Burning, Screaming, and Driving for Freedom - Literally

by Dillon Freed
May 25, 2011

http://www.weeklyblitz.net/1458/burning-screaming-and-driving-for-freedom

Just when the chemotherapy of reading the daily news nearly kills you as it also makes you more informed, a tiny bit of information, wafting its way through the digital ether, a binary-coded butterfly, will find its way onto the petal of one's computer screen.

Recently, there have been several butterflies of heroism that have found me. Acts executed in the face of great tyranny and oppression, which stops me from gadarening into a comprehensive apathy when looking at the state of things. Indeed, such news renews my fighting spirit.

Consider first, Tarek al-Tayyib Muhammad Bouazizi – the man who set himself ablaze on December 17, 2010 as the government would not let him peddle his fruit on the street in Tunisia. Many great things are said to start with a spark – but the Arab uprisings literally did. Bouazizi's authentic martyrdom – take note you dastardly suicide bombers – indeed did initiate the revolutions in Tunisia, Algeria, Syria, Yemen, Libya, and crackdowns in Russia, China and parts of Africa. Now, my dear reader, at some point this summer, when you light a match at your grill, contemplate what you would be willing to burn for. How awful must things be in a nation for a sane man to light himself on fire in protest?

Another act of great heroism is seen in a YouTube video that has gone viral in which the Pakistani actress, Veena Malik, takes it to the man - literally. In a televised interview, we find her mangling a religious zealot during an argument. As the zealot accuses her of being a tramp and a disgrace to the Pakistani nation and Islam for, as is implied, acting like a Western woman, that is, dressing in a tight dress and kissing a man, this fantastically pulchritudinous woman screams at him, "I am more angry with you than you are with me!" This, as I have stated, should be what every woman who faces oppression in the Arab universe shouts in the dogma-withered faces of their persecutors. So next time, men, when you spot an attractive female in some gossamer dress, or women, when you purchase an outfit that turns you into the aurora borealis (something not to be missed), think of the shame forced upon Arab women who are condemned as sluts for wishing to celebrate their womanhood as you do.

Also, recently in the news, it was reported that in Saudi Arabia several females have defied the ban on women driving an automobile. In the face of Wahhabism, these women took to the streets (literally), attempting to become full citizens, mile by mile. They were arrested for their actions on May 24, 2011. Such a protest has happened before, during the Operation Desert Storm, when forty-seven Saudi Arabian women, inspired by seeing the women of the United States military motoring around in Humvees in the land of Mohammad, decided to hit the road. Their liberty too was short-lived. As the New York Times reported, these original road rebels were arrested, banned from leaving the country for a year, could not work for two and a half years, and were called "harlots" by the religious establishment – again, all for driving a car. Perhaps, next time, my female readers, as you start your car to drive to work – pause for a moment at the sound of the start of the engine and think of your sisters in Saudi Arabia trapped inside their homes by oppressive male husbands and their likewise oppressive political and religious leaders.

So, in sum, I think it is good to know that in our support of democracy in the Arab world, there are truly people in those nations who seem to want the real thing, who understand that freedom is absolute. It is good to know because, at times, we may wish to look away and give up. And no doubt, the bulk of the population in those spheres are nowhere near the spiritual evolution that is requisite for a pluralistic, tolerant society, but Bouazizi, Malik and the female drivers of Saudi Arabia have, as they burn, scream and drive for their freedom, have given me hope that it may not always be like that - literally given me hope.

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