geardrops [blog]

San Jose, June 23 2009

The rally had been going on for near an hour at this point. We were collected at the Plaza de Cesar Chavez Park, and though he worked for laborers I think he would have appreciated this. The sun was beyond the skyline and night swept up as we began marching around the plaza, chanting, candles in our hands.

I carried a clear plastic cup with a little tea light inside, wick swimming in melted wax, wind still creeping over the lip of the cup and threatening the tiny flame. It danced, flickered, then went out.

“Excuse me.”

The woman beside me had a long candle whose flame was protected by a tiny Dixie cup. She was middle-aged, and her skin a lovely shade darker than my pale Slavic heritage granted me. “Yes?”

“My candle has gone out. Could I borrow your candle to re-light it?”

We pulled off from the line of slow-moving demonstrators, and struggled against the wind to re-light my candle.

“Are you half-Persian?” she asked me. Valid question, as I don’t look even remotely Persian.

“No.”

“Oh.”

Clearly she wanted to ask why I was there. The question was on her lips, but she couldn’t say it for fear of offending me. I appreciated this, as I’d spent the past near-hour concerned someone was going to call me out, asking what Whitey McCornbread was doing here.

She found a more tactful way to get to the question. “How did you hear about this?”

“A friend of mine was in a rally in San Francisco when he heard about this one, and told me.”

“So you know what this is about?”

“I’ve been keeping up.”

She was clearly surprised, I suppose most non-Persians aren’t even aware of the situation, let alone pay enough attention to keep up, so I explain.

“It’s just, a nation is clearly crying out for democracy, for a vote they can put their faith in, for a government they can trust, and they don’t have that. We’ve enjoyed this freedom in America for over 200 years now, but it doesn’t mean it can’t be taken away in an instant if we stop paying attention. A nation’s freedom is only maintained by the vigilance of its people, and I support the vigilance and the passion of the people of Iran.”

I took a breath here, a long one, to calm the burn in my throat that crept up as I spoke. Words came with increasing difficulty, but I worked to finish what I’d started. “I don’t really care what nation it is, when innocent people are being killed for trying to assert their rights, their voice, it goes beyond borders. It’s not about being Persian, or American, it’s…” I couldn’t speak anymore.

“It’s about being human.” She finished my sentence, but barely.

We caught a gap in the wind and my candle was re-lit. “Thank you,” I said.

She smiled. “Thank you.”

(more photos)

Like many people, I’ve been following #IranElection on Twitter.

First and foremost, whether or not the election was stolen (I’ve yet to hear conclusive evidence on this front, and as such I can’t assume), what is being reported is absolutely tragic, and some of the images I’ve seen have spanned from disheartening to disturbing. Regardless of the root of the situation, regardless of the outcome, people are being wounded and killed and that breaks my heart.

However, there’s been a silver lining in all of this, a clear shift in paradigm.

Our news has typically come from traditional sources. Associated Press, BBC, Reuters, CNN, et cetera. These networks (I use this term broadly, not specifically television) have been where we as interested citizens go, so we can remain informed of the world around us. In America, one of the most trusted sources of news is CNN.

So why didn’t CNN report on the election in Iran? Why were they silent on the resulting chaos?

Mediabistro had comments from Rick Sanchez concerning the lack of CNN response to this situation in Iran, which has been dubbed #cnnfail.

Frankly, it’s a compliment that you expected us to cover it more than our competitors…

Perhaps I’m alone here, but I find this response offensive (neglecting the other comments made which Mediabistro reported).

How dare CNN take such a casual, dismissive tone when ignoring a major, news-worthy situation in another country? “Thanks for thinking we’re better than we are?” An appropriate response would have been, “It was an oversight that we as an established news network should never have made. We have failed you as viewers, as people, and we hope to re-establish the trust you once had in us to report the news, quickly and accurately.” Not only have they failed us in their lack of reporting, they have failed us in understanding the error they’ve made.

