Consumption as a Lifestyle

While reading the article, Today's Consumption in Egypt by Mona Abaza, I could not help but notice again and again the parallels between the changes that have already happened in Egypt more than a decade ago and the rapid social changes happening in Pakistan today. Thanks, in part, to the neo-liberal economic reforms and opening up of our markets to multi-national corporations. This article focuses on only the consumption facet of these changes.

Consider this. In order to sell your products you need to have a certain demand for them in Pakistan. You create this demand by promulgating a certain lifestyle 'with a modern feel to it', you target certain segments of the population which have aspirations to become "modern" and can spend. You make their wants their needs and give them loans and credit cards for the immediate gratification of their desires. See these recent ads: ‘Pepsi’ here, ‘Capri’ here, ‘Jazz Share’ here, ‘Credit Card’ here. Good or bad, we can decide that later, but first, it is necessary to understand what is happening to Pakistani society.

I should also point out that my comparison (extrapolation) here is limited to mostly the middle classes in the urban areas in Pakistan. The rich always had these consumption trends. For the poor, these changes only increase their desires and frustration. See my notes at the bottom.

Image: Park Towers Mall in Karachi.

Excerpts from the article:

The New Consumption Trends

"During the last decade Cairo has witnessed a flowering of shopping malls, ATM and mobile phone use, resort-style recreation, and fast-food consuming, all of which represent a radical departure from previous Egyptian consumer habits. These new behaviours symbolize Egypt’s increasing integration into the world capitalist system, if not its growing participation in multiple dimensions of globalization.

"For those of us who grew up in Egypt during the era of Gamal Abdel Nasser in the sixties, we can still recall seeing in our households locally produced consumer durables from the Ideal national company. The stoves, refrigerators, metal cupboards, beds, and desks, while aesthetically unattractive, were functional.

"Sadat’s shift of alliance from the Soviet Union to the Western world in the early seventies was followed by the policy of the “open door,” or privatization at the expense of the “public sector” state monopolized large-scale industries. The shift from the Nasserite “state capitalist” era to full integration into the world capitalist system went hand in hand with encouraging consumerism and new lifestyles among Egyptians.

"Cairo alone boasts twenty-four shopping malls, all of which were constructed since 1989, Yamama Center being the first. They have even appeared in the most remote villages of the Egyptian Delta. Cairo´s supermarkets such as the French mega-store Carrefour, offer everything one can imagine, from household items, food, beverages to readymade home-delivered meals. ATM cards, almost unheard of some ten years ago, are becoming popular and ATM users are expected to reach around 10, 000 in the next ten years. The acquisition of mobile phones has risen significantly from 200,000 in 1999 to 4.9 million subscribers today, spurring increasing numbers of thefts and pickpockets of mobile phones. The newly created shopping malls, super hypermarkets, and mega-stores in Egypt are indicative of the dramatic transformation of consumption habits.

"Fancy restaurants and bars carrying ostentatious names like: La Bodega, Le Morocco, Le Peking, The Cellar, Justine, Villa Rosa, Cortigiani, Le Bistro Provencale, Sangria, Blues, and Casablanca are also multiplying. For the special occasion of Ramadan international five-star hotels like the Hilton, Marriott and Sheraton compete to offer the best iftars (the meal signifying the breaking of the fast) and traditional Ramadan evenings with oriental cuisine buffets, patchwork tents, shishas (water pipes) and entertainment that might even include whirling dervishes. The coffee shop culture has also become popular for middle class Egyptians. It would be erroneous to believe that this emerged only in the last decade. In fact, the sixties’ bourgeoisie had already adopted the café culture of the pre-Nasserite elite. Simonds of Zamalek, an Italian inspired coffee shop, had been the “in” place during the sixties competing with downtown cafés like Groppi, Lapas, the Indian Tea House, which were frequented mainly by Cairo’s elderly. These spaces were typical beau monde for parading and showing off. Today, the new coffee houses—and they are plenty—offer a mid-way solution for the younger generation of yuppies who can afford to pay for an over-priced drink, croissant, or a sandwich. Middle class Egyptians have in recent years been exposed to the culture of breakfasting on croissants, espresso and cappuccino’s, just as they have learned to eat Japanese, Italian, Thai, Indian, Iranian, and Lebanese food, thanks to the proliferation of restaurants that serve international cuisine.

"Leisure resorts, secondary residences, and walled and gated communities, such as Qattamiyya Heights and Beverley Hills, have multiplied in Egypt. Advertisements sell a simulated dream of grandiose villas located in new, mainly desert, communities outside the city. They are incorporated in larger condominium complexes that might include a swimming pool, a fitness centre, and, the ultimate, a golf course. In other words, everything that leads to a healthy, luxurious, and suburban life, the counter image to the rotting polluted old Cairo.

Young and Restless!

"Youngsters now have a number of affordable ways to spend time. They could go to the numerous internet cafes, bowling alleys, cinemas, or air-conditioned fast food chains, which are available both, in shopping malls, or as independent spaces. Discotheques and night clubs cater largely to the richer strata. Travel to the Far East has become an exotic tourist destination for the Egyptian rich who discover Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore; international music is widely available, and Arabic music video-clips are becoming increasingly hybridized. Popular satellite channels transmit programs with a “mixing” of, for instance, Indian and Thai dances and landscapes, Egyptian and Gulf young singers, and European and North American tastes and music.

Fulfillment or Frustration?

"Does intruding consumer culture, together with its simulative aspect for the poor, serve as an accommodative element with the galloping inflation and growing poverty? Would window shopping and aimless flanerie be sufficient replacements for consuming? Does window shopping, in other words, fulfill dreams or increase frustration? Or, as many have asked, can new consumer possibilities lead to forms of democratization? For example, do mobile phones carry a democratizing effect since, after all, “everybody” can own one? Today porters, maids, cooks, lower grade employees, and taxi drivers carry mobiles. Admittedly, mobile phones have facilitated communication and made life easier for the lower classes who might not even have home phone lines in their shanty housing areas. Mobiles are no longer a luxury item.

After the Egyptian pound was floated in 2003 and led to a nearly 40% inflation, many ask for how long more can the government hold power? One could argue that these sanitized and modern spaces, like shopping ma ls, serve merely as “clean air conditioned” spaces for escaping the crowded streets of Cairo, flirting, time spending, and possibly, shop lifting according to the recurring complaints of the managers of these malls. But today more than ever, the distinction between the haves and have-nots is flagrantly displayed; the boasting of wealth through consumerism can only sharpen class differences.

Observers acknowledge that the main opposition and forthcoming actors in the political arena will be the Islamists. Would these rising social actors adopt an accommodative attitude towards consumer culture or reject it as a form of West-toxication? The example of the young, new-age style preacher Amr Khaled reflects rather that for young middle class Egyptians most likely, a happy marriage between religion and consumer culture is in the making."

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The article makes it clear, but I want to emphasize again: I do not mean to imply in any way that in Pakistan we just do blind imitation of the West. Rather, we do what I like to call a "creative adoption" of things from the West, from India, and elsewhere (See this for an illustration). We observe things, we engage with them with our creative imagination, and then re-interpret them while giving it a local flavor in the adoption process. Our professionals educated in marketing psychology, business management, arts and media, economics, journalism, etc. consume and reproduce these trends in media and other avenues. "Can iftaar dinner be complete without Pepsi?" you hear that in ads during Ramazan. And love Pepsi as you sing "Dil Dil Pakistan"! Or, "Let's re-discover our cultural heritage" and "It's a form of art" which some channels use to wrap vulgarity and sell the viewers to products. The 'commercialization of culture' has many other problems too.

