Fear Makes Everything Possible

It is a time in Egypt when it is not welcome to write something serious that addresses serious issues. Everything borders on the ridiculous. Rhetoric has shifted to a medieval or primal state where basic values are being revisited. Is it OK to discard human rights because of the violence of non-state actors? Is it OK for the police to kill innocent civilians in the supposed act of protecting these same people from terrorism? Is it OK that we have a country without fair trials? Most of the time, in the state media, the answer is yes.

There is little public discussion permissible. The majority has made its voice heard: The mass of Egyptians trusts whatever the government does politically, but will continue to ask for economic reform. It’s a little strange that things such as murder, torture and fair trials have become something “political” that only concern the elite. As if it’s forgivable, in the eyes of the masses, that such actions occur in the name of the greater good. What greater good is there other than giving the poor their rights and holding those in power accountable, rather than targeting the innocent?

The argument is that terrorism forces us to take exceptional measures. In reality it’s fear.

The amazing thing about fear is that it makes everything possible. All of a sudden it’s possible to cure AIDS and hepatitis C without scientific research. It’s possible to grow as a nation and be respected without the government respecting democracy or its citizens. It’s possible to condemn some inhumane acts of terror, such as the slaughter of 21 Copts by ISIS in Libya, but not the murder of a thousand people in Rabaa.

It is unreasonable to ask those who are afraid to overcome their fear. How would they do that, in an Egypt that is ready to punish the weak for demanding their rights, a nation where there is no protection from rabid security forces driven by revenge? How can people overcome fear when the international community has opted to pursue interests at the expense of rights they had once agreed should be universal?

Today’s Egypt is a land of possibilities, mostly horrific. There are no means of petitioning the government. There is no elected body to attempt, even symbolically, to temper the dictatorial powers of the president and the army. I would go so far as to say there are no ministries, since state security officers can override the decisions of any minister or government official in the name of national security.

The result is the Egypt we see today, one that is trying to enforce the view that it is a democratic country with violence and intimidation, as well as lots of money invested in propaganda and Western public relations firms. We see an Egypt unwilling to represent the interests of its people, but willing to safeguard personal interests, whether in the form of military economic empire or civilian crony oligarchy. Both of these sets of interests are happy to engage in an unadvertised cold war over the country’s resources.

In 2011 many Egyptians defied tyranny out of courage. Today many are defying human decency out of fear. Fear is here to stay because there are no saviors in this world. There are oppressors painted as saviors and heroes painted as villains. The saddest part of this dark, ugly picture is that it was made possible by the blessing of the people, who were willing to justify the theft of rights. In a way fear kills dreams, but in another way, it makes other improbable things possible.

First published in MERIP on April 28, 2015

No Longer Afraid

Sanitarium

I never saw how protests could work to bring about change. I never thought they were an effective way of getting what you wanted. I always did, however, believe in protesting. In an effort to practice my beliefs I went to protest the brutal killing of Khaled Said on the hands of Egyptian police informers. I went there with the aim of expressing something I believed in and came out finding out something expressed to me by the bullies in control. I realized how frustrating it was to be in a protest.

The reasons for which I thought protests were not of much use was because I thought chanting won’t help fix things and no one wanted to listen anyway. This remains true to a great extent but there’s something deeper to it.

I was always hesitant to go to protests. A great part of it was because I didn’t believe in much of what they said and most of what was taking place in them. They were full of aggression for my taste, but if I am to be honest there’s something else that held me back. It was a fear, hidden deep, always known and never confronted. I say this now having rid myself of it, yet many still unknowingly hold it. It is the major fear that takes hold of clever, educated and well paid adults which impedes them from going to protests.

To clear something up, the reason I decided to go was because I thought the cold blooded murder of a young man by those sworn to protect us was well worth objecting to. It was something that outweighed any fear, ideas or opinions that I held. It was a cause worth fighting for even if expression will prove to yourself what you believe rather than bring about change. It was something worth more than posting a link on facebook. It was action. I expected a weak apology and a lousy investigation at the very least. Instead, I was faced with the hurtful arms and words of bullies claiming to be the police.

When I told my highly paid educated friends about protesting for the reasons that supersede all others they felt that this too was futile. What I realize now is that this refusal to object to reality was an escape from it. We want a sense of false security telling us that we’re different, that we’re human. We already had that sense of self worth going into our fancy office buildings and talking about huge amounts of money and about cutting edge technology.

