Nightmare coming

There is a nightmare I have
of our future coming.
Of government corporations
where all decisions
are made by the bottom line.
no people,
just employees and customers
and the endless war
but long hostile take overs.

I see its beginnings
free speech for the unliving
giving voice to greed;
Voltaire turns in his grave.

Changed

They came, footsteps crunching out
A slow rolling beat.
The tolling thud of thunder
Thumping in time
To their low chant.
They did not shout for change
They had shouted too often before.
The disenfranchised and the forgotten
Held banners woven of their tattered dreams
Stitched with tears and lined with broken promises.
On each face the battle marks of lives wasted
By men who knew it all
And knew it all could be taken for themselves.
Men who preached democracy,
The rotting carcass of a broken system,
Purporting to empower the people
While keeping them down.
Taking our power to decide from us
And calling it a mandate.
There were children in the crowd.
Who saw ahead a future as hard as their parents past.
All were resolute in the face of threats and weapons
They were laid out by bullets, gas canisters and riot gear.
Inside each and every one of them a minor miracle
Had fornicated with their last remaining hope.
The fucked up offspring of delusion and despair
drove them to die for a cause only they could believe in.
Fuck change. Fuck government.
Their legs pump as the stoic silence parts to angry venom
Peaceful protest finally gives up and dies
And rage spills out onto the streets.
Fists pump as sheer numbers push back men
Who until the last moment think they do their duty.
Angry words turn into angry action
And then there is change.

Why terrorism works.

I don't plan to talk about politics much on this blog, but there are some things that just need to be said.

Right now, terrorism works.

That’s right. If you want to change the world for the worse, to scare the 'West', to lessen our freedom or to inspire fear then all you need to do is sneak a bomb onto an aeroplane. It's not that hard. There are all sorts of explosives and if you're really prepared to die for your cause then it can't be that dificult to cause a plane to crash.

Sadly this isn't why terrorism works. Terrorism works because of our reactions to it. The aim of terrorism is to make us afraid, to take from us our freedom. No terrorist alone can do this. No, it takes the complicity of major world powers (I'm looking at America and Britain here) that, as soon as there's a terror threat, hit the panic button and removes more of our 'democratic' freedoms. It works because we start thinking of ourselves or our children and we decide that having everyone's private lives examined or being strip searched to fly is a price worth paying.

It isn't. Whether you have nothing to hide or not your privacy is sacred. It's sacred because without it there is no democracy. Anyone who won't to do something because of fear of their government doesn't live in a democracy and anyone who gives up their freedom for temporary safety deserves neither.

Law is not fear of government. Law is enforcement of a moral code we choose to live by with penalties set out before hand. I’m not afraid of being given a parking ticket; I just know that that’s what happens if I park illegally. I shouldn’t be afraid to read a book or write a blog because it might draw the eyes of my government and what I say or do shouldn’t be tracked by them.

Terrorism isn’t the man on the plane with the dynamite. Terrorism is what we do to ourselves after the dynamite goes off, or doesn’t.