Following the comment thread on my last post it quickly became apparent that folks were going to fixate on the wrong labels and thereby detract from the more important discussion that needs to take place. “They weren’t South Asian, they were Pakistani.” “They weren’t Pakistani, they were Kashmiris.” “There is no such thing as South Asian.”
Allow me to propose that we put semantics aside to focus on the one label that really matters. There is one label that we can hopefully all agree on: They were Second-generation. Born and raised in a western country with all the freedoms and opportunities they could want. In this instance the pejorative “confused” really does apply.
When I was a child my mother told me a story that her mother had told her. I can only re-tell the story as it was told to me:
“Once when mami was young she was at a train station. There was a strange man there who simply looked at her and hypnotized her. The man was a Fakir. She followed him unable to control herself as he led her away. Fakir’s have magical powers. Really Abhi (I was shaking my head in disbelief). They are Muslim and they kidnap and convert you to Islam. Luckily the family got her back before she walked too far off. She didn’t remember anything that happened afterward and said she couldn’t control herself. A Fakir can just look at you and you’ll forget everything, your whole life.
Now bear in mind that my family is from Gujarat, where bigotry has persisted for generations. My mom is not a bigot but she believed (and still does) that a Fakir has mystical powers that can brainwash a normal person and get them to walk away from their life and convert to Islam (even though not all Fakirs are Muslim and the Sufi order is the least fundamental). I actually asked her to tell me this story again when I went home just last month.
Most of us know at least one person that is a “born-again” into some religion. Various things motivate these people. Many of them (like at least one of these bombers) were described as being out-of-control before their conversion (or re-discovery of their family religion). Others feel overwhelmed by the influence of the world they live in and retreat back to a basic set of instructions that they think will bring order to the chaos they feel. Some take this “order” too far by trying to impose their interpretation of that order on others. Most born-agains however are perfectly sane and choose to practice their new beliefs in private without a harmful thought toward anyone. How do we recognize in our second generation peers which path they have chosen to walk?
Back in 1997 there was a movie called My Son the Fanatic that I wanted to see but never got around to. It was based upon a book by Hanif Kureishi. Here is a synopsis by a reader on Amazon.com:
My Son the fanatic is a short story of an immigrant from Pakistan. The underlying theme of this novel is the struggle of the asian immigrants face in an alien society which refuses to accept them, treat them as equals and the ways in which they deal with the alienation. There is a sharp contrast in the way Pervez and his son Farid deal with the sense of belonging and being a part of society. With all the compromises and loses Pervez suffers in his migration; he appears to take them as a part of his experience and adventure of life; to him it seems to be worth the price. He mentions how better his life has been in comparison to having stayed back. He refuses to acknowledge the cold behavior of the local British.
His son Farid on the other hand seems to have considerable anger and is not disillusioned by the British cold behavior. He finds the society constraining, limiting and degrading and feels to be a victim in his country. Having been excluded he is tempted to exclude others. He finds comfort with his own people and gets attached towards Islam. Having been brought up in secular Britan, he would turn the to a form of belief that denies him the pleasure of society in which he lived. Having devoted his life to pleasure: the pleasure of sex, music, alcohol and friends; he detracts and spends time in abstinence; for in abstinence he felt strong.
Did anyone else just get chills? Almost all crimes like the one in London are committed because of the motivation of false empowerment. For every weak-willed young man there awaits a “Fakir” and a “Madrassa” of some type in the world.
The Daily Mail has started to put together profiles of the young bombers:
<
p>
<
p> “The Family Man“
Questions to sepia mutineers and other second gen folks:
i) Is this sense of alienation found in the US/Canada – or just in UK/Europe?
ii) Is this limited to Muslims (whether Pakistanis or Indians or Bangladeshis)?
Take a look at the picture of the murderer above. They found his decapitated head on the street next to the bus bomb. That was all that was left of him.
Alienation is one thing. This has a special ingredient. A virulent strain of fascism that exists within modern Islamic thought.
Please do not go down the moral relativism and Christians-and-Hindus-and-Jews-do-bad-things-too. That is a separate debate.
There is a real frenzy of indoctrinated hatred amongst some Pakistanis in Britain. It seeks to displace guilt for this fascism onto factors such as society’s failure to integrate them, blaming others, failing to mention that most Muslims dont become suicide bombers.
Please, spare us the hippy ‘why-cant-we-all-just live-together’ shtick. This is a problem of a cancer within British Islam. Dont beat yourselves up about it. This is not a ‘Desi’ thing. It is a Pakistani Muslim thing. It is something they have to face up to and repudiate, with the help of the state. They have to repudiate the hatred for Jews, the hysterical rhetoric of the ‘corruption’ of the West, the indoctrinated hatred of Indians because of the ‘occupation’ of Kashmir, the dividing of the world into Muslim and Kaffir and painting everything as part of a struggle between Islam and the infidel Universe.
This needs to stop. Now. This fascism has to be cut out. Now.
This has been coming since 1989 when the fatwa against Rushdie was instituted after British Muslim leaders lobbied the Ayatollah and brought it to his attention and rioted and burnt his book. Since then, Islamic fundmentalism has been tolerated and sometimes even tacitly encouraged amongst British Pakistanis. Hatred for Jews, Hatred for Hindus, Hatred for Sikhs, Hatred for America and Britain. It has to stop.
