Distortions of Progress
March 30th, 2009 by Wil Robinson
All too frequently, the media sensationalizes non-stories as they attempt to whip up anti-Islamic fervor in the name of ratings. FOX News ran a story headline Sunday: “Islamic Law’s Influence in America a Growing Concern.”
What exactly is the concern? Apparently, some taxi drivers in the U.S. decided not to carry passengers with alcohol, a university installed taps for Muslim worshippers to wash their feet before prayer, and a company decided to give their employees a holiday on Eid.
Yeah – real issues to worry about – I don’t know what our free country is coming to when taxi drivers can choose their passengers, a public school helps guarantee freedom of worship, and a corporation acknowledges all religions. That certainly isn’t why our Founding Fathers wrote the Bill of Rights.
This perception of Islam has distorted what the American public now views as progress. The media has over-simplified our goals, presenting the idea of a Muslim woman who removes her veil as “progress.” That’s not progress. That’s just a different culture.
I was once propositioned by a faceless woman from under a powder-blue burqa on the streets of Kabul. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the veil that was imprisoning her in a cycle of prostitution.
Progress would be if that woman had access to affordable medical care. Progress would be if her children had access to free schools. Progress would be if both she and her husband could earn a living wage. Progress would be if their villages weren’t in danger of being bombed by U.S. drones or held hostage by Taliban insurgents.
Progress would be growth. Progress would be peace. Progress would be a future. Who gives a shit about a veil?
President Obama claimed he was going to change the way America operated in the world. Yet his “new” Afghan/Pakistan strategy has the same simplistic view and lacks any fresh ideas as to how we can combat the roots of extremism. Instead, his “new” strategy is simply super-sizing the mistakes of the past 8 years and attempting to reframe the issue with new euphemisms.
The so-called “war on terror” (now renamed, in true Orwellian fashion, the “Overseas Contingency Operation”) continues to view civilian deaths – collateral damage – as acceptable. We continue to fund Pakistan’s military despite knowing that elements of Pakistan’s intelligence forces are supporting Taliban insurgents.
Meanwhile, America keeps trying to convince Afghans, Pakistanis, and other Muslims in developing countries (or occupied territories) that we are just trying to help; yet we refuse to let them help themselves. Islam is always seen as part of the problem – not part of the solution. For nearly a decade, we have attempted to justify our own failures and distract those working for global development by pointing a finger at Islamic piety.
And this is where we have doomed ourselves to failure.
There are so many partners that could help with real progress, but too many of them have been labeled as “too Islamic” and thus a potential enemy. Islam is (like all major religions) built on charity, and there are institutions within many Muslim societies that can act as a partner if given the chance. Unfortunately, our fear has kept us from trusting anything that looks, talks, smells, or even hints at being “Islamic.”
The Indian state of Gujarat is an example of what Islamic organizations can provide if given the opportunity. The city of Ahmedabad was torn apart in 2002 by ethnic and religious riots. (I won’t get into who started it, because like so many other conflicts, it really doesn’t matter. What matters is that a small event escalated and thousands of people were affected.)
After the riots, some of the Muslim population in Ahmedabad was left without homes. Islamic charities stepped in to help. Even orthodox political institutions, like Jamaat-i-Islami, the Pakistani Islamic party with links to militant groups, came to the rescue of the displaced community. They helped reconstruct old homes, set up new schools, and built new communal housing for resettlement. The underlying fear in the Indian government was that the Islamic influence would filter down and create a more conservative, rigid community.
Seven years on, Jawaharlal Nehru University anthropologist Dipankar Gupta writes that fears about rising Islamic fundamentalism have proved to be unfounded. The Islamic institutions have not tried to implement their brand of fundamental religion, but have simply worked to better the lives of Gujarati Muslims.
“Did the [Islamists]…place conditions of a religious nature before they let people into these [resettlement] colonies? None, as far as the residents could recall…[N]obody was tested for orthodoxy before they were allowed in…
The truth is that neither Jamaat-i-Islami nor [other Islamic institutions are] keen on advocating fundamentalist lifestyles. They have no interest in sponsoring madrassas that teach only Arabic and the Quran. Instead they have set up schools that provide secular education…These schools are not a ruse for Islamic organizations, or clerics, to pump religious fervor into Muslim kids.
