Suu Kyi and that Batman Movie Line
Before 2010, Aung San Suu Kyi was the darling of the West, “a beacon of hope, an icon of democracy peacefully fighting the Tatmadaw (Myanmar’s armed forces) and its junta”, writes Michal Lubina. But then came the violent expulsion of the Rohingyas, where Suu Kyi sided with the army, and she became the “Nobel Peace Prize winner who had betrayed her fundamental values”. Was Suu Kyi then the personification of this line from the Batman movie: “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” Or did the West mis-assess her? Ben Rhodes had written that she was “the idealist, the activist, the politician, the cold pragmatist”. Lubina agrees and points out how complex things have always been. The army was too well-entrenched when she started her political struggle. She understood she could never win with violence, so she switched to “non-violence as a calculated, political choice”: “She made a virtue out of necessity.” After ...