Dont have a nervous breakdown and say we are all the same. It loses focus. The focus must be on curing the fascistic hatred and intolerance that has become currency amongst some British Pakistanis.
This is the need of the hour.
Dont obfuscate. Tell the truth about what needs to be done.
My Son the Fanatic is a terrific movie. I figured it would not be on every store shelf, so I bought myself a copy when it came out on video. Om Puri gives his best performance in a Western movie as the scotch drinking, jazz-loving cabdriver Parvez.
Parvez is a quiet man, but when he is confronted by his friend Fizzy about his affair with an English prostitute, he explodes in the movie’s most memorable line scene, “What else is there for me, but sitting behind that wheel without tenderness?! Is that it for me, is it? Till I drop dead?! Not another human touch?! You are too certain of what other people should do.”
Kuerishi flipped the generation gap. Here, it is the immigrant who assimilated, and the son who refuses to do so. Perhaps it should be required reading in English classrooms.
Okay, In this post I will be executing my censorship right and deleting all rants. Stay on topic or go to a message board and vomit there to your heart’s content.
“Prem Kahlon”: Nice rant, but my question was in all seriousness – not to explore any political point but simply as a 1st gen immigrant worried about his 2nd gen toddlers.
Prem Kahlon:
Makes some good points along the vien of Irshad Manji. But I don’t think that I’d go this far in trying to distance this from the larger desi. After all some of the tension originates within the context of the country (Kashmir), culture (Hindu-Muslim),
Model Minority:
I used to chat to my Muslim grocer when I lived in the UK – I got the feeling that at least among the people in his immediate community, the persecution complex starts with the global picture (Palestine, Kashmir) and filters down to the local. So this is a big picture that they’re connecting the dots with here – ideological.
Speaking for the situation in Canada, there certainly are small communities here that are looking for this kind of “false empowerment” (good description abhi). Hard to say whether or not there is as much a feeling of “alienation” as there apparantly is in the UK – how do you measure that anyway! I know that it’s there – after all Canadian and American citizens have both been detained for suspected activities.
Re: other communities – the bombing of the Air India flight from Canada in 1985 is an interesting comparison because it was a devastating terrorist strike, but the fomenting anti-India sentiment of the time has largely dissapeared today as the situation in Punjab has ameliorated. So again – I think the key is the big picture. Palestine, Kashmir etc are still very much unresolved.
ModelMinorirty asked: i) Is this sense of alienation found in the US/Canada – or just in UK/Europe? ii) Is this limited to Muslims (whether Pakistanis or Indians or Bangladeshis)?
The migration pattern is very different in the US as compared to W. Europe. I remember reading books and papers that actually had titles like “immigrant Success” in the US, but just the opposite in the UK (The immigrant failure). Check out all the desi’s cleaning the airport at Heathrow and you will see what I mean. The restrictions on immigration to the US meant that many of our parents are the doctors and engineers – the stereotype we laugh about. Not so in England.
I remember junior year abroad. My second day in London I went to the book store and as I was leaving some kids across the street were screaminmg someting. It took me a while to figure out: a) they were yelling at me and 2) they were yelling “go home Paki”. That never happended to me in Boston, Washington DC, NYC or Houston, where I have also lived, but it sure happened a lot to me in London that year. I think the alienation is partly to blame for what happended, but the other problem is the ethnic ghettos. Maybe they go hand in hand, not sure. However, with migration changing in the US and the number of service (i.e. restaurant, domestic help and farm workers etc) from South Asia increasing I think it is time we confront these issues.
Interesting experiences Ek Aurat
How does this explain the “alienation or ghettoization” being confined to Pakistani muslims. Indian muslims, Hindus or Sikhs don’t seem to have this problem. Based on what I read, by the second generation Indian muslims, hindus and sikhs seemed to be on par with whites (or very close). Isn’t Lakshmi Mittal the Richest Briton ? (at least according the article).
Ek Aurat, Good interpretation. Slate’s daily news round-up seems to corroborate what you say by examining what the newspapers are saying:
I agree that the economic status of desis in the U.S. coupled with more tolerant racial attitudes here are presently buffering the sort of thing brewing in Leeds. I think that Canada might be slightly more suceptible. Desi gang violence seems to be out of control there at least.
Two weekends ago I was standing in line at a bar in Atlanta. Behind me were three British Indian girls making all kinds of racially provocative statements just loud enough so that the white people in line could hear. I just couldn’t believe it. If that is the norm in UK culture then I can see how tensions spiral out of control.
The disease is spreading through Europe:
A “minority” ? I think not. Is the world going to tolerate weekly bombings in their cities due to this menace ? I suppose Europe’s passivity is matched only by their stupidity in allowing their lax immigration policies to open doors for the scum of the earth.
Yeah, My Son the Fanatic was the first thing that came to mind when SM first posted about the identities of the bombers. Everyone should definitely watch it.
