I am not a believer in democracy.
(hint: For those that are not from the mashy team I am the manager of mashy.com.)
A good member of the mashy team wanted to make a meeting today for us to discuss how we can improve mashy by taking input from the team. Also he wanted to discuss how to improve working conditions.
Well that meeting is a good idea, but it is too democratic for my taste. And the idea did not start from me, so the ruler ( me ) is not interested in this meeting. It does not fall under his plan, and it might open areas that the ruler ( me, remember the ruler is me, I am not talking about another ruler ) does not want opened. The ruler thus does what he can within reason to make this meeting fail.
Being the boss I can easily not come to work today.
That is a lesson in democracy.
When there is no democracy, THERE IS NO DEMOCRACY.
I am absent today.
Lets see if this meeting can create any important changes without me.
:)
:)
No seriosly. I wanted to give this small lesson in democracy, but in reality I have a meeting in Haram that I can not cancel, it is an all day event and I apologise. We can make it some other time. I am even going there with my feet hurting and having to use a wlaking cane, but I have to go.
Other rulers destroy our plans for democracy in ways that are not at all as civilized as mine ( I had a meeting which is a perfect excuse ). These other rulers or their minions in my opinion lack the creativity and finesse to rule a people without giving them democracy while making them think they do have democracy ( Like Bush and the people that move him have done to the American people ).
If I do not return from the meeting know that this blog post cost me too much, send me halawa in prison if you know which prison that is :)
( And well you will ask you self many times "Does he really have a meeting or is this a civilised way of destroying democracy in mashy.com? A civilized way that other rulers should follow instead of torture and prison." )
:) he he he.
التعليقات
جميل الكلام اوى
جميل الكلام اوى انا عن نفسى مبحبش الديموقراطية للناس بس بحبها جدا لنفسى غير كدة شايفة ان الشعب دة لو حكم نفسه بنفسه هتبقى ميغة بس مش معنى كدة نضرب الشعب على.....يعنى مش نسرقة ونضربه بس نحاول حتى نحسسه انه حاكم نفسه بنفسه بس من غير ما يكون حاصل ومجرد ان الشعب لو متوفرله وسائل الراحة اللى هو عاوزها وحاسس بوجوده يبقى تمام كدة ودة الشعب المثالى فى نظرى
ومستر ايهاب اظن انت بما انك مدير شركة عارف ان لو سبت الموظفين يحكموها هتبوظ لازم يكون فى حد بردة يكون بينظم كل حاجة
خلط الامور
السيد الفاضل لاافضل كثيرا الحديث مع من يخلطون الامور فأذا كان الكلام عن الديموقراطيه فى المطلق اى بمعنى الديموقراطيه الحقيقيه التى لا أرها تطبق على كوكب الارض اقصد هنا سياسيا فأنا معها ومن لايحب ان تحكم الشعوب نفسها وبنفسها .اماعن ردى على فخامتكم فقد كان خاص بالديموقراطيه فى العمل الجماعى سواء كان هذا العمل حكومى اوخاص .وارى ان ماتقوم به انت واصحاب الاعمال الخاص هو افضل الحلول لتعليم الديموقراطيه وأخذ بيد الشعب المصرى لتعريفة ماهية الديموقراطيه واذا كان الاطفال الذين ضربت بهم المثل لديك لديهم حق الاختيار فهم اطفال مرفهون وهم ليسوا كل الشعب المصرى ربما يكون معك الحق اذ قلت ان تجربة الديموقراطيه تحتاج للكثير من الحزم فى التطبيق لان نسبه الاميه السياسيه فى مصر مرتفعه لحد كبير والديموقراطيه تحتاج لمناخ اقتصادى ناجح ومستوى تعليمى عالى وقيادات مخلصه ومحبه لهذا البلد ومجموعه من المفكرين والمنظرين الذين يكونوا قدوة لايتعالوا ولايسكنوا الابراج العاليه كما فعل سابقيهم بل يكون مكانهم الشارع يختلطو بالتاس يعلموهم كيف تبنى العقول فبناء العقل هو بناء الوطن . سيدى الفاضل لسنا بهذا الغباء الذى تظن فنحن جميعا بل سأقول اغلبنا حتى لا اقع فى خطأ التعميم يعرف تمام ديموقراطية امريكا الزائفه وماتصدره للعالم وماتزيفه من الحقائق لتدلس به على مواطنيها . االسيد الموقر سأمت تمام من بعض مثقفى مصر الذين سكن الاحباط نفوسهم فملؤ هواء البلد بالياس انا بالطبع لااقصدك ولكنها محاوله للدفاع عن الذات المصريه المفترى عليها.
