When Hope Dies

The Facebook video of a young Iranian woman dying from an assassin's bullet (June 20th, 2009 1:15 PM") brings home the situation not only in Iran but in any country people live where freedom must be fought for. Because freedom should be a natural state of being, an expectation from birth, rather than a political concept subject to sometimes tragically violent conflict.

While standing alongside her father about a mile from the main protests, a woman observed the tumult and was struck in the chest by a bullet. The damage was so extensive she died in two minutes. In the video we see her already fallen, her eyes wide with terror and wonder, being tended to by passersby, helpless as her blood begins to flow from her nose and eyes, her life visibly ebbing. And then she is dead.

Hope, when it dies, dies in the gutter.

This scene has been played over and over throughout history, its repetition inciting callous comparisons by well-off fat-cats to prove an inane point, or the stuff of bleak, black jokes; so commonplace is the inhumanity. Governments routinely either support or decry such acts, rarely, if ever, aware of their own complicity or their own mortality. They are, as their policies of control over the masses have proven, fatally corrupt and exist only because they are allowed to through sheer force.

And every political argument begins with its impact upon a single life and no clearer is that truth more evident than in this video.

But not only in this video. It is shown in the millions of images revealed to our eyes and souls for generations, from human rights violations to genocide, from domestic abuse to sexual abuse to routine humiliations between class, race, gender. On and on, the images of violence rippling through the sea of humanity continually remind us of the horrors we inflict upon each other. And yet those reminders are at best impotent or last but a moment before our baser natures overwhelm both sense and the senses and more atrocities tumble forth, barely staunched.

We are all born innocent and yet many of us, through exposure to ideologies which inflame outmoded and dangerously base instincts, become corrupt and to degrees complicit in the suffering of our fellows who have been caught beneath the boot of brutal political regimes, religious extremism and commercial exploitation.

And as we have all regularly been witness to, the words of our leaders can inspire or terrorize. In either case it is the people who have in them the power to give aid to hope and to staunch the blood flowing from innocents who have been felled by the indifferent bullets of the radical ideologue.

Or else hope will continue to die over and over, in fields, in living rooms, in the gutter.

Comments

[commercelib]

I guess the Revolutionay Guards feel really macho shooting a sixteen-year-old, unarmed girl in the chest. And in front of her father. What pathetic excuses for men.

[thromulese]

In this country we watched calmly, placidly and uninterested as two elections in a row were stolen by a religious extremist. We did nothing. The press did nothing. The Supremes put their twisted and contorted stamp of approval on the first stolen election. Diebold voting machines took the next one. And we the people did absolutely nothing.

We have DEMOCRACY by Ambien and Valium. Solidified by a corporate, sold-out MSM. And let us not forget our democrats who only show a spine and guts when they are defending their corporate, big pharma, big oil buddies.

The Iranians are truly brave in their pursuit of a democracy represented and given power by their vote and hence approval. And they are willing to do whatever it takes to protect that right-that power. Because without a vote that counts they know they really would have nothing.

[research]

Agreed, I am proud of these Iranians, she died for a great cause. I wish them well.

[TheIndependenceParty]

Invariably dictators and tyrants overstep and overplay their hands. Often, it is a child, like Neda, or the deaths of many children, which brings about the ultimate demise of such men and their regimes. Whether her name is actual or mythical, Neda's "voice" is not stilled now that her breath is gone, ... not so long as we recognize this horrible price the people are asked to pay, simply to preserve these men in power who command the batons and the sniper's rifles to act on their behalves.

That these men, in their desperation to maintain control over power, would even resort to dispersing a memorial ceremony to this young woman, will simply exacerbate their crimes.

Thank you, Steven, for reminding us of her loss, in whwich all Mankind shares, and of the losses which continue in Iran.

[tccarroll]

Thank you, Steven, for such a moving and apolitical piece. Anyone, regardless of partisan leanings, should be able to read your words and understand the truth therein.

[Overd0g2]

It is the natural state of being. Then we organize into groups and give up our freedom for safety and greater prosperity. This process continues until we have neither safety nor prosperity, and a revolution occurs. Then process begins again. So shall it ever be. The U.S. is over half way to the nadir now.

[hollybork]

Superb and moving post, Steven. This targeted "take out" was done execution style by a marksman, perhaps a terrorist hired by the Revolutionary Guard to come into Tehran and do their "dirty work" from roof tops.

It is callous and brutal, like the sociopathic power mongers who are masquerading as "holy men", the marksmen are venal terrorists calling themselves "revolutionary guard." Here the revolution is unfolding in the streets.

Since the primary message of the Koran is peace, contentment, truthfulness, justice, and the qualtifies of God (honoring the sanctity of all life), and since the heart of the Koran evidences the holiness and abundance of our Creator, a worldly theocracy that acts as brutally as the Shah cannot survive.
Brutality, lies, corruption, torture, murder, threats, and terrorism may cloak themselves in a long holy robe, but the Iranians and the world have seen through the hypocrisy. That is why the wholesale stealing of the election, and then Ahmadenijad calling the protestors "nothing more than dust in the streets" has sparked shock and then rage in Iranian cities, and enormous sympathy in the rest of the world.

