...today i'll say good things
Not much has happened today... Sure there was a huge general strike, and sure there were demonstrations and riots again... but everything was much more quiet than it has been these past few days...
I read what the foreign press has to say about what's happening here, and i'm afraid it's all a bit exaggerated. That's not to say that things are not out of hand, or that there's no riots, or that things are quiet... But we are not in the brink of a civil war, we are not face to face with desperation, we are not "brave rebels who don't take oppression and rise up to anyone who takes away our freedom" (I read that somewhere, yes i did)
Ok, maybe we are to some extend. And, yes, maybe we do have a smaller tolerance level than others. I do not know, honestly.
And, yes, the people who demonstrated peacefully - and there were such, and their (our) demonstrations were beautiful and creative and hurtfully intense and to the point - were outraged by the unfair killing of a young man. A killing that was the result of many things that go wrong with this country: a justice system that is corrupt and punctured. A special police force that accepts people with "special exams", meaning that anyone who knows someone can enter and carry a gun. Policemen who are given weapons without psychological evaluations and wave them around like kompolois. Policemen who are provenly "Rambos" but still allowed to carry a gun, in the most neuralgic part of a large city. Policemen who act like mafia, selling "protection" to clubs and bars, selling drugs and trafficking women and children. Politicians who live inside their own world, far from the prefectures that vote for them, granting favors to voters a year and a half before the elections, to ensure their favor and their vote. Politicians afraid to lead the people, afraid to take a stance and make unpopular but necessary decisions, for the good of this country and the people. People who believe that everything is owed to them and whatever they don't have, has been stolen from then and should be taken back: by violence or by cheating/ stealing. People who don't respect one's right to be different ("you are aderfi/queer/anarchist/communist) People who believe themselves to be leftists, and anarchists, and strive to enforce their opinions on everyone, by causing trouble, breaking and burning, attacking to kill and disrespecting other people's lives, in the most fascist way.
I can think of only a few things that could be sadder than the murder of a 15-year-old boy, by the very person that was supposed to protect him and for nothing more and nothing less than bullyism. "I'll show you", the policeman said, and took away a life that could have so much to give.
One of the sadder things I can think of is the exploitation of this tragic event by people, in order to push their own, personal, political, ideological agenda forward. Or in order to just "go out there and burn the country down, because I am mad/sad/angry/boohoohoo". Or in order to loot stores, because i need a phone/new sunglasses/a gift for my girlfriend. If you are wondering, yes, this happened.
If Alexis Grigoropoulos is watching, I am sure he will be proud of his schoolmates, his friends, and the vast majority of teenage children, who took to the streets and defended his name in the face of police brutality. He will be proud of the theatrical manifestations of support he got, with children giving roses to the policemen, asking them to let them live and protect them in peace and love, with teenagers laying half-naked on the stairs of police stations, showing the police that their lives and body's are in the hands and protection of the police, but their souls are their own. He will be proud of all the teams, who hung black cloths at the european games to express mourning, and he will be prould of his favorite team, Panathinaikos, that made it to the Top 16 in the Champions League, because, in Greece, we love sports.
But he won't be proud that so many "little" peoples fortunes and businesses were destroyed and burned to the ground, in his name.
And I am not proud that all this happened. I believe it's my fault too, though. When shit hit the fan, I choked. I got afraid and didn't go out. I set one foot at a demonstration, and not both feet. I locked myself up in my house and chose to let these people burn up my city, break and burn the main street, where I would do my christmas shoping (which I will now probably do online). I receded and allowed them to take over the city, when I should be out there, protecting what's mine, demonstrating peacefully and standing by what I believe in.
This too shall pass. I hope those who say that we are ahead of a new junta, or a revolution, are not right. I wouldn't say no to a class revolt, in fact I would probably be one of the first out in the streets. But not the way it is expressed right now. Not by people who do not respect other people's personalities.
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