Recently, the granting of the second prize of the Canary Islands Youth Award 2022, awarded by the Department of Equality, Diversity and Youth of the Government of the Canary Islands to Redwan Baddouh Bejja from Lanzarote, has been made public. It is a well-deserved recognition, which many people who know and work with Redu are delighted about.
Redu's potential is evident as soon as you sit down with him to exchange opinions. Despite his young age, he recently turned 18, the experiences of a child who at the age of 14 had to face the unfair eviction of his family from their family home in Argana and who since then lives with his gaze focused on the social reality of the island have gradually shaped a conscious adult, responsible to the community, lucid and with a mature emotional intelligence.
In a world where human stupidity is spreading like a pandemic and where the infantilization of society is a basic objective of the power networks, sharing work spaces, cooperation or friendship with people like Redu is a shot of hope.
The island's volunteer networks are the hidden strength of this society. The true foundations of the future. Decent people, who strive every day to maintain the coherence of their ideas with their work activity and their personal life. Transparent, clear, intellectually alive people who do not evade the difficulty of reality, on the contrary, they face it. Committed to their ideals, respectful of the divergent, enriching. People who walk on the edge of the system, zigzagging institutional violence. Citizens.
Volunteer work is not done to obtain votes or recognition, it lacks the spirit of compensation or revenge. Those who work every day in direct contact with the real problems of society do not usually make the press headlines, few people know them. They do not take smiling photos with the mother they offer rest to, they protect the child they help to study from the spotlight, they welcome the migrant, they accompany in death, they give comfort to the prisoner. They do not deceive, they do not deceive themselves, they do not use their power to obtain partisan gain.
The networks of true insular power are nourished by civic awareness. They practice compassion, promote affection, value sensitivity. They build a supportive and fraternal society. Alien to political conspiracy and business marketing, they do what they can with the tools they have. Without asking anything from anyone, without expecting anything from anyone. They know that discouragement is a luxury they cannot afford. The effort of cooperation, of caring for the human being is not listed on the stock exchange, it has no price in the market, it is not part of the GDP, but it is the true value of this society.
In times of collapse, the gaze should not be placed on those who adorn reality with electoral messages or on those who continue to bet on a capitalist system that devours the planet. The future is in those who refuse to participate in this corrupt system and face collective difficulties by creating community. The survival of our society is not in those who wield power as a tool for personal enrichment but in those who are committed to continuing to deepen the dignity of every human being.
We will not all emerge from this civilizational crisis in the same way, the difference between the Mad Max-type exit and the humanitarian exit is not in the economic system that has led us to this collapse, nor in the power networks that feed social inequality as a means of survival for a few. It is not recycling, it is social awareness, it is not energy saving, it is community, it is not the protection of a species, it is respect for life. It is not time to hide, because we are gambling with the survival of humanity. We do not have to save the planet, the planet will survive us, we have to save the individual.
Dear Redu, dear Laetitia, Irene, Julene, Maria, Julie, Ana, Loueila, Natalia, Elisa, Tharais, Miriam, Carmen, Liliana, Teresa, Lourdes, Itxiar, Ruth, Monica...dear warriors, you are the example.