Another reply
We got this by email
عنوان الموضوع:ويبقى الوضع على ما هو ماهو علية
الموضوع:لااعلم اذماقداقولةيهمكم فعلا اولا! بعدماشاهدته على صفحاتكم
الرائعةفشعاركم(ضد العنف) واناماتعرضت فى حياتى لعنف مثلماوجدتةلديكم فمديركم
يتشدق ويتفاخربكراهيته للديموقراطية ويتهرب من اجتماع يتبادل مع مرؤسيه فيه
الرأى فكيف بالله عليكم لا اعلم سبب هذال الموقع ومرض صفحاتكم .وتقبلوامنى خالص
عزائى ووافر مواساتى
And here is my reply,
You can put your a comments on my blog as others have. And I will post this as an answer.
As to why i do not believe democracy is a good solution, you can also see that on past posts and on comments on my blog. If you read the comments you will realize that the meeting was done and that I had a good excuse for not coming. I do not believe in democracy for the following reasons.
If you give children democracy in choosing their food then each and every meal will be either chocolates, sweets or hamburgers and pizza. Foods that will not help children grow as they will never eat salads or vegetables.
As you know our Arabic people are not very educated especially in Egypt and thus giving them democracy will be like giving it to children. Even in the USA where there is democracy, they have chosen a president like Bush 2 times.
Thus democracy is really not a solution. Thinkers of the world need to come up with a better solution, As such I believe that the solution of plato gave us 2500 years ago( Aflatoon ) was better where democracy is applied to matters of money and scientists and philosophers make up the more important laws.
You have to realize that the USA is using democracy as an excuse to increase its power in the middle east.
As for violence, there is absolutely no relation between democracy and violence, USA is a democracy, Briatain is a democracy and both are sending troops to kill people in Iraq.
When you give democracy to people that believe in violence they will be violent.
I personally believe in the practice of non-violence as practiced by Ghandhi. If you take a democratic vote, you will not find many that support such views. Most people believe in an eye for an eye and thus democracy in most countries will never produce the kind of pure non-violence that Ghandi came up with.
As a summary.
1-Democracy has failed in producing peace, increasing human happiness or solving problems of pollution among many other failures. Democracy in itself is not a solution to the problems of the human race.
2-Even democracies create violence and wars, or non-violence has nothing to do with democracy.
Plus if you read the blog real well you will find that it is really about the rulers of the middle east and their bad ways of using power. Kings have ruled for centuries with out democracy and many of them did not do what presidents today are doing to their people.
Please note that the very fact that this is in the blog shows that our philosophy while being different is very clear, it is there for all to see and comment upon, if we did not value comments we would not have published this in our blog.
عرررربى
يا ريت لو وضحت افكارك بالعربى لانى مفهمتش حاجه منها عموما اشكرك على المشاركه بالمدونه
Democracy
Alsalam Alykom all members in mashy team ofcourse You all know me I'm the new comer to mashy team Yahia Khalil and I wish to be a good member in this team but as for my opinion concerning the meeting .meeting is a good idea to exchange ideas and offer our troubles also we will feel with the spirit of the team and reinforce relationships between members.
really since I came here I was admired by the system and the way Eng.Ehab treats his teams and I didn't feel that he is their manager so I have decided to do my best to participate in the success of mashy in shaa Allah and I want to thank our colleague Mina for this idea which if it is applied periodically it will no doubt benefit our company mashy . in my opinion the reason for any success is love so I call all my colleagues to consider themselves mashy owners so as to see our dearest mashy .com the largest and most beneficial site to the Egyptian Youth
اللغه العربيه
ارجوك اكتب باللغه العربيه لانى مفهمتش حاجه من المدونه ال كاتبها كمان مفيش لا اسهل ولا اجمل من اللغه العربيه
وأنا أيضا أعتقد
اعتقد ان المناقشة تحولت بنا عن الهدف الرئيسي ..