On the contrary, these Muslim institutions are clear that they want the boys and girls in their care to learn secular sciences and skills and heave themselves out of parental poverty. The curricula in these schools are so designed that they conform to the requirements of the state education board. There would be some religious instructions in these institutions, but they would be on the side, and a minor matter…
The accent is on turning out successful Muslims who can negotiate confidently in a secular world…
Where then is that fundamentalism that is supposedly breeding in the smoldering slums of Ahmedabad? In fact, if anything, it is just the reverse…”
The Obama administration has similar ready-made partners for reconstruction in Afghanistan and Pakistan. America (or NATO) cannot do it alone – and nor should they. Afghans and Pakistanis – and the religious values that are a part of them – need to be integrated into the very institutions that are seeking to help. We ought to heed a lesson from the reconstruction of Ahmedabad and stop being afraid of utilizing Islam in development.
But gaining public support for such an idea first requires something from the media. We need a media that focuses on true progress instead of culture. We need the anti-Islamic fear-mongering to stop.
We must have a media that presents Islam for what it is and what it should be – part of the solution.
Now that would be a truly new strategy for the “Overseas Contingency Operation.”
Tags: overseas contingency operation, riots, Muslims, War of Misinformation, War of Misinformation
Regarding Attack on Lahore 30/03/2009:
To all Pakistanis, please wake up and call this atrocity what it is. Please stop trying to find a foreign hand; please understand that this is our war. We are under attack from our own. These people, who in Waziristan and SWAT leave hanging from the trees the bodies of their victims, are our own callous murderers.
The frequent nature of these attacks does not make them any less reprehensible. These people who on one day blow a mosque full of worshippers in Pakhtunkhwa and the next day attack the very heart of Pakistan are our own people. Please admit our faults, please look at the events with open eyes, please call spade a spade and stop tying to hide behind the bulls**t of “Muslims can’t do this kind of thing”. Well, they can and they are.
It is no longer possible to stay silent and see that amongst our own, the people we know, there are those who come up with conspiracy theories for everything, look for American hand in everything, and look for excuses for our own failures.
I ask people like Imran Khan (I like him and want him as our next leader), to finally give up the charade of this business of being “at war with our own people”. No sir, we are not at war with our own people as these people want to make Pakistan a Stone Age country, they want our sisters, daughters and mothers to get imprisoned in their homes.
This is not Islam, Islam teach us humility, love and compassion for fellow human beings, Islam tell us to respect, women, elder and fruit trees even when at war. Let’s call these people what they are, they are our fascists who want a totalitarian version of their own perverted view of Islam to subjugate the free people of Pakistan.
Please speak up, please…
http://real-politique.blogspot.com
By Sikander Hayat
“Who gives a shit about a veil?” Nobody, usually, except a woman in refused to take it off for her driver’s license picture. It is for identification and you cannot identify someone from only their eyes. My neighbor is happy to be free of the headscarf. Some wear it here, nobody really cares unless it is niqab.
When you choose to live here you do not force your culture on those of us who don’t want it.
Yes, and I forgot to mention that she came to me distressed that some of her friends were trying to convert her to Christianity. I asked her if she was happy to be Muslim and she said yes, so I told her that that is what she should tell her friends, and that if they are really her friends that they will understand and let her choose what makes her happy.
Nunya–
I’m confused as to your point (your link was also dead…).
The veil is merely a symbol that can - in some instances -be used to measure gender freedom. Here in India, woman rarely wear the veil, and some don’t even cover their hair. In Afghanistan, they always cover their hair, and some wear a veil or burqa. But eliminating that is not “progress” - as the media tends to portray it as.
How is any of the examples in the FOX news story “forcing culture on us?” I thought our (American) culture was freedom to choose, freedom to worship, freedom to speak. If a few foot fountains and a holiday is really a threat, there are other issues that need to be dealt with.
The focus needs to be on growth, education, eliminating violence. The veil has been substituted for a goal because it’s visible, different from our own culture, and easy to point a finger at. But eliminating the veil is not progress, never will be.
Nice article. Since you’re already citing Orwell that ground does not need to be broken. I thought this a nice bit of ‘reverse-engineering’ the spin.
http://www.religiondispatches.org/archive/religionandtheology/1218/osama_and_orientalism%3A_where_islamophobes_meet_al-qaeda?page=entire
And this notes the original b.s. premise of Islamofascism - a bad joke propagandized as analysis
http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2001/2846b_lewis_profile.html
The demand for Muslim schools comes from parents who want their children a safe environment with an Islamic ethos.Parents see Muslim schools where children can develop their Islamic Identity where they won’t feel stigmatised for being Muslims and they can feel confident about their faith.
