Extreme in the Mainstream
By Mowahid Hussain Shah

 

The Pakistani-American Congress convened its annual summit on US-Pakistan ties at Capitol Hill, seat of the US Congress, which despite the rigors of Ramadan, attracted a decent turnout, including Congressmen Chris Van Hollen and Donald Norcross.

I was asked to speak at the inaugural morning panel. Under discussion then were the issues which roil relations between the US and Pakistan.

While much is made of hate in the Muslim world, little vigilance is given to the creeping forces of darkness, which now infest the Western mainstream. It is a manifestation of a larger problem.

Hate speech is slowly becoming the norm, even becoming acceptable and profitable. The West did much to curb the wave of anti-Semitism, but now it is doing little to stem the tide of Islamophobia. Here, a red line has to be unequivocally drawn.

Pak-American discourse is often dominated by talk of terror. But the complicity of US legislators – in effect, being a doormat before the gun lobby – cannot be overlooked. The consequences and casualties of this inaction are huge.

There are nuts galore everywhere in the world, but few elsewhere have that easy an access to guns – sometimes almost as easy as purchasing a cup of coffee. In most states, under the “gun show” loophole, firearms can be purchased without a background check from private individuals at gun shows and, in some states, not even a permit is required to buy or own a gun.

Gun glory exercises such a grip that even the language is sterilized and sugar-coated. It is always “gun violence” and never gun terror.

Utilitarian needs have often defined US-Pakistan relations. When the utility is high, the flowers blossom. When it is low, the flowers wither. Cited there was the New York Times story of June 8, stating: “Although Pakistan is formally an ally of the United States, American officials have made clear that India has displaced Pakistan in American interests and hearts.” The same article cites US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter as saying: “We have much more to do with India today than has to do with Pakistan…There is important business with respect to Pakistan, but we have much more, a whole global agenda with India, agenda that covers all kinds of issues.” A textbook definition of a green-card marriage.

Modi – demonized for 10 years for his complicity in the 2002 Gujarat massacres – has been lionized in 2016 before a joint sitting of the US Congress.

Then, too, US foreign policy advisors continue with the common mistake of switching off on Kashmir, despite that issue refusing to be switched off, with applicable UN resolutions still unenforced.

The duality on the nuclear issue even compelled the New York Times of June 5 to editorially berate the Indo-US nuclear deal as “a dangerous bargain.”

The contributory fact behind so little positivity surrounding Pakistan has been the incapacity of its elites to frame and present a compelling counter-narrative.

The xenophobic echoes heard across the Atlantic through the Brexit vote show that dislike and dread for ‘the other’ is widespread. There is no substitute but to fight for fair play.