انا ايضا لا أومن بالديمقراطية كنظام قادر على إدارة شئون البشر، لكن الأمر مختلف هنا فنحن لسنا فريق كرة قدم يحاول أن يرغم المدير الفني على السير بخطة تكتيكية معينة .. لكننا ايضا لا نحفر قناة السويس ولا نبني هرما آخر.. نحن لا نناقش مسألة توريث السلطة ولا الوصول لمقعد الحاكم... الأمر أبسط من ذلك بكثير.. أن يكون لك رأي فيما تصنع وأن تشارك أفكارك مع الاخرين وان تجد من يستمع إليها ويهتم بتنفيذها حتى ولو كانت ضد رغباته الشخصية مادامت للصالح العام .. أنا لا أنكر سعة صدر المهندس إيهاب ولا قدرته على الاستماع للأفكار لكن الأمر يتجاوز مجرد بقاء الباب مفتوحا .. إذا كنا نود فعلا ان نطور ما نفعل وأن ننجح معا .. الأمر يختلف حقا بين أن تنفذ افكارك الخاصة او افكار انت مقتنع بها وبين ان تكون مجرد ترس في آلة تنفذ سياسات هابطة بالباراشوت دون ان يكون لك رأي في صياغتها .. ربما يكون الأمر شائكا لكن اعتقد انه – مهما كانت المخاطر – ينبغي لنا ان نجلس معا لندرس هل بما نقدمه اليوم نحن قادرون على الاستمرار على الساحة وسط المنافسة الشرسة ، ولأي مدى؟
وهل العوامل نفسها التي صاغت نجاح المشروع الأول قبل عدة سنوات هي ذاتها التي تضمن نجاح "ماشي" الأن؟
ربما لا يملك أي منا سنوات الخبرة التي يملكها المهندس إيهاب لكننا نملك خبرتنا المحدودة التي يمكن إذا تجمعت معا أن تشكل قوة دفع هائلة للمشروع ككل، بدلا من ان يستمر الحال كما هو عليه وان نبقى "جزرا معزولة" دون ان يعرف أي منا ما يفعل الاخرون ونكتفي بأداء ما هو موكل لنا في صمت.
This blog is still open
Please realize that the very fact that this blog and comments in it is still open is a proof that I am open to ideas. I could after all delete all what every one says.
:)
شر لابد منه
السيد الموقر ايهاب/ اضافه لماقد سبق منى واعلنته لكم من رأى على صفحة رأيك يهمنا ،هناك من يقول: الديموقراطيه تعد للشعوب الناميه نعمه وللأغنياء نقمه ولاصحاب رؤوس المال و السلطويين وباءءءءءءءءءءءءء!
