Wednesday, May 23, 2007

First political rant of oh 7!

One of the most sobering amateur anti-war music videos I've seen, almost as good as the original! I think this sets the tone nicely...


Hey gang! I've got a few bones to pick with the status quo of the world today. I should warn one and all that its 2am and I've been working late and am strangely feeling a strong urge to write about stuff out of pure spontaneity.

First off, what the hell is happening in Lebanon and Palestine...again? If you can't find a common enemy you start a campaign of infighting, is that how it works? I'm going out on a limb here and guessing this aint just an Arab problem and I'm not so sure its a Muslim one either. I'm tempted to call it a territorial problem but that's yet another simplistic label so I'm going to go along with an identity crisis.

A Natural end

When an entire people lose their sense of direction and belonging in life, what we are currently witnessing is its full and natural end. The Palestinians have been pushed into so many different corners by ever-enlarging Jewish settlements that places like Gaza have, for lack of a better simile, crossed boiling point a long time ago. And its only natural for this sentiment to spill over to poor indefensible and easily influenced areas such as refugee camps in northern Lebanon albeit amongst a minority who are conveniently labelled as Islamists/jihadis/Islamist militants (pick and mix folks its a free-for-all on the 'ragheads' right?!) or are in one way or another linked to Al Qaeda. And yes I know not all of them are homegrown, they're a mixed bunch from around the Arab world but thats not what I'm driving at.

Sure they're brutal, sure they're not helping their cause by apparently terrorizing the camps and launching attacks against a sovereign country like Lebanon, but remember this, they are a product of injustice, indifference and rightful indignation towards the powers that be that have kept them there without even a hope of a better life. At the risk of sounding like a religious fanatic myself, I will say this much. If Muslims just once, looked within themselves - as should every other sound humanbeing by the way - and did some serious moral, spiritual and dare I say ego cleansing, we would at least be at peace with ourselves, more than enough to not only be proud of who we are but positively confident and constructive in this world and I'm sure other races, religions and beliefs would...well trust us more as much as we would respect them!

I'm no apologist for outright criminality like the killing of innocent lives and equally when lives are destroyed not physically but mentally. You can read into this what want, but if your belief system is so screwed up and your moral bearings are so off the charts that you switch what's right for wrong and what's wrong for right, then seriously don't blame the mysterious 'other' for what's happening in this world, you've no need to look any further than yourself.

3 comments:

Mermaid Melanie said...

What bothers me is how have we all as a society come to dislike each other so much? What is with the overall angst and hatred?

I have a difficult time watching the news, and even discussing it with "more informed people". We simply should be able to get along. But the ability to try and reason seem to be absent in our world.

The Hard-working Slacker said...

I hear ya on that one melanie! I never said I had the answer, but the problem with people these days is that they'd rather not know or care about the other and so like the saying goes: "You can't bring a horse to water but you can bring the water to the horse".

I hate to say it but the so-called 'clash of civilizations' is well underway whether we like it or not and the battle lines are being drawn everywhere from the poor suburbs of Paris to the Gaza strip, its how you deal with it that ultimately defines us as a species. Ignorance and oblivion are no longer viable options.

Mermaid Melanie said...

well seeing as I am neither ignorant nor oblivious, i find there are ways to get along. but, you have to let go of fear, which NO one does very well. until that fear subsides, which it wont, we can't for-go all the angst.

and basically? its mostly greed. its the same damn song going on forever, and we are the pitiful apes that are perpetuating it.

end of rant!