By Amanda Painter
Since the still-unfolding disaster in Japan has been holding our attention here at Planet Waves, I was especially intrigued by an interview today on Democracy Now! with Anthony Shadid, one of the four New York Times correspondents who was recently held by pro-Gaddafi forces in Libya. Part of the interview focuses on what he and his colleagues, including photographer Lynsey Addario, endured. But the segment I am posting here involves Shadid’s thoughts on the revolution in Libya compared to those in other parts of the Arab world.
The influence of the recent Jupiter-Pluto square and the still-forming Uranus-Pluto square have received significant attention with regard to these ‘rolling revolutions’. But the transit that came to mind as I read Shadid’s descriptions of Libya’s struggle made me think specifically of Mercury making its three conjunctions to Eris in Aries as it has moved into retrograde motion and will move back again.
Eric has mentioned time and again that one of the qualities of Eris is a fractured sense of self which, with awareness and attention, can become unified. Mercury, in addition to relating to communication and what we articulate, also relates to state of mind. And both of these planets are in Aries, home of our sense of self in the zodiac which, intriguingly, is ruled by the god of war — Mars.
And there in this corner of the world poorly understood by westerners, we have these revolutions — some involving more warfare and violence than others — in which national identity is being fractured, identified, articulated and unified to various degrees. Libya is the next-door neighbor of both Egypt and Tunisia, sandwiched between the two of them on Africa’s northern coast. But according to Shadid, Libya’s national identity is much less cohesive. He remarks that while Tunisia and Egypt are still very much works in progress, they qualify as the two “easy revolutions.” By way of explanation, he remarks, “It’s not coincidence that those two countries have, I think, the deepest sense of national identity. The divisions within those countries are not that great, are not that pronounced.” That means that regardless of the struggles these countries face, the populist forces that have brought about change share a common starting point amidst whatever diverse viewpoints may also exist. The populations of Egypt and Tunisia were able to articulate a unified vision, at least in these early stages of change, to get the ball rolling constructively.