سؤالي هو: من انت من هؤلاء المذكورين اعلاه؟
A lesson in life : Respect 101
Ok , I have a lot to say about this but am not sure if I will live long enough to say them all or not . I will try share with you some of it now with the hope that one day I will have the time to share more . This goes to Mashy users , Ehab ( Mashy Manager ) who has been a friend for so long , and to all of mashy team . First to mashy users : or those of you who do not know me , I am the marketing manager of Mashy.com. I guess by now you can truly appreciate how hard my team fights for your right . All that we want is to offer you what you are looking for and what will keep you satisfied. Afterall, what is mashy.com without mashy users ??? I will leave you with this thought to dwell on and ask yourselves. “ Are we getting what is worth of the money/time we invest ? am not asking this about Mashy.com , this is about all service providers who offer you a product or service? . If the answer is no , then we are to be blamed for that . All businesses know for a fact that customer satisfaction is the bottom line. But because they know that consumers are passive and few stand up for their rights , they just offer us anything . It is our right to complain, ban the use of the product /service , apply all kind of pressure till we get what is worth our investment . Countries develop only when the citizans are as strong as their rulers . So as in business, businesses develop when the customers are as powerful as they themselves are. Learn to say “NO” when you do not like it and next time service providers will not dare dissatisfy you . Try this at restaurants you go to, with banks you deal with, with cell phone companies. How many of us have been having problems lately with cell phone networks . Imagine if we all complain and stop using their service, stop paying the bills, would they fix their networks and be keen to offer us compensations till they do so. But what do we do in reality ,we sit and complain to each other . Think about this and act now , what do you want out of mashy.com ? what do you like /dislike ? What do you wish we offer you ? what are the extra services that you need ? We are all ears and I am sure that Ehab values your input vey much or he would not have shared his thoughts with you over the internet . He would have just put it on an intranet . But He truly and whole heartedly is willing to satisfy you , so take the opportunity now and just ask
To Ehab : I do not know how to reply to your blog and what to say, I feel there is a lot that I need to know before I can put all pieces of this puzzle together and make up my mind 1. Do you believe that Mashy would have been there without a team?
2. When you say no democracy, is it because you believe a ruler is competent to rule and his people are incompetent?
3. Should the manager of the company communicate the objectives to the team . Do they know what is the goal of the company other than making money of course I mean the mission , vision and objectives
4. Does a manager hire a team who necessarily share him the same vision or he hires executors
5. Are executors cheaper to hire?
6. Are we talking about a case where team members look at this as just a job because they need the Money ?
7. How far can the team give in and yield for the sake of “ keeping the Job “ ?
8. Is this whole argument ethical ?
9. Did God create people to treat each other in such a way ?
10. Can we generalize this debate to include all cases of business ?
11. Will the company survive long term ?
12. What is success in such a case ? Is it real or a just a myth in the mind of the ruler only ?
13. What if one day , the team would say enough is enough , and the ruler would think it is easy to replace executors simce none of them are thinkers anyway , is this good for the business ?
14. Does the ruler / Manager respect his team members ?
15. Do they respect him ?
16. Do you think all businesses and services reflect a smaller model of a country ?
I cannot make up my mind or choose to misunderstand you , before I know your answers to all these questions . GOOD NEWS : Guess what ? “The meetimg is tomorrow “ we did not reschedule , it was originally Tuesday
For mashy Team : I am sorry to tell you guys that you must have misunderstood Ehab. We would not have made it without a good team.
Did we make it ? J Make what ? I do not know , Let us ask Ehab .
I believe that a good team is all that it takes to create real success .
If the whole meeting idea did not work , Ehab set a good example and made room for us to share our thoughts with him on the blog in the open .
Respect
Oh by the way, respect, I do not think that respect has any thing to do with this.
1-I put this post as a joke.
2-A lesson in blogging.
3-A way to open our company to outsiders ( I did put this on the front page ).
4-An online alternative to democracy. ( he he he )
8-A joke.
Opinions.
I was never against taking opinions of people and incorporating them in any work I do including mashy.com.
Taking feedback, listening and keeping an open mind is different from democracy.
Democracy assumes that every one gets an equal vote. Tell me the name of ONE COMPANY THAT GIVES EMPLOYEES EQUAL VOTES.
There is none. Even in large companies where share holders vote, each shareholder gets as many votes as he has shares, so the equality goes to shares not share holders.
This is life.
I did not invent life.
As I said in an earlier blog, If you have a democracy of school children then all children would vote that the official food will be chocolates and potato chips and they will all die of malnutrition.
Lets take another example, you have two co-workers in your team that you manage, do you take equal votes on everything you do?
The fact is you do not.
Why?
Because you have more experience than they do.
OK so let me ask the team, does anyone have more experience than I, let them take a bigger vote than mine :)
Girgis, which is the other senior manager besides you and me, does he take equal votes in his team?
NO.
