The Road goes ever on and on, / Down from the door where it began. / Now far ahead the Road has gone, / And I must follow, if I can, / Pursuing it with eager feet, / Until it joins some larger way / Where many paths and errands meet. / And whither then? I cannot say. - Bilbo, The Fellowship of the Ring

Sunday, December 18, 2011

you make beautiful things

Sometimes I just need to remember the little, beautiful things in life.


"Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair." - Kahlil Gibran


The beauty of this earth is a reflection of the One who is always good, even when bad things happen.


Though the fig tree should not blossom,
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the LORD;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
- Habakkuk 3:17-18

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

#FreeWho?

Anyone who has known me in the past two years knows that I love Invisible Children and strongly believe in their mission to stop the longest running war in Africa. For the past 25 years, the LRA has been kidnapping children, brainwashing them, forcing them to kill their family in some instances, and enlisting them in the rebel army ranks. The LRA terrorizes innocent civilians in four different central African nations with impunity.

Invisible Children has told the world about these atrocities and has gotten millions of young people excited about stopping injustice in central Africa. I would probably be on a very different path in life were it not for Invisible Children. I have made so many wonderful friends and have had some incredible experiences because of IC and the work I have done in support of their mission.

So when I criticize this organization, it’s not because I don’t deeply believe in their cause. But as I have been putting more and more thought into the images and sound bytes and methodologies that I see encouraged by IC, I have been wondering if the effects are always productive.

What provoked this post is one of the publicity stunts that Invisible Children is currently promoting. An IC employee, Timmy Harris, is locking himself in a cage until 2 million dollars are raised for the Protection Plan. He’s making a sacrifice for something he believes in, and that’s great. Now, I don’t like how much emphasis IC has been putting on the amount of money they raise for the Protection Plan, but I can definitely respect someone with a different opinion about that (and that’s more of an over arching ideological problem about Western organizations doing development in Africa). The money part is not my main problem with what this guy is doing. What I don’t like is that the tagline for this stunt is #FreeTimmy.

For those who don’t know, #Free_____ hash tags are currently trending on twitter for all the bloggers and activists who are being or have been unjustly arrested and held in Arab countries (particularly Egypt and Syria). These jailed activists represent the struggle for justice and accountability and democracy in the Arab world. They have been beaten, tortured, sexually assaulted and tried in illegitimate military courts. These are the activists who have been jailed, not killed. Those who have been killed in uprisings since last December number in the tens of thousands.

The #FreeTimmy hash tag trivializes the significance of the #FreeAlaa, #FreeMaikel, #FreeRazan, and #FreeMona hash tags. I know that Timmy is raising money to stop injustice in central Africa. But he should not be comparing himself to those who are being held against their will, tortured, and sexually assaulted, regardless of what he is raising money for. Terrible atrocities are ongoing in both Arab countries and central Africa. But these are two different situations. What Timmy Harris is experiencing is much, much different from what Alaa Abd El-Fatah, Maikel Nabil, Razan Ghazzawi, and Mona Eltahawy have experienced or are experiencing. Invisible Children and Timmy Harris should find another tagline for this campaign that is both catchy and respectful.