too elephantic when it comes to language...boom boom...any uglier sounding terminology than "performative materialism" or "parametric urbanism"? yuk.
yes it is. in my opinion, they're no better than the jews they criticize, except the jews are better educated and better self organizers. the jews think they're god's chosen people...each arab thinks s/he's god chosen person.
i stil prefer the semites over the germans though, i can never fathom how a mother can scold a 2 or so month od baby for making a noise and disturbing the serenity of a cold stagnant silence outside a pub. horrible
So far you've covered arabs, jews, germans, cold blooded protestants. All horrible, of course.
But we need to know what you think of the chinese and the blacks. And polish people.
Who's the laziest race?
Archinect should pay you for dishing out all this great insight into this toilet bowl of humanity.
Yeah Tams, I'll be the first to grant theres a cultural element to everything, but easy on the ethnic generalizations. Every people on earth is corrupt, we are all fearful and nepotistic. People are paying bribes and lying from Beijing to Stockholm to Buenos Ares. Im well aware shit in egypt is complicated, but so is shit in New York. The difference is in New York people can vote. It may not be a panacea, but its a huge fucking leg up.
hi tammuz, i agree with you on the yipyipyipee and with most of what you say. altough it is to the north and turcocentric, i do have a mental and blood relation to levant. but you did sound a little self defeatist. this revolution came on right time and it will have global effect. i am elated it came from egypt much more than tunusia where we don't know much about let alone people involved.
i don't necessarily see this as mubarek centered uprising and subsequent toppling of the figurehead but all the wider conflict of emerging and global movement of have nots at a political scale, strategy, logistics and determination we have not seen in other revolutions. it is very complex yet very apparent in the same time.
to be honest, very fascinating and fruitful.
i posted a link to slovoj zizek and tarik ramadan program above where what i mean is very well described by zizek.
this is beyond an arab revolution now. it has already exposed many intricacies of favoritism, preferential treatment and policies in place by ruling class (read nations,) exposed vulnaribilities of iron fists, weaknesses and hypocrisy of political speeches, carefully hidden meanings behind political positioning and stupidity of western press.
i have been called names by some idiots here for recognizing al jazeera's integrity and value before and only now the people are starting to see what is what and these are all good changes in people's minds when they think of pan arabic and pan islamic culture, knowledge and wisdom. and you rightfully and wisely announce the work has just began. indeed. it has now a better start than ever, not limited to middle east but wider world. when and if this succeeds, the world will owe a lot to egyptian public who made this possible and show the way.
ethnicity is not of much substance in what i said; its contingent. there is an identifiable ambience that a people generate via a complicit code of conduct, common morality, shared attitudes...etc. as such, im not really being racist. i'm just an observer, my own interpretor, of 'my own' people and of others.
i also warn you against generalized individualism and that our individuality defines us. even that idea is a cultural communal construct of a capitalist mass world. we,mostly emanate a certain ambience that signals our cultural and, as you put it, ethnic belonging.
so please don't accuse me of generalizing when our observation of cultures is a necessary generalization. being silent about it and denying it in order to preserve political correctness is mutely unintelligent. let me go even further than the egyptians are probably the most melodramatic of the 'arab' people and i have yet to take their word seriously that they want a real democratic egypt with rights for lesbians and gays and people who can curse their clergy and their leaders and take active measures to defy traditions...and so on.
for me, this revolution is an expression of pent up wrath. its explosion is not a promise of better things to come necessarily. as above.
"egyptians are probably the most melodramatic of the 'arab' people"
This is a generalization. I dont see it much different than saying "The Irish are the drunkest and most violent of the european people." or "Texans are assholes." Im not bashing generalizations because they arent politically correct, Im bashing them because theyre easy and not particularly instructive.
Im also not arguing everything is perfect now and its smooth sailing from here on to utopia, or that all peoples in all places react the same way to political events. Im arguing that the peaceful assertion of basic human rights, the right to vote and have a collective say in ones own future, the right not to be scooped off the street and tortured, is still a tremendously positive step forward. I find it hard to believe you find that controversial.