Hi,
About a year ago, I wrote post “The Terror Bee Equation”. It is quite related to discussion above. Do read it at:
http://www.kushtandon.squarespace.com/journal/2005/3/27/the-terror-bee-equation.html
Kush
The French vs the British approach to Islamic radicalism. From today’s financial times (req. subscription). The UK foment of IslamÂ’s radical fringe
Hmm… you might be on to something there – I think we take cultural inclusivity a bit for granted in N. America. Similar thing happened to me in the UK – waiting in line once and this moron standing next to me starts talking to me in the Apu-accent while his girfriend starts snickering. And this was at a University!!!
Ironic that multiculturalism became a political buzzword in the UK before it did in Canada or the US. So do you see this first as a problem of cultural access?
Also you’re bringing the issue of class into the discussion – professionals vs. blue collar workers. But I don’t draw that distinction too sharply – after all “Fakirs” can (and have) brainwash engineers just as easily as they can cleaners.
“scum”, “disease”, “fascism”, “virulent strain of fascism”, “this menace”, “A ‘minority’ I think not.”
These are words that dehumanize and, in the truest sense of the world, obfuscate. My best interpretation is that there are a bunch of real bastards with power and money and some insanity and a lack of disregard for people’s lives (i.e. the zawahiris and bin ladens of the world ) and then there are these foot soldiers who are somewhat f@#ked up but led astray by false prophets, so to speak. I don’t know if I’m right, since i have so little information to go on, but I feel comfortable saying that what I’m offering is at least the starting point for a discussion about how to address this problem, whereas what you two are offering is just anger (which is fair…just don’t couch it in terms of policy or politics).
Whether or not you two think you should dehumanize people that are willing to kill you (as these people were, although they may not have thought about it as such) with imprecise language and metaphors, it’s probably not in your best interests. If you don’t understand what these people are about and why they do what they do, then what’s the point of talking about this at all, and how is the reaction to all this going to be productive and avoid excesses? It’s, in part, this kind of thinking that allowed the US government to play us into getting involved in the Iraq War (which just continued this cycle while doing little, if anything, to address the real problem).
So far, I’ve heard a call for more restrictive immigration policies in Europe (which is already a fairly xenophbic place, from what I hear). I am waiting to hear what else “needs to be done.”
Prem, I find your attack on “modern Islamic thought” and “cancer” in Islam troubling. I find it curious that you take a position that even Tony Blair has outright rejected. Today Blair did not pin this on Islam, but rather extremism, a violent expression of “an extreme and evil ideology whose roots lie in a perverted and poisonous misinterpretation of the religion of Islam.”
But what I don’t understand is why you cannot accept that the alienation that leads to violence is a common element in almost every conflict on the planet? Would you argue that with regard to the IRA bombings, that there is a “real frenzy of indoctrinated hatred amongst some [Irish] in Britain.” I think it’s unfair to attaching something fixed and inherent to Islam that is common to all people-the violent and angry reaction to perceived or real political and social isolation.
Abhi,
While I am normally a huge fan of your blog, I am shocked to see you making blanket statements like bigtory has persisted for generations in Gujarat. You’ve gotta be kidding me!! Either that or you are completely and utterly ignorant about Gujarati history. Not to put too fine a point on it, but I am forced to remind you of a certain gentleman with the last name Gandhi and the effect he’s had on many generations of Gujaratis. My family has strong roots in Gujarat and it’s incredible to see the effect Gandhism continues to have in that society – in fact, there are schools in Ahmedabad run by staunch Gandhians today that still inisist on students wearing unifroms made from hand-woven cotton. Even prior to Gandhi, Gujarat was the land of religious reform in Hinduism. The founder of one of the most liberal Hindu reform movement of the 19th century that wroked so hard to eradicate social evils of untouchability and religious intolerance, the Arya Samaj, was a Gujarati born in the Saurashtra region. You need a lesson in learning about your own heritage.
It’s curious that Prem Kahlon’s message was considered a “rant”. Are we so PC that any that we aren’t willing to entertain opinions that sound un-PC? Sad.
[Comment Deleted by Abhi–off topic]
All this stuff about young boys radicalizing made me remember my little bro when he was a teen and became a straightedge vegan punk. (he’s since outgrown all but the punk band he’s in, and matured into a healthy pinko) 😉 Similar ideas about purity and disgust with mainstream civilization, yet obviously most of those kids just take out their rage by moshing and chaining themselves to fur store entrances. Heck, think about the rise of evangelical Christianity among American teens and the whole WWJD? trend. If most teens go through some sort of rebellion and/or issues with self-control (anorexia, abstinence, etc) simply because they’re emotionally and hormonally wired to do so, how can society safely steer young Muslims away from the violent extremes? It would be interesting to hear from high school teachers, I think. One article yesterday pointed out that 25% of British Muslim men between 16-24 are unemployed, something like 4-5x higher than the average. Give these guys a productive hobby already.
Abhi,
Btw, East is East is a good adjoint to My Son. It offers a perspective from the (confused/fanatical) first gen side.
This site offers some pointers that may be constructive in this debate. It seems to have been written during the time My Son, the Fanatic was released. If anything, I would hazard a guess that matters have gotten worse. Re second generation attitudes, the Farrukh Dhondy article I had linked in the other comment is a good analysis.
