They know, like we all do, that this regime no longer cares to put on a moderate mask. That they have shown their true nature. That Mubarak will never step down, and that he would rather burn Egypt to the ground than even contemplate that possibility.
- "Egypt Right Now," Sandmonkey's first-hand account of what's happened in his country over the last 9 days ... and 30 years.
When you read this, take into account that there's no room left to behave as if human equality is a subjective thing. There is no more space in an increasingly connected world to say that what a tyrant, a tyrannous government or a tyrannous enterprise does with its dependents is its own business.
Faster communications makes territory less important and distances insignificant. That means institutionalised repression and blows to free thinking, to the liberty that sparks innovation, becomes everybody's business. The world is now too small for this.
I'm going to say something cheesy now, but I think it has to be said this way. Technology is where it is today because of higher numbers of ever more ambitious hackers fighting odds, rigid corporate standards, suspected limitations and attempted castrations of the internet's liberty. They are dogged, they self-organise and recognise no authority but the merits of what works, cutting away what doesn't, and we have all advanced because of it.
In this world and tomorrow's, that hacker culture belongs to everyone: people with access to the tools to fight governments, self-organise and speak out against human injustices without having to go through prescribed channels.
The channels that matter now belong to us. Use them wisely, tirelessly and fearlessly. United, able and armed with knowledge, we can make civilisation a kinder, more efficient machine, worthy of its name and richer because of the dynamism that serves one god: freedom. The freedom to think, be educated, feel safe, ask hard questions and decide our destinies.
This is what Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Yemen and other countries, newly inflamed, are fighting for now. This is what we should be defending every day, even if we feel like it's not our fight.
It's always our fight.
