APS — our collective complacency

What could possibly roil a large crowd of adult men to such fury that they would take to streets shouting expletives?

The year 2015 draws to a close. For Pakistan, this year’s developments have resembled the undulations of a frail, defected heart that’s in slow recovery. Recovery from what? Recovery from the cardiac arrest of the APS massacre — that grim day when evil visited our land once again to scavenge our souls. But the APS tragedy snapped within us something we thought was no longer alive. Something which in the tragic unfolding of our history had silently expired; or so we imagined. Sadly, it took the daylight massacre of kids for us to feel that something in us was still alive. Some could feel its weight in their chests, a disorienting unease gnawing at them; others felt its fangs more deeply, its spasms breaking them from within. The APS tragedy didn’t just break our hearts; it reminded us we still have hearts.

In the weeks and months following the day Peshawar cried, we have seen in action Apex Committees, military courts, hangings and cleansing operations; actions performed to stall the advance of a certain virus of the mind — yet, the virus still remains. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi is still alive, as are other militant outfits. Cleric Abdul Aziz, that cross-dressing maulana of Lal Masjid fame, continues to hiss venom.

And that’s the horror we need to contend with. That out there, in our own country, is a virus which continues to spread by way of dangerous memes.

Renowned evolutionary biologist, Richard Dawkins likened the spread of dangerous memes to parasitic infections where the parasites manipulate host behaviour for self-perpetuation, for instance, the worm which attacks the nervous system of its cricket host, causing the cricket to jump into the water. To an external observer, the sight of a cricket chirping gleefully to its death may come as a surprise. This is because the parasite does its work in silence. And as with parasites, memes act silently, slowly usurping the host’s command and control centres till it’s finally too late.

This is the virus, this miasmic proliferation of deadly, lethal memes which has infected Pakistan, and much of the Muslim world. And every once in a while, you catch it in action, shape-shifting its way across our landscape as it gradually consumes us.

Its pattern is familiar. Someone says or does something — a few take notice of it, get offended and inform the rest. The rest join the few and then everyone is offended. The elders counsel action; those cheery wardens of death never disappoint. Everyone happily takes heed, for what value is a man who disobeys authority? Of course, breaking traffic lights, taking bribes, telling lies, molesting children and so on may count as rules in some parts of the world, but not to these pious warriors who follow a different rulebook. And so, convinced of their rectitude, these unctuous soldiers take little time to form a mob, taking turns to punish that dreaded man or woman who by accident of birth was either born in the wrong faith, sect or community — in the wrong country. If the mob is feeling generous, it will just stop there, perhaps at the resistance of a policeman on duty who suddenly discovered his conscience, or a few on-lookers who decided to intervene. But on most days, the mob will carry on with the agenda, often taking the punishment to victim’s family, or even community. In most of these cases, you will observe that the victim is from a minority sect. This is not a coincidence. Because in their minds, these eager merchants of death are not committing a crime at all, let alone a sin. They are following a rulebook handed down to them by the same elders who green-lighted their savagery. This is equally true for the elders. And you can trace this horrible pedigree as far back as you want.

We occasionally observe the behaviour of these mobs, catching a rare YouTube clip or pictures on social media, and ask ourselves what could drive a mob of men, to kill with such wanton urgency? What could drive a man who on a normal day would offer you free chai at his dhaba if you don’t have money, to suddenly get up, grab a stick or a cricket bat, join an angry mob, and bludgeon someone to death? Or torch his entire community?

For instance, just the other day, hundreds gathered outside Lahore’s Hafeez Centre in angry protest. What could possibly roil such a large crowd of adult men to such foaming fury that they would suspend their daily affairs and take to the streets waving banners and shouting expletives? Surely, a great tragedy, you would think. Were these disgruntled malcontents protesting the new world order? The rise of autocracies? Was this our very own Occupy Wall Street moment? Sadly, no. These men were protesting the Lahore Police’s arrest of a shopkeeper for putting up an anti-Ahmadi poster. Because of course, in a land where politicians feast on the blood of the anaemic, where the policeman links arms with the robber, where institutions incentivise debauchery, the best use of our resources is to agitate against a peaceful minority community that only asks it be left alone.

Here, we return to the trouble with deadly memes. Like parasites, memes are in the business of survival. What is the most effective way to kill parasites? Create an environment hostile to their survival. And this is what we need. An environment which not only resists, but actively destroys deadly memes. This means teaching kids to think critically, to dispel delusions of ideological superiority, to sanitise our textbooks and our discourse on history, to promote universal ethics of equality for all, and above all, to empower women. Let there be not a single law that discriminates between man and woman, Muslim and non-Muslim, and rich and poor. This is what we, the people of Pakistan, not just the government, or Nawaz Sharif, or the army, but the people who call themselves citizens of the state, need to do to redeem ourselves for our collective complacency which led to the tragedy of APS.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 22^nd, 2015.

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