People who are in good positions feel important, respected and human. All this was just an illusion. It was a part for them to play given by authorities because if they came down to protest, all that self worth will be knocked off the pedestal. If they were to object to what the bullies said or did, they would cease to have that importance, they would be no more than the servant or doorman they look down upon. They would be demoted to filth that is dusted off a police animal’s shoe.

*Welcome to where time stands still

No one leaves and no one will

Moon is full, never seems to change

Just labeled mentally deranged

In a protest they would not be able to talk to bullies as men or women of certain standing in society. Imagine a person stopping police abuse by saying, ‘Stop, I’m a doctor’, or ‘Stop, I’m an engineer,’ or a marketing director, or an architect or a manager or a CEO. These bullies don’t care. You’re worth nothing if you’re not important to their superiors. “Go back to your illusions,” they’d say, “or we’ll pull you into reality.”

Dream the same thing every night

I see our freedom in my sight

No locked doors, no windows barred

No things to make my brain seem scarred

This is the true threat lurking about people’s sub consciousness. That is the true fear that people have these days: to wake up from their dream, their illusion of power and control. So many take the government’s side in an attempt to maintain that self worth, and many pretend to fear the beatings and the arrests, but what they really fear is coming face to face with their worth.

Build my fear of what's out there

Cannot breathe the open air

Whisper things into my brain

Assuring me that I'm insane

They think our heads are in their hands

But violent use brings violent plans

Keep him tied, it makes him well

He's getting better, can't you tell?

If you’re reading this you’re one of us; either someone who has come to terms with reality or someone who has not. You’re one of us. You may have great education, you may be a lawyer, you may be a marketer or an engineer, a doctor, a journalist, an artist, a student or a good policeman following orders. You might be someone who makes a lot of money or has a lot of money.

Either way, if you haven’t faced the music then you’re filled with this fear. No need to feel ashamed, it’s a legitimate fear. I too am sedated by my travel to various countries and my work on ‘important’ projects. It’s easy to escape when things can seem to look good for you.

No more can they keep us in

Listen, damn it, we will win

They see it right, they see it well

But they think this saves us from our hell

In a truer form of reality we’re worth more than the bullies want us to think, but they have the keys to our chains. We’re in a sanitarium inside a giant prison. They keep us locked in, living out our delusions while they guard the gate. If we try to escape the sanitarium and our delusions, they show us the real prison. The sanitarium is a much happier place; it’s a much easier place. I guess the fear we have is to wake up and realize that we’re captured prisoners.

*Italicized lyrics from Metallica’s Sanitarium

I'm Not Afraid

I'm not afraid of death, I'm afraid of pain and loss.

I Too Had Hopes And Dreams

"Don't look at me this way, I too had hopes and dreams," that's what I told him as he stared back at me. I had a look of sorrow and disappointment on my face and I expected him to have the same look on his, yet his face was filled with contempt. I waved my left hand slowly and he waved his right, I moved my head to the right and he moved his head to the left. Whenever I would make a move he'd do the same move albeit inverted in a way, but when it came to the facial expression, no matter what I did, he'd still have that look of contempt on his face.

I felt sorry for him and he felt contempt for me. I looked for all the possible futures and he looked for all the possible pasts and with all these possibilities, we found ourselves in an impossible situation of having to live with each other. He's like an old companion, who shadows me wherever I go but could never really turn into a friend.

Of course I wouldn't always see him and on many occasions I would only just remember him and hear his voice. One such occasion when I hear his voice is whenever I open the fridge door. He tells me to drink from the bottle directly while causing my thoughts to drift to unsubstantiated fears of contamination. It's always him that tells me that it doesn't matter if I infect another, trying to convince me that it's okay if those I love share what I may suffer for if they discovered what I might have, they'd let me suffer too and in all likelihood disown me.

Every time I use a fork or a spoon that will be used by someone else other than me I feel that same struggle and that same inner fear, the fear that someone will contract the virus. I've read so much and I know that this is highly unlikely but when I look into the spoon that same contemptuous face stares back and tells me different. He also reminds me that people won't shake my hand even though they can't contract the disease, he tells me that they won't want me around even if I'm wrapped in a sterile wrapping. Sometimes I'd listen to him till he wears me down and sometimes he'd listen to me till I wore him down, for there was no escape from our joint fate.