In addition to macro economic changes and the expansion of middle classes in Pakistan in the recent years, there are other internal and external factors that are crucial for any understanding what is happening to the society in Pakistan. For example, the education structure (schools, college, universities, professional institutes) has lengthen the duration of schooling for young people, and along with other social and economic factors, has expanded what we call the adolescence age between childhood and adulthood. You did not have this gap that much in agriculture based communities of our past, where a child would directly enter into adulthood, once he/she is able to work in the field/house, has attained puberty, and therefore, the logical next step was to get married, which was also a rite of passage from childhood to adulthood. That is not happening anymore, in the newly expanded middle classes. The new age group of adolescence is a reality today, but there is a vacuum of productive roles and activities for this age group (in our community especially), and this vacuum is being filled by the new lifestyle and consumption habits promulgated by media and other social outlets, as described above. Change is not bad in itself; it is good or bad depending on who is leading the change and in what direction. More on this some other time, inshallah.

Another quick thought. A trend is often observed in the newly expanded middle and upper classes in Pakistan: to show off their class status through spending and consumption, of a certain lifestyle, in housing, and on social occasions. Those that live in Pakistan know about the 'dekha dekhi' trend. Yet they are also familiar with the trend of aspiring to appear unique. (These tendencies are of course not limited to Pakistan. Materialism exists everywhere.). The struggle for uniqueness in weddings is an example - from the selection of invitation cards to the selection and decoration of the wedding hall, to the kind of food and how it is served, to what kind of make-up and dress the bride (and bridegroom) wears, and what kind of car does she comes in and leaves!

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Click on the tag/label “Materialism” (right column on top) to find other related posts in this blog.

Making of "Good" and "Bad" Muslims

Speaking of multiple players and their competition for dominating the public discourse in Pakistan (see my previous post), the below example points to yet another player and its contribution to the current political conditions.

From "Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror" (2005) by Mahmood Mamdani. Mahmood Mamdani quotes the below from Pervez Hoodbhoy.

"... children's textbooks designed ... by the University of Nebraska under a $50 million USAID grant that ran from September 1986 through June 1994. A third-grade mathematics textbook asks: "One group of maujahidin attack 50 Russian soldiers. In that attack 20 Russians are killed. How many Russians fled?" A fourth-grade textbook ups the ante: "The speed of a Kalashnikov [the ubiquitous Soviet-made semiautomatic machine gun] bullet is 800 meters per second. If a Russian is at a distance of 3200 meters from a mujahid, and that mujahid aims at the Russian's head, calculate how many seconds it will take for the bullet to strike the Russian in the forehead." The program ended in 1994, but the books continued to circulate: "US-sponsored textbooks, which exhort Afghan children to pluck out the eyes of their enemies and cut off their legs, are still available in Afghanistan and Pakistan, some in their original form" (pg. 137).

These books will become extinct within a few years but their effects will probably last for at least a generation.

Today the US propagates and supports the discourse of "enlightened moderation" in Pakistan. This discourse has a resonance with the predominantly liberal media, an example of which was given in the previous post (Umrao Jan Ada's Pakistan). I feel that we are already experiencing the polarizing effect of this discourse as it seeks to reduce a whole population into "Good" and "Bad" Muslims. In this discourse, Good Muslims are supposed to be moderate, peaceful, enlightened, with a progressive outlook. Bad Muslims are fundamentalist, violent, extremists, with dreams of taking history back to the 7th century!

This discourse seeks to control people's thoughts and actions. Think about the negative connotations now attached to the word "fundamentalist". "Are you a fundamentalist?" Well, if being fundamentalist means to believe in certain fundamentals of Islam, then all Muslims are fundamentalists! One needs to question the underlying assumptions and politics of this discourse. One should not let their political options restricted by the "either/or" logic. "Are you with us or with them?" Well, neither with you, nor with them!

Umrao Jan Ada's Pakistan

If you know Urdu and are in touch with Pakistani culture and media, you must know how popular the serialized TV plays are in Pakistan. You might have heard about a recent serialized television play called Umrao Jan Ada, which was aired on Geo TV in 2003. The serial was based on Mirza Hadi Ruswa's early twentieth century Urdu novel with the same title.

In what follows, are excerpts from an article, entitled "The Courtesans in the Living Room," by Kamran Ali, published in the ISIM Review in Spring 2005. The article analyzes the politics behind the recuperation of the Umrao Jan Ada story from the past by the predominantly liberal media for the purpose of influencing the contemporary moral discourse in Pakistan. The below analysis shows that media does more than merely reflecting the ground reality; it actively seeks to construct and mold public opinion in certain directions. The analysis in this article also provides a good example to explore the broader secular-liberal politics in the social and political spheres of the Pakistani society, especially, during the past few years of "enlightenment". I hinted at this politics in an earlier post where I talked about the 'discovery' of Bulleh Shah by our pop culture.

Before you read the excerpts, please do note that my intension in this post is to just highlight the liberal politics and the role of media. I do not intend to get into a discussion about the merits or problems of liberal notions of liberation, justice, and tolerance, and in contrast, what may be the alternative ways of looking at women's status and problems in Pakistan. Also, below is not a summary of the abovementioned article; I am only focusing only on certain aspects.

The Courtesans

"The courtesan (tawaif) has been a stock character in popular South Asian literature and movies. Indeed the “fallen woman” is universal in its appeal among readers of pulp and highbrow fiction. Yet in Pakistani films and literature the courtesan’s character remains intertwined in a morality play and almost always achieves a tragic end (mostly commits suicide), repents for her “wayward” behaviour or, extremely rarely, becomes a sharif bibi (respectable woman), which for a courtesan may be akin to a social death. In contrast, in Rusva’s novel the protagonist not only survives, but becomes a respectable poet and a wealthy patron of art without renouncing her past profession. In this sense the novel is unique in its empathetic treatment of courtesan culture.

"These interventions do put forward an argument for re-evaluating the space of sex workers in contemporary Pakistani society; Geo TV’s initiative can be understood as an extension of this thematic interest in courtesan life by liberal intellectuals. This opening allows Geo to produce Umrao in a country where extra marital sex legally remains a crime against the state and where memories of severe punishment for sexual liaisons under the Hudood Ordinance of the Zia-ul Haq era in the 1980s still resonate among the populace. Unlike the modest reach of the above-mentioned academic works, Geo’s production brought courtesan life into domestic spaces (50 million of 150 million Pakistanis have access to TV) as it also intervened into a debate on morality, sexuality, and gender politics in present day Pakistan. Why, one might ask, have Pakistan’s liberal intelligentsia and feminists chosen at this juncture to depict the life-world of the prostitute and the figure of the courtesan as metaphors to argue for sexual freedom and women’s autonomy?

