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Australian Deported From Bahrain Over Facebook Posts

Posted by timothy on from the bah-humbug dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Australian English instructor Tony Mitchell recently moved to Bahrain where he was offered a job at the state-run Polytechnic University. He described himself as a witness of the various horrifying events in the struggling country (see The Atlantic's four-part series). Mitchell was eventually fired, evicted, and forced to flee because of posts he made on Facebook."

1 of 188 comments (clear)

  1. Re:When in Rome by Dhalka226 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    on the other hand, some would say he had balls for standing up to the oppressors.

    He does.

    he stands up for what he thinks is right, and you say "well, it's your own fault" when he gets deported?

    It is. They are not mutually exclusive.

    I support people standing up for whatever they believe in, and I certainly support this guy's cause. At the same time, I have no idea where this notion that one should be free from consequences if they are doing what they feel is right has come from. It is not a thing to be proud of, but it is a reality. Black people were arrested and beaten constantly standing up for their rights in the civil rights area. I'm sure none of them wanted to be, and but I also don't remember them going on about how they were in disbelief that they were arrested for breaking the law. They expected it. That was their way of standing up and drawing attention to how bad things were.

    So yes, he is welcome to stand up to oppressors, but he has to also be willing to accept the consequences of doing so. That's pretty much the crux of the whole "taking a stand" thing; if you're only doing it with the expectation there will never be consequences, you're not exactly going out on a limb are you? Frankly he should be quite happy with the results. Things aren't too bad for him and he has made the news nationally and internationally. That's damn close to a best case scenario for people hoping to effect change.