SUPERFICIAL LIFE

Is there a deeper kind of life than the one you are currently living? Is there more to life than acquiring all the material things you could possibly get your hands on?
The truth is, when things are going well in our lives, we don’t give it any thought. We seldom stop to think about life’s meaning when things are great.
Society has taught us to live in a world of fantasy; therefore, we find ourselves living in a superficial world without any substance and without any love for ourselves and others.
If you only find happiness by having instead of being, you may want to look at your life and consider shifting your focus. Instead of focusing on finding fulfillment through external things, try to focus on the happiness that comes from within.
Feeling the need to accumulate things in life in order to feel loved and satisfied will only leave you craving for more, because when the excitement wears off, you will likely find yourself empty and dissatisfied. It’s like being thirsty and drinking only soda or coffee to quench your thirst. Nothing can quench your thirst better than water. You cannot rely on soda or other liquids to do an adequate job, because you will always be thirsty.
(Dr Alex ledgister at dralexledgister.com)
Superficial means being fairly shallow in character and attitude. It means focusing on the surface reality and not what lies beneath. It means that there is not much substance. It means that you are only concerned with seeing the obvious without exploring any underlying issues and circumstances. It means that you are only appearing to be real, but you are not truly being real.
(Jedha Dening at EzineArticles.com)
CB contributed the following poem at associatedcontent.com (a poem to emphasize that there is more to a person than just looks):
“I write this because like many of you, I too am tired of reading messages from strangers talking about my looks, Oh you look good? Can we be friends?’- Both from men and women. LOL. To those strangers – I am privileged that you feel so and thank you for those compliments. But when I get these messages, all I think is – You don’t even know me! I just wished people stopped being superficial.”

THE BEGINNING…..
O’ Stop being Superficial
Stop being so Tri-vial.
Just because I look so hot
Does not mean I have no brains
Just because I’m NO model
Does not mean you can call me names

I may be blond and dumb
I may be blond and wise
How do you really know?
That I won’t take you by surprise?

I may not look too exquisite
I may not be a model
I may still be the sweetest person
You encounter in this life

O’ Stop being Superficial
Stop being so Tri-vial
Learn to see beyond the layer
Only then will you be smarter
I hope when you look at me
A wonderful human is what you see

Most of us have at least heard the saying “It’s not what’s in the outside that matters, but what’s in the inside is what matters“, at least once in our life. This saying may be true, but our society has made us believe that the outside matters a lot.
Many girls read magazines and see that beautiful air brushed models, they want to become that dream girl…that doesn’t exist, and some will take drastic measures…to become that size zero girl, even if it means becoming anorexic.
Our media is full of beautiful, size zero girls, but they fail to realize that most regular teenage girls don’t look like that. In our society the first impression is what matters. They judge us by our exterior, forcing some young girls to feel self-conscience about them.
Girl self-esteem is one of the easiest things to break, they are already judging themselves too harshly, and the media doesn’t help them at all, seeing perfect models, only makes them wish they looked like that. We have to emphasize to teenage girls that beauty comes in all shapes and sizes; you don’t have to be a size zero to be beautiful. Beauty comes from within, but the media and our society don’t help the cause, they are creating the “perfect girl” that doesn’t exist. Now days, we are judged too harshly on just our physical appearance. Some people don’t even take our personality in consideration, which is sad and unfortunate. We cannot stop the media from putting out airbrushed pictures of perfect models, but we can stop being so influenced by them, and realizing that we are beautiful in our own way.
(princess6 at teenink.com)
Are you surrounded by shallow people? Are you in an intimate relationship with a superficial individual? You like that person, but the superficial nature of that person is a barrier to any genuine relationship. This situation is a case where actions speak louder than words. Why is this case? Well, you see them saying the right words and attempting to do the right things. However, sooner or later, their superficial disposition comes out, and you can’t believe they are that way. If you were honest with yourself, you knew that person was pretty hollow in the beginning, but you didn’t want to accept it. Let’s analyze this situation closer.
First, there are no physical characteristics that can identify a superficial person. Clearly, shallow people come in all shapes and sizes. They have varying backgrounds. They live in every community. However, these people all have a common characteristic; they are externally-driven.
In the frantic pace of modern living, many people are in the pursuit of the wrong possessions. The media bombards us with the notion that “We deserve it all.” When this philosophy is believed, it creates a generation of inwardly focused people. We become a “Me” generation. Because this person feels he is entitled to be happy, he focuses on what can make him happy now. Obviously, it is far easier to pursuit things (money, power, right clique, etc.) in terms of happiness because they are tangible to the eyes. However, this short path is not a road to fortune but perhaps a highway to destruction. If you are in relationships with outward-focused people, you can be assured that your intimacy will lack depth. Your relationship may feel like the real thing but over time the truth usually will reveal itself.
Sadly, some people do not have this deepness of character. They exist on the shallow end of the spectrum; they rarely make serious relationships. Why is this factor the case? These people are more concerned with what’s on the outside of an individual than what is on the inside.
(Daryl Green at articleslash.net)
Human personality is like an onion. It consists of multiple layers that become denser as you go deeper within. Manners are a thin veneer on the surface, a set of formalized patterns of action and response demanded of each of us by the society we live in, regardless of how we actually feel inside, which is often very different from the outward manners we exhibit.
Though manners are superficial, perfect conduct even at this level is extremely difficult. We may exhibit good manners on important occasions or with important people, but few are capable of maintaining perfect conduct all the waking hours with close friends, intimate family members, work colleagues, casual acquaintances, servants, etc. The world worships appearances and gives utmost value to good manners, even when they conceal the very opposite inner disposition. Self-restraint, soft speech, humble considerate behavior towards all, thoughtful gestures are extremely difficult to maintain as unvarying conduct. One who is a perfect master of good manners can by virtue of that endowment alone secure international fame and recognition.
Manners are on the surface. Behavior is on the depth of the surface. Whereas manners reflect conduct that the world expects or demands of us, behavior is conduct expressive of our inner attitudes and beliefs. What the society demands as manners develops into genuine behavior in the individual. Friendly manners may disguise inner anger or anguish because society frowns on their expression, whereas cheerful, warm behavior expresses genuine happy, positive attitudes towards oneself and others.
(Garry Jacobs at mssresearch.org)

A ‘PROUD CONTEMPT OF OTHERS’

