Cyber-racism.

The concept of racism is nothing new to this world. It's been a part of human civilization ever since the evolution of culture. It has, however, never become more relevant to our daily lives than in the present. With strides in technology, people find themselves living with other people from different ethnic and racial backgrounds, they find themselves interacting with other cultures, and forming judgments based on skin color, behavior, speech and habit. People living in minority groups are increasingly finding it stressful to deal with mainstream authority and oppression, more so with races that have classically held power and privilege.

The USA is an interesting country in that it is a country essentially based on an amalgam of different immigrants. This immigration process started right from the time when Columbus landed. The white Europeans evicted the native Americans from there lands and subjugated them to torture and slavery. The native Americans themselves were a diverse group of peoples scattered across the land. This set the dice rolling with more European colonists coming in to fight for their piece of pie. In the ages of imperialism, Africans were brought in numerous hordes into the continent. Africans from different cultures, from an entire continent, each African representing a different tribe. After this slavery-tide, came waves of immigration during the world wars; with large numbers of Europeans fleeing the war in Europe. And finally, post-second world war saw the rise in immigration of Asians - Chinese, Indians, Koreans, Japanese into the mainland.

So the question of race becomes very important to the people of United States. In spite of this amalgam of peoples living in this country, all the positions of privilege were classically held by the whites - seen by the absence of a single president who was also a person of color, until maybe probably now; among other things.



The US however has shrugged off a lot of its duties in dealing with racism - both systemic and personal. This came to light in the recent UN conference on racism in Geneva. The international community has recognized racism as a necessary evil and has very strict laws in dealing with it. For example, in Germany, there are laws that ban the existence of the extreme-pro-Aryan neo-Nazi party. This should however not be interpreted as absence of racism in these countries.
In spite of international pressure , the US has grappled with policies on racism and sadly, many racists in this country are in fact supported by law. The first crucial amendment to the US constitution which guarantees freedom of speech and expression has often been misused, abused and taken advantage of, in the States, when people propagate hate crimes, hate speeches, and set-up websites of white supremacy. It is sad, that the US government does not see that freedom always comes with duties - duties to human values. In fact philosophers have time and again pointed out that there is no such thing as absolute freedom. While hate speeches are widely illegal across the world, it's so common in the States, that if one searches for white supremacy on google, a number of websites show up - websites filled with racist hate speeches, anti-semitist feelings and homophobia.
One such website is www.stormfront.org, bringing me to the topic of cyber-racism.
It is the first of the 2000 and odd websites that are now available and propagate white supremacy, anti-semitism, and neo-nazism. In many countries these sites would have been censored and the creator of such websites would have been persecuted - more evidence of the ambiguous stand of the US government on race. In fact the US is now a safe haven for the new generation of cyber-racists.
It comes as a shock to many people across the world - almost like a loophole in spite of all the international laws against racism. Five years ago there was just one such website propagating white supremacy. Now there are over a thousand sites, easily accessible by public. Even more shocking is that some of these websites target kids. The members of these websites recruit new members from chat-rooms, which are now increasingly filled with naive and vulnerable youth. It is indeed a pity that creators of these websites can walk free without facing any legal consequences.
The world and the international community are now alarmed at the rise of such websites. For not only is the world wide web internationally accessible, the white supremists now have a way of propagating hate across the world. As feared, this is exactly what is happening. Blocking is of course an option, but a lot of good websites end up getting blocked too. Not only this, cyber-racists can easily set up their own servers or move on to other servers.
The internationaly community, after experiencing US reluctance in dealing with racism, has come up with certain measures that might be passed into practice very soon.
1. If internet companies publish racist material, their directors should be liable for criminal charges on trips abroad, where they could even be arrested.
2. If racism cannot be legally proved, it maybe easier to get a conviction on grounds of discrimination
3. Another legal route to cracking down on internet racism may be to confiscate the copyright of a racist work put onto a US server from abroad. Armed with the copyright, that government could then force any US provider to remove the offensive material from the site.

Hopefully, if US citizens do elect a black president, there would probably be better handling of policies concerning racism. For not only is this a country's problem , but a problem of the world - spread through cyberspace, and targeting the most vulnerable population - the youth.These measures therefore have to be implemented soon, to prevent racists from winning this war through cyberspace.