Literacy & Income levels of second gen immigrants also offer a clue. There is considerable disparity between UK Indians and Pakistanis. See this (PDF), and this (PDF). Pay particular attention to the stats on women. Quote from the latter: So the FRS data suggest that there are some systematic geographical influences on minority incomes. These are strongest for Indians and Chinese, and weakest for Africans, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. On the other hand, these area effects do not explain much of the very wide variations in income levels within ethnic groups (third row of Table 2.10). Nor much of the differences between ethnic groups: in every type of area, whites, Chinese and Indians had the highest levels of income; in every area, Africans, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis had the lowest. Thus income seems to be determined more by who you are, and where you came from, than by where you live now.
CT, The answer to your question is yes. It has nothing to do with being PC. I don’t want my site degenerating into garbage. Thoughtful discussions require a moderator.
Gujjubhia, I stand firmly behind my original assertion. Feel free to email me offline on this point, themadblogger at gmail dot com.
Not to be an idiot, I never really understood the first/second generation thing. The American Heritage Dictionary defines First Generation, like this “1. Of or relating to a person who has left one country and settled in another. 2. Of or relating to a person or persons whose parents are immigrants.”
Definition one and two contradict each other!
Now back to the topic.
I’ve haven’t seen or read My Son the Fanatic but I recall reading this a long time ago and it is linkable so here it is Jonathan Raban writing in the New Yorker
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/020204fa_FACT
“Like many homesick people, living outside their language in an abrasive foreign culture, Qutb aggrandized his loneliness into heroic solitude.”
“It also confers a heroic glamour on the everyday alienation felt by the immigrant—especially the male immigrant—who struggles to keep his head up in a foreign culture”
When the Sepia Mutiny page opened, I was shocked at reading the title of the post and staring into the eyes of a young man that resembles my brother to the small bumb of his hooked nose. The resemblance is uncanny and saddening. Radical Islam brought home because I am completely and utterly sadenned for the family he left behind and for the futures he quashed with one decision. These men are someone’s loved ones, they are someone’s sons but most of all, they are our neighbors and their decisions are killing us and changing the view of the world for all South Asians.
As a Sikh who has lived in Britain, I can profess the type of hatred I have encountered suddenly while walking down the street, while buying vegetables and when I was younger, at the playground. I was called Paki, my cousins were made fun of for wearing the top knot and I remember being asked if my father was a “camel jockey” at the tender age of 6. The members of my family (the patriarchs and matriarchs of our current generation) are very succesful business people. Their main income was from the cornershops that many minorities are known for, raking in millions every year. Upwardly mobile, I remember attending school at a prestigious school in London but being heckled on my way home from school by skinheads. These people had no concern that I was a child or that my tender years would prevent me from answering their crude and often times violent language. The worst incident that stands out in my mind was my bedroom window being broken by a brick. The only reason I was saved from any injury was the double plated glass that had been installed earlier that week. We traded fresh air for safety. These are terrible memories but they are my memories of the street, not my neighborhood. Those people were transients in my neighborhood. They were not my classmates, not my peers. They were simply the skinheads that were so economically depressed that they panhandled near trafalgar square when they werent on our street bothering people passing. I do remember being treated differently by “normal” people, but that comes with the territory of being the product of a culture that is proud to be different. I am Indian but I also had an inside view of the Pakistani community. Even now, my friends admit that their parents pay to have Al Jazeera beamed into their house via sattelite. We avoid speaking of Kashmir or Palestine. Our parents simply wave at one another and rarely converse (not true of the US where my parents have many Pakistani friends). Still, I hear the rumblings of their displeasure and sometimes I am privy to the conversations over tea in the living rooms while watching the Indian/Pakistani news. Even the names of the Imams known for spreading a fundamentalist/fanatical idealogy hedge up in the conversation. The unrest that is transformed into hatred all starts with the news of Islam being supressed, treated unfairly and from the fealing that Islamic peoples across the globe are under attack. Islam is seemingly under attack from the US to the Middle East and inwards to India (even China supresses Islam and holds innocent leaders in jail). The results of supression, the fruit of the seeds of unrest, bloom in blood in the mosques where men like Tanveer are changed, fundamentally and internally, into soldiers of a spiritual war by the ideology preached by the leaders of their faith. The belief that war is the only way to call to attention and change the fate of Islam around the globe becomes the only solution to a growing problem. Sikhs and Hindus are also alienated and treated differently but most do not feel that their religion is under attack across the globe. Lakshmi Mittal is only one part of changing, hybrid face of South Asia in Britain. The fundamentalist problem may not be a “Desi thing” but there is something of the South Asian status in the problem of fundamentalist Islam. South Asians are treated differently by British society but Pakistani muslims do not count themselves in the same group as Indians. Perhaps these young men had something to prove? I have heard many times that Bangladeshi and Pakistani muslims are somehow lesser than Arab muslims many times. Is this a status problem? Pakistanis are not accepted (always) as true muslims but they are not ready to counted in the same group as Indians. Where do they fit? Fundamentalist Islam was perhaps the solution to that void for these men.
It’s hard for me to believe that the “global picture” is where the sense of persecution comes from (if in fact, that’s what’s going on). I’d imagine there’s an emotional substrate of a person’s life experiences that makes them prone to adopting the kind of intellectual analysis you’re talking about. You can take the same set of facts and spin it 100 different ways, depending on what you’re prone to do.
Sorry about the second post but — here is a more relevant quote from Raban’s article.
