Time Person of the Year: The Protester
Although protesters across the globe stand up and speak out often for very different reasons, today are united in recognition as Time Magazine's "Person of the Year."
Ladies and gentlemen, young and old, take a bow:
"My son set himself on fire for dignity," Mannoubia Bouazizi told me when I visited her.
"In Tunisia," added her 16-year-old daughter Basma, "dignity is more important than bread."
In Egypt the incitements were a preposterously fraudulent 2010 national election and, as in Tunisia, a not uncommon act of unforgivable brutality by security agents. In the U.S., three acute and overlapping money crises — tanked economy, systemic financial recklessness, gigantic public debt — along with ongoing revelations of double dealing by banks, new state laws making certain public-employee-union demands illegal and the refusal of Congress to consider even slightly higher taxes on the very highest incomes mobilized Occupy Wall Street and its millions of supporters. In Russia it was the realization that another six (or 12) years of Vladimir Putin might not lead to greater prosperity and democratic normality.
In Sidi Bouzid and Tunis, in Alexandria and Cairo; in Arab cities and towns across the 6,000 miles from the Persian Gulf to the Atlantic Ocean; in Madrid and Athens and London and Tel Aviv; in Mexico and India and Chile, where citizens mobilized against crime and corruption; in New York and Moscow and dozens of other U.S. and Russian cities, the loathing and anger at governments and their cronies became uncontainable and fed on itself.
The stakes are very different in different places. In North America and most of Europe, there are no dictators, and dissidents don't get tortured. Any day that Tunisians, Egyptians or Syrians occupy streets and squares, they know that some of them might be beaten or shot, not just pepper-sprayed or flex-cuffed. The protesters in the Middle East and North Africa are literally dying to get political systems that roughly resemble the ones that seem intolerably undemocratic to protesters in Madrid, Athens, London and New York City. "I think other parts of the world," says Frank Castro, 53, a Teamster who drives a cement mixer for a living and helped occupy Oakland, Calif., "have more balls than we do."
Madison, Wisconsin!!
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
Too bad they didn't put the UC Davis pepper-spray PIG on the cover. But, I guess it's good news.
far left loon >.<
you might want to see what williambanzai7 did with this cover at max keiser's site.
since I last bought a copy of that corporate, capitalist rag. However, this is one issue of TIME I might actually buy.
The editor of Time was on tv this morning and he said that face on the front was a composite of faces from all over the world who were protesting. Of course the finks at fox thought it was just about the US and all but said yuck when the cover was announced.
I think it was a great choice for people of the year. Can you imagine how much Glenn Beck is burning because he was so upset the year the tea party started and Time didn't mention them or have pictures in their year in review. Suck on this, Glenn.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
of an international phenomenon. I'll never forget when I learned that Egyptians were calling Madison, WI to buy pizzas for the protesters there at the state capital, it was such an emotional moment, and a very telling one. The individual waves of this phenomenon have given courage and strength to others in other parts of the world. It appeals to so many different people; even though the movements have a "youthful" energy, people young and old are taking part.
The teabaggers are mostly bitter, hateful, entitled senior citizens who hate that the world is changing in many ways and is leaving them behind.
"The greatest tyranny is censoring information in order to be better able to control people." - Cristina Saralegui
Fox News et. al. tries to either downplay this or simply slander Time in 3, 2, 1....
Any day that Tunisians, Egyptians or Syrians occupy streets and squares, they know that some of them might be beaten or shot, not just pepper-sprayed or flex-cuffed.
the difference is that in the US, peaceful protest is supposed to be a right, even a foundation of American exceptionalism. But it turns out that, that foundation is only a talking point for right wing authoritarian morons who use violence against other humans as their first, preferred, and usually only response to differences with their fellow humans, and who do everything in their power, including violence to prevent and restrict protest.
Time names The Protester , person of the year , and the manure spreaders at Fox are going berserk .
"The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."
"After all, the Tea Party protests subsided only after Tea Partyers achieved real power in 2010 by becoming the tail wagging the Republican Party dog."
On our local news tonight, the leader of a local Tea Party group here in TN was interviewed and she said she didn't like the Tea Party being compared to these other protest groups. They protest for "different" reasons, you know.
You bet , these protestors are different , they're not a bunch of pea brained morons being led around by the nose and being bused around the country by the Koch brothers and Dick Armey .
"The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all."
lol, how awesome would it be if it was the guy with the pepper spray as person of the year?
as a joke of course- for the humorless types on here who would have jumped at opportunity to whine
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