I did some reading last night and this morning that made me realize that this trend of ours (to just latch onto something and run with it) runs deeper than just catchphrases. We seem to do this with concepts, as well. How many of us got swept up in the awe of the internet's might during the Arab Spring? We cheered Egyptians on for harnessing communication technology to overcome authoritarianism. It was cool. It was really heartening.
What we need to realize, however, is that this was such a rarity. Authoritarian regimes are nothing new. This battle of Good vs Evil (Information vs Suppression), is a big misconception that we Westerners have dreamt up. That's not to say that it has good roots. When the East German government broke apart from the West, many citizens along the border (ie Berlin) were able to enjoy western TV programs. The wall went up and cable transmission stopped until those East Germans, hell bent on watching their shows, learned to angle satellites to pick up stations. After efforts to stop this consumption of western media, the Eastern government realized that it just wasn't worth the time and headache (yes, MANY Germans complained about not being able to watch the American soaps). Moreover, they discovered that consumers of this information were less likely to demonstrate against the regime and find outlets to release politically charged frustration. Why? Because from 5pm-9pm there was an escape; a way over the wall. So here, on a silver platter, the Eastern Regime was given a seemingly free way to pacify its people. We thought we were showing the commies what they were missing out on and therefore charging their drive to break free. We were just giving them what we had always had: mindless, captivating TV.
This same trend has been noticed in several other regimes as well. Russia, although not nearly as paranoid as the GDR, has actually welcomed the net because it understands that youtube can occupy the minds of a populace with empty media. Given a choice, the people want to think about recent plot developments on a sitcom, not domestic economic policy.
"The internet has provided so many cheap and easily available entertainment fixes to those living under authoritarianism that is has become considerably harder to get people to care about politics at all."
"Unless the West stops glorifying those living in authoritarian governments, it risks falling under the false impression that if it builds enough tools to break through the barriers..., citizens will inevitably... rebel against repressive government."
- Evgeny Morozov (The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom)
This also runs beyond TV, however. We have started to figure out that introducing the internet to countries under close state watch has resulted in search topics dealing mostly with porn. Surprising? Humans are humans, I guess. If you give a wired computer to an up and coming generation living under, what we could consider, out-dated social norms, the internet provides a clear vent for pent-up sexual frustration. We can refer to Mazlow's levels here to reinforce this image (no pun intended).
We have got to stop assuming and start working with the actual results of this living phenomenon.
Speaking of cliches and buzzwords, I think "Arab Spring is a good example of both. It's a term that's heard so often that no one seems to question it any more.
ReplyDelete'Arab Spring' is a kind of one-size-fits-all category that you can lump any kind of uprising taking place in the Middle East into. It ignores the fact that all of these uprisings, while they share common themes, are being played out in very different countries for very different reasons.
You can't really compare the armed, CIA-backed uprising in Libya, in which Libyan exiles (Khalifa Hafter) that were living in suburban Virginia re-appeared in the country before the fighting took place with the largely nonviolent protest movement taking place in Bahrain. Nor can you really compare these two countries to Egypt, which has a drastically lower standard of living than the first two countries.
"Arab Spring" is a term that was invented by non-Arabs and plastered over everything taking place in the middle east. If I spoke Arabic I would tell you the word that people there use, but I'm pretty sure it's not in English.
The term allows journalists to get kind of sloppy with their facts and make sweeping generalizations about movements taking place instead of looking at them all individually. Down with buzzwords!