“He was a normal person. . . . He drank alcohol, he had girlfriends.” “His personality and his life bore no relation to the kind of things that happened.” “We are in shock. . . . We thought he liked the U.S.A.” In Europe and the United States, each of these ordinary, insecure, unprepossessing men learned to think of himself as someone who might yet have a spectacular career, as a martyr. This peculiar strain of religious belief, with its equal measures of rage and passion for death, was hatched in Egypt more than fifty years ago, and seems to have found an ideal growing climate in exile, in the most secular-looking landscape yet devised: the low-rent, rootless, multilingual suburbs.”
Abhi,
The nihilism in the second-generation bombers of Leeds is perhaps matched by the nihilism of the shooters in school in Columbine, Colorado, or that of the perpetrators of several such incidents.
In the case of the bombers of Leeds, the existence of a jihad, the ability of the bombers to use the expertise of the jihad to make the bombs made them much more deadly. But perhaps the human impulse is the same – a growing alienation from the people around oneself and the lapse into inhumanity.
It is only a perhaps,we can never interview a suicide bomber, only failed suicide bombers – and who knows there may be some crucial difference between the guys who couldn’t do it versus the guys who could.
It is a primarily a failure of the perpetrator’s moral judgment, but it is also a failure of the society around them to seem human and welcoming to them.
-Arun
Gujjubhia,I stand firmly behind my original assertion. Feel free to email me offline on this point, themadblogger at gmail dot com.
Sorry, I am not going to waste my time arguing against “truth by repeated assertion”. After all, you’ve expressed your views condemning the entire Gujarati scoiety in a public post. I’ve given you evidence to refute your claims. It is only fair that you defend your position in a public forum. If you don’t have the intellectual integrity to defend your viewpoint – and a very bigoted and offensive one at that, if I may say so – then I don’t see how we can go anywhere even with an offline dialogue. And don’t throw tired cliches of 2002 pogroms at me. Yes, that proably wasn’t the proudest moment in Gujarati history. However, to be brutally clinical about it, less than one thousand people killed in a riot with almost 1/3rd of them being Hindus does not make a genocide, not even by a long shot. Gujarat in 2002 pales into insignificance compared to the brutality perpetrated on Hindus in Bengal and Kashmir. http://www.rediff.com/news/2004/jul/28arvind.htm
So, if you have any arguments other than the 2002 riots, let’s hear it out in the open. Perhaps I can learn something from you too, and discover if I am a product of generations of bigotry myself.
He has such a paavam face. I agree with sunderban, he could have belonged to any of our crowds or families. They can only get young impressionable fools to blow themselves up, bastards like Bin Laden know how to save their own skins.
And the article in the previous thread is almost unbearably sad. “Her mother Romena is riddled with guilt because she insisted her daughter should go to work. . .” 🙁 But she needs to know that she was doing the right thing, and so was her daughter. Nobody could have known.
sundarban
great comment.
I think there is no straight upfront answer. There are too many issues involved. The whole birth of Pakistan based on religious ideals is in hindsight a very shallow ideal to base the birth of a nation on. I am sure Pakistanis today would have more of a identity had they been a part of a larger India as was known in the first half of the 20th century.
Probably its not too late for it to become one !
There is less racism towards desis in America than in the UK due to the ‘model minority’ image, less history/bagage with desis in US and also due to the fact that there are more blacks, hispanics, and east asians here, so the racists in America can ‘spread out’ their hate. Or as my father was told in the late 60s, “if you’re white, you’re all right, if you’re black, stand back, if you’re brown, stick aroun'” … HOwever, 9/11 changed that sentiment, especially when you’re ‘flying while brown’.
Although I’m American, I spent most of my summers in UK. The way I see it desis are the “Blacks” of the UK and up until recently were labeled black by many in UK (including desis themselves). “Blackie” is still used as a slur against desis there. Pakistani muslims seem to be at the bottom of the desi heap there. No one likes the Pakistani mulsims not even the Indian Muslims. Even the Afghani Muslims are better thought of by Arab muslims there than the Pakistani ones.
I am Indian but I also had an inside view of the Pakistani community. Even now, my friends admit that their parents pay to have Al Jazeera beamed into their house via sattelite. We avoid speaking of Kashmir or Palestine
Thats strange considering the fact that Al Jazeera is an Arabic channel and most Pakistanis dont speak or understand Arabic.
Thanks for sharing your experiences sundarban. Your analysis of Pakistani youth appears to mirror the national tragedy of Pakistan. Neither Arabic nor Western. Betrayed by the country leaders. Engaging in copycat violence in an effort to prove their allegiance to the Arabs. Fate of the lowest of the conquered. Sad indeed.
Yes what is this substrate? Why can Bin Laden say “Palestinians are being destroyed by UK forces” and provoke a terrorist response in Pakistani Muslims but not in Indian Muslims? Both parties seem to have the same distance from the actual problem. Both the youths I suppose go through the same taunting and racist UK behavior, both are from the same religion, why does one become a terrorist the other doesn’t? Could it be that Pakistani muslims (not Indian muslims) who used rule the Indian subcontinent prior to the British have gradually seen their power vanish over the last few centuries. Under the British the Indians slowly started prospering and growing in power by assimilating British liberal values. In turn, you have this anguish of Pakistani muslims — a sense of loss, a collapse of their world something they can’t acknowledge. Neither can they turn “Indian” with liberal values, adopting the ways of the “uncivilized” people they once “ruled”. Especially critical in a society given to ‘honor’. The only way out is to turn against that liberal view in the a very brutal manner, become more muslim more insular. Indian muslims were poorer and lower class muslims they don’t have that ‘history’ to live up to. There isn’t that sense of loss and collapse.
