Mental Colonialism
By Mowahid Hussain Shah
Americans are prone to believe in their own exceptionalism. US elites constantly parade their own unique virtues while berating other cultures and societies for breeding extremism and hate. But do these claims square with facts?
A much-needed historical corrective was provided by President Obama who, during his address at the National Prayer Breakfast on February 5, said: “People committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. In our own home country, slavery all too often was justified in the name of Christ.” This has invited furious reaction in those US circles accustomed to the one-way tarnishing of Islam.
100 years after Lincoln’s slaying, American blacks remained largely disenfranchised, particularly in the old slave-owning South. There, as late as 1965, bureaucratic obstacles effectively blocked most blacks from registering to vote. There was no federal legislation augmenting and enforcing their voting rights. Amidst this, after attacks by state troopers on unarmed protesters gained nation-wide attention, the Reverend Martin Luther King led a high-profile march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama to highlight the basic deprivation of fundamental rights enshrined in the US Constitution.
The new movie, “Selma”, provides a snapshot of the civil rights movement and highlights events that pressured US President Lyndon Johnson to initiate and navigate passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
It was in 1965, too, that one of the most influential black leaders of the 20th century, the Muslim American, Malcolm X, was gunned down.
The cerebral and fiery Malcolm X – who had gained the respect of Nelson Mandela and Muslim leaders in the Mideast – had an even more striking and inspirational impact at the grassroots.
The 1992 movie, “Malcolm X”, depicts his seminal role in the awakening of black self-awareness, urging them “to throw off the shackles of mental colonialism.” He swayed Muhammad Ali to become a Muslim.
Both the “militant” Malcolm X and the “moderate” Martin Luther King were assassinated by 1968. “Selma” suggests that President Johnson supported King to counter establishment anxieties about Malcolm X.
For 150 years, the Klu Klux Klan has been a violent extremist white supremacist cult infesting the American landscape and terrorizing black lives. They used the Christian symbol of a burning cross. It was part of the US mainstream. By 1925, it had over 4 million members. Reportedly, at least 5 US Presidents were members of the KKK, including Woodrow Wilson and Harry Truman. So, too, was Hugo Black, Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court. The landmark 1915 movie, “The Birth of a Nation”, glorifies the Klan.
Drawing huge crowds in 2015 is the Clint Eastwood-directed movie “American Sniper” which, in effect, glorifies the killing of Iraqis in their own homeland by an invading force. According to a February 2 advisory issued by the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, the movie is inciting hate and violence against Arabs and Muslims.
As is largely in the case of Muslim Americans today, blacks then
were led to believe that the appeasement route was the safest route.
It is a slippery slope. And is there a substitute to having the faith to stand up and speak Haq?
