{"id":59,"date":"2011-07-30T19:37:00","date_gmt":"2011-07-30T19:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/?p=59"},"modified":"2011-07-30T19:37:00","modified_gmt":"2011-07-30T19:37:00","slug":"shadows-of-democracy-and-dissent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/?p=59","title":{"rendered":"Shadows of Democracy and Dissent"},"content":{"rendered":"
Freedom of expression is a the\u00a0hallmark\u00a0of a democratic society, and so is\u00a0tolerance and the ability to live with multiple and somewhat incompatible views and\u00a0beliefs. \u00a0All of this ideas were put to a serious test yesterday in Tahrir. I was happy that the day ended\u00a0peaceful with no major incident given that there was an highly\u00a0combustible\u00a0 mix of people in the square having demands and view that are either tangential or standing in direct\u00a0opposition.<\/p>\n

Prelude to the\u00a0Friday\u00a0of “Unity”<\/b>
The families of the\u00a0protesters that had been\u00a0brutally\u00a0 murdered by the police during the early days of the revolution \u00a0have been calling for those responsible to be put on trial. The\u00a0supreme council of the armed forces (SCAF) have been pussyfooting in making that happen, and hence many\u00a0protesters gathered in solidarity with the families and started a sit-in on July 8.\u00a0\u00a0They demanded first and\u00a0foremost\u00a0that fair and open trails must be conducted. They had several other demands that would insure that the path to democratic transition is less bumpy, such as stopping subjecting civilians to military trials where justice is handed out summarily with little or no rights for the accused. \u00a0 From more on the rationale of the\u00a0protesters, check out my earlier post<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
“Islamic, Islamic, not secular or theocratic” the call says. It adds “Time to hear us roar”<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Islamists on the other hand have been gathering forces for what they called “Islamic Identity Friday”. For reasons that remain unclear the Islamists are acting as if they are under serious threat from the\u00a0liberals and secularist. Many\u00a0amongst the\u00a0protesters and several political parties called for calm to focus on the demands<\/a> that would serve the interests of the\u00a0revolution\u00a0and\u00a0\u00a0would not\u00a0exacerbate\u00a0\u00a0polarization<\/a>. But that turned to be a pipe dream.<\/p>\n

Betrayal\u00a0<\/b>
The Islamist did not honor<\/a> their agreement and instead came out with demands at odds with those who were sitting-in. They stressed the need for the application of Sharia in their chants. The term itself does not mean much as there are many schools of thought around Sharia and it does not directly mean Saudi or\u00a0Afghan\u00a0style system of\u00a0government\u00a0and laws. \u00a0After I had a few chats with some of Islamist, I found that members of the\u00a0Muslim\u00a0brotherhood (MB) had a much clearer picture of what the state should like, they seemed to embrace the notions of democracy and pluralism. The Salfis (Wahabis \u00a0is a more\u00a0appropriate\u00a0term) has divergent views and some of them were uncomfortable with the notion that certain basic rights for citizens and protection of minorities must \u00a0be enshrined in the\u00a0constitution. Salfis lacked clarity as to what system of government they \u00a0would espouse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Salfi sign “No\u00a0liberalism, No\u00a0communism, No\u00a0 Socialism, No Secularism, No pan Arab Nationalism”<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

The Islamist generally were engaged in a\u00a0muscular show of force, there chants attitude and were somewhat disturbing. Some were waving Saudi flags<\/a>, others were chanting “Behold Obama, the Square is now full of Osamas<\/a>“. Instead of seeking to dismiss worries about them, they were engaged in confirming the worst fears of\u00a0liberals and even the majority of\u00a0Egyptians who do not subscribe to any particular\u00a0ideology.\u00a0\u00a0They wasted a fantastic opportunity to show their countrymen and the rest of the world that they are political force that are worthy of doing\u00a0business\u00a0with. The fact that they reneged on a promise and \u00a0presented a narrative that would alienate \u00a0most Egyptians, specially those who took part in the revolution, is bound to hurt them on the long term.<\/p>\n

It was quite a\u00a0peculiar scene to see that while the\u00a0protesters who were at the sit-in were\u00a0reeling\u00a0against SCAF, the\u00a0Islamists\u00a0made\u00a0\u00a0a point of showering the head of SCAF, Tantawi, with praise in their chant. One has to wonder when he sees Saudi flag waving, Bin Laden sympathizers, expressing there deep\u00a0loyalty\u00a0to SCAF. Either something is very wrong with SCAF, the Islamists, or probably both.<\/p>\n

Whilst all of this was happening in Tahrir, Egypt’s spy chief\u00a0\u00a0Murad Muwafi was meeting US vice president Hillary Clinton. Speculations were rife amongst\u00a0protesters that the old Islamic\u00a0boogeyman card was being played. It is either a SCAF\u00a0autocracy or a fanatical terrorist\u00a0harboring\u00a0theocracy that comes to power and\u00a0eliminates any hopes of a\u00a0democracy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
SCAF\u00a0riling up Islamists\u00a0against\u00a0protesters\u00a0\u00a0(by\u00a0Ahmed Nady<\/a>)<\/span>\u00a0<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

On the upside<\/b>
Despite everything, there was an upside to all of this. I consider it very\u00a0reassuring\u00a0that both the\u00a0Islamists and sit-in\u00a0protesters managed not to be at each others throats for the duration of the day. The degree or restraint and self-control on both sides was impressive. Many of the Islamist seemed eager to listen, engage in dialog and to try to appreciate other opinions as well as articulating theirs. Despite very differing world views, dialog was possible. A society that had no public space or means of self-expression is going to take a while to overcome decades of fear and mistrust between its fragmented elements and establish some form of cohesion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
The cause of \u00a0justice for the martyred has not been served by all of this . (By Mostafa Gamal<\/a>)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Ill will and garbage\u00a0<\/b>
The\u00a0Islamist left the square, leaving behind tonnes of trash<\/a> and ill will. Many of the revolutionaries felt violated. I met quite a few who were in tears. Some told me “we did not fight and watch \u00a0our friends die so that fanatics would come and deny us our freedom”. Many were also deeply\u00a0offended by what they saw the Islamists making themselves self\u00a0appointed\u00a0spokespersons for their religion. The chant “where is the media, \u00a0Islam is here!” was specially offending to many who have view of Islam and values that strongly\u00a0diverged with those of the\u00a0Islamists. The Islamists literally hijacked several of the secular stages for their purposes. They prevented Sufis from entering the square and called them infidels.
After they left there was a some\u00a0rejoicing\u00a0and singing and everybody in the square was chanting for civil and non theocratic state. However, we were breathing a heavy and depressing air. The \u00a0magic of the early days of the revolution where we showed a great deal of\u00a0tolerances\u00a0and\u00a0genuine\u00a0love for each <\/a>other seems to be fading away.\u00a0<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Freedom of expression is a the\u00a0hallmark\u00a0of a democratic society, and so is\u00a0tolerance and the ability to live with multiple and somewhat incompatible views and\u00a0beliefs. \u00a0All of this ideas were put to a serious test yesterday in Tahrir. I was happy that the day ended\u00a0peaceful with no major incident given that there was an highly\u00a0combustible\u00a0 mix […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,5,57,56,22,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-egypt","category-islamists","category-jul29","category-jul8","category-tahrir","category-unity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=59"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=59"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=59"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectionatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=59"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}