The best way to deal with an arrogant person is to understand why he is being arrogant. This may sound odd, but the truth is, as soon as you know the reason behind his arrogance you will pity him.
Arrogant people think that they are always right, they think that they know the best answers to all life problems and they think that they are better than most of the ordinary people. Arrogance is no more than a shield that covers inner emptiness and sometimes an inferiority complex.
(Dealing With Arrogant People, Written by M.Farouk Radwan, MSc. at 2knowmyself.com)
Those to whom much has been given sometimes suffer from arrogance; or rather the people around them suffer. Arrogance is doubly a pity, because the talents of the arrogant serve primarily themselves. The arrogant assumes his views and opinions are The Truth. In arrogance, natural confidence goes sadly awry. Rather than the self-assurance born of knowing his own strengths and limitations, arrogance admits no limits. The arrogant brooks no weakness in himself and may even secretly rejoice to find flaws in others. But imperfections are inherent in being human, so the arrogant, like everyone else, always has feet of clay, however well hidden they may be. Fearing exposure, haughtiness forms a hard shell masking inner emptiness.
(Inner Frontier at innerfrontier.org)
Arrogance is a defense mechanism used by the subconscious mind in order to prevent further criticism. If someone had a terrible childhood and if he was hurt by others he may develop arrogance in order to prevent further criticism from hurting him, the trick usually works, because if someone criticized him he can simply devalue him and assume that he is worthless.
Arrogant behavior can be a result of feeling neglected. If someone felt that he is not getting all the attention he deserves, he may unconsciously become arrogant just to attract some of the lost attention.
Arrogant people are single minded, they either think that they are superior to others or inferior to them. This arrogant person who is intimidating you feels inferior to someone else because this is how his mind works, this arrogance may be nothing more than a way to cover this feelings of inferiority he experiences when dealing with someone else.
(Dealing With Arrogant People, Written by M.Farouk Radwan, MSc. at 2knowmyself.com)
Be arrogant if you wish. Look down on others and treat them poorly, if you wish. But realize that if you do so, you’re only allowing your own inner weaknesses to shine through, and you’re not fooling anyone. Not the people around you, who hold you in disdain, not God who made you and loves you and knows all about you, and not yourself.
And for those who must deal with arrogance on a regular basis, please keep in mind that arrogant people treat you poorly only because they’re needier than you, and they haven’t yet admitted to themselves that they are needy. They need and deserve your compassion, not your anger.
(livinglifefully.com)
They stride among us. Their eyes wary, their armor buckled, their words pre-sharpened. They hold themselves superior. They are haughty, imperious, and disdainful. There is one notion they hold dear: They are better than you.
“Arrogance,” Webster tells us, is “that species of pride which extols the worth or importance of one’s self to an undue degree.” This is not healthy self esteem. This is not brimming confidence. This is a “proud contempt of others.”
People build their arrogance from different foundations. Some start with money, others with intellect, education, lineage, job status, good looks, and athleticism. Some allow their arrogance to sprout from even the most obscure hobbies or traits. Arrogance can be based on real qualities or possessions: a genius IQ, a staggering bank account. It can just as easily be based on illusion: a ‘brilliant’ strategist who gleans every last idea from others, a ‘millionaire’ who owns nothing more than a generous line of credit.
Many people bristle at arrogance, quickly asserting themselves or rejecting the speaker. Others must suffer quietly as the arrogant person is in a position of power. Some take a person’s arrogance as a signal of importance. “She must be somebody to act like that.” Fans can be willing to excuse the arrogance of someone whose achievements or skills they admire. “When you play the horn like he does, you’re allowed to be a jerk.”
(Human Solutions Humaines at wilsonbanwell.com)
There are three kinds of arrogance. There is the most surface sort of arrogance that seeks to justify sin. Often this will take the form of saying to ourselves, “But no one was hurt.”
If the sin is against another, this arrogance blames the other, or a third party. We see this in the seven year old boy who isn’t watching where he is going, and rams into a wall and loudly proclaims, “I didn’t do it!”
The third form of arrogance is the most interior. It deposits itself just a few layers from our soul when we first commit any act of arrogance. This arrogance afflicts the entirety of humanity – all who has not sought it out in themselves and cut it out, and have remained watchful for its return. This is an arrogance that deceives us into thinking we know best. It is held up and supported by pride. It is this arrogance that makes us an easy mark for any temptation that may present itself to us.
(On Sin, Arrogance, and Peeling an Onion, By Steven Clark at ancient-future.net)
Some people become arrogant because they are afraid of losing their power. They are in good standing right now and they don’t want to come down. Arrogance gives them a certain distance. These powerful people can find that arrogant behavior gives them an air of invulnerability, renders them slightly untouchable. “Others may be less likely to challenge me if what I have seems out of reach.” It is easier for powerful people to cast an arrogant eye on others. They do, after all, have some tangible ‘evidence’ of their positions. Psychologists Steven Spencer and Susan Fiske find that people in positions of power tend to stereotype more. This is because they often don’t consider personal, distinguishing details about others and they need to defend their decisions.
(Human Solutions Humaines at wilsonbanwell.com)
“Arrogance” looks awfully much the same. The person is aware of his skills and talents in an area and assumes leadership in that area. The only difference is that those around him or her are bothered by it. For some reason, that control feels pushy and out of place. The observer is inclined to think, “Who does he think he is?” There seems to be a divide between the individual’s self-assessment and that of onlookers.
That runs us right into the next question: Who’s responsible for that — the person or the spectators? After all, if beauty is in the eye of the beholder, wouldn’t that also be true for another person’s talents and management? Perhaps, when there is a difference of opinions, the arrogance lies not with the person in charge but with the viewers. Perhaps it is the viewers who have misplaced arrogance rather than the presumptive leader. How are we to tell?
Here’s one clue: A person who knows his (or her) strengths, also knows his weaknesses. You’ll frequently find a person who is proud and takes leadership roles in one domain, deferring to others in different domains of activity. The arrogant person won’t do that. The arrogant person seems to know everything about everything and won’t give up a stronghold on anything. Thus, in judging who the arrogant person really is, ask yourself: Which one of these two people thinks he or she knows everything about everything? Which one has all the answers on all subjects? That’s one clue.
(Which Is It: Pride or Arrogance? By Dr. Debby Schwarz Hirschhorn at jewishworldreview.com)

