Questions and Assumptions
Bobbie
Gilmore SSC
Looking
up an elderly man was standing in front of me saying:
"I
see you welcome bombers here".
"Oh,
no, we welcome immigrants", I replied.
"Oh,
he said, I was an immigrant myself in Detroit for thirty five years".
"Did
they call you a bomber too?" I asked.
"No",
he answered, and walked on to the bus stop nearby.
1
think he got the message.
Watching
and listening to reporting of and debate about the horrific violence
in London during the week one is reminded of similar debates and discussions
about terrorism and its aftermath that went on over the past sixty years,
particularly in Britain and Ireland during what were known as The Troubles.
Unfortunately,
objective debate and analysis of terrorism and its causes get sidetracked.
Demonizing its untouchable agents, who even if exterminated or jailed
will not bring an end to terrorism, dissipates public energy. Frequently,
it seems those who propel it are out of reach. Demonizing the Mau Mau,
the Viet Cong, the ANC, SWAPO, IRA, Al Qaeda et al did not wish them
away. They disappeared over the horizon when the root causes of their
struggle, disaffection and claims were understood, analyzed and communicated
with. Terrorism is the language of the politically dumb trying to reach
the politically deaf. How many times has the public heard from political
leaders that there will be no negotiation with terrorists? Also, how
many times over the past sixty years have political leaders berated
those who said, "1 condemn terrorism, however, I understand why
they are doing it" Understanding terrorism and it's causes was,
and indeed still seems to be equated with justifying it. Political leaders,
academics and think tank gurus like to appear in public as the select
few who have a monopoly on terrorism and solutions to it
The
big questions being asked at present in the media is: how could intelligent,
well-educated young idealistic people from a quiet British street carry
out such horrible atrocities? For whatever reason most of the questioners
are expecting one single-sourced, suitable answer that fits their own
preconceived personal analysis.
There
is not one single source that leads a person to carry out this kind
of terrorist, violent act. Most reasonable people accept that there
are a cocktail of causes, beliefs, values, images, information and misinformation
forming an amalgam that drove these young Muslims to act in this way.
There always has been a blend of sources that led many other different
people to act in a similar way in the political, ethnic, and cultural
terrorist wars of the past sixty years.
At
present there are a plethora of institutes and individuals that have
emerged over the past forty years claiming expertise on terrorism. Alongside
them is a bandwagon of security theorists and complimentary defense
gadgetries competing for a share in a market that promises offshore
mirages of protection costing more and more of the public's hard earned
money. This growth industry has the backing of security-centered governments
who know only too well that where political change is impossible violence
is inevitable. It is generally accepted that political, social, economic
and cultural pimples if not cared for become cancerous and destroy the
body politic by violence. Security without political inclusion just
structures and respect for difference will not succeed, because it makes
everyone a suspect.
In
the recent past when various governments and their representatives began
a dialogue with the IRA political change began to happen and political
violence began to wane. Is it not possible that when negotiation begins
to bring new political structures to the Middle East and other trouble
spots that terrorism will also wane? Also, would it not be true to say
that if political leaders were less manipulative with the facts and
listened to the public that unnecessary conflicts could be avoided?
The
public is no longer completely fooled and particularly immigrant diasporas.
Diasporas carry a baggage of unresolved grief and loss. They experience
racism, marginalisation, confused identities, spurious interpretation
of religion that may be of relevance in the provinces of the homeland
but is disconnected to the de-cultured secular cosmopolitanism of the
urban world. What is there in the horizons of a culturally bleached
European society that people of other cultures can identify with other
than an economic network? Even Europeans themselves are finding it difficult
to identify with the cold, economic secularism of the European Union
as is clear from recent referenda.
Pluralism
has no overarching set of values. In a world with a homeless mindset
people need to validate their values with a reality that offers meaning.
But there is a confusion of realities, indefinite gods. So, people internalize
everything that gossip, rumor and assumption offer in order to feel
empowerment in their lives. In this scenario the last person encountered
or the talk show host is king and his/her message dominant and passing.
So, if there is nothing of a culturally soul-warming nature in the new
surroundings of diasporas people look over their shoulders for cultural
guidance and nourishment. The annual pilgrimage to a perceived homeland
is a must in many isolated cultural diasporas. Is this what is happening
to Muslim youth in Europe? In that visit, is the clash of the provincial
and the cosmopolitan, the definite and the uncertain presented with
extreme solutions?
Why
is it that the first generations born of immigrant parents in the United
States, Canada, New Zealand and Australia seem to have little difficulty
giving allegiance to their new national signs and symbols? Why does
this not seem to be the case of their counterparts in Britain, Germany,
France and the Netherlands? Why are immigrants the subjects of rejection
in every European Election? At election times and in sections of the
media the nature of the language used relating to immigrants is similar
to that used in dealing with vermin. Immigrants are made feel unwanted
ad disposable. As a result of such intemperate language the public will
assume that what happened in London is caused by multiculturalism. But
that doesn't explain the emergence of the IRA, UFF, ETA and other mono
cultural terror groups.
Also,
can it be a healthy situation to have a national identity in Britain,
France, Netherlands and Germany and a cultural identity elsewhere?
But
then, history informs us that many political and social revolutionaries
arose from diasporas, were of mixed race, culture and ethnicity. The
difference between them and present groups is that the latter have access
to global communications, oxygen for their cause. Nevertheless, the
task of civil society must be to enable the disaffected to communicate
the anger of the cause to the agencies of society and for civil society
to respond. Fencing the swamp and ignoring its anger does not banish
its presence.
However,
the continuous message from civil society must be that violence in whatever
guise is destructive, de-creative and a failure of the human imagination.
All terrorism is local.
The
message and the messenger may not always rhyme with the expectations
of the receiver. But the message must be received and responded to.
If not, the fanatics win, the spiral continues and violence subverts
us to accommodate it by defining ourselves not by what we like about
ourselves but by what we dislike about its perpetrators.
Beware
of assumptions.