Inside the Kotha

"As Umrao grows up accomplished in the various skills of courtesan life, she is much sought after by many members of the elite that frequent the kotha. She is eventually “given” for the first time to a respectable Nawab who retains the exclusive right to her company and maintains her through gifts and cash. This man becomes the first of many with whom Umrao is shown to, within the parameters of Pakistan’s censors, have a sustained sexual relationship. There are many twists and turns in the story, but Umrao is always characterized as an extremely sympathetic person — a victim of circumstances beyond her control — with whom the audience can empathize and identify. Periodically the play does remind us that Umrao is a courtesan (with its contemporary connotation of a prostitute) and hence allows for the audience to create a distance from her guilt-free sexual relationships. Yet despite the techniques that the director uses to distance us from the protagonist’s assertive sexual practices—perhaps to satisfy the censor—the audience is constantly exposed to and remains engrossed in Umrao’s various relationships.

In addition, life in the kotha itself is portrayed in extremely women friendly terms. There is camaraderie among the younger women in the household and the audience gets the sense of a caring family. The strongest person in the entire household is the chief courtesan, Khanum, who rules over the household as a deft diplomat who has the power of coercion always at her disposal. The interesting aspect of this household is the secondary and dependent nature of the men. In traditional kothas, as depicted in the serial, men occupied the more subservient roles of servants, doormen, musicians, and instructors. Men, of course, were also wealthy patrons and benefactors. But even they, within this domain, deferred to the immense power that these women wielded in their own space and treated the courtesans as equals.

A Liberal Fantasy of What "Tolerant Islam" Should Look Like

"Further, in contrast to Pakistan’s recent history of rising Islamic radicalism and the Islamization process of the Zia era, the play seeks to display a much more tolerant atmosphere not only in terms of gender relationships, but also in its depiction of Islamic authority. There is a retainer in the kotha, Moulvi Saheb, who is married to the main female servant in the household. Moulvi Saheb teaches Umrao the Quran and religion, literature, and morals. He is portrayed as a man of religion, yet accepts the lifestyle of his surroundings with ease and grace. Similarly, in one episode Umrao runs away with her paramour and ends up in an unknown village after being abandoned. Here she finds the shaykh of the local mosque who generously gives her shelter and then helps her to establish herself as a local courtesan with her own kotha and clientele. These portrayals use the midnineteenth century Muslim society in North India, and its imagined tolerant social space where religious leaders and courtesans could co-exist, to implicitly critique the moral and theological extremism of contemporary life.

The Politics

"The choice of Umrao Jan Ada to argue for women’s liberation and religious tolerance is an intriguing one. Historically modernist Muslim reformers of late nineteenth century opposed Nawabi culture, of which courtesan life was an integral part. Post-1857 Muslim reformers like the author Nazir Ahmed, Sayed Ahmed, the founder of Aligarh Muslim University, and the poet Altaf Husein Hali (inlcluding Deobandi religious reformers) in their writings argued against the extravagance, impiety, and ignorance of the Nawabi era, which according to them was the cause of Muslim backwardness. In contrast they advocated the pursuit of knowledge, piety, and restraint.

"It appears that the female director and script writer of Umrao sought to make an implicit argument against those tendencies of Muslim reformist thought, whether secular or religious (Deobandi), that asked women to distance themselves from the realm of custom which was deemed superstitious, un-Islamic, and irrational. This reformism indeed aided some women to gain more rights within the emerging middle-class household. For example, literacy skills along with modes of reformed behaviour did open spaces for women to articulate their rights in marriage and property. Yet, these gains were at the cost of losing separate spheres of female activity that were condemned by the modern reformists as the realm of the nafs, the area of lack of control and disorder. The creators of this play through their depiction of female spaces, use the mid-nineteenth century milieu to invoke this sense of disorder/sexual themes and link it to an older oral tradition of women’s narrative construction and other forms of popular performances—the arena of reformist attack—to make a more contemporary case for women’s emancipation and equity.

In invoking this past the producers present an alternative narrative of custom, traditional space, and Muslim religious practice. This move to reinvent the past as tolerant and inclusive is linked to a liberal political agenda that is in opposition to an earlier generation of modernist thinkers. Using late-nineteenth century North India as a backdrop, this serial confronts the more homogenizing elements of Islamic politics in Pakistani society; a major political task for liberals in present day Pakistan. The play’s implicit portrayal of a more tolerant and inclusive national entity interestingly enough also relates to President General Musharraf’s propagated rhetoric of a modern, moderate, and Muslim Pakistan. This resonance perhaps allows liberal intellectuals the space to use media outlets to promote agendas of diverse freedoms and tolerance without the fear of state censorship. The long-term implications of this tentative cultural alliance between liberals and the Military junta require a detailed discussion and analysis that cannot be provided here. However, in conclusion I would raise another politically important question that the liberal intelligentsia rarely confronts. As issues of gender equity and tolerant Islam are emphasized in the play, the idiom of this discussion remains within the parameters of high Urdu culture. In this play as in others, the depiction of late nineteenth century North Indian life is depicted as Pakistani Muslim culture and in doing so remains oblivious to extremely vital issues of cultural and linguistic diversity within Pakistan.

The Question of Diversity

"Since Pakistan’s independence in 1947, Urdu’s dominance of the cultural center has bred a sense of exclusion among other linguistic groups (Pashtun, Sindhi, Punjabi, Baluch, among others) hindering the emergence of a national culture that democratically includes the diverse voices and languages present in Pakistani cultural spectrum. Where Geo’s Umrao Jan Ada tackles the issue of female emancipation using North Indian ashraf (respectable Muslim elite) culture, it addresses an audience that is also culturally steeped in other traditions, vernaculars, and cultural ethos. The imposition of nineteenth century high Urdu culture, though in this case ostensibly well meaning, retains within it the hegemonic aspect of centralizing state projects of cultural homogeneity which have continued to undermine the rights of the various linguistic and cultural groups that constitute Pakistan. In this sense the liberal feminist agenda in its attempt to re-interpret “tradition” and Muslim social practice in South Asia, may still be entangled in modernist projects where experiences of specific linguistic groups who have a longer urban history (as in the case with Urdu speakers) takes precedence over practices of other ethnicities. A more inclusive cultural politics may yet require a sensitivity toward the diverse histories of the various peoples who inhabit Pakistan."

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Insightful and provocative, isn't it! I won't comment any further on the above analysis, but would like to point to a useful sociological framework to evaluate the abovementioned politics.

The above analysis helps us identify the different players/groups competing in, what Bourdieu would call, the "cultural field". They each bring their "habitus" (outlook, cultural values, practices) and their capital (ability to influence) to dominate the field. The players in this case are the liberals, the reformist-Islamists, the traditionalists, and the non-Urdu-speaking groups. Depending on a group's capital, as well as support from the adjacent fields (of political and economic, among others), a group is able to gain dominance in the cultural field, if only for sometime. Other groups keep exerting their opposition to resist this dominance, so the dominant group has to continuously invest its energies to maintain its dominance. In the cultural field, it would be through continuously shaping public opinion and cultural discourse.

Now, if we place the different players of the Pakistani cultural politics in this framework, we can see how certain groups were dominant under Zia-ul Haq's regime and how others are under Musharraf's blessings. And how in each episode, the dominant group tried to re-write history and shape cultural discourse, through all available means of reaching out to the people. Print and electronic news and entertainment media is one example. Re-writing textbooks and formation of education boards with set agendas under both regimes is another.

This framework should also help us analyze the competition surrounding the very existential question for Pakistan for the last sixty years: What is Pakistan's identity, who should we - the Pakistanis - identify with in our cultural outlook and practices, or should we have our own unique culture, but who would determine that culture and on what basis, and why should others allow one person or group to do this determination for all others?!!

