A World Away
author: CatWoman
As I write this, a woman screams across the crackling wires. A
faceless cry of anguish from a world away. I stare out through the
grey, impassive, Oregon rain, squinting through the fog, trying to
see her, trying to imagine what it's like down there. Trying mutely
to offer solidarity. Reaching out across the ether to someone I have
never seen, but whose voice I recognize as a comrade. I'm listening
to the voice of Oaxaca.
This, this is why our voices matter. This is why independent media
matters. This is why the real media -- narco news, indymedia, radio
universidad, etc -- is worth the risks that people are taking for
it. Last summer, the women of Oaxaca put their bodies on the line to
storm the corporate media. They took over first one, and then all
the television stations in the region, and have occupied them ever
since. Their strong voices have been heard across the world, all
through this struggle. A week ago today, an imcista gave his life to
make sure this story would be heard. As the crackdown began, he was
shot down with his camera in his hands, still bearing witness to the
violence even as the life drained from his body. And today, as guns
sound and tear gas falls from the sky and tanks roll down streets,
the brave voices of our comrades at Radio Universidad continue to
defiantly call out through the crackling wires.
Yes, this matters. This is a voice that will not be silenced.
Without the strong voices of our comrades on Radio Universidad, the
world might have ignored what is happening down there. Without the
solidarity of media activists throughout the world, without the
strength and ingenuity of those who took over the television
stations and set up this radio station and got word out to the
world, our comrades in Oaxaca might have been erased from history.
But we hear them. We are with them. They will not be silenced.
As I listen to these powerful voices, holding together under the
terrorism that has been unleashed against them, I feel almost
impotent up here. I'm so far away from them. I can hear their
screams, but I cannot stop the tanks. I don't know what to do. So I
keep listening, keep listening. As if this connection between them
and me is a lifeline. As if, in listening, in bearing witness, in
willing my strength and solidarity to them, they can be stronger. As
if in hearing their voices, in gathering in the strength and
inspiration offered up by them to me, I can be stronger. Yes, it's a
lifeline, but I'm not sure for whom. I need to hear their story as
much as they need to tell it.
This is the strength of the story, the power of an idea that cannot
be silenced. The oppressor knows that it is the control over the
story that confers real power. That's why every oppressor's first
act is to consolidate control over the media. Because an idea,
communicated by brave voices, is a dangerous thing to the oppressor.
It can catch hold and take off like wildfire. It can ignite the
spark of resistance and revolution, even half a world away. And so
it is with the story of Oaxaca. The oppressor can drop cannisters of
tear gas from the sky, they can shoot bodies, they can rumble down
the streets in tanks. But they cannot shoot down an idea. Once it
has been offered up into the ether, then it is free. And these ideas
being offered up from the guts of resistance, there in the streets
of Oaxaca, these are dangerous ideas. And we are a dangerous people.
A strong, inspired, rising, dangerous people.
Vamos a Resistir. Todos somos Oaxaca.
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2006/11/348510.shtml
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