On the other side of things, theres trouble in paradise, it seems:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/world/middleeast/13diplomacy.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&pagewanted=2&adxnnlx=1297537308-ykovXSmky2T13vDVFJ/h+w
i dont find that controversial. i'm saying that what happened is not NEECESSARILY a promise of better thing to come...there is more to be done to make it better!
and yes egyptians are pretty melodramtic people. the majority that i've met are anything but understating. that is not to say they were not nice...but ultimately trying to make you get my point without getting another point that is neighbouring to mine due to preset cliches is like making you go through a labyrinth so i will stop now. all the best.
it is also time for egyptians to say and relay the message to US. "we don't give a fuck what your president and politicians say or do in order to represent 'your' policies and 'interests'."
one thing i kept noticing during the egyptian protests was that americans (administration and to a degree, the public) was led to believe as if it was in our control or decision to shape the events according to what we wanted or supported. this made people think like, that we are the moral authority and/or inspiration of the events in american wider public eye (democracy chants again and over). nothing further away from the truth. in fact, everybody's pants are on fire in washington right now following the further decline of american stand and policy in the eyes of egyptian people and greater region. except israel who also is deeply troubled with the developments and with the uncertain future they might face and adjust their fisted policies. business as usual is forever ended, not for egyptians only..
I agree the protesters themselves dont give a fuck what Obama has to say, nor should they at this point. For the US to come out pretending like we were for democracy all along is absurd as Iran saying it. But on a purely mechanical level, it was up to washington whether Mubarak stayed or left. That is to say, protesters in the streets alone were not driving him out, they needed the military to make the final move. I have very little doubt that final order came from washington.
I also dont think there is exactly one mind over all this in washington. Theres a vested diplomatic class, and they have a huge amount of power, but that power is fading. There are a huge number of people now actively trying to find a way to cut Israel loose. Even Patraeus is sick of them. The less than subtle implication from that NYT article is that most of the reason for confusion and waffling was that Clinton and Gates were actively undercutting Obama the entire time. In the end though its pretty clear who Obama sided with.
The Middle East sucks and Egypt is part of Africa.
i would go somewhere toward the middle. i don't think the US govt had much of a say in him leaving at all, although i think they've wanted him to reform the country for a long time, regardless of whether or not that meant true democracy. even bush called egypt his biggest disappointment while he was in office. they know it isn't sustainable in the long run to support unpopular regimes, even though they obviously do. they don't often publicly criticize them, for fear of stepping on toes. south korea and taiwan were once corrupt autocratic regimes that we supported. the fact that they became democracies was due to US influence. it certainly wasn't coming from any of their neighbors, and it didn't come from any dramatic policy shifts.
besides, that the egyptian people have demonstrated that they can change the world for the better (assuming it turns out that way) without US influence is for everyone's benefit. we spend more tax dollars propping up the rest of the world than we do taking care of ourselves. and the egyptians can still wear levis and play with facebook and twitter all day to their hearts content.
bossman, my opinion differs. just for the record, that facebook, twitter and levis are not our free gift to the world but commodities we profit from. this fact changes the meaning of your post completely.
we don't spend single tax dollar propping up the world without sucking up many times more in return in one way or another.
true. my point which i probably didn't articulate very well was only that there are other forms of influence (or perhaps profit) than the political and military.
And now the Iranians and Bahrainis are getting into the act. This is simply awesome and more power to them.
And yes, I'm aware Bahrainian unrest will severely gimp U.S. military Gulf operations, probably cause gas prices to go up significantly and I sincerely don't care. This has all been a long time coming.
What's this about a 60 minute correspondant getting brutally raped and beaten by a mob of 200 in a public square?
Egypt, I'm trying really hard to cheer for you, but you're making it hard.
Yeah, that's what I thought when I saw that story.
"Sexually assaulted" (that's what I saw), I was just hoping it was something a little less severe.
CBS says "brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating". Either way. it sounds bad.
I mean what is this? Puerto Rican parade in Central Park? ha!
Glen Beck works for a network that's 7% owned by Saudi Arabian. Oh fuck it...
I know, I know. I thought it was mildly ironic.
I'm waiting for someone to now claim that the revolutions or rumblings of revolution in the Middle East are secretly Zionist Occupation Government slash Protocols of the Elders of Zion conspiracies carried out by the Moussad.
Beck just went from "Nut job who occasionally makes a good point" in my book to "full blown nuttier-than-squirrel-shit maniac".
So when do the rapes start?
Rusty she was rescued by a group of EGYPTIAN women and soldiers. Don't let a few rotten apples spoil the bunch.
I have mixed feelings about whether she should have been reporting from a mob scene. Please don't confuse this with my saying she deserved it. Going back to 2005 there was a report warning about sexual assaults against female journalists. 140 journalists have injured or killed reporting from Egypt since January. She put herself in a dangerous place. It is lousy because she comes across as extremely dedicated. She went back because she believes deeply in her work. Maybe there is a time and place for caution though.
Hopefully she is back on TV in a couple months as a big FU to everyone who did this to her.
Lastly WTF is with the stories mentioning rumors of her romantic life while she reported on Iraq? Very poor judgement by the editors. When someone is assaulted and robbed do they dedicate a paragraph to their past relationships?
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