Mystical Murmuring

Mera dard, naghma-e be-sada
meri zaat, zarra-e be-nishaan

Mere dard ko jo zuban mile
mujhe apna naam-o nishaan mile

Meri zaat ka jo nishan mile
mujhe raaz-e nazm-e-jahan mile

Jo mujhe ye raz-e nihan mile
meri khamoshi ko bayan mile

Mujhe ka'ynaat ki sarwari
mujhe daulat-e do-jahan mile

- Faiz

Some may find this 'mystical' reading of Faiz rather surprising. I can only suggest reading this poem more closely. My 'mystical' reading is limited to the meanings expressed in this poem only; I am not making any extrapolations about Faiz's worldview or on his other works.

Dua Kumayl: The Supplication of the Distressed Hearts

Crying is the universal language of pain. Supplication enriches its vocabulary and experience.

The below excerpt is from the supplication popularly known as Dua Kumayl. This supplication was taught by Imam Ali to his companion, Kumayl Ibn Ziyad Nakha'i.

The sublime and timeless character of this dua becomes evident from the very first reading. Further recitation of this dua and mastery of its subtle meanings has a transcending effect. Each time its recitation reveals a new dimension of spiritual experience and expresses the inner pain of the seeker in a unique way. It is said that Dua Kumayl has enough light and guidance for anyone wishing to take the first step into wayfaring or spiritual journey toward Allah.

The other name of this dua, Al-Khidr's Supplication, also illuminates its 'la-fani' (ageless) character. Khidr, a figure who appears in Quran and in Islamic traditions, could be the name of a role (of Imam or Guide) or a single person, but a transhistorical character in either case, not confined by the limits of time or place.

I recommend watching its Arabic recitation with English and Farsi subtitles here. The recitation of the below excerpt starts at 10:39.

A Passage from Dua Kumayl

"But now I have turned to Thee, my Lord, after being guilty of omissions and transgressions against my soul, apologetically, repentantly, broken heartedly, entreating earnestly for forgiveness, yieldingly confessing (to my guilt), as I can find no escape from that which was done by me and having no refuge to which I could turn except seeking Thy acceptance of my excuse and admitting me into the realm of Thy capacious mercy.

O Allah! Accept my apology and have pity on my intense sufferings and set me free from my heavy fetters (of evil deeds).

My Nourisher! Have mercy on the infirmity of my body, the delicacy of my skin and the brittleness of my bones.

O' Thou! Who originated my creation and (accorded me) my individuality, and (ensured) my upbringing and welfare (and provided) my sustenance (I beg Thee) to restore Thy favours and blessings upon me as Thou didst in the beginning of my life.

O' my God! My Master! My Lord! And my Nourisher! What! Wilt Thou see me punished with the fire kindled by Thee despite my belief in Thy unity? And despite the fact that my heart has been filled with (pure) knowledge of Thee and when my tongue has repeatedly praised Thee and my conscience has acknowledged Thy love and despite my sincere confessions (of my sins) and my humble entreaties submissively made to Thy divinity?

Nay, Thou art far too kind and generous to torment one whom thyself nourished and supported, or to drive away from Thyself one whom Thou has kept under Thy protection, or to scare away one whom Thy self hast given shelter, or to abandon in affliction one Thou hast maintained and to whom Thou hast been merciful.

I wish I had known o' my Master, my God and my Lord! Wilt Thou inflict fire upon faces which have submissively bowed in prostration to Thy greatness, or upon the tongues which have sincerely confirmed Thy unity and have always expressed gratitude to Thee, or upon hearts which have acknowledged Thy divinity with conviction, or upon the minds which accumulated so much knowledge of Thee until they became submissive to Thee, or upon the limbs which strove, at the places appointed for Thy worship, to adore Thee willingly and seek Thy forgiveness submissively?

Such sort (of harshness) is not expected from Thee as it is remote from Thy grace, O' Generous One!

O' Lord! Thou art aware of my weakness to bear even a minor affliction of this world and its consequence and adversity affecting the denizen of this earth, although such afflictions are momentary, short-lived and transient.

How then can I bear the retributions and the punishments of the hereafter which are enormous and of intensive sufferings, of prolonged period and perpetual duration, and which shall never be alleviated for those who deserve the same as those retributions will be the result of Thy wrath; and Thy punishment which neither the heavens nor the earth can withstand and bear!

My Lord! How can I, a weak, insignificant, humble, poor and destitute creature of Thine be able to bear them?

O' my God! My Lord! My King! And Master! Which of the matters shall I complain to Thee and for which of them shall I bewail and weep?

Shall I bewail for the pains and pangs of the punishment and their intensity or for the length of sufferings and their duration?

Therefore (my Lord!) If Thou wilt subject me to the penalties (of hell) in company of Thy enemies and cast me with those who merited Thy punishments and tear me apart from Thy friends and those who will be near to Thee, then my God, my Lord and my Master, though I may patiently bear Thy punishments, how can I endure separation from Thee?

If I may be able to patiently endure the scorching fire of Thy hell, yet how can I endure not gazing upon Thy generosity? How can I remain in the fire while I have hopes of Thy forgiveness?

O' my Lord! By Thy honour truly do I swear that, if Thou wilt allow my power of speech to be retained by me in the hell, I shall amongst its inmates cry out bewailingly unto Thee like the cry of those who have faith in Thy kindness and compassion.

And I shall bemoan for Thee (for being deprived of nearness to Thee) the lamentation of those who are bereaved, and I shall keep on calling unto Thee:

"Where art Thou O' Friend of the believers! [Ya Waliyal Momineen]

O' (Thou who art) the last resort and the ultimate goal of those who acknowledge Thee [Ya Ghayata Aamalil 'Aarefeen];

O' Thou who art the helper of those seeking help! [Ya Ghiyathal Mustaghetheen]

O' Thou who art dear to the hearts of those who truly believe in Thee! [Ya Habiba Quloobis Sadeqeen]

And O' Thou who art the Lord of the universe [Ya Ilahal 'Aalameen]."

My Lord! Glory and praise be to Thee, wouldst Thou (wish) to be seen (disregarding) the voice of Thy slave, incarcerated therein (the hell) for his disobedience and imprisoned within its pits for his evildoings and misdeeds, crying out to Thee the utterance of one who has faith in Thy mercy and calling out to Thee in the language of those who believe in Thy Tawheed [the One, the Creator, the Nourisher, the Accomplisher, and the Protector of the entire existence] and seeking to approach Thee by means of Thy Lordship?

My Lord! Then how could he remain in torments when he hopefully relies upon Thy past forbearance, compassion and mercy?

And how can the fire cause him suffering when he hopes for Thy grace and mercy and how can its roaring flames burn him when Thou hearest his voice and sees his plight? And how can he withstand its roaring flames when Thou knowest his frailness? And how can he be tossed about between its layers when Thou knowest his sincerity? And how can the guards of hell threaten him when he calls out to Thee?

"My Lord", and how would Thou abandon him therein (the hell) when he has faith in Thy Grace to set him free?

Alas! That is not the concept (held by us) of Thee nor has Thy Grace such a reputation nor does it resemble that which Thou hast awarded by Thy kindness and generosity to those who believe in Thy Tawheed.