Now this great empire of brilliant people, high art, and remarkable history needs to perform another “Luther like” miracle for islam, and reform it to the great religion it can be. Get rid of the by-products of a primitive, civil war society as enshrined in Shariat. Proclaim liberty, equality, the rights of women and embrace the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

[WellTickleMeWillie]

Excellent, Steven as always. Given the history of mankind, it confounds me after all the dastardly things that have happened, why hope continues to spring out. It truly seems to be eternal that hope always comes back and is crushed again and again time after time. Perhaps hope is not the answer to mankinds woes but rather determination and persistence are. Revolutions as we perhaps are now witnessing in Iran spring from despration and the determination and persistence to change things. Are they hopeful? Perhaps, but hoping alone does not produce results and is thus is false as a sense of motivation.

[oxi]

"freedom must be fought for. Because freedom should be a natural state of being, an expectation from birth, rather than a political concept subject to sometimes tragically violent conflict."

They fight for freedom and we just give it away to the Patriot Act, the Dept. of Homeland Security and the NSA! Where is our fighting for freedom?

By the way where is the outrage at the brutality of the G20 and NATO protests in Europe, I recall somebody died, but nobody cres about protests against evil western institutions only those that our masters label as evil regimes around the world.

Typical!

[Reme]

This sentiment applies to people engaged in nonviolent struggles all around the globe, not just in Iran. They're in Burma, Pakistan, Belarus, Zimbabwe, Tibet, Western Sahara, Iraq, Egypt, Palestine, West Papua, Vietnam, and Venezuela, just to name a few. They are all risking their lives for their freedom from oppression, and I think those of us in the free world would do well to heed the words of Aung San Suu Kyi, the world's only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, who asked us to "use [our] liberties to help promote [theirs]."

Keeping their struggles in the spotlight, maintaining solidarity, and refusing to give up hope are all ways we can do that.

[oxi]

That's funny, the Patriot Act and the Dept. of Homeland Security as well as the executive branch of our government have taken liberties away from us and you have the nerve to pint at other nations?

By the way it's not Burma, it's Myanmar!

[JacqueItch]

Lovely sentiments, Steven.

I want to add that until we collectively realize that we are one flesh, ----one large extended family----- the psychopathic narcissists who man the governments will do as they please, even through the horror and outrage we may feel by their actions.

It is a consciousness we do not yet have . . . . yet we may attain it in a relatively short time.
Something along the lines of the power of microchips doubling every 1.5 years is also pertinent to humanity, although on a lesser scale, and with a gradually increasing percentage of the global population affected each time.
When the shifts occur, more people are affected. Eventually there will be too many for the Master Manipulators of Minds to reverse the trend through their spread BS and we finally begin to sense ourselves as common inhabitants of the planet Earth.

The forces of darkness still hold sway.... but the shifts are getting stronger now.
There will be another large war. It will be a last-ditch attempt to stem the tide by those dark forces.
After that the shifts will occur more quickly, each time with greater durability.

It will happen. And I wish I am wrong about that war------but the signs all point toward it. The historical record is pretty convincing that an old pattern is once again unfolding.

[BethS]

Thoughts beget words, and words beget action, and action begets change. Keep writing, but get an even bigger soapbox. Mr. Weber, are you ready to start a revolution? I'm with you!

[TomR]

This woman died because absolute power corrupts absolutely, no matter if their leaders believe themselves to be well-intentioned or acting in the best interest of their country. Villains don't think of themselves as villains, they always think they are doing the right thing.

This post reminds me of an exhibit I saw some years ago at the Neanderthal museum in Mettmann, Germany. They had a looping film that discussed the topic of human aggression, from hundreds of thousands of years ago, to toddlers and modern day wars. I hoped the film would give insight into why we are such an aggressive species, but it merely concluded that yep, we are still aggressive to this day.

Like any other animal, I think the capacity for aggression in humans is there as a biological survival mechanism. Learning how and why to tame those impulses is also a key to our survival, particularly with WMD and rising CO2.

We have a continuum of behavior to choose from: Submissive -> Assertive -> Aggressive. As progressives, we need to strive to be as assertive as we can to combat the unrestrained aggression on the right. That means calling them out when they are covert-aggressive (manipulative) as well as when they promote overt-aggression (war of choice, torture, etc.).

The capacity to feel healthy shame directs us toward civilized behavior and keeps our aggressive impulses in check. We must stay vigilant toward those who are shameless or misguided by toxic shame.

- Tom

[tomas0808]

I saw the video and it made me want to cry. As I did when I stumbled across a video on the web of the Taliban beheading five people, on a stage in front of thousands. And now the news about rape in Africa, one in four men admit to it. What a world. More and more I feel I'm just not cut out for it

[zerotimes10]

That is why our Founding Fathers called them "enumerated Rights". They just simply wrote them down and made them Law. These "rights" we have are ours because we are sovereign human beings and we claim them. No government can give them or take them away. Although it is nice that our Founders went to so much trouble to "enumerate" them. :)

[JohnSawyer]

One of the main reasons America's founding fathers had to enumerate human rights (though they weren't the first people to do so--they borrowed a lot from previous documents), was because so many people work so hard to trammel on those rights, to the point where, in some countries, it becomes somewhat difficult for some citizens to point, with consistency across the population, to what their rights are; but the primary reason for enumerating rights wasn't simply to make a statement--it was to allow people to cite violations of those rights as "something more"--illegal actions that can be prosecuted. The founding fathers recognized that even though humans have certain rights, that's no guarantee that everyone will see it that way, and so putting these rights into law was the necessary next step. Spelling things out, and making them laws on the books, is always better than leaving things as "commonly understood", and hoping for the best.

[JulieSA]

This is a great post, Steven.

[WebHubbleTelescope]

spot on. whatever style he writes in.

[Cameleon]

I AM A FAN OF DEEBLES: And we must remember Americans "Could Have Rebuked" those chads in 2000.