Egypt's Euphoria

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2011/02/day_joy
Egypt's euphoria



Feb 11th 2011, 19:42 by W.W. | IOWA CITY

JUBILATION is catching. It is impossible, for me at least, to watch  
the crowds in Egypt, overjoyed at Hosni Mubarak's hotly-desired  
resignation, with dry eyes and an unclenched throat. The best  
explanation I have heard today for the mass euphoria rippling through  
Egypt came earlier this morning when one Al Jazeera reporter, choking  
back sobs, described the rise of Egypt's people and the fall of  
Egypt's dictator as "everything I've ever hoped for". Everything!  
Another correspondent, reporting from Alexandria, described Egypt's  
collective elation as the release of 30 years of bottled-up emotion.  
He said he had seen birth, that he had seen marriage, but he had never  
seen happiness like this, and it is everywhere. This is sublimely  
powerful stuff. It may be the most powerful stuff.

I admit that I am more than a little tempted to rain on the parade and  
note that Mr Mubarak's departure guarantees nothing and that it is not  
unreasonable to fear a turn for the worse. There's a tiny, stability- 
loving Burke on my shoulder, and I'm afraid he's no devil. All the  
same, for now I'm not listening. Well, I did listen a little, but I've  
heard enough. It is partly due to my Burkean worries that I feel the  
pessimist in me should just stuff it for now. Whether or not Egypt  
flowers into a model democracy, whether or not Egyptians tomorrow live  
more freely than Egyptians today, today they threw off a tyrant. The  
surge of overwhelming bliss that has overtaken Egyptians is the rare  
beautitude of democratic will. The hot blush of liberation, a dazzled  
sense of infinite possibility swelling millions of happy breasts is a  
precious thing of terrible, unfathomable beauty, and it won't come to  
these people again. Whatever the future may hold, this is the happiest  
many people will ever feel. This is the best day of some peoples'  
lives. The tiny Dionysian anarchist on my other shoulder is no angel,  
but I cannot deny that there is something holy in this feeling, that  
it is one of few human experiences that justifies life—that satisfies,  
however briefly, our desperate craving for more intensity, for more  
meaning, for more life from life. Whatever the future holds, there  
will be disappointment, at best. But there is always disappointment.  
Today, there is joy.

-- 
dadl-ot mailing list
http://mail.thehood.us/mailman/listinfo/dadl-ot_thehood.us
http://news.gmane.org/gmane.music.dadl.ot