It has been more than a year since I wrote my last article in
Opednews. I guess I was taken by the speeding events in the Middle East, my
part of the world, were events went beyond anyone's imagination. Who would have
thought two years ago that a presidential debate will take place in Egypt or
the Libyan people will be able to stand on the so-called Green Book with their
feet.
But that was not my only reason.
In all my previous articles, I was driven and motivated by an event to
write. Motivated may not be fair to
describe my feelings. It was more of an emotional reaction to an incident that
has affected me to the extent that words were fighting in the keyboard.
I have to confess that my writing skills
are at their highest when I am reacting emotionally to an event, and I suppose
this is what most of the readers want to read, an honest expression of the
feelings provided common sense and logic are maintained. I can count a number
of events that has forced me to go to the key board and write. The collapse of
Saddam Hussein dictatorship, the inauguration of Barack Obama, The immediate
and timely sacking of the Saudi
Secretary of Education after failure to save some students from a school
fire, the killing of Saddam's Hussein's two dictator sons".etc.
Surprisingly the world reaction to
the killing of Bin Laden didn't create emotions such as those created when the
famous Paul Bremer's announcement ( We got'em -- (Saddam) ) was heard across the
world, despite the fact that Bin Laden's crimes exceeded by a large margin
those of Saddam.
Recently, I am more concerned with
the unjustified, unwarranted cultural antagonism between nations and religions. Such antagonism is not accidental, but,
unfortunately is fueled by greed and hate. Let us call them G&H, the greatest
danger to human survival and well-being. For example, Iran is promoting the
Sunni/Shiite sectarian mutual hate because it wants Shiite people, wherever
they are, to be loyal to Iran not their countries.
Another example, weapons factories
would go broke if peace and harmony spread across the world. Therefore they may
have interest in feeding sectarian and border disputes. It is interesting to
analyze how both peace and non-peace can support the world economy but the
difference is the former is long-term and the latter is short-term.
I believe the G part of G&H can be dealt with through dialogue and understanding each other's interest. Also victim nations realized the game they are being subjected to and took counter measures. It is the H part that is hard to get rid of. People, to a large extent, are the production of an educational system that may have engraved in their minds certain superiority feelings or a negative picture of other cultures or religions. This, combined with the not so innocent media nonstop degrading of these cultures and religions is a major contributor.
In my view, people of the world
went through three stages. In the
fifties and sixties of last century, it was mainly naivety and ignorance,
probably due to almost non-existence of people-to-people communications
channels. The seventies are the beginning of the wake-up process where many
social movements started, but the H factor didn't exist then. You can travel anywhere in the world and feel
safe and welcome.
It may be appropriate to conclude
with the developments in the eighties until now where communication channels
between people of the world grew up so fast until we got to cheap flights to
anywhere in the world, mobile phones, internet and most notably now Skype and
twitter, where some one in India can talk to some one in Brazil live anytime
during the day free of charge. What puzzles me is that this is supposed to make
us closer but, on the ground, the situation of cultural understanding is indeed
getting worse not better.
Hamad S Alomar
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