I remember the time we went to Dubai after I had landed my dream job in one of the largest architectural firms there. It was perfect, a new life and a new chance to start over without the fear of being discovered, without the instability caused by that constant fear of having to spend the rest of my life in quarantine. In short it was the chance to start living out my dream. I arrived on a visit visa that lasts three months but should be changed to a residential visa. I was in a hurry to make that move and settle down. I had left everything behind in Egypt, and I wasn't really prepared to look back, and even my old companion had disappeared for a long time and I thought I had left him back there.

But one day, well into my second month of stay in Dubai I went out with an acquaintance from work. We went to a nightclub. I can't remember much about it except that it was mostly blue and dimly lit. A band was playing for the first half of the night as we drank our beers followed by tequila shots. When we had lost our senses enough they switched to a DJ with loads of house music and everyone was dancing. The loud music and the drinks made me feel like I was in a dream. I heard the words I said as if spoken by a stranger as I talked to random people at the club. I was aware of what I was saying and yet I seemed to be just an observer, looking at myself from behind a glass. I headed to the bathroom and as the sound of loud music became distant I became more and more aware of that voice. It sounded familiar to me and not quite me. Dazed and drunk I looked into the mirror and I caught a glimpse of that familiar face that I knew all too well. It was only a moment and it felt like a dream to have seen him after a long time. I shook it off though and went back to dancing.

We left the night club and I was half drunk and half sleepy but we decided to have a little snack. We walked down a street with lots of food shops to choose from, but I discovered that this wasn't the only thing in plenty. The street flooded with a plethora of prostitutes. I didn't know if my mind was playing tricks on me or if these were really women who sold pleasure, and so I asked my friend, and he confirmed that they were.

"It's a form of tourism over here, it' not exactly legal, but the government doesn't stop it either," he said.

"Yes, but how does it work here?" I asked.

"Simple, you just walk up to them and ask 'how much', and they'll tell you their prices, but alternatively they may give you a piece of paper with their number and you can call them and negotiate a price," he responded.

"Why would they give you a piece of paper instead of just talking?" I asked.

"Well lately the police have been harassing them and asking questions whenever they talked to people so they talk on the phone instead to steer clear from trouble, but it's all just for show anyway," he replied.

"But isn't it dangerous to do that, considering they might carry AIDS?" I said as my phobia started to take its old shape.

"That shouldn't be a problem here if they have a residential visa, because everyone gets an HIV test and has to pass before they're granted the visa, if they test positive, they have to leave the country or are deported or something"

This piece of news awaked my long dormant old companion who seemed to have been determined to visit me that night. He awakened frightened and frightened me to death. What if they were on visit visa or if they had engaged in their activities with clients that were on visit visa and carried the virus, I thought to myself.

I started dreading the blood test and I was once more surrounded by that feeling of instability. Once more my old companion surfaced and looked at me with contempt. By the end of the visit visa my fear had turned to a living nightmare thanks to my old companion who seemed to have never left me from that day. I eventually listened to him and turned down my dream job, opting to live obscurely in reality. He won that time and continues to survive as long as I'm ignorant as to whether I carry the virus.

So there we were right where we started, facing each other through a body length mirror, looking at me with contempt for blowing away his dream, he had hopes to be somewhere safe with all that he ever dreamed of. He's such an odd character, this old companion, he speaks with such contempt about those carrying the virus, and yet he doesn't want me to try and find out if I have it or not. It's as if he's stealthily willing the virus to spread if I actually do have it and willing me to live in utter fear if I don't.

The odd thing about him too is that he's right about a great many things, about how people will treat me and how they will put distance between us, even my closest friends and he's right about how my life will never be the same and none of the normalcy which I enjoy now will be taken when I cross that gate. But the only reason that's true is because of him. Yes, it's because of how he feels, and how he can never accept me. It's his desire to be in denial, even though he's my own denial.

He's taken me down a spiral of despair. He's taken me to judge, he's taken me to deny and he's taken me to look upon others with disgust. He's taken me to phobia and he's taken me to mania and all the time I knew I wasn't in the right places.

It's a horrible thing to live in fear, and worse yet to be judged by someone living inside you. But even with this fear and discomfort, I think it better and more bearable than for everyone to know and never let you forget the discomfort of their harsh judgment. Even my old companion inside, who is me, thought of everyone that had the virus with disgust and blamed them for their misfortune without even knowing their story. But he knew mine and never dared blame me.

