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Revolution in Egypt: A 4-Minute Introduction
Poziom:
Temat: Sztuka i rozrywka
Nerdfighters in Pittsburgh: GOOD MORNING,
HANK. IT'S MONDAY!
So Hank, that's a lot of Nerdfighters, and
this is Hosni Mubarak. That's called a transition,
Hank. It's a skill of professional writers.
Hank, Mubarak may or may not be a Nerdfighter.
Although, I suspect he isn't because he doesn't
seem to love the Internet, But he is the 82-year-old
dictator of Egypt. And as you may of hear
on the news, his 30-year rule is in peril,
and lots of Nerdfighters have asked me to
make a video of Egypt, so I'm gonna.
Okay, so Egypt is a Northern African nation
of 80 million people. Primary language: Arabic.
90% Muslim. 10% Christian. It used to be kind
center the of the world, then it was part
of a bunch of Empires. Let's just skip ahead
to 1979.
Okay, so it's 1979, and the president of Egypt,
Anwar al-Sadat, signs a peace treaty with
Israel, thereby establishing Egypt, at least
in the mind of the west, as a kind of politically
and militaristically moderate Arab state.
Two years later, in 1981, Anwar al-Sadat is
assassinated by Islamists. His vice president,
Hosni Mubarak, gets shot in the hand but survives.
So congratulations Hosni, you get to be president
of Egypt!
That was the first time he survived an assassination
attempt. Mubarak has since survived five more
assassination attempts, which is the kind
of thing that could make you super super paranoid
and, in fact, has made him super super paranoid.
Anyway, despite the considerable dangers of
the gig, Hosni Mubarak seems to really like
being president of Egypt because his three
main political positions are:
Number 1: I, Hosni Mubarak, should be the
president of Egypt.
Number 2: There should be no freedom of press
and no Islamic political parties, in fact,
no political parties at all, really because
I, Hosni Mubarak, should remain the president
of Egypt.
And number 3: people who disagree with number
1 or number 2 should go to jail.
In fact, Hank, even before all these protests
started in the last week, there were more
than 10,000 political prisoners in jail in
Egypt, which is a lot but like a drop in the
bucket compared to China, and we're not exactly
fomenting revolution in China right now, unless
you define fomenting as purchasing and revolution
as iPods.
So everybody's always been kinda friends with
him, both in the Arab world and in the West.
Everybody's like, "Ah! It's Mubarak. He could
be worse."
But then in beginning of 2011, Egypt's neighbor
Tunisia suddenly and unexpectedly got rid
of their dictator. And after seeing what happened
in Tunisia, people in Egypt were like "Hey!
I'm pissed off too! I'm pissed off about not
having freedom of speech and about the secret
police and about rising food prices." Remember
the French Revolution, Hank? Rising food prices!
I'm telling you Hank, if you ever become a
dictator, keep your eye on the price of food.
So on January 25, 2011, people hit the streets.
Now initially, the police, which are often
seen as a force of terror in Egypt, were attacking
protesters and throwing them in jail and torturing
them, and then Mubarak resorts to all the
typical old-fashioned dictator stuff, like
turning off all the phones and turning off
the internet, and none of it really worked.
So finally, Mubarak played his last card.
He sent the army out onto the streets of Cairo,
which totally backfired.
It backfired because all male Egyptians have
to serve some time in the army, so the army
is seen as an extension of the citizenry.
And that's why you see all these protesters
climbing on top of tanks, and shaking hands
with the guys inside the tanks, and, like,
scrawling anti-Mubarak graffiti on Mubarak's
tanks. And it looks like Mubarak is going
to have to make his graceful exit, and that
is when the hard work will begin. There's
a lot of romance in revolution, Hank. We all
know this, right?
I can't help myself. I love a good revolution.
I love men and women standing up to authority,
risking their lives for their country. But
that's exactly what happened in the French
Revolution, which ended up being a "massiva
disastro". That's not French. In fact Hank,
it must be noted that revolution does not
have a particularly good track record.
So Hank, right now, the story of Egypt's political
situation is really shinny and interesting,
that's why we're all paying attention to it.
And in a few months it won't be so shinny.
There will be something new shinny, hopefully
the invention of puppy-sized elephants. And
I will name him Louis and teach him to poop
outside, and he and Willie will play together
in the snow, and it will be so beau... Were
we talking about something? Egypt, right.
So hopefully Egypt will make the transition
to a real democracy, and the way that we can
support that is to continue to pay attention
to their story, even when it's not so shiny
anymore.
Okay, so thank you for listening to me talk
about Egypt. As a reward, I will do a question
Tuesday on Friday. Please leave your questions
and comments. Baby's crying, so I gotta go.
Hank, I'll see you on Wednesday.
