"The internet isn't written in pencil, Mark. It's written in ink." says the former girl friend of the main character in the movie The Social Network.
I've been paying attention to what's going on in Egypt. The news isn't good, people.
Yes, there's the off chance that an actual Democratic Republic will come out of what is currently a state of Marshal law but I'm not putting any money on that outcome.
In the last few hundred years there have been many revolutions; ours, the French revolution, the Russian revolution, the Cuban revolution, the Iranian revolution...
Revolutions are tricky things. You get rid of one rotten ruler only to be left with chaos into which, as history repeatedly shows; the strongest, most ruthless entity usually steps, taking charge and making things pretty much worse than they were to begin with.
The French got rid of the aristocracy only to be plunged into the reign of terror. Fun.
The Russians got rid of the Tsar only to wind up under the boot of Communism for eighty years and now are a state run by organized crime. Fun.
Cuba...I don't even know what they had before Castro took over but despite anything Michael Moore says, I notice rich folks from around the world do NOT flock there to take care of their health problems. Any gorgeous tropical Island nation from which citizens are willing to float in inner tubes across 90 miles of shark infested water to escape must have serious problems.
Iran got rid of the Shah only to wind up a mullahcracy in which laughing in public can get a woman stoned to death. Fun.
So you can see, the odds of things turning out well in Egypt in our lifetimes simply aren't very high.
Getting rid of tyrants is a good thing. The problem isn't simply that you need to have a mechanism in place to ensure that the tyrant isn't replaced by a new and better tyrant . Human beings, being what we are, can't be trusted with political power.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely may be the truest words ever spoken by man.
The only revolution in history ( that I know of, not being a history buff, merely an interested observer) in which the resulting nation got the government the people wanted was ours.
For one thing, our founders sat down with some very definite ideas about what was wrong with the Monarchy they had just broken from and they came up with real ways to prevent a new tyranny from forming here in their new nation. They wrote The Constitution, guaranteeing the rights off each and every citizen. They built into the Constitution checks and balances to ensure that power could not become absolute and therefore would not be absolutely corrupted.
Human beings, being what we are, have been trying to circumvent the constitutional checks and balances ever since. This was expected and it's why the Constitution was written the way it was.
I can't help but notice one thing about the American Revolution that makes it unique in all of human history; it was lead by the rich. The philosophy behind our revolution wasn't "we're starving! Let's eat the fat man!" but "This is great! Think of how much better it could be without George, over there."
This is sort of what Mark Z. (the main character in The Social Network) thought when approached by the crew-rowing twins about an internet directory at Harvard; "That's great but I can make it
so much better without you guys."
The Social Network (TSN) is based on true events and the real people involved in the invention and rise of Facebook but like the lawyer in the movie says about emotional testimony; she believes 85% of it is exaggeration and the rest lies. So it is in any movie based on a "True Story"; 85% is exaggeration and the rest lies.
So it is with the news.
I don't know what's going on in Egypt. Neither do you. Neither do most Egyptians. No one will really know until we can look back on it all with some historical perspective and see what happens.
Now; as I freely admit, I make a habit of connecting dots where none exist. I can't help it; I'm an artist. My eye naturally fills in blanks every where. Show me an arc and I see not just a circle but a spirograph design.
Egypt is on fire. We have no way of knowing right now if this flame will consume or temper. What we do know is that it is spreading. The riots and protests are spreading quickly throughout the middle east.
Most European countries have very large Muslim populations. Will the protests spread to Europe? A few years ago, while my daughter was in Europe for a semester, she skipped visiting Paris because that city was in flames during the months she was there due to Muslim protests. Paris is not immune to the fire that is burning in Egypt. Not if the flames are being fueled less by a desire for 'democracy' than by a desire for power.
In the last few years, I've read three books that I can't get out of my head. The first was Epicenter by
Joel Rosenberg a Christian author with Orthodox Jewish roots. He's written several action/adventure novels featuring jihadists and the attempt to build a world wide Caliphate, which resonate with current events. He wrote the book Epicenter to explain where he gets his ideas; from the biblical book of Ezekiel.
Got that? An author based his wild ideas for a fictional series on a book of prophecy from the Bible and events in his stories keep coming true in the real world.
What a coincidence!
The second book, which I just finished and from which my brain is still reeling is God's War on Terror by
Walid Shoebat. Mr. Shoebat is a Palestinian,(as he says, he was a Jordanian until 1947, when suddenly he became a 'Palestinian') raised in Islam to be a Jihadist, converted to Christianity. As an apostate, he can be killed under the laws of Islam but he has dedicated his life to warning the world about what he believes is coming.
Upon what does he base his wild assertions? Upon the prophetic books of the Bible; Ezekiel, Daniel and Revelation.
So here we have an Orthodox Jew, converted to Christianity and a Fundamentalist Muslim, converted to Christianity, both of whom read the Bible, saw how biblical prophecy exactly correlated with events in their own lifetimes and believe that a world wide Caliphate is coming and it's coming soon.
This is not a good thing.
The third book in this philosophical triumvirate was America Alone, by
Mark Steyn , a Canadian expatriot Right Wing Extremist who has been put on trial in Canada for 'hate speech' for having the temerity to quote Muslim Imams in the book America Alone.
Got that? In Canada, accurately quoting someone can get you hauled into court for Hate Speech but it's Mr. Steyn who's the 'extremist'.
America Alone is an entertaining look at world wide demographics. If you don't know, demographics are simply statistics describing a population.
Example; I didn't care for Eminem's performance at the Grammy's but I don't think that would bother him, as fifty year old women aren't the demographic he's interested in impressing.
Mr. Steyn's book outlines in stark terms what is happening all over the world; Muslims are outbreeding non Muslims everywhere on earth by about 10 to 1.
Even without violent Jihad, in a hundred years, Islam could be the dominant religion, culture and political system every where on earth.
What does all this have to do with the internet?
I don't know.
But I can't stop thinking about the story of the tower of Babel. Men tried to build a structure tall enough to reach heaven and God reacted by scattering them all over the earth and giving them different languages so they couldn't understand each other.
Now we have the internet. As a character in TSN says about Bosnia; "They don't have roads but they have Facebook."
Here in the West, we're so proud of our technological achievements. Not only do we have central heat and indoor plumbing, which put us miles ahead of 95% of the human race, we have cars with GPS, smart phones and youtube.
"The internet isn't written in pencil, Mark. It's written in ink." the line from TSN reads.
But I look at the state of the world and I wonder if we're writing in ink on a tablet of sand.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely is true but I've thought of another old saying that has even more truth and weight;
Man plans while God laughs.