Twenty-four hour coverage, for days, about the events of September 11th, an event which at its core spanned a few hours. The slightest breath of doomsday news from the war in Afghanistan, Iraq, and they were on it. But now? Not a word about the protests, the riots, the fires, the shootings, the numbers dead. No insight into what’s going on at the street level, in an event which some are saying is 1953 all over again. The inmates are running the asylum.

It fell to us to declare what was the news. And we did.

People may make derrogatory comments on Twitter, how it’s full of narcissistic fucks discussing their breakfast selection. But I’ve always been a supporter of Twitter, since I first discovered it. I loved it, and I knew it could be a great tool. But I’ll admit, I never conceived how powerful it would be.

This isn’t a slam on CNN, not entirely. There’s been enough of that. This is an explanation of my personal disappointment (with a noteworthy lack of surprise — it’s a bad day when you feel you can’t trust someone you once did, and it’s a worse day when you know you can’t). This is my celebration of the peoples’ response.

Iran attempted to cut all communication with the outside world. People grab pay-and-go phones and tweet. They capture photos and toss it on twitpic instantly. Upload cellphone videos to youtube before it can be confiscated and destroyed. Word got out, despite efforts to the contrary. Despite the apathy of our “trusted news sources.” Citizen reporting at its finest.

Cheezy as it is, it’s also true: You can’t stop the signal.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChanTFSmqao]

This is the blog post I wanted to make.

Excuse me while I get political. I avoid this sort of thing, typically, but I want to say this. And well, it’s my blog.

It’s likely this post isn’t going where you think it’s going.

Last night was a victory, and not just because the candidate I preferred won. Last night, we saw history made.

People have spoken about the election of a black man into the highest office of our country as a real step forward in civil rights. But we also need to remember that this is a step forward in the American dream. For the entirety of our nation’s history, the seat of presidency has remained in a ‘tell’ state, with little ’show.’ Writers understand what I mean. “Keep working, and maybe someday you can be president!” This mantra is oft-repeated, and time and again a white protestant male above 40 is elected. But last night, that changed. Last night, the guy who did keep working, against odds, was named the next president.

This was the first election I remember where people were voting for who they liked, not against who they hated. We are living in times of hate and fear, strict polarization between the “us” and the “they.” Fear, warmongering, and economic collapse are the legacy of the Bush administration, and I have spent the past eight years unable to be political, for the sheer fact that I get so emotionally hurt by this great nation tearing itself apart.

And the youth vote turned out. Finally. Finally, the youth vote turned out. And look at what it required. We can argue whether or not it was Obama’s voracious courting of the internet, youtube, twitter, that clinched the election. What I saw from my friends, from the friends I have who are still in college, is for once they felt they could make a change. For once, we felt we were important, our voices mattered. For once, we felt as though our government was of-by-and-for us.

But it’s not over. Not by a long shot. Obama won the presidency, but he does not have an easy path before him. None of us do.

When the problems we’re currently facing are listed, it seems far too much for one man to solve. We’re tangled in a war in the middle east that we should never have started, and history has never smiled on a two-font war. The financial crisis is only now a spectre in the distance soon to be a real problem, when this next quarter shows economic decline, when companies realize there isn’t money to keep them afloat and affluent, when jobs are not lost by the hundreds but by the hundred-thousands. The planet is sagging under the weight of our overproduction and hyperconsumerism, and clean fuel is only the start of the solution. America, a former leader in science and technology, has slipped behind in basic literacy and mathematical competency.

And there is a large part of our country that believes this man to be a terrorist, that believes he is a Muslim and therefore on the path to destroy us all.

Obama must simultaneously make the sweeping changes required to resolve the above-listed crises, as well as maintain enough status quo to appease the dissenters. And there will always be people who hate him, simply because of his skin.

Why did I vote for Obama? Because I believe he has the intellect to guide us through these intricate problems, the temperament to handle the delicate and highly volatile international situation, and the self-awareness to surround himself by those more experienced than he.

