Fuck Obama! I don't mean that at all. If I could vote for the man ten times this November, I would.
But if I did mean it, I could write it, here, in America, without fear of government reprisals, censorship or jail.
I know: It's almost prosaic to talk about freedom of speech. Not the outer edge definitions, expansions and limitations that come out of Supreme Court decisions, but regular, meat and potatoes freedom of speech. To most of us, it's no more exotic than running water (another first world privilege we take for granted).
But seeing that picture of Pussy Riot behind the glass in court, chilled me, shook me, messed me all up.
As Americans, we rarely feel powerless. We know we can protest, call our congressmen, tweet. We can get a reaction. We can, and will, effect change. Looking at those three young musicians, knowing that we are powerless to help them, imagining what it must be like for them -- women who were born into the brief moments of a free Russia -- to see it all get closed off, locked away, I am left breathless.
Yes. We have troubles here. Just look at whatever may be written above or below me on the site. But the very fact that we can debate them, yell about them, fight for them, means that we have hope. Which is like oxygen. As long as you have it, you are alive.
I cannot imagine how young Russians today have that oxygen.
One more thing: Fuck Putin!
That one I did mean.
Charlie Angus: Artists of the World Unite -- For Pussy Riot
Andy Miah: Pussy Riot Sentence Jeopardises the Sochi 2014 Olympic Games
Human Rights Watch: Pussy Riot: Band Members' Conviction a Blow to Free Expression
Because what i got from those demonstrations is that those Russian kids have more guts than all of us in America combined.
Guess we won't find out for sure if we have those freedoms, or the guts, until a group of folks tries to protest something here.
From the article: "One more thing: F*** Putin! That one I did mean."
Yes, that's it. So much for the free press.
What should be the top headlines? What should be the editorial emphasis?
Why, the allegedly “severe” injustices of THEM, some other nation - outside our imperial domain!
From the native Americans to the Libyans, Vietnamese to Iraqis, now Syrians and Iranians.
Oh, and let’s add the Russians and Chinese to THEM as well.
We may have the biggest prison network in the world, and daily mete out long unjust sentences for petty and victimless crimes.
We may persecute Wikileaks, whistleblowers, and demonstrators under our own legal versions of “hooliganism”.
We may support criminal narco-states in Colombia and Afghanistan, despotism in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, apartheid in Israel, and a mafia-run Kosovo.
We may invade, assassinate, torture and imprison without any trial at all- but if their faults are labeled “severe”,
ours must appear even less so by virtue of being unmentioned, less mentioned, or dismissed as hardly relevant because we have “free speech”.
So what shall we do about THEM?
Invade them, bomb them, economically sanction them , or threaten with more missiles?
Shall we have our CIA and nefarious allies attempt “regime change”?
Shut down their embassy?
Or should we be satisfied simply having our own upstanding government protest their behavior?
Certainly, no ludicrous hypocrisy there.
We don’t need to set any example ourselves.
First, WE have to fix THEM.
We need to make an example of THEM.
Protecting “freedom” is so hard when we must make other countries practice it.
because as long as "we" can keep the finger pointed at "them"...
it isn't pointing at "us".
FBI Director Robert Mueller recently confirmed that the bureau is pushing for a new web wiretap law.
With the Federal Bureau of Investigation's recent push for web wiretaps and increased Internet surveillance, the U.S. seems to be edging closer to the fictional state described in George Orwell's "1984."
As CNET reported earlier this week, the FBI recently created a secret web-surveillance unit, the Domestic Communications Assistance Center, aimed at creating tech that would allow the authorities to more easily eavesdrop on . . . etc etc
because we do not allow OUR government to commit such HORRIFYING outrages.
We are the “best”,
notwithstanding the war crime invasions, torture, assassinations, daily severe sentences for victimless crimes, imprisonment without trial, our Homeland version of political “hooliganism”.
How dare they insult our fine sensibilities.
Our courts would NEVER give sentences so harsh, even if neo-Nazis demonstrated in a synagogue.
Nor would our upstanding allies like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kosovo, Colombia, Israel, or Honduras.
Russia needs a “humanitarian” invasion by USA! Iran next and China too!
Go team USA! Go get ‘em.
Do you really think those Russian patriots put their well being on the line to have any of the above imposed on them?
On the global stage this so called American exception-alism is A JOKE. The global community thinks we are nuts...the last thing they want is for the current US values set as imposed by the wealthy to be imposed upon them. They have enough of that already.
Just yesterday, a Bahraini activist was sentenced to three years in prison, but since Bahrain is an "ally", or better, a client state of the USA, we won't hear an awful lot on that.
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/16/world/meast/bahrain-activist-sentenced/index.html
And not so long ago, both the Danish and the Belgian Governments sentenced Greenpeace activists to jailtime for crashing the party at two separate Climate summits.
http://euobserver.com/institutional/32015
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/aug/22/denmark-sentences-greenpeace-activists-copenhagen
Off course, it is also a LOT easier for "celebrities" and "artists" like Madonna and Bono to speak out in favour or against events that are "sexy" from a marketing / commercial point of view, but (whilst there were real musicians like f.ex. the Dixie Chicks) I haven't heard (m)any of these "celebrities" take a stand to voice their opposition to the Iraq War, or the continued military occupation of the Palestinians. For that, we are mostly dependent on Israelis who have the coconuts to speak out against their own government.
The heart of the matter is: if countries have such an appalling record (like the US, the UK, the EU) in guaranteeing their own citizens' alleged "Freedoms", they really aren't in a good position to teach others a lesson in morality.
We will pray to Gaia Primordial Mother Earth to oust Obama.
Expect all the freedom-lovers to support us.
They will be sweeping streets, probably.