Green Wall Of Silence - I

Friday, November 1, 2002
By: Tashbih Sayyed

Progress is synonymous with continuos forward movement. A positive movement ensures peace and stability. Absence or lack of movement means stagnation and self destruction. Civilizations owe their existence to the people who remain in a perpetual mode of forward movement. Such forward looking people organize themselves into an orderly group to ensure the continuity of productive action. Such people are not individualistic or uniletaralist. They are not short sighted either. They do not work for short term benefits but they strive to achieve long term advantages for humanity. Their commitment to remain dynamic in their thinking and deed guarantees a stable and peaceful world. A group of people organized with the aim of providing long term means for progress to its members and durable stability to the world at large is referred to as a political society. And often translate into a responsible state. A world comprising of such states is termed as a civilized world.
The success of such a civilized world depends on the quality of its leaders. A political society guided by a real leader is always a source of world peace and stability. The real leader makes sure that in times of trials and tribulations his people stay the course of reason. Such a leader leads his people on the basis of his conviction in basic human values. He does not compromise on principals and always proves to be a vital link in shaping the course of his nation. Successful democratic societies, today, are the best example of such a leadership.

Uncivilized world, on the other hand, is composed of groups of people who are hijacked by false leaders. These groups are like a rudderless ship that is whipped around by the storms of emotions and winds of sentiments and can not be termed as states. They are a form of a mob. A mob does not believe in moving forward and is always a cause of destruction to itself and to the community. Mob mentality manifests itself in the shape of States like Afghanistan under Taliban, Iraq under Saddam Husein, Saudi Arabia under Wahabbism, Sudan under Islamism, North Korea under communism, etc. Such mob states have made the world realize the threats posed by such an uncivilized world.

The manner in which a leadership evolves or emerges in a particular society determines its status as a civilized or uncivilized state. In a true and successful political society, leaders always rise from the ground up like a tree. They grow up with the grass roots masses. I will call it a Process of ascending leadership. Such a leadership is always aware of the positive needs of human societies. In mobs, leadership descends from the top as a selfish individual. This individual imposes himself on the society as its ruler. Such rulers almost always cause death and destruction like a plague. I will call it a process of descending leadership. Muslim societies of today are the best examples of such leadership.

The process of ascending leadership always results in democracies. And fascist states have always been a product of a process of descending leadership.
When faced with a crisis, societies controlled by mob mentality, often lose their nerves, resulting in a loss of life and property as was evident in Gujrat, India recently. Whereas a political society under a true leader does not buckle under any kind of pressure. Terror perpetuated on September 11, 2001, caused grief among Americans and made them very angry. As all of the terrorists were Arab Muslims, Americans could have vented their grief and anger by reacting violently against the Arab Americans.

But President George W. Bush did not lose his sense of American values. He guided his nation with responsibility. He said, "Our nation must be mindful that there are thousands of Arab-Americans who live in New York City, who love their flag just as much as [we] do. And we must be mindful that as we seek to win the war, that we treat Arab-Americans and Muslims with the respect they deserve. I know that is your attitudes as well. Certainly the attitude of this government, that we should not hold one who is a Muslim responsible for an act of terror. We will hold those who are responsible for the terrorist acts accountable and those who harbor them." (President George W. Bush, September 13, 2001). We all know that he handled the situation in an American way - justice and freedom for all - and made the difference between life and death.

As if to help the world better appreciate the difference between a true and a false leadership, in another part of the world an another terrorist act was committed by religious extremists. In India, on February 27, 2002, fifty-seven persons, mostly women and children, were burnt alive and 43 sustained burn injuries when a train car carrying Hindu pilgrims was set afire by terrorists on the outskirts of the Godhra railway station in Gujrat state of India. Senior police and railway officials, who rushed to the spot, found it difficult to recover the bodies, most of which were charred beyond recognition. The authorities said they had estimated the number of dead by merely counting the bones. People were naturally struck with grief and wanted to take revenge and they did not have a real leader to channel the popular grief and anger in a responsible and civilized direction. The "leader" there, Chief Minister of the Gujrat state, Narendra Modi, himself belonged to a radical Hindu extremist group, and he, instead of controlling the popular anger, encouraged it to react violently. Within days hundreds of Muslims men and women were massacred, raped and lynched.

A major newspaper of India wrote, "The Narendra Modi regime showed little signs of having come to grips with the situation as late as Thursday evening (almost 36 hours after the incident), leaving the field absolutely free for rampaging mobs to go about their `business' — looting, pillaging and setting blocks of houses afire at will — and there appeared to be a clear design behind all the `senseless' violence, going by the targets they had chosen — shops and houses owned by the minority community in revenge for the Godhra incident. But shocking was the police personnel's blatant failure to intervene even in cases where such outrageous attacks were taking place in their very presence, as tellingly brought out by the electronic media.

If the law enforcing machinery in Gujarat has been notoriously politicized and communalized, the fact that all the current lawlessness that has been unleashed in the name of a VHP-sponsored `bandh' to protest against the Godhra carnage more than explains the State BJP regime's deliberate lack of firmness in containing the orgy of violence. There has also been an inexplicable delay in calling in the Army. Such a partisan approach to critical issues of governance like maintaining public peace and ensuring the security of citizenry will seriously undermine the legitimacy of the Modi administration."

Similarly, the behavior of Muslim main street also demonstrated an absence of true and responsible leadership. Muslims in Arab countries, instead of sharing the grief of the civilized world, were observed celebrating the carnage in New York. Their retrogressive attitude confirmed their image of a people who are led by leaders devoid of any understanding of human values. Echoing the sentiments of their leaders, most of them were heard saying that Americans deserved the atrocity. None of their leaders was forthcoming in condemning the barbaric act.

What was shocking to many was the silence of the Muslim leaders - political and religious both. In the view of the rational world, this was the moment when Muslim leadership could have shown to the world that they do not condone violent behavior. They could also have convinced the non Muslim world that they are not encouraging the extremist elements in their midst. But they failed miserably and in the process betrayed their real self - a side that hates freedoms and human advancement.

The uncivilized behavior of the Muslim leaders instigated some in the Western world to comment, "Most religions have been able to inspire nobility and cruelty, glory as well as madness, and Islam is no exception. But that does not preclude the possibility that something in Islam lends itself, more than other religions, to exterminations and totalitarian politics. The Islamists who have interpreted their religion in that manner are our enemies. They are not the entire Muslim world, but they are not a tiny and isolated minority of it either. Since they claim to speak for all Muslims, it is up to those Muslims who reject the Islamists' views-including, yes, Muslim immigrants to America-to repudiate them in word and deed. And it is up to the rest of us to demand that they do so. This would not be an unprecedented demand: Especially in recent years, both Christian churches and the secular culture have held Christians accountable for the enormities committed in the name of their religion." 1

September 11, 2001, brought the contrast between a political society and a mob into a sharp focus. It made more than obvious that the world today is divided into two camps - a political society and a mob. And unfortunately, most of the societies displaying a mob behavior seem to be Muslim societies. Watching the behavior of a Muslim society today, one wonders as to why a people claiming to be the adherent of a faith that teaches only humane values of life and encourages everything but retrogression, are transformed into a mob that hates a forward movement and abhors freedoms.

To Be Continued...