THE MAN WHO GAVE CHE TO THE WORLD

Alberto Díaz Gutiérrez, better known as Alberto Korda or simply Korda (September 14, 1928 in Havana, Cuba – May 25, 2001 in Paris, France) was a Cuban photographer, remembered for his famous image Guerrillero Heroico of Argentine Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara.
The relationship between Fidel Castro and Korda could not be defined by one label or title. For Castro, Korda was more than an official photographer, a friend or personal photographer. They never discussed the salary or the title, their relationship wasn’t boss and worker. Thus, Korda was very relaxed, and interested in everything and everyone. Every photo he took was a symbol of the revolution, instead of a documentary of the events of the revolution. The Cuban Revolution was the turning point in Korda’s career. His career plans were completely changed with the success of the revolutionaries. In 1959 the newly established newspaper offered the largest space for photographers to display their photographs, and Korda became part of the revolutionary cause. Korda Says, “Nearing 30, I was heading toward a frivolous life when an exceptional event transformed my life: The Cuban Revolution. It was at this time that I took this photo of a little girl, who was clutching a piece of wood for a doll. I came to understand that it was worth dedicating my work to a revolution which aimed to remove these inequalities.” He got caught up in the ideals of the revolution and began photographing its leaders.
(en.wikipedia.org)
The revolution turned Alberto Korda’s career in a completely different direction. Korda said he “fell in love with the Revolution and its heroes”. He photographed Fidel Castro’s entrance into Havana in January 1959, with Camillo Cienfuegos, another notable Cuban revolutionary, by his side. Although Korda was not a photojournalist then, he took this picture to ‘Revolucion’, the newspaper of the Cuban revolutionaries, which published it. Four months later, ‘Revolucion’ asked Korda to accompany Fidel on his first trip abroad after the revolution, to Venezuela. Commenting on his relationship with Fidel, Korda said it was “distant at first, but I was very happy to photograph what I loved — and still love — the Revolution and Fidel”.
(Seeing with the heart, V. SRIDHAR, Frontline at hinduonnet.com)
As Revolution photographer Korda always worked at his own photographic tempo. He wasn’t pushed by the press or by any other requests. Where ever the revolution took Castro Korda followed. One of Korda’s most recognizable images was of Castro’s visit to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. in April 1959. Castro’s travels took Korda all around Cuba, overseas, and the Soviet Union. In 1963, photos of Fidel and Nikita Khrushchev, taken by Korda, illustrated the differences in both men that were evident in their respective politics.
(en.wikipedia.org)
In 1969 Fidel went back to the Sierra Maestra, the remote mountain region, where the revolutionary army began its attacks on the army of the Fulgencio Batista regime. Korda’s style was to move to the front of whatever group Fidel was leading in order to get the shots he wanted. When Korda comes back to his home, his daughter couldn’t recognize him. His hair and beard were long and hadn’t showered for months. Korda took many pictures for the newspaper and called the series “Fidel Returns to the Sierra.” Fidel always liked Korda’s photos and never stopped him when he attempted to take his picture. He worked freely without thinking about political consequences, in order to get what he wanted in his photos.
(en.wikipedia.org)

Che guevera
(Ernesto Guevara)
Guerrillero Heroico
Taken by Alberto Korda on March 5, 1960
The La Coubre memorial service
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Che Guevara stepped onto the podium and scanned the crowd. Korda snapped two quick shots, including the legendary one of the revolutionary with his beret, gazing like a prophet into the distance. Korda recognised its greatness and kept the photo tacked to his wall for seven years, until an Italian journalist saw it.
(news.bbc.co.uk)
It is this photograph that adorns student bedsits across the world. The famed black and white portrait of Ernesto “Che” Guevara perfectly captured his intense stare and brooding good looks, helping establish his myth.
The fact that the photograph, taken with a Leica camera on 4 March 1960 at a political rally in Havana attended by Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, came to international prominence owes as much to luck as Korda’s skill. “It was not planned, it was intuitive,” said Korda, who worked for the ‘Revolucion’ newspaper. He told one interviewer that Guevara had shown such an intense gaze that he had been briefly taken aback and only managed to fire off two quick shots, one vertical, one horizontal.
It was at the same rally that Cuban leader Fidel Castro delivered his famous “Homeland or Death” slogan in front of thousands of people. But the photograph of Guevara, which Korda later called “Heroic Guerrilla”, did not make the next day’s paper and only emerged after Guevara’s death in Bolivia seven years later.