If people should find out, like my mirror companion they won't care about my story and they will blame me and judge me and punish me. They will punish me not knowing that I have enough punishment to bear and that I carry a burden with me that they can't ever imagine, not considering that I too had hopes and dreams that have diminished with the impossibility of achieving them. There's a bit of comfort with my old companion for he knows that even with his harsh judgment some cases are beyond his evil reach. Those children bearing the virus from their mothers, children abused at a young age, those who have been raped and those whom others' neglect transferred the virus into their blood stream. My old companion cannot blame those but I know that some of these people look for forgiveness from others even though they shouldn't need any.

Once in a while when I look into a shiny spoon or a shiny doorknob or a reflective glass he stares at me with disgust, but at the same time urging me to remain in hidden shame. He is my fear and he embodies all what I fear if I find out I'm infected. How I wish I could kill him, but that would mean killing everyone who would look at me with disgust; how I wish he would change, but that would mean changing everyone around who lacks sympathy or understanding; the understanding that I too have hopes and dreams and without their help, they are crushed.

This story is a work of fiction sent in to the "Creative Art Competition" organized by UNAIDS as a part of the 2007 World AIDS Campaign, the category was 'Journalism and Creative Writing'.

I Harbor a Fear

I mean it’s not such an imminent fear, but it’s a thought that made its way to my reckoning after the statement Al-Qaida made that it will not sit idle while Israel continues to kill people in Lebanon. It’s obvious things are going relatively well for Hizbollah against Israel and I think Al-Qaida wants to support a winning battle. So long as Hizbollah stands its ground, there is room for some sort of victory.

Let me emphasize something, I’m not a political analyst and for all I know these expectations may not even be feasible but my politically mediocre reasoning has opened my eyes to certain possibilities. There may be a remote chance that the many resistance forces will join together, united by their hate to Israel even more than they are separated from each other by major ideological conflicts. This may even result in their gradual sovereignty over various strips of the region. This of course means that they will have acquired a victory over Israel and hence the USA. But the question is, what will they do with victory? We have seen Israel acting ruthless, even within boundaries of international law, fighting on many fronts, politically and militarily, but how will those resistance forces act?

Let us not forget that they will not be answering to international law, they will not be under constraints of doing what is acceptable, they have been under occupation, humiliation, attack and repression for more than they can remember, what will they do when they get power? The fight might later on be between Hizbollah, Fath, Hamas and Al-Qaida for dominance but what if that’s all worked out and they have power?

This is my fear, that such a situation happens. Perhaps the only thing worse than Israel winning this fight against the resistance, is losing heavily. When you’ve been cruelly treated for years on end, all that will differ is the power changing hand, but by that time the world might see even more cruelty than it has ever seen, perhaps even a second holocaust. If power goes to the wrong hands, the whole world might end up living in terror. If Hizbollah chooses to defend itself in the same way that Israel chose, then there will be attacks on innocent Israelis for what their government did, attacks on innocent Americans for what their government did and attacks on the innocent for what the guilty did. The excuse can be as absurd as Israel’s and America’s, the right to defend oneself.

You see the problem is that when a tyrant battles a tyrant, the world cannot take sides, it can only wait to see who wins. The problem is that the USA as a super power has wasted its chance of gaining support from anyone by becoming a tyrant, for now it is the strong tyrant but if it’s defeated, it becomes a strong tyrant that does not have support. What I mean to say is that the USA does not have the option of doing the right thing anymore because it has proven that it cannot. So when the time comes and if extreme cruelty is displayed by Hizbollah upon victory, the USA cannot act as the world leader or a savior. It wasted its chance to play that role by tarnishing its history.

The problem is that no one will come to the aid of Israel who has bullied the international community for so long. No one that has been picked on will help a bully up. Israel has bought its support rather than earned it, but once the purchasing power ceases there will be no more support, so far Israel is counting on the USA for all of its support, and that’s putting all your eggs in one basket if you ask me. So if Israel faces a defeat and the USA cannot pull it out of the hole, then there’s no one else who will.

How will life be with chaos and with people doing all they want to do? We already know that no one cares about the Lebanese people, but who else is on the list of expendables?

When good fights evil, good will win eventually. When evil fights evil, evil will have to win. No one will support a tyrant when he loses. So I guess that’s the sad thing about being evil, that when you lose, no one will be there for you, so if you’re evil you’d better win.