Our nation was born from intelligent discourse, from the papers written by our founders and framers, and somewhere along the way we forgot that. I long to see that nation in my lifetime, an America made sovereign by its intellect.

Today there were primaries in California. All both of them.

I didn’t vote, but that’s not due to any social irresponsibility on my part. I’ve mentioned before why I hate politics. Years ago, I read a speech that changed my life: Washington’s Farewell Address (yes, I’m linking the vernacular version - you’ll thank me later). It outlined a good deal of things that I felt, the most important important of which was:

Let me now … warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.

Translation: All parties suck.

…

This spirit [of uniting as a group against another group], unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

Translation: People like to get in groups to hate other groups. It’s what we do. And it really, really sucks.

…

The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.

Translation: All party leaders are power-hungry jerks. And they suck.

- George Washington, 1796

It’s not that deep into the speech. Just look up the word “parties” (either version) and read that section. Political parties are going to ruin us. They are ruining us. And I refuse to join up with something that is destroying a wonderful system of government. It’s converting the vote into a coin-flip. People who are fiscally conservative and socially liberal, or the other way around, feel caught in a bind. Sure they would like their vote to go to the Libertarians/Green/Socialist/Reform/Etc. But they want their vote to count.

I think if more people realized that 5% of the base vote can get a party federal funding in the next election they’d be more inclined. But these are the same people who can’t balance their sodding checkbooks.

“I really want Obama to win the election in ‘08.”

“So you’re going to vote for him even if he doesn’t take the primary?”

“No. I’m not going to vote.”

I wish I could say I maintained my initial outrage at this statement. But when I gave myself a moment to actually think on it, I realized I couldn’t fault him at all.

The elections have never been a big thing at my house. My parents were raised in communist Poland and fled here as political refugees. They registered Republican to distance themselves as much from the perceived left which had plagued their lives thus far. However, politics were never discussed. It wasn’t until I left the house that my mother finally opened up to me on how they left. Elections were a quiet drive to the local voting booth where I sat and read a book until they came out from behind the curtain.

“How do they count the votes? Do they do it by hand?”

“They use machines,” my mother said.

“What if the machines make a mistake?”

She looked at my father, long-suffering and impatient. “They test them to make sure they don’t,” he replied in her stead.

“But what if they do? Or what if people cheat? How would we know?”

“We wouldn’t.”

I’m not showing off. This isn’t a feature of myself that I appreciate having. I’ve been mistrustful of everyone my entire life, authority in particular. It would be a weight off my shoulders if I could relax and let someone else just handle things. I’m not a control freak. I’ve just been let down too many times.

When I entered high school, I had a very political friend who engaged me in this world. I started reading smarter books. I looked forward to the year 2004 when I could vote in a presidential election, especially considering the outcome of 2000. I wasn’t upset back then. I didn’t know enough to be upset. But by the time Ye Olde Septembre Eleventhe hit, I knew more. The Patriot Act caused me to make a scene at a Starbucks.

Then two thousand four came. November loomed on the horizon. Surely, I thought, then nation must see the position we are in. Fighting an internationally unpopular war, a good chunk of seats about to be up for grabs in the Supreme Court, an administration that has either lied to its nation or acted on mountains of bad intelligence, neither a bright option. This is a bad place to be. If nothing else, we had a conservative legislative and executive branch, which decreases the use of checks and balances. Surely they will see that this ‘Gay Marriage’ problem is a media smokescreen. Or perhaps, I hoped, that the political games might go to the background in the name of a better country. That people would stop fighting one another’s good ideas simply because they hadn’t thought of it first.

Well, the outcome of that election broke my heart. And it broke the hearts of many of my friends.

I thought on what my friend said. He’s not even going to vote. In all honesty, I’m not sure if I’ll have it in me either. That’s how futile we feel the process is. Not that we think our vote doesn’t count because of the masses of other votes. Not that we are abstaining because we are protesting the process. We just don’t have it in us to care. It’s been broken.

How would we know if we’re being cheated? We don’t. But we have a distinct feeling we are.