Muslim schools are working to try to create a bridge between communities. There is a belief among ethnic minority parens that the British schooling
does not adequatly address their cultural needs. Failing to meet this need could result in feeling resentment among a group who already feel excluded. Setting up Muslim school is a defensive response.
State schools with monolingual teachers are not capable to teach English to bilingual Muslim children. Bilingual teachers are needed to teach English to such children along with their mother tongue. According to a number of studies, a child will not learn a second language if his first language is ignored.
Bilingual Muslim children need state funded Muslim schools with bilingual Muslim teachers as role models during their developmental periods. Muslims
have the right to educate their children in an environment that suits their culture. This notion of “integration”, actually means “assimilation”, by
which people generally really mean “be more like me”. That is not multiculturalism. In Sydney, Muslims were refused to build a Muslim school, because of a protest by the residents. Yet a year later, permission was
given for the building of a Catholic school and no protests from the residents. This clrearly shows the blatant hypocrisy, double standards and racism. Christians oppose Muslim schools in western countries yet build their own religious schools.
British schooling and the British society is the home of institutional racism. The result is that Muslim children are unable to develop self-confidence and self-esteem, therefore, majority of them leave schools with low grades. Racism is deeply rooted in British society. Every native child is born with a gene or virus of racism, therefore, no law could change the attitudes of racism towards those who are different. It is not only the common man, even member of the royal family is involved in racism. The
father of a Pakistani office cadet who was called a “Paki” by Prince Harry has profoundly condemned his actions. He had felt proud when he met the
Queen and the Prince of Wales at his son’s passing out parade at Sandhurst in 2006 but now felt upset after learning about the Prince’s comments. Queen Victoria invited an Imam from India to teach her Urdu language. He was highly respected by the Queen but other members of the royal family had no respect for him. He was forced to go back to India. His protrait is still in
one of the royal places.
There are hundreds of state schools where Muslim pupils are in majority. In my opinion, all such schools may be designated as Muslim community schools with bilingual Muslim teachers. There is no place for a non-Muslim child or a teacher in a Muslim school.
Iftikhar Ahmad
http://www.londonschoolofislamics.org.uk
I know, and have preached with, several Muslims. Our goals and basic tenets are quite analogous. I believe most of Christianity’s problems with Islam are quite simply, jealousy and envy.
Christians like to project themselves as being pious, yet very few could withstand the rigors of Islam. Can you even imagine a Christian being called to prayer 5 times a day? Or to adhere to a month-long fast such as Ramadan? Or the removal of one’s shoes when stepping on the holy ground of a church?
It’s a textbook example of tearing down another to build one’s self up. It’s illusionary at best.
It’s ignorance of other people’s religions. 99% of American Christians have never held, much less read, or studied, the Qur’an. This includes the church hierchy.
After hearing a pastor rant on a Qur’anic verse one Sunday, I asked him: “Do you understand the main underlying theme in that Surah?” His reply: “Surah…….What’s that??????”
When God seperated the sons of Noah at Babel, He did so for a reason. It is not Biblical to attempt to unite the world under the banner of one religion. We Christians, just as the Muslims, are to deal fairly and justly with ALL peoples, not just those of our own stripe.
Obama, with his background, should be more aware of this than most. Sadly, he too, has bought into the great lie.
Another great post, Wil. Well-written, thanks.
Opit–
Thanks for the links. Nice piece deconstructing the so-called “expert” Bernard Lewis.
Iftikhar–
Not sure if your comment is spam or not, but I put it up because it was relevant (and wasn’t selling rolex watches…).
I can’t speak on the situation in Britain, because I have no basis or experience. I think Muslim schools - just like Catholic schools - should be allowed in a free society.
However, as an experienced English instructor in more than one Asian country, I will take issue with your claim that a “bi-lingual teacher is needed.” Not sure where your “studies” are from, but English immersion - even if it’s monolingual teacher - is the best way for children to learn a second language. Bi-lingual teachers tend to underestimate their students’ abilities and will coddle them with their native tongue.