I definitely conclude that hadst Thou not ordained punishment for those who disbelieved in Thee, and hadst Thou not decreed Thy enemies to remain in hell, Thou wouldst have made the hell cold and peaceful and there would never have been an abode or place for any one in it; but sanctified be Thy Names, Thou hast sworn to fill the hell with the disbelievers from amongst the jinns and hummankind together and to place forever Thy enemies therein.

And Thou, exalted be Thy praises, hadst made manifest, out of Thy generosity and kindness, that 'the one who has submitted is not equal to the one who has not.'

My Lord! My Master! I, therefore implore Thee by that power which Thou determineth and by the decree which Thou hast finalised and ordained whereby Thou hath prevailed upon whom Thou hast imposed it, to bestow upon me this night and this very hour the forgiveness for all the transgressions that I have been guilty of, for all the sins that I have committed, for all the loathsome acts that I have kept secret and for all the evils done by me, secretly or openly, in concealment or outwardly and for every evil action that Thou hast ordered the two noble scribes to confirm whom Thou hast appointed to record all my actions and to be witnesses over me along with the limbs of my body, whilst Thou observeth over me besides them and wast witness to those acts concealed from them? Which Thou in Thy mercy hast kept secret and through Thy kindness unexposed.

And I pray to Thee to make my share plentiful in all the good that Thou dost bestow; in all the favours that Thou dost grant; and in all the virtues that Thou dost allow to be known everywhere; and in all the sustenance and livelihood that Thou dost expand and in respect of all the sins that Thou dost forgive and the wrongs that Thou dost cover up.

O' Lord! O' Lord! O' Lord! O' my God! My Lord! My Master! O' Owner of my existence! O' Thou who holdeth my destiny and who art aware of my suffering and poverty, O' Thou who knoweth my destitution and starvation, o' my Lord! O' Lord, o' Lord!

I beseech Thee by Thy glory and Thy honour, by Thy supremely high attributes and by Thy names to cause me to utilise my time, day and night, in Thy remembrance, by engaging myself in serving Thee (Thy cause) and to let my deeds be such as to be acceptable to Thee, so much so that all my actions and offerings (prayers) may be transformed into one continuous and sustained effort and my life may take the form of constant and perpetual service to Thee [wird'un waahida=unified litany].

O' my Master! O' Thou upon Whom I rely! O' Thou unto Whom I express my distress! O' my Lord! My Lord! My Lord! Strengthen my limbs for Thy service and sustain the strength of my hands to persevere in Thy service and bestow upon me the eagerness to fear Thee [Khash-yatik - internalizing His Presence in the heart] and unceasing continuity to serve Thee.

So that I may lead myself towards Thee in the field with those who are in the fore-rank and be swift towards Thee among those who hasten towards Thee and urge eagerly to be near Thee and draw myself towards Thee like them who sincerely draw themselves towards Thee and to fear Thee like the fear of those who believe firmly in Thee and thus I may join the congregation of the faithful congregated near Thee (for protection)."

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You can access the full translation from here. I have made minor edits in the above translation. The translation in the abovementioned clip is a bit different. You may find it useful to compare the two.

Of course, these translations are no comparison to the original Arabic and the depth of meaning one can derive from the original. For example, look at the part (at the beginning of the above excerpt) that has been translated as "O' Thou! Who originated my creation and (accorded me) my individuality..."; the Arabic says, "Ya man bada' khalqi wa zikri". The last word is 'zikri', which means 'my remembrance'. It can also mean 'my being worth-something'. One can relate it to the exoteric and esoteric meanings of the profound Quranic verse from the Chapter al-Insaan (Human):

هَلْ أَتَى عَلَى الْإِنسَانِ حِينٌ مِّنَ الدَّهْرِ لَمْ يَكُن شَيْئًا مَّذْكُورًا

"There surely came over man a period of time when he was a thing not worth mentioning."

The word for "worth mentioning" is 'mazkora' in the above verse and is from the same root ('zikr') as 'zikri'.

Along with the first verse, the next two verses read as follow: "There surely came over man a period of time when he was a thing not worth mentioning. Surely We have created man from a small life-germ uniting (itself): We mean to try him, so We have made him hearing, seeing. Surely We have shown him the way: he may be thankful or unthankful" (Quran 76 1-3).

Now, in the context of the above verses, read that full sentence and savor the sublimity!

"O' Thou! Who originated my creation and (accorded me) my individuality, and (ensured) my upbringing and welfare (and provided) my sustenance (I beg Thee) to restore Thy favours and blessings upon me as Thou didst in the beginning of my life."

Come My Love, Take Care of Me

Come my love, take care of me,
I am in great agony.

Ever separated, my dreams are dreary.
Looking for you, my eyes are weary.
All alone I am robbed in a desert,
Waylaid by a bunch of waywards.

The Mullah and Qazi show me the way,
Their maze of dharma that is in sway.
They are the confirmed thieves of time.
They spread their net of saintly crime.

Their time-worn norms are seldom right,
With these they chain my feet so tight!
My love cares not for caste or creed.
To the ritual faith I pay no heed.

My Master lives on yonder bank
While I am caught in the gale of greed.
With his boat at anchor, He stands in wait
I must hasten, I can't be late.

Bulleh Shah must find his love,
He needn't have the least fright.
His love is around, yet he looks for Him
Misled in the broad daylight.

Come my love, take care of me,
I am in great agony.

- Bulleh Shah

Translated by Kartar Singh Duggal (Source)

The Promise of Love

I wanted to share a very famous mystical poem (ghazal) by Imam Khomeini here. I do not find myself competent enough to comment on the deep meanings that are conveyed through subtle allegorical symbolism in this poem. But the radiance of this poem should be immediately felt by the discerning readers. I read this poem as the promise of ishq (love) to the wanderers. (Click on the below image to view in larger size.)


I have become imprisoned, O beloved, by the mole on your lip!

I saw your ailing eyes and became ill through love.

Delivered from self, I beat the drum of "I am the Real!"

Like Hallaj, I became a customer for the top of the gallows.

Heartache for the beloved has thrown so many sparks into my soul

That I have been driven to despair and become the talk of the bazaar!

Open the door of the tavern and let us go there day and night,

For I am sick and tired of the mosque and seminary.

I have torn off the garb of asceticism and hypocrisy,

Putting on the cloak of the tavern-haunting shaykh and becoming aware.

The city preacher has so tormented me with his advice

That I have sought aid from the breath of the wine-drenched profligate.

Leave me alone to remember the idol-temple,

I who have been awakened by the hand of the tavern's idol.

- Imam Khomeini

Translated by William Chittick. Similar to what we see in Urdu ghazals, it appears that the above ghazal does not have a title. Perhaps Farsi and Urdu both share this tradition/style in the ghazal genre.

I heard from a good source that Imam Khomeini wrote the above poem after the Revolution toward the end of his life. Those that consider the combination of gnostic and political a paradox should look into the lives of those that inspired him - the Prophets and the Imams and their nobles lives. As Quran describes their missions, to Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammad (peace be upon them all), political was never separated from the spiritual. In fact, it was their spirituality and compassion for their fellow human beings that defined the principles of their political struggles.

For further reading, I highly recommend reading Dr. Hamid Algar's excellent essay "The Fusion of the Gnostic and the Political in the Personality and Life of Imam Khomeini" (see here).