(Row rages over iconic image of Che Guevara, Jamie Doward, The Observer, Sunday 7 March 2010 at guardian.co.uk)
No other image — apart from the one of Marilyn Monroe standing at a subway grid — has been reproduced as many times in history. That photograph of Che, with his long hair flowing from underneath his beret with a star affixed to it, his eyes gazing into the distance, can be found on posters, subway walls and countless consumer articles such as T-shirts, mugs, key chains, wallets and cigarette lighters all over the world. It also adorns walls across Cuba where Che is loved for the part he played in the cause of the revolution. However, the man who took that photograph, Alberto Diaz Gutierrez, known to the world as Alberto Korda, never made anything for himself from the image he gave the world.
Wherever Korda went, at photographic exhibitions or while talking to youth about photography, he would invariably be asked about that famous image of Che and how he created it. This is how he described it to Pacifica: “This photograph is not the product of knowledge or technique. It was really coincidence, pure luck.” Korda was one among the 20 to 30 photographers below the grandstand that day and Che made a brief appearance at the front of the stage, for barely a minute. Korda managed to take just two shots of Che – one horizontal and one vertical. He rejected the vertical shot because a head covered Che’s shoulder; he cropped the horizontal shot and gave it to ‘Revolucion’. French writers Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir were among those present at the memorial service for 136 people killed in an explosion that destroyed a vessel loaded with weapons for the Cuban government. Ironically, ‘Revolucion’ did not use Korda’s pictures of Che; it carried his other pictures, of Castro and Sartre and Beauvoir. The Che pictures remained forgotten until after his death in Bolivia.
(Seeing with the heart, V. SRIDHAR, Frontline at hinduonnet.com)
The picture was still hanging on the wall in 1967, by now tobacco-tinted though, when a man knocked on the door. The person did not present himself, but handed over a letter of introduction from a high-ranking member of the Cuban administration. The letter asked Korda to help this person in his search for a good Che picture. Korda pointed at the wall saying: “This is my best Che picture”. The visitor agreed and asked for 2 copies of the print. Korda told him to return the next day, which he did. When asked the price of the prints, Korda replied, that since the visitor was a friend of the revolution, he didn’t have to pay.
What Korda didn’t know, was that the visitor was the famous Italian publisher Giangiacomo Feltrinelli. Well known in Europe for smuggling the “Dr. Zivago” manuscript out of The Soviet Union. Feltrinelli came to Cuba directly from Bolivia, where he had been negotiating the release of Regis Debray. Having learnt from Debray, that Che Guevara was the guerrilla-leader in Bolivia and that the end might be near, Feltrinelli saw a business opportunity in the possible assassination of Che.
(Michael Harder Photography 2001 at pix.dk)
The corpse of Che Guevara was hardly cold in Bolivia, before you could buy big posters, all around the world, with the Korda-image of Che. Copyright Feltrinelli it said, down in the corner. In half a year, Feltrinelli sold 2,000,000 posters. Later on the image has been transformed, transplanted, transmitted and transfigured all over the world.
Korda never received a penny. For one reason only – Cuba had not signed the Berne Convention. Fidel Castro described the protection of intellectual property as imperialistic “bullshit”.
(Michael Harder Photography 2001 at pix.dk)
By 1969 Korda had quit covering politics, turning instead to underwater photography. Now semiretired, he supports himself with freelance advertising jobs and by selling photos of Castro and Che for $500 apiece.
When not at work, the four-time divorce and father of five nurtures his other great passion: women. He and his 21-year-old companion, Zaeli Miranda, share a modest two-bedroom apartment with her sister and a friend in Havana’s Miramar district. “He’s friendly and loving,” Miranda says of Korda. “I’ll ask him to take out the garbage, and he does it happily.”
Korda, took the photo when Che was 31, yet never tried to protect his copyright. That is, until Smirnoff appropriated the image for a 1998-99 U.K. vodka ad campaign. “Hundreds of companies used my photo, but none have been as offensive,” says Korda, 72. “Che wasn’t a drinking man. He was a revolutionary killed defending his ideals.” Outraged, the Havana-based photographer slapped a lawsuit on a London advertising firm and a photo agency for trivializing Che’s image. A hearing was set. The ad agency, Lowe Lintas, denies “infringement of any copyright or moral rights.”
Korda says no matter how his lawsuit turns out, his lifestyle won’t change, and any proceeds will buy medicine for Cuban children. “I don’t care about money. I like being a poor man,” he says. “I went after Smirnoff because of their degenerate ad. It’s the principle of the thing.”
(The Way of Che By Joanne Fowler, September 25, 2000 at storage.people.com)