Gujjubhia, FYI. I don’t care either way about Gujarat’s communal character and I won’t respond to this further, but for those interested in history (scroll to …
History of Communal Riots in Gujarat
At some point one has to turn take off the lab coat and turn off the measuring instruments and put on the pest control gear. What have people really gained from studying the philosophies of Neo-Nazis ? Of the Mafia ? Of groups like NAMBLA ? To each such group, their philosophies and goals make precise sense and seem reasonable. But would those words make any rational human society any closer to understanding them ? No matter how well written those words are. “Mein Kampf” did not help anyone in formulating anyway to counter the Nazis peacefully.
Your question about what needs to be done is not one that can be answered without crossing what I think you would consider the boundaries of PCness: the closure of all foreign(Arab) funded mosques, close monitoring of what is taught in Islamic schools, the filing of lawsuits against mosques that invite hate speech spouting imams (If the Catholic church can be sued for the actions of their priests, why cannot mosques ?). I suppose that is a start. Anyone else ?
Kashmir ??? Its amazing. Its the Hindu minority that is being persecuted in Kashmir. Hundred of thousands of Hindus refugee in their own country. Sikhs brutally murdered in Jammu.
WTF… Its the muslims who are the opressors in Kashmir, but they conveniently take on the ‘victim’ role as it fits in their “under seige” mentality.
They always have Palestine and Kashmir in the same sentence as if both are equal situation. They are NOT. In palestine the Jews are the majority and Muslims the minority and Muslims were driven out.
The Palestine comparison would mean that Hindus should be doing suicide bombings in Kashmir.
The American Muslims have done a much better job of assimilating with the mainstream when compared to the Pakistanis in UK, Algerians in France, Turks in Germany and Moroccons in Holland and Spain. Why do the Muslims in the US have a lower profile (apart from 9-11, which too was perpetrated by foreigners and not American Muslims) than they have in Europe. Why have the Muslims in the US been able to assimilate better or atleast avoid most of the problems that plague the Muslim communities in Europe. The Muslims in the US have been surprisingly tolerant of some very nasty comments from people on the right, from Franklin Graham to Michael Savage. Where are the realistic death threats like the ones given to Rushdie in UK and Hirshi Ali in Holland and murder of Van Gogh? The Muslims in the US have their problems with terrorism but the problems they have in the US are qualitatively different from the problems the Muslims face in Europe. Is it because there are more Muslims in Europe ? The total Muslim population in Europe is around 3%. The US population in US is around 2%. (1) It might be because the Muslim population in US is more dispersed while the Muslim population in Europe is concentrated in a few big cities in a few countries. They are more visible and have an opportunity to create their own ‘muslim ghettos’ complete with halaal meat shops and streets full of covered women and crazy imams. This is not possible in the US because of the Geographical dispersement of the Muslims in the US. In Europe you have Pakistani ghettoes from Bradford in UK to Arab ghettoes outside Paris. (2) It might be because the more Conservative America has less differences on social issues with the Muslims than the Ultra Liberal Western Europe where the differences between Muslims and the natives on social issues are more pronounced. (3) It might be due to the fact that there is a higher majority of second generation Muslims in Europe than in the US. Second generation immigrants tend to be more assertive. They are also more likely to follow radical ideologies especially when theres unemployment and discrimination. Unlike their parents who thought they were lucky just to be in the West, they dont have the incentive to work 2-3 jobs and more demanding of their governments. Their parents on the other hand were too busy working hard and were more willing to accept racism or alienation from the mainstream. (4) Muslims are the biggest minority in Europe, while in the US the Muslims are far behind the Blacks and Hispanics in numbers. Traditional hostilities to blacks and the sheer number of Hispanics dwarf the problems created by Muslim immigrants. (5) Muslim immigrants to Europe are more likely to be from rural areas and hence less tolerant, more religious and less willing/able to assimilate. Majority of the Brit Pakis in Britain are from the rural areas of Pakistani Punjab with almost a half of them from Mirpur, a remote rural area in Pakistan. The Arabs from Morocco in Holland and Turks in Germany all come from very remote, rural and conservative areas of Morocco and Turkey. A lot of Muslims to the US come on student/ work visas. Also with the abundance of cheap capital and a much bigger/stronger US economy, a lot of Muslim immigrants (especially Arabs) find it easier to start their own small business and come out of poverty. The Black Muslim immigrants from Africa are treated like other African Americans and not as a seperate minority. The Paki Muslims in the US are a very small minority with no community and spread all over the US (6) US in general is more accepting of Immigrants than Europe. The US economy being bigger and better, the strain on resources is more dramatic in Europe than in the US. The strain on resources due to new immigrants and already settled poor immigrants is much higher in Europe than in the US because the US has less charitable welfare programs for new and poor immigrants while Europe has better and more generous welfare programs for new and poor immigrants.
