Iranian blogger "Bolts" posted this commentary on her blog on Monday. It was translated into English by "Sanli". One of our Iranian Observers, Farnaz Seifi, alerted us to the post. The information has not been verified by FRANCE 24 journalists.
Originally posted in Farsi by Iranian blogger Bolts on August 3.
In the history books of the
21st century, the first chapter will be about us.
In the introduction, they might write that important events have happened before us, events like 9/11 and war on Iraq and Afghanistan, but those were the remnants of the previous century, with an outdated dialogue and with twentieth century tools: Airplanes, bombs and bullets. And then they will write that the first chapter is dedicated to us because we have been the true children of our time and our dialogue was the dialogue of the beginning of the third millennium.
Early in the book, they will write that social movements are born out of communication technologies and at the same place they will write that we were the first movement that exploited entirely all the new communication tools that were established at the beginning of this century.
Perhaps they will write a footnote on how these tools changed the social
structure and how they changed the world view on the social classes, work flow,
production and distribution of wealth, social leadership and management and
even changed the world's attitude about the sustainable human values.
Perhaps on the same page, there is a photograph of the inventor of the first
mobile phone and the portraits of the founders of Wikipedia, Facebook, Blogger,
YouTube, Podcasts, or maybe photos of their statues in the main squares of the
world's leading cities, with captions like: "Figures who built the twenty
first century."
Idem they will write that previously there were only one-way paths: Somebody
wrote and published the newspapers and the rest of the people read them. Somebody
spoke while the rest were listening. One person was on TV and the rest were
watching. Somebody commanded and led and then shapeless masses followed. They
will write that the community structure and distribution of wealth, power and
information was pyramidal, and then they will highlight that the new
communication technologies flattened the society. It empowered the bases of the
pyramid such that they reached the top.
It made it possible to communicate with each other, send and receive news, exchange information, tell and listen, watch and be seen, and find new means of cooperation, thinking, criticizing and progress.
There, on top of that page they will put a picture of us with our green flags. They will write that we were the first social movement that all of us were its leader and all of us were its organizer. The name which was called the most was only the speaker of a part of our demands.
Perhaps they will open a box there to put Mirhossein's written statement as an example, where he said: because the people participate in the Friday prayer, he will accept their invitation and join them. They must also add the explanation that previously the leader of a movement used to announce his presence and invited people to join him.
They may make a subsection to describe how a movement without a command centre was acting so well-orchestrated. How its ideas, desires, and slogans were suggested, criticized, and completed so well, and then one day they were expressed in such a harmony as if all these millions, have practiced together for years. Perhaps there, at least in the electronic version of this history book, they will make a link to a clip of us, where the speaker shouts from the loud-speaker: "death to the U.S." and we all respond "death to Russia". Without anybody been preparing for this response, without being coordinated, we shout as if we are all one mouth and one voice.<
They will write that we were the first party that had no central council, no secretary general, and no political branches. They will write that our party was one of complete anarchy that behaved quite systematic. They may presumably point their sarcasm toward anarchist parties of decades before us that were built systematically to behave as anarchists. They will write that our party had no party organs, but all its strategies were clear and its programs were all set correctly. Our demands were also summarized, reviewed, completed, and expressed in the clearest form of expression.
In the same chapter they will write that we lived the last days of guns and bullets and we showed that wherever the awareness, information and enough communication channels for human connection exists, the bullet is pointless. There may put a picture of a single bullet somewhere in our Freedom Museum and will write for its caption "the last bullet that was pulled out of the magazine".
A delicate person will calculate the total weight of the electrons that construct our blogs and websites, and will show that it was not even a thousandth of a bullet weight. He may estimate the weight of all the air molecules in our chants, our "death to dictators", our "all political prisoners must be released" and show that they altogether weigh less than the weight of a single wall of the Evin prison.
Next they will write that we suggested a new definition for the human society, the human relations, for globalization and for living in the global village. Each of these historians will give us a name. Their simplest may write the "Green Revolution", another will call us the "Silent Revolution", somebody will call it the "Smile Revolution", and at last there will be someone to write the "Awareness Revolution".
Comments
I had never thought about
Submitted by pool table (not verified) on Mon, 10/08/2009 - 22:27.I had never thought about this time as a time when the base of pyramid could uprise and be loud than the peak. This is so true, and such an interesting time to be alive during.
Unregistered user
You missed twitter, dear
Submitted by rottengods on Thu, 06/08/2009 - 20:09.You missed twitter, dear bolt!
www.rottengods.com
Fariborz Shamshiri
rottengods
how it should be remembered
Submitted by diptychal on Wed, 05/08/2009 - 12:23.This is an incredibly thoughtful and at the same time thought-provoking piece. Certain parts gave me goosebumps. And I certainly hope that the brave uprising that continues to surge on in Iran is successful. That said, there is one part that I have to say I wish was not a part of this beautiful piece of writing.
The uprising in Iran is about the Iranian people. It's about THEIR democracy and THEIR freedom. Including "Death to USA/Russia" as part of the call for freedom doesn't make sense to me. That is the Iranian government's game - to blame the US, the UK or whatever other foreign scapegoat they can, and we can laugh at their inability to understand their own people, their inability to understand the strength of the Iranian people. And we can be disappointed in Russia's decision to open its doors to Ahmadinejad. But at the end of the day the struggle is BY the Iranian people AGAINST the so-called Iranian government. And I believe THAT is how it should be remembered.
diptychal
Death to Russia
Submitted by Nader (not verified) on Wed, 26/08/2009 - 12:49.Dear diptychal,
As the author of that text, I was aware that the paragraph about "death to Russia" might be very misleading for those who have not been in that Friday prayer 5 weeks ago and specially for non-Iranians. The reason why I left it in the English translation was to have a complete translation of the text.
You have very correctly noted that this movement is not about "death to this and death to that", it is actually a movement for "Life". If I was ever to chant a death slogan, that would be "Death to Death".
The whole subject of this slogan is that in the Friday prayer, there's someone by a load speaker who chants slogans and people repeat after him (some joke that his name is "slogan minister"!). Usually the slogans are : "Death to America" , "Death to Israel" , "Death to the enemies of Velayat faghih (that is term used for supreme leader of Iran)".
It is a common belief that Russian army has trained these brutal anti riot guards and that the election coup was planned by Russians.
That is why people chanted "death to Russia".
what I was about to mention by writing that paragraph, was not the slogans, it was the very strange harmony and orchestration of people. no one has thought about it before, but in great harmony, all those hundreds of thousands of people, chanted the same words. it was a very strange and very interesting experience. and that was not the only slogan that was altered by the people on that day. people changed almost all the slogans to what they wanted most. so after few minutes, the slogan minister had to stop all his death to this and death to that and say only , Allah-o-akbar (God is great), that is actually the same thing people shout these days as protest; calling God for peace and justice.
Unregistered user