Some said, humans never asked to be born, but they are born
eventually. He/ she doesn’t have the privilege to decide who are their parents
nor family, but they can choose the right time to come into this world. Since
the beginning of their creation, humans have learned an important lesson on
freedom. They learned that there are things to become real as their wish them
to be, and there are things cannot. How lucky some people are, as they are
granted a comfortable wealthy life since they were babies until death takes
their breath away. However, humans can never know when their comfortable life
reach the end of the line. And when that day finally comes, humans lose their
balance and fall in ache as their life are no longer as comfortable as before. As
they feel helpless before the face of change, they are screaming in protest
when life goes in the opposite direction and does not come in line with their
expectations. Just as law of nature speaks, a reaction will appear only after a
prior action. In short, a hungry belly will be sending out its dissatisfaction.
Few men seem forgetting the fact that freedom does not only belong to them.
Conditions also have freedom to change the course, regardless who’s in control.
Nevertheless, if we take some time to decipher deeper, there
are some huge mass strikes these days which contrast with law of nature since
they were launched to protest a plan, or something that has not went wrong yet
because they were still undergoing legal basis drafting procedure to substantiate
a certain decision. The so-called heroic Yellow Vest mass action carried out for weeks was an expression of protest against the French government's plan to raise fuel tax. Then there were also similar scale of mass strikes by the Hong Kongers who initially protested the Extradition Bill some time ago. Although the bill has been canceled, Hong Kongers still continues their struggle by the time of this writing. Even the initially peaceful order of action turned violent (then calmed down and on the rise again) and is reportedly supported by a number of developed Western countries demanding independence from China as the ruler of the island nation as well as the center of the Asian stock exchange. While in Indonesia, student demonstrations taking place in several cities protested against many more draft bills, starting from RKUHP (criminal law draft), KPK (anti-corruption) bill, Workers Bill, the Commercial Sex Worker Bill, and a number of other issues. Similar with two other phenomenal rallies, these rallies also ended riot and claimed lives. India has also been facing a wave of rallies triggered by a plan to pass the Citizenship Act. The rallies which is reportedly claimed lives were also triggered by a mistake in interpreting the actual meaning of the law, so that there was an opinion that the law was anti-Muslim.
In the midst of the successful flow of identity politics in a number of countries, it turns out that differences in race, language and culture are not obstacles for the world community to trust the efficacy of strike in any kind. In contrast to previous years where the protesters tried hard to get their demands fulfilled, today's protesters who are mostly millennials try hard to attract the attention of the mass media to gather more support for their actions. Is this strategy effective? Yes, because the government they protested finally succumbed to their demands. However, it could not stop the rallies. A number of protesters still took over the streets and protested against other matters, even though the government had fulfilled protesters' demands. All humans on this Earth are indeed free to express their aspirations and take part in rallies. Until this very moment, freedom of expression is still a human right that must be guaranteed by countries throughout the world. With freedom, humans can engage change for the better. With freedom, humans can seek relief from the burden of a heart that is not satisfied with the situation. Or it is?
Collective Unconscious Desire
When it was established on January 1, 1995, the WTO (World Trade Organization) pledged that the organization's goals were to improve living standards, create full employment, increase real incomes and demand, increase production and trade in goods and services by emphasizing the importance of sustainable development, and integration of developing countries in the world trade system. Since then, all countries are free to market their products to any country based on international trade laws set by the WTO. One of the provisions is to use the dollar (USD) as a exchange tool in trading activities between countries.
When World War I broke out in 1914, a number of European countries joined in the Allied group sold their gold reserves in exchange for paper money. Paper money is collected to pay for the purchase of weapons and other items from the supplying country, namely the United States. During World War II, the Allied countries decided to pay US' weapons with gold. Hence, the United States became the country with the largest amount of gold reserves in the world as the war ended. In Bretton Woods, USA, 1944, 44 countries agreed on a system of foreign currency exchange that (supposedly) did not harm any countries. Since then, it was determined that value of the currencies of all countries no longer depended on the amount of gold reserves owned by such country. The value of a country's currency will depend on the value of the USD (US dollar) which pegged to gold. That's the story of how US dollar became the number one currency in the world.
