Dear Israel… (V)
ISLAMABAD:
What Sami Shah is saying is exactly what I was discussing with a friend — the compulsion for exclusion. The indelible scar in the consciousness of the rest of the world of the Holocaust is what keeps such societies (which continue to be plagued by extremism and discrimination) from the brink of such an extreme reality ever again. Somehow, culturally and historically (I don’t know what to blame for this) we’ve bypassed this lesson completely. So much so that Holocaust denial and/or admiration of Hitler is used as a childish taunt. The fact that this is considered acceptable just underlines depth of our ignorance. But as a result, as a society we seem willing to test the limits of how far we will push exclusion, assured that the rest of the Muslim world is culturally and religiously just like us — our arrogance in our ignorance is astounding.
Published in the Express Tribune, June 5th, 2010.
What Sami Shah is saying is exactly what I was discussing with a friend — the compulsion for exclusion. The indelible scar in the consciousness of the rest of the world of the Holocaust is what keeps such societies (which continue to be plagued by extremism and discrimination) from the brink of such an extreme reality ever again. Somehow, culturally and historically (I don’t know what to blame for this) we’ve bypassed this lesson completely. So much so that Holocaust denial and/or admiration of Hitler is used as a childish taunt. The fact that this is considered acceptable just underlines depth of our ignorance. But as a result, as a society we seem willing to test the limits of how far we will push exclusion, assured that the rest of the Muslim world is culturally and religiously just like us — our arrogance in our ignorance is astounding.
Published in the Express Tribune, June 5th, 2010.