Lessons of the Egyptian Struggle

http://www.solidarity-us.org/node/4584
Date Written:  2016-03-01
Publisher:  Against the Current
Year Published:  2016
Resource Type:  Article
Cx Number:  CX21361

I almost cannot believe that five years have passed since the chants of "the people want to bring down the system" and "Bread...Freedom...Social Justice...Human Dignity..." Maybe this is because even in my cell I am filled with dreams of freedom and with hope.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

Maybe because I am among the believers in the dream, and among those who are convinced that we face not only internal authoritarianisms and tyranny, but also an international system that is inhumane - and to which people mean nothing compared to profits and oil - I therefore see that we are still on the journey to build a humane and just society.

We made mistakes sometimes. We were arrogant sometimes and hopeless at other times, but we are still in the fighting ring. Glorification, however, is the voice of the stupid, and crying over the ruins is the voice of the cowardly and desperate. There are lessons for everyone - lessons we learned by pure blood that has been shed for us.

The first of these lessons is that there is no individual salvation, and that desperation and the attempts to escape to the outside or the inside will not help us make our day better. When we only saw ourselves and started calling for freedom only for those we know, and did not move for freedom for all the people - for example, in prisons there are not only thousands of innocent political prisoners, but also thousands of citizens who have been framed, or fallen into debt or are serving time instead of others, because of the economic system of the state, and many other cases - if we allow the regime to separate us from the street and from our goals, then they have won the last round.