April 6

Sunday April 6 was a gloomy day all around. I wore black like I said I would, and went with the full intention of participating in what I felt was a unified voice against corruption. I was happy to see the streets empty. To me it meant people were taking a stance. I got out at Tahrir Square on my way as usual. Yet it was dark, because of the coming sand storm, and it was quiet.

Naturally security forces were everywhere. Dressed in their riot gear, they were prepared to strike at anyone who crossed the line. As I walked by, an obvious protester, I got menacing looks from all of them. I was frightened.

Students in the American University in Cairo pretty much stayed home. A lot of the professors didn’t want to deal with whatever the strike was, and decided not to hold classes that day. Many didn’t want to stand in the way of their students speaking their minds. Yet there was a fear that day that someone was going to get hurt. Of course there’s always the government you have to worry about too.

Some kids didn’t stay home. Some came to school, and protested in their own ways. Students went to Tahrir Square in hopes of making their voices heard, but their voices echoed in the silence around them.

The protest was thwarted by threats of imprisonment from the Egyptian government. People were scared, and the few that weren’t were stopped almost immediately. While I applaud the efforts of the strikers of April 6, this is not the way.

The last thing the Egyptian people need is to loose their young educated minds to the system of corrupt governance. When students from the Universities are arrested for lone acts of emotional outbursts it doesn’t help the cause. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying University students are useless. The South Korean regime was overthrown by University and High School students. I’m saying, if we want to do this, we need to do it right.

The government may have a lot of power, but history has shown that mass numbers makes a difference. Yet millions mean nothing if they can’t mobilize. So when my usually 20-30 minute ride took 8 minutes on Sunday morning I felt hope. Egyptians are starting to agree they can’t take it anymore, and they are agreeing to say something about it.

Tomorrow I Wear Black

A textile company in Egypt has had all they can take from the government. Low wages and higher prices mean that many can not feed their kids. The people in Egypt are finding it harder and harder to live, and they finally can’t take it anymore. These workers called a strike in their factory for tomorrow April 6. Judging by the 50,000 member group on Facebook, people are following suit.

I spoke to the organizer of the group about what they hope to accomplish. Obviously this one strike isn’t going to be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Rather, strikers and protestors in Egypt put themselves in a precarious position since they are breaking the law. Her response is that she simply can not sit back and watch what is going on in her country without speaking. She is not calling for a violent protest, nor is she asking that people disrupt their day. Rather, the strike calls for people to do what they can. If you can stay home from work or school without being penalized, do so. If not, then don’t purchase anything tomorrow. If not, wear black.

The protest isn’t going to change anything tomorrow, but it has captured the government’s attention. Security forces will be outside ElMahallah textile factory tomorrow morning in anticipation of the strikes. There have been rumors that downtown Cairo, where the American University in Cairo is, will be closed down with no one able to get in or out of Tahrir Square. AUC is still open and the government offices, also located downtown, are operating on a normal schedule. Political parties such as the Labor Party, the Karma Party, revolutionary socialists, Kefaaya and the Nasserist Socialist Party have joined in the protest, and have given their support to the day. When I called the NDP (National Democratic Party), the ruling party, I couldn’t get anyone to answer the questions.

So tomorrow I will wear black. As people die all around me from unnecessary hunger and preventable disease, I will wear black. I will mourn the young minds lost in a lacking educational system. My fellow Egyptians and I will protest political torture, press imprisonment, police abuse, low wages and rising prices. Tomorrow we will speak out.

Everyone should know

9/11 had Americans asking why people on the other side of the ocean hated them so much. Thus they have taken the initiative to “learn thy enemy.” Yet the American media and literary press leave much to be desired. The United States is a democracy; therefore the press is free and informative. On the other hand, Noam Chomsky in Media Control, The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda, indicates that “an alternative conception of democracy is that the public must be barred from managing of their own affairs and the means of information must be kept narrowly and rigidly controlled. That may sound like an odd conception of democracy, but it’s important to understand that it is the prevailing conception.”

For example, Americans are unaware of the violent impact American Imperialism has had on the entire world, including the Americans themselves. Leuren Moret in her “Depleted Uranium: The Trojan Horse of Nuclear War”, published in The Journal of International Issues July 1, 2004, states:

“The use of depleted uranium weaponry by the United States, defying all international treaties, will slowly annihilate all species on earth including the human species, and yet this country continues to do so with full knowledge of its destructive potential.”

Moret has been banned from speaking at particular events such a The Physicians for Global Survival. Her story is on of the top censored stories in the United States by Project Censored. So it’s not surprising most Americans don’t know that the amount of depleted uranium released in the atmosphere is the equivalent of 40,000 Hiroshima bombs, with the effect lasting approximately 4.5 billion years, and no way to reverse or stop the spresd. As Dr Rosalie Bertell, an international radiation expert and one of 46 authors of the European Parliament by the European Committee on Radiation Risk (ECRR) states in Moret's article:

“The concept of species annihilation means a relatively swift, deliberately induced end to history, culture, science, biological reproduction and memory. It is the ultimate human rejection of the gift of life, an act which requires a new word to describe it: omnicide.”

Moret declared the ’91 Gulf War as on of “the most toxic and environmentally devastating wars in world history.” Between the destruction of the desert ecosystem by attacks against oil wells and tankers and the dispersal of 340 tons of depleted uranium weapons, a serious problem was created.

“Smoke from the oil fires was later found in deposits in South America, the Himalayas and Hawaii. Large annual dust storms originating in North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia will quickly spread the radioactive contamination around the world, and weathering of old depleted uranium munitions on battlefields and other areas will provide new sources of radioactive contamination in future years,” reported Moret.

The ailments as a result of DU range from headaches, to homicidal tendencies, alimentary disorders, cancers, reproductive issues, skin eruptions, deafness, dyspraxia, paralysis, blindness, birth defects such as malformed legs, arms, toes and fingers, just to name a few. With a list this long, and effects this lasting its no wonder a lot of people on this side of the world really don’t like America.