Terrorists have given revolution a bad name. So have advertisers, for that matter, who regularly coopt the word to market everything from a new brand of shoe to a marginally pinker shade of lipstick. I attended the swaering in of Nova Scotia’s new government cabinet last night. A beaming Darrell Dexter, the first New Democratic Premier east of Ontario, welcomed his new cabinet in a province where conventional political wisdom had traditionally ruled the NDP out as viable election winners. It was a crowded room and during the ceremony I heard someone whisper to a companion that we were witnessing a revolution in government.
Bullshit. If you’ll excuse the bluntness. What we witnessed was the peaceful transition of power – a beautiful thing, to be sure, but hardly a revolution. It ain’t nothin’ but democracy.
Scene change: Iran. When I got home last night and logged onto Twitter as I always do, there was this chilling message from one of the Iranian sources I follow: “Saturday has begun.” The announcement of the dawn of a new day is not normally described as “chilling”, I grant, but this Saturday is not like every Saturday in Iran. This Saturday has the potential for making history, but what kind of history remains to be seen. There is a rally scheduled in Tehran, to begin roughly an hour from when I write these words, that is being held in direct defiance of the Supreme Leader of the Iranian theocracy. What kind of history is being made? It could be the equivalent of the Berlin Wall coming down, the beginning of a democratic revolution that will see the people of Iran freed from their theocratic masters. Or, it could be the equivalent of the Tiananmen Square massacre, a violent and bloody crackdown on dissidents and protesters foolish or brave enough to stare down the barrels of police and military weapons.
The world is watching, as best it can with no media there to report. We are relying on Facebook and blogs and Twitter, yes. The tweets heard round the world. We are waiting, and those like me are doing so with an uncomfortable gnawing in their bellies, tears at the verge. “Today, we are all Iranians”, and other such bumper sticker shows of support don’t come anywhere close to the depths of the feeling. But what else is there? We could take to the streets in our own countries, in our own cities, in a show of solidarity with our Iranian bretheren – but what can that honestly accomplish? My gut feeling, when I can isolate it from that overall gnawing, is that massive street protests in the west merely feed the political-religious zealots in Iran who seek to blame their domestic unrest on western interference. This is about Iran, not The Great Satan, and we could do the people of Persia a great disservice by providing an external bogeyman on whom the Ayatollah and his puppet president can pin the blame.
Some tens of thousands of people are expected in the streets of Tehran. Protesters are being advised to carry a copy of The Koran, because it is apparently a mortal sin to kill someone who is holding a copy of that wholly holy book of Islam. It is difficult to imagine how this can end, if not in great bloodshed. The Ayatollah has spoken, warning against future protests, holding dissident politicians responsible for the violence such protests might unleash. Even though he is the one man who could stop the violence, as he is the one man who can give the order to begin the crackdown. We are watching. We are waiting.
Saturday has begun, and today, we are all Iranians.
