Million Man March
I do not know if this will make any sense to Icelanders, but there is something about the Icesave referendum tomorrow that reminds me of the Million Man March.
The rhetoric of social change is a complex trick, where somethings work and other things do not. Somehow someone somewhere comes up with just the right thing to turn to conversation in a new direction, to put attention on those principles and ideas that had been neglected and overlooked in the frenzy to stereotype and simplify.
African American males had been portrayed for decades, even centuries, in unflattering ways, and there seemed no way what so ever to make any headway to correct that impression. Then the march organizers hit upon the idea for a march by African American males demanding that men take care of their family and their obligations. So contrary was it to common stereotypes that it just made everyone do a double take, and it sufficiently destabilized the existing preconceptions that new ideas were able to emerge about African Americans. Maya Angelo wrote a lovely poem for the occasion, from a insiders perspective, about what the day meant to her and her people.
I hope Icelanders find a way tomorrow to express to the world that they too do not want to shirk responsibility, they too do not want to be stereotyped. They just want the Icesave issue to go to international court.
The rhetoric of social change is a complex trick, where somethings work and other things do not. Somehow someone somewhere comes up with just the right thing to turn to conversation in a new direction, to put attention on those principles and ideas that had been neglected and overlooked in the frenzy to stereotype and simplify.
African American males had been portrayed for decades, even centuries, in unflattering ways, and there seemed no way what so ever to make any headway to correct that impression. Then the march organizers hit upon the idea for a march by African American males demanding that men take care of their family and their obligations. So contrary was it to common stereotypes that it just made everyone do a double take, and it sufficiently destabilized the existing preconceptions that new ideas were able to emerge about African Americans. Maya Angelo wrote a lovely poem for the occasion, from a insiders perspective, about what the day meant to her and her people.
I hope Icelanders find a way tomorrow to express to the world that they too do not want to shirk responsibility, they too do not want to be stereotyped. They just want the Icesave issue to go to international court.
Comments
Það eru fæstir sem eru að kjósa 'Nei' til að fá málið fyrir rétt.
http://truflun.net/oligneisti/2010/03/05/skyr-skilabod/ er ágætur listi yfir nokkra möguleika sem Nei þýðir.