WE ARE OUR OWN WORST ENEMY

Almost all human beings do have something to ask for from Almighty. Some have a craving for some lawful worldly objects, some have to ask for solutions of their problems, some longing for remedy of illness and getting good health, while some have the far-sight of asking favors of the next world. Thus everyone has something to ask from his/her own angle of view.
(boltwolf.tripod.com)
Imagine for a moment that you find yourself with a flashlight in your hand in a room that is totally dark. You turn on the flashlight and see a beautiful painting hanging on the wall. You might think, “Sure, this is a wonderful work of art, but is this all there is?” Then, all at once, the room becomes illuminated from above. You look around and see that you are in an art museum, with hundreds of paintings on the walls around you, each more beautiful than the last. As these possibilities stand revealed to you, you realize you have a lifetime of art to study and love. You are no longer constrained to view just one painting lit by the weak glow of your flashlight.
(Excerpted from The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire by Deepak Chopra. Copyright © 2003 by Deepak Chopra at deepakchopra.wwwhubs.com)
Can anything be classed as real when our perceptions differ greatly on so many things? Just because we see something a particular way does not make it so. We can be so insistent sometimes that our way of seeing something is more right than someone else’s way.
Let’s take the example of war. There are some people who believe that war is necessary sometimes to get peace and then in order to keep the peace. There are other people who will believe that war is evil and should never be entered into no matter what. Who is right? Is war right or wrong? That’s just an example…..
What you see as real is only defined by your belief structure. Your version of what is real is only your perception of it; not what is so.
Here’s another example: Let’s say an event occurs in your life. You have the choice about how you respond to it. Let’s say you have a death in the family. You can choose to see that event as something terrible and tragic to which you will respond accordingly. Or, you can choose to see that event and something that inspires you to make something more of your life; living every day as if it was the last, so to speak.
From that example you can see that you may or may not have control over the events in your life but you can certainly take control of how to respond to them. That part of life will always be within your power. This is where life gets interesting because you shape your own reality through your beliefs.
Your belief structure determines your perception which then ultimately determines how you respond to events. Going by that sequence you can then see that there is another place to start. You can choose to examine your beliefs and then choose to change them.
(Adaptted fron Perception vs Reality by Amit Sodha on March 22, 2006 at unlimitedchoice.org)
We have a very narrow view of things. Naturally, the imperfect existence cannot be the source of perfect consciousness. The imperfect perspective of the human mind cannot be expected to give a complete picture of things in their true state of affairs.
There is a habit of the mind by which it looks at things in a linear fashion, in a line or a straight vision, as it were, as a series of objects, a line in space and time, and this is what may be succinctly called the three-dimensional perspective or the individualistic perception of the human mind – to look at things as bodies, as isolated existences, with the feeling that you and I are different, that things are isolated from one another in such a manner that there cannot be intrinsic or organic connections among them. This is perhaps the historical way of things. There is no organic connection between events in history. They are mathematically or causally related, so that one follows the other.
(An Analysis of Our Perception of Historical Personalities by Swami Krishnananda at swami-krishnananda.org)
The ultimate source of our problems is in thought. Our thinking determines our actions and our actions determine the quality of our relationship with each other. Society is the result of relationships. Problems arising out of human relationship appear to be intractable. There is conflict at all levels of human relationship. There is conflict between husband and wife, between parent and child, between one group and another, between nations, religions and within the same political and religious organizations. There is enormous confusion, violence, brutalities, the wars, terrorism and endless division of religion and nationality. Roots of disorder lie in the state of human mind.
Unfortunately we use the same thinking ability to find solutions to the numerous complex and intricate problems that thought has created. Past history clearly demonstrates that despite all the knowledge and experience accumulated through centuries, man has not been able to produce a harmonious and healthy society. We do make some improvements here and there but the overall situation remains grim. The momentum at which the problems are being created is quite overwhelming. It is obvious that there must be a serious flaw in the way we think.
It is amazing that two distinct systems of thought operate within the framework of human consciousness, one that creates the problem and the other that tries to find solution to the problem. Both arise out of the same source. That source is self-centeredness. Thinking arising out of self-interest, self-concern creates numerous problems. Problems like greed, jealousy, anxiety, anger, hate and violence arise out of the conditioned state of mind. Any problem that arises in the mind poses a challenge and there is an automatic response to meet the challenge. This response generates thought process that has no clue as to how the problem got created.
It is extremely important that we should understand the nature of the self because most of our actions spring from this center. Our perceptions and responses to the challenges of life and our basic urges, desires and demands are determined by the nature of the self. Human relationship is based on the operation of thought that is self-centered. Only a profound understanding of the nature of the self can bring about inward revolution.
(Adapted from Clarity of Perception by SardarSingh, September 17, 2009 at lifeisrelationship.com)
One of the things people are quickly becoming aware of is the media’s nonstop repetition of the same old themes and always trying to keep us scared and manipulated, whether it be who to vote for in an upcoming election or the suppression and total disregard of information which paints things in a different picture to the one that they are trying to impose on us. Another is how democracy is just two sides of the same coin so to speak, they offer us choice but that choice is limited inside of their choices.
Freedom is more than a word. It is everything and the only thing that is in our way of obtaining it is our own perception. What we perceive is what believe. Consider this, if we were walking along and spotted a house and someone said that it was a nice house and you disagreed, and then which one of you is right? The thing about perception is that more often than not it is not even your own perception; it was manipulated from the day you were born and constantly conditioned by outside forces, from parents to school and work. We are being bombarded with influence and the problem with that is we don’t realize it until we become someone else’s perception altogether and we cry out inside to ourselves.
If someone said the words planet earth most people would immediately conjure up visions of the earth from space as we know it, a giant sphere covered in ocean, dotted with land and surrounded with clouds. But what if you could see ultraviolet light, or x-ray or even gamma rays? Than earth would look incredibly different to you and would therefore provoke different thoughts and feelings, you see everything is symbolic and just because you see something does not mean you see all aspects of something; you just have an idea of how it is and this is one of the biggest problems in the world today as Governments, Media, religion and society in general are constantly trying to take other peoples freedom to see things from many angles and points of view and limit them to only the ones they want them to see. Parents are some of the worst offenders for this.
Everything expresses itself in many shapes and forms and your perception is the only thing that holds it in that myopic and preconceived view you have. You must open yourself up to possibility and when you do that you can let the information flow freely and make an informed judgment. But that is not the world we live in now; the world we live in now is the same world that burnt people alive at the stake for ideas just a few hundred years ago, and although we may not be as physically brutal anymore, fear of changing the way we look at things is still alive and kicking in today’s social structure.
(Adapted from How Everything is a Symbolic Representation of Your Perception, by AndrewCalvisi Mar 2nd, 2010 at bukisa.com)