BT-
Thanks, as always, for backing me upon the religious front. I have hope that the day will come when religion is no longer hijacked by extremists.
Sikander–
Your comment wasn’t really that related - but a good message, nonetheless. Well said.
Orwell again, from his days as a radio shock jock flogging racism http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/107326/former_news_radio_staffer_spills_the_beans_on_how_shock_jocks_inspire_hatred_and_anger/
That’s out of my Overton Window collection on the Links page.
http://www.911kemet.co.uk/islamophobia-and-the-coming-wars.html
BTW ‘Religion not hijacked by extremists.’ Like the mob shouting ‘Crucify Him’ ? That’s politics and manipulation of public perceptions.
I saw a quip posted by a Baptist minister years ago - and thought he was one I’d like ‘at my back’. “Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners : not to promote religion.”
I thought this lot looked promising
http://www.religioustolerance.org/statbelief.htm
Somebody remembers the Ecumenical movement.
The veil is not about a religious choice in the US it’s about IDENTIFICATION.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2970514.stm
Women want to hide behind that thing in places where men are protected from their own sexual urges, fine.
Wimpy assholes.
Look, that last response was an angry response based on my experience listening to women’s stories who came from countries with repressive Islamic regimes, SA, Iran, and Afghanistan. Repression breeds abuse. Also a little bit on the few Arab men I have dated or worked with, here, in my home town, in the US.
This does not mean I watch Fox newz, nor does it mean I have ever supported or agreed with the “War on Terror.” I want the US forces out of Afghanistan and Iraq and I want corporate control of the mainstream media to end.
I don’t care if they eliminate the veil or not in majority Islamic countries. If women want to wear it that’s ok with me.
If a woman is driving erraticly in this country and the cops pull her over and they cannot identify her from her driver’s license, that is a problem. If a woman wants to live here in the US and drive then she needs to follow the law here and take off the niqab for her driver’s license picture.
If I moved to Saudi Arabia, you can bet that I would follow the law there.
Silence Meets Despair of Afghan Women
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090401_silence_meets_despair_of_afghan_women/
“Afghan President Hamid Karzai has just signed a law that forces women to obey their husbands’ sexual demands, keeps women from leaving the house—even for work or school—without a husband’s permission, automatically grants child custody rights to fathers and grandfathers before mothers, and favors men in inheritance disputes and other legal matters. In short, the law again consigns Afghan women to lives of brutal repression.”
Progress? NO.
Nunya–
I was disappointed when I came across the story about Karzai signing the law - even more disappointed that the American media has tried to ignore it (for fear that our puppet-president might be exposed as being anathema to what we’re trying to do).
Significantly, the law says nothing about the veil - mostly because it’s a traditional and cultural thing. You’re exactly right- it’s NOT progress, and someone needs to point it out in the mainstream media.
Here in India, most Muslim women do not wear a veil - many don’t even cover their hair (and almost an equal number of Hindu women cover their hair). It’s tradition and culture, and is not related to their freedoms (or lack thereof).
Thus, the veil is really not an accurate measurement of women’s freedom, but perhaps a reflection of what happens AFTER women acquire freedoms and begin to insist on their own development.
In the US, there are times and places when the veil is inappropriate (i.e., DL photos). But given that America is a collection of all people, all cultures, and all religions, it’s not automatic that everyone will assimilate our own values and culture.
Either way, the focus of US foreign policy needs to be on development - and in how to partner with those groups capable of helping. So far, we’ve tried to impose our own goals, ideas, and values with little regard for realities on the ground, and have ignored Muslim organizations to our own (and their) detriment.
“Either way, the focus of US foreign policy needs to be on development - and in how to partner with those groups capable of helping. So far, we’ve tried to impose our own goals, ideas, and values with little regard for realities on the ground, and have ignored Muslim organizations to our own (and their) detriment.”
Absolutely I agree with that.
Education of girls and family planning opportunities are sorely lacking in any aid packages to developing countries. It should always be sanitation first, then basic infrastructure, then education.
I have only recently become aware of just who the IMF and World Bank loan packages really benefit and it is nauseating to me. Business classes in the US turned me into a raging radical liberal, and I don’t mean someone who approves of the neo-liberal economic policies shoved down the throats of developing nation governments.
You do realize just how pathetic the education system (including college) is here?