Abhi, thanks for telling that story. I heard similar stories as a child and am surprised to see that it’s as widespread as it is.
It’s hard for me to believe that the “global picture” is where the sense of persecution comes… You can take the same set of facts and spin it 100 different ways, depending on what you’re prone to do.
Sure – there’s an element of personal experience there that’s being tapped into. On the other hand, this doesn’t explain why you can sit down for coffee with a rich Arab in his own country and get an earful about how Muslims are being singled out all over the world for persecution… even the gentleman at the grocery store couldn’t stop talking about Palestine/Kashmir as Muslims vs the-rest-of-the-world.
So I see some continuity there. It’s the same discourse, even if they are from different social strata and in different countries.
This is almost pointless and other people commenting are doing what I’m suggesting anwyay. What I’m saying is not to study the ideologies (as I made clear in another comment–although that might be important as part of it) as it is to look at what produces people who are willing to do things like this. What factors lead on an individual level to people being willing to fall into the psychology that produces things? What social conditions facilitate that? My question about “what needs to be done.” was sarcastic–without abandoning phrases like “pest control” or your preconceptions and trying to get a real handle on what this phenomenon is about–you’ll never be able to come up with social policies that actually have an effect in accomplishing what you want. This is a common problem among people who are angry about something and then move into a normative analysis and then put toward policy ideas, all while rejecting any kind of thinking about whether those policies are at all connected to producing a solution. It doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about childhood sexual abuse in the Untied States or organized crime or xenophobia.
It’s always possible that what you’re advising are the necessary ones, but until you can come up with a way of presenting them reflects an undersatnding of what’s going on in language that eschews hyperbolic rhetoric (that has a lot of really horrific antecedents that I won’t bother mentioning here), there’s very little credibility to what you’re saying in my eyes.
Us, and them And after all weÂ’re only ordinary men. Me, and you. God only knows itÂ’s noz what we would choose to do. Forward he cried from the rear And the front rank died. And the general sat and the lines on the map Moved from side to side. Black and blue And who knows which is which and who is who. Up and down. But in the end itÂ’s only round and round. HavenÂ’t you heard itÂ’s a battle of words The poster bearer cried. Listen son, said the man with the gun ThereÂ’s room for you inside…….
Sorry for the messup up text… here it is cleaned up
Perhaps the anger is because many of us are tired of rationalizing and explaining away a culture of destruction that has grown beyond pacifistic sympathy and explanation.
It is unrealistic to expect a clinical unemotional computer like analysis of what is happening currently. Pearl Harbor brought the country to its feet and action. Historians in later years could look back and fill libraries with detailed (and quite often meaningless) discussions of the geo-political climate that led to the fateful day in 1941. Do you expect people in the eye of the storm to be able to disassociate themselves from the reality and emotionality of the situation ? I don’t think so.
As regards social policies, it takes two hands to clap. The Muslim community has not made any significant move in addressing the issue. Why do they continue to hire radical imams ? Why do they continue to hand out hate literature to fuel more jihadis ? The hyperbole is more from their side than ours and has had more of an effect on their followers than we’d like to admit. So perhaps we should request CAIR to address our questions. Until we recieve answers, we cannot formulate any solutions. I’m sure CAIR et al will say that is no problem in the Muslim community. And that my friend is the crux of the problem. Their denial and not ours. Why should the onus be on us to suggest the solutions ? The Muslim community needs to show that it is working on long terms solutions. And so far sadly they are not.
Yes, clearly “pacifistic sympathy and explanation” is what lead to the Iraq War. Which is doing so much to stop the recruitment of other people like this. I suggest you read this pdf from a Department of Defense committee about how flawed the underlying analysis of the War On Terror is and how reliant it is on the narrative of the Cold War. If you can’t open it, I have some quotes from it here.
.
True. But it’s not unrealistic to expect people to strive more towards an empirical understanding of what’s going on (rather than a knee-jerk emotional reaction built on preconceptions)–particularly when they’re conscious that that’s what’s going on.
Yes, and that led to some good things and some bad things from the U.S. government. The more rational you are about it, the more you come up with good things or necessary things that are really, really unfortunate. The more irrational you are about it, the more you come up with unnecessary and counterproductive bad things. Not trying to aim for the former is inexcusable.
This is factually incorrect. You can argue that the diverse predominantly Muslim communities in the West (which is what I assume you refer to) haven’t done enough to tackle intolerance or extremism or violence or have gone about it the wrong way, but you can’t argue that they haven’t done anything. Also, I’m not sure what you’re basing your argument on (as opposed to, say, some of the personal experiences that some of the Muslim people posting to this blog have related).
The “Muslim” community is extremely diverse, as I’m sure you’re well aware. There are many ideological and theological bents within Islam. See some of the information that a scholar gathered on different attitudes in Pakistan, Egypt, Kazakhstan, and Indonesia. There’s a review of the author here.
Placing the blame on the “Muslim” community is like blaming all Americans for the excesses that led to Abu Ghraib.
Who is “their side”? Who is “our side”? If you really want to pose it in a “with us or against us” kind of way: people who don’t want to get killed and are interested in policies and programs that make sense that will help us not get killed; people who don’t fit in category one–including: violent Islamist fundamentalists; “go kill ’em” American conservatives; xenophobes and racists and otherwise severely intolerant people of all stripes; elites with too much power and not enough conscience; and well-meaning, but extraordinarily stupid people with too much power. Not a moral classification–just a political one.