89 000 and counting

It's been five years since the war officially started in Iraq. Blogs of Iraqi survivors are now the focus of the international community. In one of these blogs, a 14 year old girl describes how she had celebrated Id . She describes how much it meant to her to be with her family, and how happy she was that there were no bomb blasts in her town and no one, at least in her family died that day.
Another 16 year old writes about how her father was forcibly evacuated from her house in Baghdad, knocked unconscious, tied and gagged. She writes about how she learned of her father's death, who had been shot in the head that night. And how much her life has changed ever since.
Such is a plight of a war-torn country. And as history has reminded us time and again, the worst sufferers of a war such as this, are the civilians.
Other bloggers describe how they have been displaced from their homes, how they've lost all that they'd possessed, except their lives, and how most unfortunately, they've all lost someone who had been a part of them - husbands, and wives, children and fathers, mothers and sisters - all as victims to the war.
The international communtiy now places the toll of iraqi civilian deaths since the war started to be 89 000. 89 000 lives were killed over the last five years. These deaths have affected families who find it hard to cling on to hope and faith. A far greater number of Iraqis have fled the country. The international community and UNHCR have placed an estimate 2.5 million refugees now living in Syria and Jordan. These numbers are harmless on paper, but each one of them is a life that has been forcibly evacuated or has fled out of fear from home. Furthermore, the number of asylum seekers has increased and rough estimates range anywhere from 25000 to 30000.

Such is the extent of civilian damage due to the war.

The war itself was started by the US government five years ago under the presidency of George W Bush, a time in which Iraq was suspected of possessing weapons of mass destruction. President Bush justified the cause of the war then by iterating his three goals of the war - to destroy the weapons of mass destruction, deport Saddam Hussein ending his dictatorship and establish a stable democracy in Iraq. This is one of the instants in history where a superpower in this world assumes the privilege of making radical changes in a society that is far removed from its own - the concept of western "civilization" reaching out to other "less developed nations" . Even after five years of brutal fighting, only one of the three goals has been achieved - the deport of Saddam Hussein. The first goal of destroying weapons of mass destruction can only be achieved if any of those weapons existed. On the other hand, the establishment of a stable democracy has been indefinitely postpond.
In spite of this, President Bush is convinced that the war happened for good. He talked about the "success" the US army had in deporting an Iraqi dictator in a recent speech that he gave to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the iraqi war. There was no mention , however, of how weapons of mass destruction have never been found, and how a stable democracy is still a dream to the Iraqi people.
On another note, US Vice president Cheney, this Monday, made a trip to Baghdad and praised the improvement in security situations in Iraq. The same day 60 civilians were killed in a bomb blast. Also to be noted is that this statement came from a man who traveled with a pack of well armed body guards and had not left the "green zone" of high security while he was in Iraq.

The war itself is now at a stale-mate. Back in the States, Bush's presidential term comes to an end. As US presidential-hopefuls fight for the presidency, they voice their opinions on the issue of Iraq. John Mc Cain the chosen republican candidate strongly supports the war, as he always had had. He believes the troops have to stay in Iraq to ensure the establishment of democracy in Iraq. Obama and Clinton both oppose the war, with each proposing plans on how the troops ought to be withdrawn. Either way, there is no convincing solution. The damage is done. A lot remains to be done in terms of establishing a democracy as well as improving security measures. If the US withdraws its troops, would it be helpful to a country that is already very unstable politically and lacks the intelligence of the US troops? On the other hand, how long can US interfere in something that is not its business?
Indeed, Bismarck in the 19th century had wisely observed that democracy can never be "brought" to a country. This had been clear to him after an attempt by the French revolutionaries to bring democracy to Germany failed. Had he been alive now, he would have felt something more than deja vu.
Thus the saga of US superiority continues in this world. Its foreign policies have always been controversial, be it its role in Central America or in Vietnam. As the international community watches on, the Iraq war continues. There is no convincing solution at hand as changes in government take place in the US. Globally the war has been condemned, but little has been done about it. As many countries do take a stand in the war, they fail to voice the double standards the US government resorts to, to justify anything that it does, be it as destructive as a war. There is a lesson to be learned as the war goes down in history, and as we still stand at 89 000 and counting.