Showing posts with label riots. Show all posts
Showing posts with label riots. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

And for the rest of us...



Because what do you suppose happens to those who aren't part of that powerful club?

Pioneered by the North American Free Trade Agreement between the U.S., Canada and Mexico in 1994, the only "freedom" they bestow is to investors through investor rights clauses that empower corporations to trump the democratic rights of citizens and their governments to enact laws and policies for the public good.

Investor rights clauses are reminiscent of colonialism, says Osgoode Hall Law School associate professor Gus Van Harten.

Corporations will count on (and can count on) the masses being too wrapped up in -  wondering how to pay their electricity bill or if they can ever get electricity; how to keep their kids off drugs, or how to get their next fix; how to hold back the relentless push of extremists who want to turn the clock back 100 years or how to push that tide of extremism forward - to fight these anti-democratic trade agreements.  But this will only last a short while.

Unlike colonial times, more people have had a taste of equal rights, more are at least aware of them, and more have access to vast amounts of information they can check and cross reference.  We are more aware this time around that our rights are being trumped, and many can communicate with each other instantly, with a few key strokes.

This time around, the masses viewed by the corporations and compliant governments as meek sheep will not have to go through centuries of education to know they are entitled to certain fundamental rights, and they will push back.  However, having little money or positional power to effectively fight back against corporations and governments who have positioned themselves to be relatively untouchable, there will be spontaneous and simultaneous outbursts of violence all over the globe.

We are seeing some of these already in the protests in Greece, Spain, England, and France.  Cornered, desperate people who bear the anger of injustice as a flag don't act rationally.  They are driven by powerful emotion, drawing in others as their rumblings grow to thunderous roars.  Then it's a self-powered tsunami that only exhausts itself after a great deal of bloodshed.

Chaos reigns.