Anyone who takes a glimpse on the events sweeping currently the Arab world, will not be able to miss certain realities; 1. people and youth are trying to jump on the speedy train of the 21st century, while tyrants are clinging to the status quo. 2. People and youth insist to turn the page of the status quo or die trying to, while tyrants are ready to kill their own people to preserve this status quo. 3. People and youth are dreaming of nation building with the principle of citizenship as an umbrella of unity, while tyrants are fueling society diversities, sectarian and otherwise, in order to spread and rule, ignoring the risks and hazards of civil war, or the disintegration of state and society. In general, it is a struggle for forming the future, where people dreaming of it to be bright, tyrants tend to kill to preserve it dark. But if oneself takes more than a glimpse, the reality to unfold is a different story.
I wish if I could blame Saleh of Yemen, Qaddafi of Libya, Assad of Syria, or Al Khalifa dynasty of Bahrain; i wish if I just could blame them for the atrocities and the blood shed in their countries, and consider them as the only obstacle in the face of the wend of change. But I will be fooling myself. Those tyrants are just symbols of the outcome of some elements of the social structure in the Arab world. In another word, "We produced our tyrants". After all, the orders of these tyrants are carried by ordinary people, and, as we saw in television, they are supported by a significant minority.
Many scholars argued that one of the characteristics of the Arab personality is the ability to accept, to some extent, enslavement. Many elements in the Arab social structure are characterized by coercion, oppression and domination. These elements are rooted within the patriarchal nature of Arab society, where a social acceptance of tyranny in the contemporary Arab society, is easily noticed. This acceptance is built within the personality of the Arab individual by the concept of obedience, whether at the scale of the family (as the father to be always obeyed) or the scale of the political sphere where leaders are to be obeyed. The concept of obedience established the virtuousness of loyalty and dependence of an individual on another. This created a political and social engagements defined the relationship between authority and society. The authority is the patriarch that gives, and the society is the the obedient and thankful Parish.
Apart of the past low-key challenges to the authority in the Arab world, this Arab awakening is the only real popular challenge by the parish to the patriarch. But it is not clear yet if it is a real challenge to the concept of obedience. Ousting a tyrant would been seen as a walk in the park compared to shaking a fundamental element of the social structure, which is necessary to build a future where the society does not tend to produce tyrannies. There is no dynamic bill to solve our social problems; but it is clear that Arab social structure must be subjected to heated debates among scholars and experts, otherwise, the Arab awakening will only succeed in replacing a tyranny with another form of it. It is essential that we realize that it is impossible to build a different future based on the same old norms, the same old patterns, or the same ancient traditions. It is also essential, as we revolt against our tyrants, to bring about, in our heart and mind, a radical revolution.
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