Ugly Times
By Mowahid Hussain Shah
Obama’s Presidency has somehow unleashed forces of darkness, aided and abetted by an untethered media/social media, along with unscrupulous politicos.
Non-stop bashing of the ‘other’ has contaminated the US public space. Its toxicity has reopened long-festering wounds, deepening the racial divide.
The evening of July 7 saw in the streets of Dallas, Texas, the unfolding on TV of Police muqabla – a staple of Punjabi movies. This was immediately preceded by two graphic episodes of what appeared to be unjustifiable slayings of black men by white cops.
Signs are not sanguine. Election year 2016 is sliding America on a downward path. The caption on the cover of the July/August issue of The Atlantic magazine, “How American Politics Went Insane,” captures the essence.
Why is this happening now? Sectors of the dominant white majority are bewildered and hurt over their declining leverage and lowering of their stature. It is this angry frustration that is being encashed by politicians seeking to attract voters who feel threatened by the browning of American social milieu. Hence, the maligning of the marginalized. It is safe and it is profitable. Social media amplifies bellicosity directed at those perceived weaker.
The tired slogan of “Make America Great Again” can be transliterated into “Make America White Again.” Can there be a rollback? Unlikely. The US electorate is too diverse and the momentum of changing demography is irreversible.
To cite the Persian poet, Omar Khayyam, memorably translated by Edward G. Fitzgerald: “The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on.”
On ABC-TV “Good Morning America” on July 8, its black reporter tried even to falsely insinuate that “Islamic radicals” are behind the Dallas cop shootings. Significantly, mass media, which is fast and loose in lavishly deploying the term ‘terrorism’ when a perpetrator carries a Muslim name or background, took, in striking contrast, painstaking care to eschew the term ‘terror’ while depicting the cop killings by sniper fire.
For a long time, the dominant community in America had a self-assured posture of patronizing superiority, when looking down at Third World immigrants who possessed inadequate English language skills and lacked a supporting network of contacts. But, slowly and surely, their bright progeny, born, bred, and schooled here, were unshackled from these inhibiting burdens and started making inroads and knocking at the doors of Constitutionally-protected opportunity.
The playing field has seen a leveling, which has been disconcerting and unsettling to those elements dining on old delusions of unchallenged hegemony.
In this volatile environment, seeing a Black Family implanted in the White House was, perhaps, a bridge too far for the growing disgruntled elements.
The emergence of open interconnected societies in a globalized world is a fact. Those with a cloistered view have difficulty in dealing with that.
Over and over again, one is continually spoon-fed conventional wisdom that education is the one-size-fits-all solution for many problems under the theory that education equals enlightenment and empathy. But does it? Has it in technologically advanced and developed societies? The flames of dehumanizing bigotry burn bright in the 21 st century.
To cite the noble Abdul Sattar Edhi, better education has not led to better humanity.
