jordan pulse -

By Prof. Dr. Ali Hayasat
Every few days, a new whirlwind is unleashed in the country's space, dominating screens, social media platforms, and public gatherings, as if it were the fateful issue that will determine the nation's future. We disagree, argue, and exchange accusations, and then everything suddenly vanishes with the arrival of the next wave of noise.
While we are preoccupied with these seasonal battles, more urgent questions recede into the background: poverty, unemployment, the high cost of living, the decline in public trust, and rapid societal transformations. It is as if we have come to prefer chasing loud headlines over confronting difficult questions.
(1) Al-Anani's Statements
The statement made by Dr. Jawad Al-Anani sparked a storm of comments and analyses. Perhaps he was not successful in some of his expressions, but the paradox is that a statement with no direct practical impact succeeded in occupying the public space for several days.
Once again, we are more preoccupied with words than with the reality that produced them. What is more dangerous is that some officials have realized that the lifespan of public anger is short, and that any whirlwind, no matter how severe, will not live for more than a noisy week before being swallowed by another whirlwind. Unfortunately, reality proves this bet right every time—we get angry quickly, we get preoccupied quickly, and then we forget even faster.
(2) The Petra Concert... A Night That Passed
What happened around the Petra concert during the Eid was another example of the "night that passed" culture. There was widespread media and social noise, but without a clear agreement even on the nature of the problem itself. Was the objection to the form or the substance? Have the major issues of society become so settled that we have nothing left to divide us except an artistic concert?
Far from invoking old polemics like "Slowly, slowly, O Fahd" if you remember, the reality remains much simpler than that. There are officials who strive; they succeed sometimes and make mistakes at other times, but what is certain is that the volume of noise that accompanied the concert was much larger than the event itself. After a few days, everyone will move on, as usual, to a new issue, leaving behind all that anger as if it never existed.
(3) How Many Times Do We Need to Break the Jar?
For years, I have stopped following the stock market of government formations—who came and who left, and who carries the strongest CV or the widest relationships. However, what always draws attention is the insistence of some elites to deal with ministers as if they are isolated islands; you see them attacking this minister and glorifying his chief, as if they have never read that the Council of Ministers is a collective responsibility, in both success and failure. Every time the jar is broken over the head of a person, a ministry, or an official, we behave as if the problem has been solved, only to discover after a while that we have returned to the exact same point. Individuals change, while the real questions remain hanging without answers.
(4) Beyond the Noise
We have become more adept at producing noise than at confronting the problems that it. We chase a statement, judge a passing event, and disagree over individuals, while real challenges accumulate in silence.
Perhaps for this reason, officials do not fear the storm as long as it is temporary, nor the anger as long as it is quickly forgotten.
As for the questions that deserve to take center stage, they are still waiting: How do we face an economy that places increasing pressure on people? How do we deal with a society that is changing faster than the capacity of its institutions to keep pace with this change? And what future do we want for our children if the public sphere turns into a permanent race between noise we have not yet understood and new noise that has already begun?
In the age of noise, the problem is no longer just the abundance of voices, but rather that the real and most important voice is often the least present—and perhaps that is exactly what is intended.