Last night I watched the latest episode of Frontline/World. This version of Frontline focuses on shorter segments from around the globe rather than an hour or two dedicated to one topic. The first segment entitled Pakistan: State of Emergency helped elucidate the fear, uncertainty, frustration, and chaos that is the Middle East today.
Reporter David Montero focuses on Swat Pakistan (yellow region on the map) and the residents and leadership within this district. I don't want to get into the details of the happenings presented in the show as the flow of the story and the pictures are what make it so vivid and empathetic. Of course most folks in the world know of Bhutto's assassination, but there is much here that is not presented via mainstream media.
But this is what struck me. You have these peoples, trying to take care of their communities and families, raise their children safely, share their diverse ideologies to the betterment of their society, love and live. Amidst all this, there are small groups of individuals bullying through fear and murder to push their ideologies. And because of the resulting chaos, no one can live their lives. How can you live if you fear buying your groceries, having your children play outside, all the small things that make up your base existence, let alone your higher levels of life.
These individuals look to their government, to Musharraf, and indirectly the US and see only that they do not provide protection or assistance. It helps me to understand even more, as a wife and mother, how it could be that so many have come to not trust or even hate the US. So many here in the US have apathy when it comes to politics. They just want to live their lives. When you are deprived of that, it can become easy to hate those you blame for taking that from you - even if it may not be fully accurate or just in doing so. But we see the effects of chaos on our own people in uniform when they are subjected to constant fear and stress over time. How can we not have empathy for those who live in this kind of environment whilst our governments play games of politics with the goals of power, resources, self-aggrandizement and winning rather than humanity.
You can watch Frontline online. The first segment is Pakistan: State of Emergency. The second segment Russia: Putin's Plan is also eye-opening and I recommend watching that as well.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Pakistan: State of Emergency (Frontline)
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