Worst case scenario

The Arab region is a fertile region these days, I never thought the Arab world had that much intellectual diversity. Surprisingly there actually are a lot of people who have independent thoughts, who want to change, build and live their lives free of the restrictions of old; political, social, cultural and even religious boundaries are being overthrown along with the dictators who have come to represent these unwanted boundaries.

The wave of change has hit the region, this change is not only political, it a whole change in the mind frame of the people. It is a change that has been building up for so long, even though its effect is only surfacing recently.

To talk about Jordan specifically I think I can say with a degree of certainty that the general awareness is increasing and people are no longer falling one-sided stories in the age of globalization. I use the world globalization because I think that, as a people, we collectively respond to the world, especially the "Western world" in a much better way than we have ever done.

If we don't see any positive instantaneous political reform, which is the worst case scenario, then I think we have still gained the experience of peaceful demonstrations, demanding our rights as against asking politely, and increased our political awareness. I'm not leaning on any official (or unofficial) statistics but I find myself sure of the fact that Jordanians are reading a lot more news than they used to. I would like to read statistics from the large websites on this subject, until then I'm assuming its the case.

Another huge step is the fact that a lot more people are standing up and saying whats on their mind, even if it is not as polite as some might want, but because its their right to say it. The Jordanian constitution is, in theory, quite an open, democratic one, the flaws lay in the implementation of them rather than the written laws them-self. I think the situation we are in is a win-win situation; people are becoming more aware of their rights, more open to freedom of speech and most importantly more critic of issues that were previously prohibited to freedom of speech, even if it was by rule of thumb.

If we don't gain anything we will at least gain a boost to our awareness and a better implementation of our not-so-bad laws. That to me is not that bad of a "worst case scenario" ..