See http://www.cair-net.org/default.asp?Page=articleView&id=1656&theType=NRhere. (it’s the most prominent link on their website).
Again, I’m not sure who “us” is, but setting that aside: because we might get killed. Or because we want the world to be slightly more tolerable and want less other people to be killed. Or because we have Muslim friends who have asked us to be allies. etc. etc.
But the most important reason is because Al Qaeda has managed to draw in the American and British and other elites into a trap, and now they’re in it, and so my tax dollars are going to support the expansion of this nonsense and I have to sit around and hear about this all the time while other problems continue to get ignored.
Okay, I give up. Here’s the link to the main CAIR site. I’ll leave it to you to find the link called “U.S. Muslims to Release Anti-Terror TV Ad”
Disclaimer – This is just a hypothetical thought, not a suggested plan of action.
Am I the only one who finds it difficult to believe statements from family members to the tune of – but we never thought he would do anything like that, he seemed normal etc ?
Does love for close ones cloud ones judgement or R they lying? Is it possible to hide such hatred/nihilism/fundamentalism/confusion- call it whatever – from family? Wouldnt it be a daily oscar worthy performance?Why dint they do or say anything?
Is it a crime to hide knowledge of possible crime?Can family members be arrested for this?
Maybe if the bombers were scared of the consequences of their actions on their family members, they wouldnt be so ready to murder.
The Catholic community has done a lot to combat the problems of the Church, but that still didn’t exempt the U.S dioceses from a multi-billion dollar lawsuit. In the same way, the organizations supporting extremist behavior in the Muslim community need to be served with lawsuits. So far that hasn’t happened.
From http://www.wikipedia.org
Not a particularly peaceful and community relations building statement woouldn’t you say ? I think they made the first distinction of “them versus us”. And this was before 9/11 etc.
Perhaps having CAIR police/control the Muslim community is like having the inmates run the asylum.
Diary of a Terrorist
Here are the thoughts of Omar Sheikh, British-born Pakistani-Origin Top Student, the murderer of Daniel Pearl and of Indian citizens while in Delhi. Diary of a Terrorist . Delhi was at various points in history the seat of muslim power in the subcontinent. [AFAIK, Omar now enjoys the good life in the terrorist state of pakistan after being sentenced to ‘hanging’ more than two years back]
Here you have the summation of islamic radical thought — At one point, the islamic empire was the greatest. Those wily indians in collusion with British have robbed us of our land. We must fight to get back ‘our land’. Various similar versions throughout the Islamic world. This idea of the great past stolen by west is constantly drummed into peoples heads since they are kids. That is why we can never expect the ‘moderate’ muslims to really fight against the islamic radicals. It is too convinient. One one hand they get to enjoy the privelages of the liberal west by making money and living the good life in host countries on another they can be supportive (or turn a blind eye) of their ‘brothers’ back in their ancestral country. After all, they don’t lose out if the Islamic Umma is established. They have a longing, however slight, of their past.
Another problem is lack of reformation in Islam. To be a muslim is to be a believer who follows the strict unchanging laws or be an apostate. Nothing in between. The religion forces you into submission to the unchanging idea of the islamic world. The islamic world of the caliphate, islamic glorious past, Quranic law etc. There is no idea of western reformation, the enlightenment, liberty of man. Nothing. When you ask the moderates to stand up to the religious leaders and call their bullshit, it is to formulate a reformation philosophy, have the energy and character to look past the political game being played. Too hard again for moderates. Easy to sit this out by making weak protests.
As I see it, convinience and lack of virtue will continue to play out among the moderates. Some weak protests, standard apologies, Islam is a religion of peace etc. Whatever it is, I dont think the rest of the world can count on inner reform to occur within the Islamic society. Muslims might eventually come to recognize the political power game that is being waged by their religious leaders, but it could be too late for the rest of the world. One nuclear bomb in a big city. Nothing is beyond these power mad mullahs and military men. Unfortunately, this really leaves the option of forceful intervention and wiping out the mad mullahs and military men or putting them somewhere where they cannot influence the muslims. I don’t believe this is ideal or probably workable, but I am sure appeasement will not work.
Here’s the page from wikipedia, which is highly disputed in terms of its neutrality. But setting that aside for a moment, you’re going to pull one statement by one person at one organization that purports to represent Muslims in the United States and cite that as evidence of a moral or political failure on behalf of the entire, diverse community?
Try going to this event for Arab-American heritage week in New York (keeping in mind that not everyone who shows up is a Muslim).
I’ve been reading this blog for quite sometime now and I’ve liked it from the first day I came across it. But this post is something else. I’ve acquired a new found fondness for Sepia Mutiny.
I’m ashamed to admit it, but it has broken a long held stereotype, which I can’t even bring myself to say it.
Anyways, definitely one the best blogs on the net. I felt you guys should know your effort in running this blog is appreciated.
http://www.abdusalaam.blogspot.com (shameless plug)
Abdusalaam, Thanks man! It’s amazing how productive an intelligent, rant-free discussion can be.
[Deleted by Abhi–off topic]