Re: do we need any arabeyes ?

[Nadim Shaikli <shaikli at yahoo dot com>]

--- Arafat Medini <lumina silverpen de> wrote:
> with our political situation right now and the whole situation of the
> Arab world, a question arises on which I want to hear some discussion
> some arguments that really convince and some interesting reads. Do you
> really think that our work helps the Arabs in any way? Do you really
> think that our project will become a success? The resources are very
> narrow the people are not present and the Arabic culture is heavily
> using foreign languages for technical work, the arabs don't even now
> what liberty is to understand what liberty of choice or open sourced
> apps are, and hoping alone rally doesn't help much. what do you think?

Arafat, your questioning is most likely based on the recent world news.
Its understandable to be sad/confused/happy/worried/hyperventilated/hungry
among other things :-) but what is serious here is to question what has
happened to us Arabs in general (I'm talking with regard to Arabeyes, but
it can be extrapolated to other things).  What will it take for us to
finally become active as we once were.  I contend that we need to fist-slap
our own faces to WAKE-UP to realize we have things we need to do and things
we need to accomplish.  This feeling of helplessness and indifference _is_
in itself defeat and there is no reason to be defeated - hope and work go
hand-in-hand.

Case in point - this mailing-list has in excess of 150 people on it (yup,
150).  We see at most 5-6 active people posting and actually working and
caring.  What worries me and makes my head shake and boils my blood is
wanting to know what will it take for the rest 144 people to get off their
bums and finally say "Yes, I do indeed need to help and I will make a
difference - I WILL DO IT !!".

We've been taught (culturally and religiously) to give back to our community
every chance we get - why is that such a difficult concept to comprehend ?

As for "is Arabeyes needed - we're all going to be assimilated anyways ?"
My answer would be, if you intend to dye your hair blond/pink, wear blue
or green eye-contacts, change your name to Hans/Francois/John/Alberto and
raise your kids as though they are from Atlantis then its a clear YES.  I
love my heritage and will do all I can to keep it alive and to raise my
kids by its values and standards.

> cheers

I'll keep the cheers for later - if you don't mind :-/

Wake-up people - make a difference and contribute.

Salam.

 - Nadim


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