The past month’s civil uprising in Tunisia reached a milestone today, when President Ben Ali announced he will be stepping down – in 3 years! Ben Ali also stated that he will be cutting the cost of food, has ordered security forces to stop killing civilians, and will be ensuring freedom of speech and internet access.
While this speech – delivered in the Tunisian’s native tongue – may placate a few protesters, the bulk of the dissenters are unlikely to be satisfied with mere words. They want justice, and will not rest until their repressive regime gets removed.
The collective voice of regular Tunisian people has been saying “We’ve had enough!” Enough with the corruption in the government and the oppressive oligarchy. No more will Tunisians tolerate the injustice of suffering in poverty while Tunisia’s leaders hoard too much of the pie.
What is happening in Tunisia should serve as a microcosm for our entire world.
Right now, the top 1% of the world’s people control 40% of all the world’s wealth. Meanwhile, about 20% of the world’s people are dying in extreme poverty, and another 20% are barely making enough to survive. This grossly distorted distribution of wealth allows preventable human suffering to persist.
The world’s wealthiest humans are content to keep things as they are. It is up to the bulk of humankind – those who’ve been getting a disproportionately small slice – to let their collective voices be heard. Only then will some of the world’s most egregious injustices come to and end.
Fortunately for everyone on earth, this social revolution has been gradually brewing for a very long time. Within the next decade or two, we will come together as a species to fundamentally alter our world’s system and permanently establish a more just global civilization.
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Tags: civil, democracy, freedom, justice, movement, progress, revolution, Tunisia, uprising