RULE OF LAW, NOT RULE BY MAJORITY

A majority taken collectively is only an individual, whose opinions, and frequently whose interests, are opposed to those of another individual, who is styled a minority. If it be admitted that a man possessing absolute power may misuse that power by wronging his adversaries, why should not a majority be liable to the same reproach? Men do not change their characters by uniting with one another; nor does their patience in the presence of obstacles increase with their strength.
The main evil of the present democratic institutions does not arise from their weakness, but from their irresistible strength. The excessive liberty which reins in any country as at the inadequate securities which one finds there against tyranny. An individual or a party is wronged, to whom can he apply for redress? If to public opinion, public opinion constitutes the majority; if to the legislature, it represents the majority and implicitly obeys it; if to the executive power; it is appointed by the majority and serves as a passive tool in its hands. The public force consists of the majority under arms; the jury is the majority invested with the right of hearing judicial cases; and in certain states even the judges are elected by the majority. However iniquitous or absurd the measure of which you complain, you must submit to it as well as you can.
( Unlimited Power of the Majority in The United States, and its Consequences, Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocquevilleat xroads.virginia.edu)
The phrase “tyranny of the majority” (or “tyranny of the masses”), used in discussing systems of democracy and majority rule, is a criticism of the scenario in which decisions made by a majority under that system would place that majority’s interests so far above a dissenting individual’s interest that the individual would be actively oppressed, just like the oppression by tyrants and despots.
(en.wikipedia.org)
“The tyranny of majorities may be as bad as the tyranny of kings.” Arthur James Balfour, 1848-1930.
The American founding fathers were incredibly wise. They had experienced firsthand the tyranny of kings and realized that concentrating power in one person was dangerous. They designed the American governmental system such that power would be spread among three equal branches of government. Rejecting the divine right of monarchy, they felt that government was only legitimate when governing by the consent of the governed.
The founding fathers also realized that pure democracy was nothing more than a fancy term for mob rule. They knew that the majority was not always right. They gave a country not ruled by the majority, but ruled by law – a nation of laws, not of men. Thomas Jefferson, in his first inaugural address in 1801 said, “Though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable;…the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression”. The law provides protection when the majority is wrong.
Every civilized society needs laws, needs rules to govern behavior. Without laws, we are subject to the impulses of the majority or to those with the means to enforce their whims. In the late 18th century, the king had the power to enforce his desires, no matter how oppressive. Later in the same century, the French Revolution showed the brutality of mob rule – emotional, irrational democracy in action. The French atrocities may have been democratic, that is, sanctioned by the majority, but they were still atrocities.
Law is objective; justice is blind. The flaws in our system of governance are caused not by the nature of law, but by the emotional application of the law by people. Injection of irrational emotionalism into the law subverts the intent of the law, and opens the door for abuse, oppression and tyranny.
We accept these laws and other rules – what Frederick Hayek calls “rules of just behavior” – because we believe that they are in our best interest. We would not accept a majority ruling that abolished the Bill of Rights, or one that legalized murder because we know that these actions would not support the general welfare of our nation. Instinctively, we know that the majority is not always right.
In political science, democracy is an interesting concept, but in reality it doesn’t work. Democratic theory ignores human emotions and passions. The theory does not account for selfishness, bias, prejudice or ignorance. These real life attitudes make necessary laws and rules to prevent the potential abuses of power caused by unbridled emotion.
(Adapted from The tyranny of the majority By Charles Bloomer, senior writer for Enter Stage Right at enterstageright.com)
There are communities in which the members of the minority can never hope to draw the majority over to their side, because they must then give up the very point that is at issue between them. Thus an aristocracy can never become a majority while it retains its exclusive privileges, and it cannot cede its privileges without ceasing to be an aristocracy.
If, on the other hand, a legislative power could be so constituted as to represent the majority without necessarily being the slave of its passions, an executive so as to retain a proper share of authority, and a judiciary so as to remain independent of the other two powers, a government would be formed which would still be democratic while incurring scarcely any risk of tyranny.
(Unlimited Power of the Majority in The United States, and its Consequences, Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocquevilleat xroads.virginia.edu)
Democracies were thought vulnerable to two distinct forms of majority tyranny. The first is political or legal tyranny that operates through the formal procedures of majoritarian rule. Where all aspects of government, from public opinion and juries to the legislature, the executive, and even some judges, are a function of the majority, its power is absolute. As Tocqueville put it in the first volume of Democracy in America (1835), “politically speaking, the people have a right to do anything.”
The second type is the moral or social tyranny the majority exercises through custom and the power of public opinion. “As long as the majority is still silent,” Tocqueville observed, “discussion is carried on; but as soon as its decision is irrevocably pronounced, everyone is silent.” More insidious than the overt tyranny long practiced by monarchs and despots, which was physically brutal but powerless to inhibit the exercise of thought, under this new form of “democratic despotism,” as Tocqueville would come to call it, “the body is left free, and the soul is enslaved.”
(Tyranny of the Majority, International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences )
Why governments sometimes follow the law and other times choose to evade the law? The traditional answer of jurists has been that laws have an autonomous causal efficacy: law rules when actions follow anterior norms; the relation between laws and actions is one of obedience, obligation, or compliance. The rule of law results from the strategic choices of relevant actors. Rule of law is just one possible outcome in which political actors process their conflicts using whatever resources they can muster: only when these actors seek to resolve their conflicts by recourse to law, does law rule. What distinguishes rule-of-law as an institutional equilibrium from rule-by-law is the distribution of power. The former emerges when no one group is strong enough to dominate the others and when the many use institutions to promote their interest.
(Democracy and the rule of law by Adam Przeworski, José María Maravall)
In any institution in which a majority of citizens or members can pass laws or rules that apply, not just to themselves, but to all members of the group, judgment is required to distinguish potential laws which are reasonable and fair from those which are tyrannical because they are unnecessary, unfair, and justifiably intolerable to the minority that opposed them. And formal mechanisms need to be in place, wherever feasible, to prevent tyrannical laws from being passed by those whose judgment in such matters might fail.
(The Need for Formal and Informal Mechanisms to Prevent “Tyranny of the Majority” in Any Democratic Government by Rick Garlikov)
“Like other tyrannies, the tyranny of the majority was at first, and is still vulgarly, held in dread, chiefly as operating through the acts of the public authorities. But reflecting persons perceived that when society is itself the tyrant — society collectively over the separate individuals who compose it — its means of tyrannizing are not restricted to the acts which it may do by the hands of its political functionaries. Society can and does execute its own mandates; and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with which it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development and, if possible, prevent the formation of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own…..” (John Stuart Mill to On Liberty, The Library of Liberal Arts edition)
There is a common misconception that in a democracy, 51% of the electorate can override the wishes of the other 49%, even ordering genocide by decree if they wanted to. This is not so; it may be true in the idealized dystopia world of some political scientists, but in reality, no democracy is a democracy for very long if it implements a tyranny of the majority.
There is however a worrying tendency amongst many people to assume that all branches of government must always reflect the views of the majority, no matter what, without regard for the rule of law.
In a democracy, the laws created by the institutions are to be enforced and followed, regardless of whether the majority benefits or is harmed by them. In the West, it is not possible for white policemen to gun down suspicious-looking black men on the excuse that these people are probably criminals, or that this coldblooded murder benefits the majority white population.
Similarly, when the courts interpret the law, they are supposed to have only one thing in mind — what the law says. To allow the majority to impose its will on the minority by coercing the courts into following a false interpretation of the law is to throw the door open to anarchy.
The institutions of a country do not exist to provide a semblance of organization to the messy process of enforcing a tyranny of the majority. A civilized country is ruled by what the statute books have to say, not by the whims and fancies of the majority.
In some “democracies”, the branches of government which are directly or indirectly elected by the citizens seem to think they can lord it over the unelected branch, which is usually the judiciary.
But all that does is raise the question, what is supreme in a civilized nation? Is it the will of the majority, or the will of the constitution? In some idealized dystopia “democracy”, the will of the majority may be supreme, but in the real world, any self-respecting civilized society knows that it is the law which takes priority.
(johnleemk at infernalramblings.com)

