Authentic help: I hold your photo, you hold mine

There's a new video of the kidnapped CPTers.  They're still alive!  Here's the CNN story.  I think this is really hopeful.  The kidnappers have had plenty of time to find out about CPT and their opposition to the occupation and hopefully they've all  been talking and making human connections during all this time (I think the most dangerous time is the first 24-48 hours for kidnappings of this sort). 

Did you see the photos of the Iraqi kids holding posters with the pictures of the CPTers, calling for their release?  Wow.  I gotta say something about this.  I've held a lot of photos of Iraqi kids in over the past several years, going back to the time of the sanctions that everyone knew impacted the civilian population way more than it ever impacted the government there.  We used to have these vigils and pass out pamphlets about the humanitarian toll the sanctions were having on the people of Iraq.  At that time Iraq wasn't in the news much, even though we were quietly bombing them every couple of weeks.  We were often discouraged and felt like no one was listening but we kept going out there.

Anyway, now it's all Iraq all the time and then the CPTers got taken and I'm looking at photos of Iraqi kids holding pictures of Westerners and it's just a beautiful thing.  It's so beautiful... (forgive me, I'm crying now)... Just as we (Western peace activists) used to hold photos of them, now they (Iraqi kids) hold photos of us.  It's people saying hey, these other people are not demons; they're just like us and they deserve to live.  That's the gist also of this editorial written by a friend of Jim Loney's in Toronto.  Go read it.  It's really good.  This is what real activism is all about.  It's not "us" helping "them"; it's all of us helping each other, realizing we're all in this together.  It reminds me of this quote by Paulo Freire:

Authentic help means that all who are involved help each other mutually, growing together in the common effort to understand the reality which they seek to transform

This is how we will change the world.  This is the revolution.  It comes from places like this when people come together across cultures and something strikes a spark in the common area within all of us.  When we hold each other's photos up and say I'll stand with you.  I'll hold your hand.  I'll hold the line with you.  I'll face the firehoses, the teargas, the police dogs with you.  I'll be your ally.  And we will change the world.

[See also: More on Authentic help]