Did the Arab Spring fail? Three views from Monitor readers

In light of an op-ed by Ayaan Hirsi Ali ('Why the Arab Spring hasn't failed in Egypt and Middle East), we asked our readers on Facebook: “Do you think the Arab Spring has failed?” See some of their most thoughtful responses here.

3. What about the US?

Cathy Barnes: …. One would hope that some day these people would grasp even the basic concept of democracy, but US with NSA spying is no longer a good example. We have no more 4th, 5th , or 6th Amendment rights.

Fauzi Tchelebi: It is not logical that the EU [European Union] and US fight Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Mali, but on the other hand, they support it indirectly in other places like Iraq [and[ Syria, ... financially, with weapons, and with strategic support.

Diane Marston: I suspect [Egypt] is divided, just like [America].

3 of 3

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.