SODOM & GOMORRAH: Revolution is a virus. Once it infects the mind of one or two people, it can spread across an entire region without regard. Echoing western policy makers, we may even say that it more adversely affects the poor and vulnerable.
The Syrian government has experienced formidable opposition from revolutionary groups. You can read about the spread of the revolution in this article.
It is largely the same story as elsewhere: the underclass is rising up against autocratic government and demanding democracy. Or so we’re told.
The Monthly Review, a socialist publication, is fairly candid about what’s going on. The socialists point out that there are essentially two opposition elements calling for democracy, and neither actually wants it.
First, there are the Syrian communists (which western media is aware are communists and lets them write opinion pieces). These Arab communists “fought for social justice, workers’ victory, the dictatorship of the proletariat, revolution, and liberation but not for democracy.” The article takes a hardline stance, criticizing communist leaders who “can’t stop invoking the discourse of democracy […] religiously.”
Second, there’s the Muslim Brotherhood which also says that they want democracy. But this publication, unlike much of the traditional media, has actually done their homework.
There is no amiability between the Muslim Brotherhood and the socialists, but there is a common agenda of striking against the status quo. The tame, multi-cultural, pluralist liberal democrats are nowhere to be found.
Of course, everyone forgets that the current Syrian state was a product of the swarm itself; its 1973 constitution defines it as a secular socialist state. The revolution eats its own; the locust consumes the waste of its predecessors.