HE WAS THE FIRST NATIVE EGYPTIAN TO RULE EGYPT IN OVER 2500 YEARS

In 1929, Gamal Abdel Nasser entered the boarding house of the Helwan High School where he stayed for one year. The following year, he moved to Ras El-Tin High School after his father joined the Postal Service in Alexandria, Egypt. It was at that school that Nasser’s national sentiment was shaped.
In 1930, the Ministry of Ismail Sidky issued a decree pertaining to the cancellation of the 1923 constitution. This fueled student demonstrations calling for the fall of colonialism and the re-institution of the constitution.
Nasser recounts the first demonstration in which he participated: “While crossing the Manshiya Square in Alexandria, I noticed clashes between some demonstrating students and the police, I did not hesitate: I immediately joined the demonstrators not knowing anything about the cause of demonstration for I found no reason to ask. It was at the police station, while receiving treatment for my head injuries, that I learned that the demonstration was an anti-government protest led by the “Masr El-Fatah” (Young Egypt) society. I went to jail filled with zeal and came out fuming with anger” (Interview with Sunday Times correspondent David Morgan, 18 June 1962).
In 1933, Nasser joined El-Nahda Secondary school at El-Zaher district in Cairo where he pursued his political career and became head of El-Nahda schools student union. During that time, his passion for reading on patriotic and history-related literature led him to read about the French Revolution, Rousseau, Voltaire, and Napoleon Bonaparte, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, and Gandhi. He even wrote an article entitled “Voltaire, the Man of Freedom” which was published in the school magazine. He also read Les Misérables by Victor Hugo, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens.
(nasser.bibalex.org)
At the end of World War Two, colonialism still dominated large parts of the Arab World. Egypt was a monarchy under British rule and the base of Britain’s presence in the Middle East.
Egyptian discontent at still being a colony was rising and Egyptians felt angry and humiliated after their poorly-armed military lost the 1948 war against Israel.
On July 23, 1952, a group of Egyptian army officers, calling themselves the Free Officers Movement, took power in a bloodless coup. At the forefront of the uprising was a charismatic young army officer called Gamal Abdel Nasser.
This was the first military coup to happen in the Arab World and it set a precedent for many to follow. After assuming power, Nasser and the Free Officers formed the Revolutionary Command Council, which constituted the real power in Egypt. General Muhammad Naguib became Egypt’s first president. However, it soon became clear that the revolution was driven by the charisma of Nasser, and his strong ideological notions. Conflict with Naguib over strategies soon resulted in his removal, and in October, 1954 Nasser was appointed president of Egypt. He was the first native Egyptian to rule Egypt in over 2500 years.
Nasser set about changing Egypt. He had his own vision for both a new nation and the Arab World. Politically, he transformed Egypt into a republic, introducing centralized parliamentary rule, but he is better known for his domestic social programmes. Dia’ El Din Mohammad Daoud, the secretary-general of the Nasserite movement, says: “For the first time an Egyptian leader from the people and not from the upper classes, was able to win the hearts of the Arab people, there was now contact with various Arab forces and dialogue, there was a common language, one with which all Arabs could identify, this paved the way for a common Arab strategy.”
Nasser’s modern take on nationalism inspired Arabs, in a way which the Nahda, the Arab renaissance of the 19th century, had not. Nasserism had taken Arabism a step further. He believed Arabs would be stronger if united, that they shared a common struggle against colonial powers and that the liberation of Palestine should be an Arab duty.
Nasser’s vision extended far beyond Egypt. He believed that the lessons of the revolution should be applied in other Arab countries. His charisma and influence were so great that he inspired Arabs elsewhere to dream of a unified Arab nation. His defiant attitude towards Egypt’s former colonial masters made him even more popular. Nasserism swept the region.
(aljazeera.com)
Gamal Abdel Nasser, on the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt:
“During 1953 and 1954, Party of the Muslim Brotherhood wanted to influence the course of the Revolution and submit it to their guardianship. We were not in agreement. Then, they have declared war on us and tried to assassinate me in Alexandria, October 26, 1954. The battle has begun and we imprisoned the terrorist members of the party.
In the year 1954, while we were negotiating withdrawal terms with the English occupation forces from Egypt, the ‘brothers’ held their secret meetings with staff members of the British Embassy. They told the British: ‘we can take over power; we will do this and that… ‘. That was taking place during our negotiations with British Empire, meanwhile the Party of the Muslim Brotherhood in no way acted as patriot Egyptians.
To the question: ‘what is your position on the Canal. ” (i.e. The Suez Canal) for which we were fighting, there Morshid [i.e. The Guide] answered the question! It’s you who are interested, in Egypt to fight for the canal; we have a consideration to fight elsewhere! This is the message of Muslim brothers; they are misleading the masses and trading in religion!
In 1953, we sincerely considered to work with them and to make sure they are on the right way. I myself met the supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood who has put conditions to us:
Their Morshid demanded of us In the first place, you should impose “Hijab’ (veil) on Egypt’s women, he stated. He told me as a leader, this is your responsibility! I told him, Morshid “guide”, you have a daughter enrolled in the Faculty of medicine, who does not wear a veil. So why don’t you make her wear it? If you are unable to impose the veil on a single girl, in this case your daughter, you want that of me alone, to throw the veil on ten million women in this country!
The Morshid “guide” added, women must not work! I said, by allowing women to work, we protect women from misery. We know all the stories of poor women, sick or healthy, who have had to survive… The work is a protection for women. Prevent them from work goes against society interest. We are working on empowering women so that men and women can mutually support each other! His conditions and demands do not stop there! He demanded of us ‘to close cinemas, theatres’… to immerse Egypt in darkness!
Obviously, we couldn’t give in to their demands. They fought us. In 1954, they have embarked on their assassination attempts and their ‘deception’ using religion; eventually some of them ended up convicted by the tribunal of the Revolution.
That was before the adoption of the Constitution, when we decided to pardon them and released them from the prisons. We have even enacted a law enabling them to go back to work, claim their salaries, work promotions and guaranteed their rights in all areas.
That was what we did in 1964. But in 1965, we discovered their secret organizations plotting a new conspiracy, they carried out attacks on the country’s infrastructure and I was a target as well. A plot with a rather amazing ruthlessness: the Egyptian people would be ‘apostate’. “They are Muslims Brotherhood; therefore they have to take power to guarantee that God governs in the country, not man!”
Ok! But how could God govern without Prophet? We know all that at the beginning of Islam there was a prophet! They said, we refuse the Sunni representation. We reject the parliamentary representation. We want the Government of God! But who could therefore ensure that Government of God? They can! Their Morshid “guide” is therefore the Prophet of God and we are all apostates. All Arab countries, even those that receive and supports them today, including rulers and citizens are apostates. This is what they told us: they are the only Muslims!
Naturally, they were arrested. It was certainly not a trivial operation to try to assassinate Gamal Abdel Nasser. But for one Gamal Abdel Nasser murdered arise thousand more! It is not possible to murder a whole nation. Whatever the circumstances, we cannot tolerate their destructive operations, nor their fascist behavior and ideology seeking to govern on behalf of God, while they are actually motivated by hatred.
We have therefore commenced to investigate the history of each of them who were involved or collaborated with the secret organizations. We will do the same with the heads and dangerous members of their secret organizations, who were released from prison in 1964… The rest will be released and they shall be entitled to a second chance.