See here for a collection of other mystical poems by Imam Khomeini (the translations are not that great though). See an interpretation of the above poem at this link.

[Edit Oct 2009: Found an Urdu translation from the backcover of a friend's book. Apologies for the poor quality of this image, taken with my cell phone. Click on the image to view larger.]

Come to My Abode, My Friend

From Baba Bulleh Shah, I copy below a kaafi with treasures of wisdom for the wanderers. The poem not only has Bulleh Shah's characteristic dissenting voice and yearning for the Truth, but it also exhorts the reader that Truth cannot be found without cleaning one's nafs from the vices of this world. Only a clean heart, free from the dirt and filthiness of materialism, can experience and reflect His Divine light, including an all-embracing love and compassion for all humankind.

Saadhe verhe aaya kar

O beloved one:
If God were to be found by bathing and washing,
then God would be found by fish and frogs.

If God were to be found by roaming in jungle,
then God would be found by cows and buffaloes.

O Mian Bulleh
God is found by hearts righteous and pure.

You have read a thousand books
but have you read your 'self'?

You rush to mosques and temples
in indecent haste,
have you tried to enter your 'self'?

You are enagged in
needless battle with Shaitan
have you ever fought with your 'nafs'?

You have reached the sky
But have failed to reach
what's in your heart!

Come to my abode, My friend
morning, noon and night!

Destroy the mosque,
destroy the temple
do as you please;
do not break the human heart
for God dwells therein!

I search for You in jungle and wilderness
I have searched far and wide.
Do not torment me thus My Love
morning, noon and night!

Come to my abode, My Love
morning, noon and night!

- Bulleh Shah

Translation by Raza Rumi (source)

PAIN IS YOUR BEGINNING...

O' Wanderer!

Pain is your beginning...

If it were not for the pain, life would be so meaningless and absurd. The first pain is that of other hearts that you feel in your own heart. The second pain is the 'wahshat' (vacuum and agony) in your soul.

The first pain realizes the suffering of human beings around you and makes you restless. This pain is also your only attachment to them at the moment. It makes you strive for justice to better their conditions, because relentless striving is the only way you know can ease this pain.

The second pain has made your heart realize that nothing can comfort your soul except the blissful Wine from The Ultimate Reality. You also realize that this pain is as painful as the first one, but it is also different. It is in a way also a fulfillment, involving pleasure; however, this pain can also intensify over time and make the 'wahshat' much worse and tormenting, unless...

O' Wanderer, you realize that pain is an immediate inner experience that does not require any rational proof or repetition for validation. One realizes it immediately when one opens eyes in this world and expresses it through crying - crying is such a universal language of pain, for infants and adults alike. Hence, even if the whole world around you is a fiction, your pain is still real.

Life was never meaningless or absurd to you because there is pain. You felt it right from the very first moment of your presence in this world.

Pain is your beginning...

But, O' Wanderer, know that there also exist other realities and higher stations. Ishq (love) that you only through pain has many more colors which you need to discover. And along with pain, ishq can guide you to your home!

- Your Heart, the Consciousness of your Soul.

Missing in Pakistan - Documentary

"Missing in Pakistan", a documentary by Ziad Zafar, presents a heartbreaking account of the plight of hundreds of disappeared people and their families in Pakistan. These people are in illegal detention by the intelligence agencies. The documentary is informally circulating in Pakistan and could be downloaded from the net (24 min long, see here)

My quick thoughts:

The documentary is timely and to the point. It correctly points to the two major factors that determine Pakistani politics: the American geo-strategic interests and the politico-economic interests of the military establishment. It is important to note that religious extremism and sectarianism in Pakistan have always been the function of these two factors. The American selfish interests in the region and the failure of political process since the establishment of Pakistan are the real causes behind religious extremism. Busharraf's war on terror is failing. This war is itself a form of and a cause of growing terrorism in the region.

The individuals that are involved in militant organizations and terrorist activities should be brought to justice. But it should be done through given constitutional and criminal procedures instead of extra-judicial kidnappings and killings. The support by certain social classes in the urban areas for Busharraf’s dictatorial rule and war on terror (against the fear of so-called Islamists) is backfiring now in the form of emergency rule. Because illegitimate and unpopular power has its own logic. It does not distinguish between one type of body from the other - one type of citizen from another - militant or otherwise - when it comes to the question of preserving itself. The history of dictatorships in Pakistan - military and democratic - provide plenty of examples where in the name of National Integrity, Development, Islamization, and more recently, Curbing Islamic Extremism and War on Terror, the state has suppressed dissenting voices, liberties, and freedom of its citizens.

Notice the list of missing people at the end of the documentary. Try to guess the backgrounds of people through their names. Are they only what the state likes to call the Militants? Or, does the list also include the Baloch, the Muhajir, the Pashtoon, the Sunni, the Shia, the Liberal, the Human Rights Activist, the Journalist - all citizens of Pakistan?

In the Image: The cry of a mother begging for her son. The most painful scene from this documentary.

Faiz again helps me express my deeper feelings:

Nisar mein teri galiyon ke

Nisaar mein teri galiyon peh ai watan, keh jahan
Chali hai rasm keh koi na sar utha keh chale
Jo koi chahane wala tawaaf ko nikale
Nazar chura keh chale, Jismo-jan bacha keh chale
Hai ahel-e-dil ke liye ab yeh nazm-e-bast-o-kushaad
Keh sang-o-khisht muqayyad hain aur sag aazad

Bahut hain zulm keh dast-e-bahana-ju keh liye
Jo chund ahel-e-junoon tere naam leva hain
Baney hain ahel-e-hawas muddai bhi, munsif bhi
Kise wakil karen, kis-se munsifi chahen

Magar Guzaarane walon ke din guzarate hain
Tere firaq mein yun subah-o-shaam karate hain

Bujha jo raozan-e-zindan to dil yeh samajha hai
Keh teri maang sitaron se bhar gai hogi
Chamak uthe hain salasil to humne jaana hai
Keh ab sahar tere rukh par bikhar gai hogi

Gharaz tasvvur-e-shaam-o-sahar mein jeete hai
Giraft-e-saaya-e-diwaar-o-dar mein jeete hain

Yuhin hamesha ulajhati rahi hai zulm se khalq
Na unki rasm nai hai, na apni reet nai
Yuhin hamesha khilaye hain humne aag mein phool
Na unki haar nai hai na apni jeet nai

Isi sabab se falak ka gilaa nahin karate
Tere firaq mein hum dil bura nahin karate

Gar aaj tujhse juda hain to kal baham hongey
Yeh raat bhar ki judai to koi baat nahin
Gar aaj auj peh hai taal-e-raqib to kya
Yeh chaar din ki khudai to koi baat nahin

Jo tujhse ahad-o-wafa ustuvaar rakhate hain
Ilaaj-e-gardishe lailo-nihaar rakhate hain.

- Faiz (Dast-i Saba, 1953)
(Faiz’s recitation, audio excerpt)

We All Need Heroes

I recently came across with Howard Zinn and Rebecca Stefoff's "A Young People's History of the United States." This is a condensed and simplified version of Zinn's classic work with almost the same title and does not miss the insights and dissenting spirit of the original work. This condensed version is aimed at reaching the younger generation.