So why am I attacked for not taking equal votes ( the definition of democracy ). Well because I am honest about it and very verbal about it.
I hope that answers all your questions and gives you something to think about. Also as stated again, I have never closed my door to ideas and suggestions. I have incorporated many ideas of others in mashy, many of your ideas about making mashy more suitable for general family viewing, making it more decent have been incorporated.
So do you really think that I have not taken your ideas into mashy, is mashy not as much your creation as it is mine, and Girgis too and all the team.
Seniors get more in terms of how much I am willing to listen and change for them. Juniors get less.
For example Hareedy, has requested many things for the chat, the nature of which I would not like to discuss online, that I feel are not as important as other features I suggested. But I know he wants these features and I my self spent half of my past WEEKEND doing NOT WHAT I THINK SHOULD BE DONE IN THE CHAT BUT WHAT HE THINKS SHOULD BE DONE.
The main problem with democracy is that to the political system the vote of a multi-Phd holder genius gets the same voting rights as one that did not pass secondary school. That is why I think that democracy can not be a way for the human race to rule itself.
To sum up
Besides you miss the point, this blog post is not really about me or mashy.com. It is about you know who, doing you know what to people. And you know who is not alone, because other you know who's are doing much worse. They just do it with more professionalism, where the people they rule ( Americans ) think they live in a democracy when they really live in a country that is ruled by a few people that have too much money and power that they can not spend the money they have in 1000 life times.
China is not really democratic in the common use of the word. Look how this giant is waking up. China could rule the world.
Look, see and think. There is no perfect system of ruling people. Democracy is not perfect. And until our people in the Arab world learn the problems that come with democracy, democracy will be used as a weapon against them not for them.
I Think,
Well, patience has always done me good, I was going to reply to your first blog post Eng. Ehab, but, after the second and third, I have changed my reply. I think what has happened today, the forth and back blog posts between you and the appreciated Eng. Nancy are such a good example that I wished to see since I came into the firm.
I think that the main idea that started this whole thing has faded and turned into nothing, the whole matter has turned into a lesson about democracy and what we should call this awaited meeting, WITH ALL MY APPRECIATION FOR THE INFORMATION ENG. EHAB GAVE US AND ALL RESPECT TO HIS OPINION.
Call it democracy, vote, poll, opinion exchange, doesn’t make much difference to me, I think I would call it interaction within a work society, this kind of invisible streaming of everything between all parts of this society is one of the things that helped get me to what I am now and the lack of it is the thing that makes me feel like part-missing here in mashy.com.
In such a meeting that our colleague Mina proposed, I THINK, so many people in this workplace will get a long time missing feeling of comfort; they would be able to get burdens off their shoulders and start interacting instead of keep loading themselves with things that they don’t like, don’t feel like doing, don’t know why they should do, and the long lasting who, where, what, when, why series.
I don’t want my opinions to be all executed on time and as soon as I offer them, but, I would like them to be heard, I would like to get a sense of some practical respect for me being an employee, and me being a part of this work society.
The least that everyone would be getting out of such a meeting is more willingness to work and take part, this is in addition to the fact that it would let us share you some of that experience you have, broaden our horizons, teach us that brain-storming is a good thing and an appreciated effort instead of leaving us behind like a lot of people -- who are lacking the cultures of expression and the understanding of impressions – and making us feel that creativity, brain-storming, thinking, expressions, partaking, or anything other thing than heads nodding is an interference in the royal presidential regime and ruling's most sensitive matters of all time, which, for a taste of irony, if I was the one to say, would consider an unforgivable crime.
Thank you Mina for starting the whole thing, we all know that you always stir the tea causing the tsunami, Thank you Eng. Ehab & Eng. Nancy and I would like to thank myself for writing such a blog post which made me feel like I answered the call of duty.
NOTE: all what I wrote in this post is my own and nothing but my own words, I didn’t discuss, talk about or share what I wrote in this bog with anyone but myself, therefore I take all responsibility for writing this. I repeated the phrase "I Think" many times in this less than a page, would love to hear some pro and anti feedbacks.
Yours, Mohannad