We do not need to be a psychology graduate to conclude that the course of history will influence the behavior, views, and future outlook of a person, a community, or an entity. As history memorizes any experience of pleasures, humans' instincts will drive them to maintain that pleasure so that it can be felt even longer. Once you feel the pleasure of being in control of the survival of other countries in financial matters, why not maintain that pleasure as opportunities arise? That determination is planted into part of a collective unconscious of a people and passed down from generation to generation through historical stories taught in educational institutions. The media also plays role in instilling a collective subconscious on delusion of greatness by spreading negative news about other parties with different point of view. This way, people will always go in line with the idea that the only way not to be oppressed by other nations, whoever it is, is to be the strongest among them by all means.
Reviewing Freedom
Mass actions often succeed in attracting the sympathy of others who are very much interested in providing support for all the issues the group is fighting for. Especially if those who provide support are some with big powers. Indeed, no one forbids it. But such a thing can be categorized as interference attempt in others' households and should not be followed or applied in any kind of social interaction, whatever the scope is, whether it's in the neighborhood or in global society. Unfortunately, groups that have the support of other countries tend to be proud and grateful, and they neglected that those supports have actually violated the sovereignty of their own countries in a subtle way. A concrete example is a group of Hong Kongers who marched to the United States Embassy in Hong Kong while carrying the banner "Thank You, America." This phenomenon is an irony, as millennials see legitimate governments as monsters and they trust outsiders more as they forgetting a very famous phrase, "there is no free lunch." Something that is easily obtained usually has unpleasant consequences in the end of the day.
In my previous article, I saw protest as a way to survive. The article was written some time ago when I had not yet found any conclusion that protest was not the only action citizens could use to voice their opinions. Over time, I discovered the fact that the dominant factor behind each protests were disappointment, and this was a form of negative emotion. Like an eclipse, negative emotion is represented by moon that moves slowly cover the sun so that for a moment the sun's rays cannot illuminate the expanse of the human mind. Destructive behavior that is almost inseparable from mass action, mass dissent, and the tendency to naively accept foreign support, is this not real evidence of a mass eclipse in the minds of each protesters? Freedom and or fight for freedom become a shield to legalize the destructive behavior of the sovereign territory.
Whether coincidental or not, the same behavior is also shown by the US government (the president, the Parliament, and its ministers) in their efforts to uphold economic freedom and overseas politics. They are not quite satisfied with the achievement of 'just' having a currency that is the benchmark for other countries in the world. Intelligent people in the country managed to find a way to produce high-quality goods in a short time. However, the abundance of production outcomes is not accompanied by a significant increased in people's consumption. The better the quality the higher the price, and not all citizens can afford it.
The goods must be sold elsewhere so they are sold and there is a cash flow in to produce and sell more. In the past, developing countries had not been skilled enough to produce goods with the same quality as goods made in the USA, so these "random" countries were the markets of US' products, ranging from agricultural commodities, electronic equipment, clothing, to popular culture. But people in these countries apparently not only buy, but also learn how the process of making these products and have ideas to make it themselves and sell it at cheaper prices. As a result, not only lost its markets, the US as the first party who had the idea to produce these goods also lost intellectual property. That's more or less of how US-China trade war began, as well as the background of other trade wars that US declared against other countries, such as Russia (and Germany in the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline dispute) and France (as an act of retaliation of digital taxes imposed by France).
Cowboy attitude in the global economic arena and on the streets, this is not what we expect for a better world. Therefore, it would not be so excessive if the Russian President Vladimir Putin asserted that "liberal ideas have failed". Liberal-style freedom has failed to liberate the freedom-fighter countries from the narrowness of the mindset and the intention to enrich themselves. As citizens, we should be thankful that our countries have ideologies and perspectives that are not exactly the same as liberalism. We do not need to be too dazzled by the freedom exhibited by liberal countries. All countries need stability in order to build and prosper the people. The mission of the people is willing to work together to create stability, and this may result in our protest voices not being as loud as they used to be. Are we ready for it? (dswasti)