Wanted to share a quote from the backcover of Volume I:

"We all need heroes, people to admire, to see as examples of how human beings should live. But I prefer to see Bartolomé de Las Casas as a hero, for exposing Columbus's violent behavior against the Indians he encountered in the Bahamas. I prefer to see the Cherokee Indians as heroes, for resisting their removal from the lands on which they lived. To me, it is Mark Twain who is a hero, because he denounced President Theodore Roosevelt after Roosevelt had praised an American general who had massacred hundreds of people in the Phillippines. I consider Helen Keller a hero because she protested against President Woodrow Wilson's decision to send young Americans into the slaughterhouse of the First World War. My point of view, which is critical of war, racism and economic injustice, carries over to the situation we face in the United States today." - Howard Zinn

Related SM Posts:
Thanksgiving or Thanks-Taking
Justice and Resistance

On Global Disparities

Watch a segment from the documentary "We" here. In this segment Arundhati Roy, the writer and activist, talks about the ever-widening disparities between the rich and the poor in the world today.

Roy's comments in this segment end at a very insightful point where she says that both socialism and market capitalism are inherently flawed and are bound to fail. Because both are conjured up by the human-mind but they destroy themselves by human nature!

I am reminded here of Shaheed Sadr's profound analysis at the beginning of his book, Our Philosophy (here). Any social system that does not take into account the various dimensions of human nature, including the material and the spiritual; any system that does not have a program for curing the problems in hearts and for developing the good potentials in human souls, and only focuses upon the material factors, is bound to fail - be they the socialist states or the welfare systems anchored in capitalist economies. Similarly, a movement that focuses only on reforming the system, but no concern for reforming and disciplining hearts, can't go very far. Because ego and vices of hearts often lead to internal disputes, competition, factionalization, corruption, and abuse of power. These problems become especially visible once the common enemy is removed from the scene and/or once these movements get hold of power.

Islam is against materialism because materialism causes social injustice and oppression. But also because Islam wants to nurture the inner spirituality and other potential noble qualities in human beings, and materialism ('slavery of this world') takes them in exactly the opposite direction. Often non-religious movements choose to resist materialism because of its consequences on society; that is, they resist materialism for instrumental (means to ends) reasons. Islam, however, places importance on simplicity and modesty because they are valuable in themselves for human perfection. Hence, even if the world becomes full of resources and everyone has more than what he/she needs, Islam would still stress on simplicity and modesty in the lifestyles and pursuits of its followers. With its ideals of human perfection and emphasis on the eternal life in the hereafter, Islam provides a powerful rational and emotional stimulus for individuals to abstain from materialism and channel their self-interest into attaining lofty human ideals and qualities. I would discuss this point further in another post, Inshallah. In addition to the abovementioned text of Shaheed Sadr, you can also refer to Shaheed Mutahhari's following works: "Spiritual Discourses" and "Perfect Man."

Back to Roy's documentary. I highly recommend watching the whole documentary, here. It is a very thoughtful reflection on our state of affairs, at the current juncture of the history of human civilization. The documentary is based on a critically acclaimed speech delivered in 2002 by the award winning author and activist Arundhati Roy. The speech has been turned into a fast paced, musical documentary with the title 'We'. The issues reflected on in 'We' range from sep 11, wars, palestine, and kashmir to corporation, global inequality, and sweatshops, and many others, all thematically connected through a longing for justice for all.

A quote from Arundhati Roy from elsewhere:

“In the midst of putative peace, a writer can, like I did, be unfortunate enough to stumble on a silent war. The trouble is that once you see it, you can’t unsee it. And once you’ve seen it, keeping quiet, saying nothing, becomes as political an act as speaking out.”

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Click on the tag/label “Materialism” (right column on top) to find other related posts in this blog.

Materialism and Its Discontents

Let's look at materialism at the structural level. By 'structural' I primarily refer to the institutions of politics and economics in the global as well as national contexts. How these structure human relations in society, how they stratify and differentially treat people in different groups - economic classes, racial majorities and minorities, women, elderly, immigrants, and so on.

While reading the wonderful speech by Arundhati Roy which I quote below I could not help but think about the description of 'Dajjal' given in our religious sources. Can't today the Dajjal of New Imperialism, with 'materialism' as its single eye through which it perceives and scrutinizes the world, make the earth heaven for some people and hell for other people? Can't it place mountains of food and resources for people who follow it and deprive others of even a single loaf of bread who do not follow it? Does it not try to lure people with promises of heaven (happiness) and hell (suffering) on earth?

A much argued issue is that of who controls this system? A few multi-national institutions, a few economies of the so-called developed world, or something else? In other words, where do we locate the power and coercion of this materialistic system? The question of power is important because it explains, at least partially, why do people who do not benefit from this system still follow it?

Materialism can be seen in the myriad of practices of global capitalist institutions (corporations, international financial institutions, neoliberal policies) enforced by a global coercion, what Tom Friedman likes to call 'the hidden fist'. See here. Most of world resources are today controlled by a few powers/economies, and in a sense, these powers/economies (try to) determine heaven and hell for people on earth. For example, they can shrink the economies of the Asian Tigers into half almost overnight in 1997 (See Asian Financial Crisis). And yet they can protect the dictatorial and corrupt regimes around the world through military support and economic Aid, no matter how unpopular these regimes may be among their own people.

Scholars find so many parallels between these practices and the pre-21st century colonialism/imperialism that they like to name these practices as manifestations of a 'New Imperialism'.

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Excerpts from Do Turkeys Enjoy Thanksgiving?, a speech delivered by Arundhati Roy on January 16, 2004.

"LAST JANUARY thousands of us from across the world gathered in Porto Allegre in Brazil and declared — reiterated — that "Another World is Possible". A few thousand miles north, in Washington, George Bush and his aides were thinking the same thing.

Our project was the World Social Forum. Theirs — to further what many call The Project for the New American Century.

In the great cities of Europe and America, where a few years ago these things would only have been whispered, now people are openly talking about the good side of Imperialism and the need for a strong Empire to police an unruly world. The new missionaries want order at the cost of justice. Discipline at the cost of dignity. And ascendancy at any price. Occasionally some of us are invited to `debate' the issue on `neutral' platforms provided by the corporate media. Debating Imperialism is a bit like debating the pros and cons of rape. What can we say? That we really miss it?

In any case, New Imperialism is already upon us. It's a remodelled, streamlined version of what we once knew. For the first time in history, a single Empire with an arsenal of weapons that could obliterate the world in an afternoon has complete, unipolar, economic and military hegemony. It uses different weapons to break open different markets. There isn't a country on God's earth that is not caught in the cross hairs of the American cruise missile and the IMF chequebook. Argentina's the model if you want to be the poster-boy of neoliberal capitalism, Iraq if you're the black sheep.

Poor countries that are geo-politically of strategic value to Empire, or have a `market' of any size, or infrastructure that can be privatized, or, god forbid, natural resources of value — oil, gold, diamonds, cobalt, coal — must do as they're told, or become military targets. Those with the greatest reserves of natural wealth are most at risk. Unless they surrender their resources willingly to the corporate machine, civil unrest will be fomented, or war will be waged. In this new age of Empire, when nothing is as it appears to be, executives of concerned companies are allowed to influence foreign policy decisions. The Centre for Public Integrity in Washington found that nine out of the 30 members of the Defence Policy Board of the U.S. Government were connected to companies that were awarded defence contracts for $ 76 billion between 2001 and 2002. George Shultz, former U.S. Secretary of State, was Chairman of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. He is also on the Board of Directors of the Bechtel Group. When asked about a conflict of interest, in the case of a war in Iraq he said, " I don't know that Bechtel would particularly benefit from it. But if there's work to be done, Bechtel is the type of company that could do it. But nobody looks at it as something you benefit from." After the war, Bechtel signed a $680 million contract for reconstruction in Iraq.

