“Current affairs” for week 9 is about Arab spring and democracy. There are four talks on political aspects and evens in three Arab countries included Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya. First talk was about democracy in Egypt. In Egypt, it is showed that high democracy ideals but less democracy reality, people expect brighter future despite hardships while women ask for liberty and justice. Also, Egyptians refuse anti-westernism, ask for equality between men and women. However, there is a lack of political leadership. The talk was very clear about Egypt’s status on democracy which was reflected common features of Egyptians during the time of Arab spring. In my opinion, Egypt is an Arab country where most of its population follows Islam (Sunni) and they really care about women right and justice rather than other Arab countries. The talker is Egyptian citizen and she looked so professional to give a spiritual speech about her own respective country’s political state and her talk also had a great influence from audiences.
The second video was about inside revolution in Egypt. Again we stayed in this country and looked at their political aspects at the stage of revolution 2.0 as the speaker is also Egyptian. He did strongly mention that everyone is a hero and Egyptians won just because they believe in their dream, but not play dirty games of politics. What can be conclude for this talk is that people in Egypt are better than what have been showed on the internet, they refuse the present time which stay on democracy and they have an archaic strata of power which all citizen fight by their real solidarity. Egyptians feel proud of themselves as they won by trying so hard, sacrificed everything just the hope of revolution for the country without intervention of political strengths. Egyptians make me admire and respect what they did for the country. In revolution, they fought by their own hope and dream and proudly won for the independence of the entire nation.
A story in Tunisia reflected a historic moment in the Arab world was gone through the third speech. First, the speaker mentioned fast about Iraq and some nearby countries which were at the time of war. People lost lands, homes, and family and everything. They became very sad and hopeless. Besides that, internet creates new mindset among media about the state in those countries and also in Tunisia. We can say that Tunisia’s status at that time was conflict since people were “sleeping”, they had no real democratic experiences. It can be said that Tunisia was in holiday in the history. There was an absence of modernity as a deep rooted structure and historical experience. That presence showed that Tunisia was in a really need of creating new partied to push the country up. Moreover, at the same time, Islamic ideology appeared and entered into the history and competed with other modern ideologies. It showed that people had lots of effects from modern trends beside Islamic teachings. Political Islam returned to compete with other outside modern ideologies just to get back what the country used to be and made Islam become more power. What can be seen in Tunisia at that time are negative impacts that people sleep deeply instead of trying so hard to fight for revolution and peace by their own strengths.
Finally, the last speech revolution and democracy time in Libya. Actually, Libya revolution did not work well and created a new violence among the country. People in Libya get a better understanding and learning about western modernity in spite of the painful memories of colonisation. Besides that, people established a democratic structure and develop critical thinking which made lots of effectiveness for the current stage of the country. As one of Arab country which Islam plays a very much important role in every aspects of life, Libyans better returned to the moral values of Islam which are most suitable for them. In fact, I do not so enjoy those classes which are about politics, democratic or something related to that topic. My mind becomes stuck and seems like no idea to talk and argue about that. Anyway, in my reflective diary what I wrote are whatever I could get and understand about the lecturer, not something which are imagined.
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