Enough is enough! We will not allow them to endanger our national achievements of the past nineteen years, which were attained through hardship and suffering. We cannot rely on the henchmen of the colonizers and the reactionaries, regardless of their names, and even if the name is that of so-called Muslim Brotherhood. We all know that, in this case, their Islam is a hoax intended to entrap more people in joining them. They are just a dark force full of hatred. Their leaders have worked with those of the “Baghdad Pact” and those of the colonial countries. Their have collaborated with our enemies. They have clearly shown that the movement of the Muslim Brotherhood is nothing other than a tool used to serve the colonial powers and its reactionary puppets. Our principles forbid us from leaving these collaborators of colonialism and feudalism causing more harm to our country. We shall protect Egypt’s future and ensure the nation’s achievements.
In 1954, they tried to kill the Revolution while serving the interests of colonialism. We succeeded to reach an agreement with the English colonial power, who was occupying us on the date, forcing the occupation to agree to the withdrawal from Egypt within a maximum of 20 months. This is the time they chose to launch their deadly operations and tried to assassinate me in Alexandria.
We knocked them out and we were able to halt them. Today, the people of Egypt do despise the Muslim brotherhood since they know who they are. We did give them a second chance; they did not want it to work.”
(saebpress.com)
Founded by Hassan al-Banna, the Muslim Brotherhood – or al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun in Arabic – has influenced Islamist movements around the world with its model of political activism combined with Islamic charity work. The movement initially aimed simply to spread Islamic morals and good works, but soon became involved in politics.
While the Ikhwan say that they support democratic principles, one of the group’s stated aims is to create a state ruled by Islamic law, or Sharia. Its most famous slogan, used worldwide, is: “Islam is the solution.”
After Banna launched the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928, branches were set up throughout the country – each running a mosque, a school and a sporting club – and its membership grew rapidly.
By the late 1940s, the group is estimated to have had 500,000 members in Egypt, and its ideas had spread across the Arab world. At the same time, Banna created a paramilitary wing, the Special Apparatus, whose operatives joined the fight against British rule and engaged in a campaign of bombings and assassinations.
The Egyptian government dissolved the group in late 1948 for attacking British and Jewish interests. Soon afterwards, the group was accused of assassinating Prime Minister Mahmoud al-Nuqrashi. Banna denounced the killing, but he was subsequently shot dead by an unknown gunman – believed to have been a member of the security forces.
In 1952, colonial rule came to an end following a military coup d’etat led by a group of young officers calling themselves the Free Officers.
(bbc.com)
Egypt had endured autocracy for decades. It was Gamal Abdel Nasser Hussein who first suppressed The Muslim Brotherhood, which was reactionary and opposed his land reforms and modernization plans, in the 1950s. But Nasser was extremely popular: he had planned the ouster of King Farouk, survived an assassination attempt by a Brotherhood member, and later became a hero of the Suez confrontation with Britain, France and Israel.
After the death of Nasser, Anwar el Sadat became president. After Sadat was assassinated Hosni Mubarak succeeded him. Mubarak tried to contain the Brotherhood. Not a single one of the current generals, including defense minister and coup leader Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, has the popularity, charisma, intelligence, and track record of Nasser to overwhelm the Brotherhood by force.
(blackstarnews.com)
General Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, now the supreme power, appears to be feeding into nostalgia for nationalist president after July coup.
The two men can be seen together all over central Cairo, on banners, flags and on posters on sale to tourists and locals. One is mustachioed, square-jawed, and handsome, with short graying hair and an enigmatic smile; the other is clean-shaven, open-faced, most often in dress uniform, a clutch of medals on his left breast.
The first man is the pan-Arab nationalist former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser, hammer of the Muslim Brotherhood, who died in 1970. The second is General Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, head of Egypt’s armed forces and, since the July coup that ousted the Brotherhood-backed president, Mohamed Morsi, the supreme power in the country.
In the coffee shops of Cairo, where political discussions have bounced off peeling walls since Nasser’s death, a vigorous debate is taking place over whether Sisi has deliberately risen in the former’s likeness – and what parallels between the two men’s careers may mean for post-revolutionary Egypt.
While Sisi has pledged stability as a central plank of the military-led government he will shepherd towards elections in the future, he has also tapped into themes that Nasser used to enshrine his legacy as one of modern Egypt’s most celebrated figures.
In his public appearances since the 3 July coup, Sisi has mirrored Nasser’s key messages of nationalism, skepticism of western intentions, Arab dignity and strong leadership. The latter has been seized on by a broad swath of the Egyptian public that has struggled in the chaos of the revolution that brought down Hosni Mubarak’s presidency in January 2011.
The parallels between him and Sisi run deep. Nasser had a background as an officer and became president with military support in 1956, after planning the revolution that had ousted Egypt’s last monarch, King Farouk, four years earlier. Sisi also has a revolution under his belt. And, while not currently an elected official, he is being talked about as a presidential candidate after the interim government ends.
“We have to make a distinction between Sisi as a person and the military institution he represents. He has a good chance to prove himself now and there is a sense that he represents the Egyptian national identity that the Brotherhood wanted to steal away.” said Hamdeen Sabahi, a presidential candidate in 2012 for a bloc of Nasserist parties, called the Popular Current.
The deadly showdown with the Brotherhood, which remains bitterly disenfranchised and encamped in two parts of Cairo, shows no sign of being conciliated. Sisi’s generals have repeatedly warned during the past week that both sites, at Raba al-Adawiya and near Cairo University, will be cleared imminently. More bloodshed would likely cast a pall over a legacy that remains very much in the making. Although some Egyptians feel that another showdown (two massacres have already taken place since 3 July 2013) may be a price worth paying, despite almost certain condemnation from some western states.
“The thing that links the two is that Sisi, like Nasser rejects the west and wants national independence,” said Mohammed Fahim. Both men fighting the Muslim Brotherhood are not seen as a bad thing.” Nasser, the man the Brotherhood wanted to forget is, however, very much part of the new Egyptian psyche. “It’s up to Sisi whether he leads by example, or just reflects in his glory,” said Fahim.
After the last verdict from the Cairo Court for Urgent Matters, the Egyptian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood is set to face a future that mirrors the majority of its past: once again becoming an illegal organization.
After some deliberation, the presiding judge proclaimed, “The court bans the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood and its nongovernmental organization, and all activities that it participates in and any organization derived from it.” He also ordered the interim government to freeze the Brotherhood’s assets and establish a panel to administer them until any appeal has been heard.
The court didn’t reveal the grounds for the ruling, but it was apparently prompted by the leftist National Progressive Unionist Party—also known as Tagammu—who claim that the Brotherhood have links to terrorists organizations and are guilty of “exploiting religion in political slogans.” Whatever the reason for the verdict, it seems that the spectacular fall of the Muslim Brotherhood is now complete.
That alleged link to terrorist organizations would have been bolstered in the eyes of the Egyptian public after the recent failed assassination attempt on Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim. Although Ibrahim escaped unscathed from the apparent suicide bombing, the attack killed one and left at least ten wounded, with voices on the street instantly pinning the blame on the Brotherhood.
“Of course it was the Brotherhood—they are terrorists! Who knows what they will do next?” cried a street vendor in downtown Cairo after hearing the news over the radio. Despite the fact that an al Qaeda-inspired group known as Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis has since claimed responsibility for the attack—and the Brotherhood have vehemently denounced it—they still remain guilty in the eyes of many Egyptians.
After weeks of stringent crackdowns that have resulted in the deaths of more than a thousand civilians and the arrest of most of their leading members and activists, the political potency of the Muslim Brotherhood has completely dissipated.
(Excerpts from Egypt wonders if army chief is another Nasser, Martin Chulov in Cairo, The Guardian, Wednesday 7 August 2013 at theguardian.com)