Thursday, February 03, 2011
Editorial

Wednesday’s scenes of mayhem and violence in  Cairo have offered the world the most forceful expression of the following reality: Arab leaders just don’t get it.

They rule over youthful populations, and perhaps not a week goes by without this salient fact mentioned in reports, conferences, statements and the observations of officials holding public office across the Arab world.
The violence in Egypt, as an embattled regime seeks to dash the hopes of millions of young people for change, represents the worst kind of counter-productive and venal behavior.

In the past, strongmen in the Arab world feared that their young, restive populations would turn to Marxism; later, the fear grew that the same segments of society would turn to political Islam as an alternative.

In Egypt, we have seen the Internet capabilities of recent years allow young people to do neither: they have formed unbreakable bonds with fellow young Egyptians, and youth in other countries, based on neither class nor religion. This is why the protest movement in Egypt, and before it Tunisia, has been hard to characterize. It has been refreshingly free of ideology, but even that isn’t good enough for the elderly powers-that-be.

Instead of trying to engage in real dialogue – over the last few decades, and not in the last few days – authorities in Egypt and other Arab states largely treat their youth with condescension and outright dismissal.

People who have long passed the age of retirement are simply incapable of understanding what young people want: they do not want to live under archaic notions, outdated slogans, or obsolete laws and regulations.

The rulers have cornered their young populations, who are forced to live under “states of emergency,” but in countries where the political and economic elites appear far-removed from any emergency conditions, judging by their comings-and-goings to gala events and celebrations of foreign donations and aid.

The “lucky” young people are those who manage to escape, risking their lives in some instances to emigrate and secure a dignified living abroad. The rest are forced to hear the same, tired old clichés and promises from their out-of-touch leaders.

Those who remain in the country are told the following: your votes don’t count, your opinions don’t count, and it is we who know best. If you disagree, you are trouble-makers, acting on the orders of some unidentified foreign “conspiracy” against the country.

This has only led to a dramatic increase in the cynicism and despair in Egypt, and the rest of the Arab world. Any ruler who browses the comments section of a Website can gauge the level of anger, outrage and utter dismissal of official rhetoric.

Like others in the region, the Egyptian regime is producing lost generations that have already begun to haunt the region’s future.