Are the Egyptian people angering American liberals?
Jonathan Wright seems to think so. He blogs:
“I doubt I’m alone among people with an interest in Egypt in finding myself shocked in recent weeks by the dramatic changes I’ve seen in many people I know. I’m talking about people who used to hold liberal views, professed to believe in democracy and the usual freedoms and respected the work of human rights activists, for example. Many of these people are well-educated and had travelled abroad and could see that Egypt had some serious governance problems at the most basic level – corruption, waste, cronyism, favouritism, negligence, inertia, lack of accountability and so on. The vast majority of them supported the 2011 revolution against Mubarak and looked forward to a fresh start that would try to put their ideals into practice and redress some of the deficiencies that were part of Mubarak’s legacy.
The ones that have shocked me most have been transformed into reactionary, intolerant, xenophobic, chauvinistic and irrational people who advocate the repression, exclusion and in some cases even the wholesale slaughter of their political opponents. They have called for the closure of television stations and newspapers whose editorial line does not please them, and even for the arrest and prosecution of the people who work in them. They are highly sensitive to criticism from non-Egyptian individuals, institutions and governments, and in many cases have started to dismiss out of hand such notions as democracy and human rights. “We don’t want ‘your’ democracy!” is a phrase I have heard or read on numerous occasions this past month. On top of all that, they have embraced with the fervour of converts an institution that represents some of the worst aspects of late 20th century Egypt – an army that is parasitical, unproductive, wasteful, incompetent, class-ridden and ruthless in pursuit of its commanders’ corporate and private interests.”
found at: http://jnthnwrght.blogspot.com/2013/08/elite-angst-in-sisis-egypt-i-doubt-im.html