© the eyeranian

On Weblogs!

Much discussion has been centered on the unique ability of this medium (weblogs) to provide individuals their own forum and soap-box to express and exchange ideas and opinions, without much interference from the controlling hands of information conglomerates.

What most experts have missed in this dialogue is the ability of weblogs as an organizing tool. Of course we have already seen them used in that fashion by anti-war demonstrators or those protesting the IMF and G8 meetings, but that is a group already familiar with electronic media for most parts and use of a blog to organize would only be natural. But what if this became a much more accessible tool used by the greater masses, blue-collar workers, the unemployed and under-employed, minimum wage slaves, the poor, the homeless? What if THEY could get together, organize and co-ordinate their efforts this way?

One such site I have been following regularly is maintained by the workers of government-owned Al Mahdi aluminum production facility in Iran (sorry, it’s all in Persian). It is a group log of mostly worker’s whistle-blowing about management’s corruption and dishonesty. Anything from bribery accusations and the questionable way tenders have gone to foreign companies, to boss’ brother-in-law getting a cushy job. One of the latest posts is about the process of selecting a “female employee of the year” and the corrupt way it was handled, comparing it to the “damn Pahlavis” way of conducting business.

The language is down to earth, satirical at times and obviously refers to very specific situations and people that I am sure other workers would find most useful. Here’s translation of one post, explaining a sort of editorial policy: “On this weblog nobody is supposed to be disrespected without justification. If someone has been disrespected, be sure that whoever it is, has already disrespected over 800 honest employees of the facility by abuse and ignoring of their rights”.

Now if they are successful in getting their grievances out to me thousands of miles away, imagine if there was a government in place that actually cared and could use such a direct pipeline to what actually goes on in their very expensive ($2 billion to built, according to the site) facility.

Posted by Pedram at May 28, 2003 09:48 AM