The eyes of the beholder...

[unusualmusic_lj_archive]

Via:slit

slit is in Egypt and among other things, she noticed that:America's image in the rest of the world is one of a cold, cruel and uncaring superpower

I never thought I'd miss the underbelly of American media, but after being here for almost two months, watching only CNN and BBC and Al-Jazeera English, I've started seeing the U.S. in a different light. On television, our government looks scary-competent. It looks cold. And the American people -- when they are featured at all, which is rare -- look like cold and calculating minions of it. We look much more intentional than we really are. "Yes," we are saying to the world (unsmiling), "George Bush is our president. We like him, because he is powerful. We are more powerful than you."

...

Yet this cold version also misses the level and intensity of American opposition. I've gotten frustrated with German friends in the past who are critical of the U.S. government, particularly this administration, but obstinately refuse to acknowledge that I am too, probably way more than they are. But now I can kind of see it, because people who speak for me are not in power, and in this kind of news format, where it's Australia (60 seconds) --> France (30 seconds) --> South Africa (60 seconds) --> U.S. (30 seconds) --> Russia (60 seconds)..... there's no room at all for people like me. So why WOULD they think I exist? They watch the news, right, they're informed? And they don't see me. So my opposition looks like a defensive posture I'm adopting only because I'm under fire, in the moment, rather than the thing that drives me every day of my life.More

slit then makes a surprising and thought-provoking linkFacebook is being used as an organizing tool against oppression in Eygpt

AHA! Lets pat ourselves on the back for encouraging the spread of democracy, right?


Not so fast.

We in the U.S. hear "America supports democracy abroad!!ELEVENTY!" so much that it's become a cliche, so much that we assume the government must be just killing themselves doling out of democracy instruction booklets around the world. We complain that their reality doesn't match their rhetoric, but that criticism concedes half the argument -- it assumes the rhetoric, at least, is there.

It's not. In Egypt all the American rhetoric about democracy comes with so many caveats and explanations of what's meant by the word "democracy" -- explanations Egyptians hear and Americans don't -- that no one sees it as 'America failing to live up to its promise' or anything so forgiving. The issue here isn't rhetoric without teeth: it's that no one has been promised democracy in the first place. They've specifically been told that the U.S. will not be promoting democracy if it threatens to come at the expense of stability.

Think about that while you watch this:

Egypt's Facebook Face Off - Egypt