This brutal blueprint has been used over and over again, across Latin America, Africa, Central and South-East Asia. It has cost millions of lives. It goes without saying that every war Empire wages becomes a Just War. This, in large part, is due to the role of the corporate media. It's important to understand that the corporate media doesn't just support the neo-liberal project. It is the neo-liberal project. This is not a moral position it has chosen to take, it's structural. It's intrinsic to the economics of how the mass media works.

"A government's victims are not only those that it kills and imprisons. Those who are displaced and dispossessed and sentenced to a lifetime of starvation and deprivation must count among them too. Millions of people have been dispossessed by `development' projects. In the past 55 years, Big Dams alone have displaced between 33 million and 55 million people in India. They have no recourse to justice.

In the last two years there has been a series of incidents when police have opened fire on peaceful protestors, most of them Adivasi and Dalit. When it comes to the poor, and in particular Dalit and Adivasi communities, they get killed for encroaching on forest land, and killed when they're trying to protect forest land from encroachments — by dams, mines, steel plants and other `development' projects. In almost every instance in which the police opened fire, the government's strategy has been to say the firing was provoked by an act of violence. Those who have been fired upon are immediately called militants.

Across the country, thousands of innocent people including minors have been arrested under POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act) and are being held in jail indefinitely and without trial. In the era of the War against Terror, poverty is being slyly conflated with terrorism. In the era of corporate globalisation, poverty is a crime. Protesting against further impoverishment is terrorism. And now, our Supreme Court says that going on strike is a crime. Criticising the court of course is a crime, too. They're sealing the exits.

Like Old Imperialism, New Imperialism too relies for its success on a network of agents — corrupt, local elites who service Empire. We all know the sordid story of Enron in India. The then Maharashtra Government signed a power purchase agreement which gave Enron profits that amounted to sixty per cent of India's entire rural development budget. A single American company was guaranteed a profit equivalent to funds for infrastructural development for about 500 million people!

Unlike in the old days the New Imperialist doesn't need to trudge around the tropics risking malaria or diahorrea or early death. New Imperialism can be conducted on e-mail. The vulgar, hands-on racism of Old Imperialism is outdated. The cornerstone of New Imperialism is New Racism.

"Part of the project of New Racism is New Genocide. In this new era of economic interdependence, New Genocide can be facilitated by economic sanctions. It means creating conditions that lead to mass death without actually going out and killing people. Dennis Halliday, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator in Iraq between '97 and '98 (after which he resigned in disgust), used the term genocide to describe the sanctions in Iraq. In Iraq the sanctions outdid Saddam Hussein's best efforts by claiming more than half a million children's lives.

In the new era, Apartheid as formal policy is antiquated and unnecessary. International instruments of trade and finance oversee a complex system of multilateral trade laws and financial agreements that keep the poor in their Bantustans anyway. Its whole purpose is to institutionalise inequity. Why else would it be that the U.S. taxes a garment made by a Bangladeshi manufacturer 20 times more than it taxes a garment made in the U.K.? Why else would it be that countries that grow 90 per cent of the world's cocoa bean produce only 5 per cent of the world's chocolate? Why else would it be that countries that grow cocoa bean, like the Ivory Coast and Ghana, are taxed out of the market if they try and turn it into chocolate? Why else would it be that rich countries that spend over a billion dollars a day on subsidies to farmers demand that poor countries like India withdraw all agricultural subsidies, including subsidised electricity? Why else would it be that after having been plundered by colonising regimes for more than half a century, former colonies are steeped in debt to those same regimes, and repay them some $ 382 billion a year?

For all these reasons, the derailing of trade agreements at Cancun was crucial for us. Though our governments try and take the credit, we know that it was the result of years of struggle by many millions of people in many, many countries. What Cancun taught us is that in order to inflict real damage and force radical change, it is vital for local resistance movements to make international alliances. From Cancun we learned the importance of globalising resistance.

No individual nation can stand up to the project of Corporate Globalisation on its own. Time and again we have seen that when it comes to the neo-liberal project, the heroes of our times are suddenly diminished. Extraordinary, charismatic men, giants in Opposition, when they seize power and become Heads of State, they become powerless on the global stage. I'm thinking here of President Lula of Brazil. Lula was the hero of the World Social Forum last year. This year he's busy implementing IMF guidelines, reducing pension benefits and purging radicals from the Workers' Party. I'm thinking also of ex-President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela. Within two years of taking office in 1994, his government genuflected with hardly a caveat to the Market God. It instituted a massive programme of privatisation and structural adjustment, which has left millions of people homeless, jobless and without water and electricity.

Why does this happen? There's little point in beating our breasts and feeling betrayed. Lula and Mandela are, by any reckoning, magnificent men. But the moment they cross the floor from the Opposition into Government they become hostage to a spectrum of threats — most malevolent among them the threat of capital flight, which can destroy any government overnight. To imagine that a leader's personal charisma and a c.v. of struggle will dent the Corporate Cartel is to have no understanding of how Capitalism works, or for that matter, how power works. Radical change will not be negotiated by governments; it can only be enforced by people."

Read the full text at The Hindu.

Image: Capital by Viktor Deni (1919)

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Click on the tag/label “Materialism” (right column on top) to find other related posts in this blog.

Rotten Tomatoes

Below is an example of how materialistic greed can blind people from seeing its grave consequences for the lives of thousands of fellow human beings. Although the below story is an example from the US, this illness of heart, this cancer is by no means limited to this region. We can observe similar examples in our own families and societies.

What we also need to do is to place this story in the context of structure and culture. How are resources distributed in society, on what principles and through what economic mechanisms? Next, what are the ideological underpinnings supporting such mode(s) of resource distribution? Through what institutional and cultural mechanisms does this economic exploitation become possible and justified? Can we imagine alternatives? For example, would making everything 'equal' and building a 'class-less society' solve the problem of injustice, which socialism/communism thought of as the solution, however un-realistic and impractical it was?

Shaheed Sadr argues here that it won't because the root of the problem would still be there. That root lies in the nafs.

"Verily the love of this world is the root-cause of all evils." - The Holy Prophet (peace be upon him and his dear ones).

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New York Times
November 29, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor

Penny Foolish
By Eric Schlosser

THE migrant farm workers who harvest tomatoes in South Florida have one of the nation’s most backbreaking jobs. For 10 to 12 hours a day, they pick tomatoes by hand, earning a piece-rate of about 45 cents for every 32-pound bucket. During a typical day each migrant picks, carries and unloads two tons of tomatoes. For their efforts, this holiday season many of them are about to get a 40 percent pay cut.

Florida’s tomato growers have long faced pressure to reduce operating costs; one way to do that is to keep migrant wages as low as possible. Although some of the pressure has come from increased competition with Mexican growers, most of it has been forcefully applied by the largest purchaser of Florida tomatoes: American fast food chains that want millions of pounds of cheap tomatoes as a garnish for their hamburgers, tacos and salads.

In 2005, Florida tomato pickers gained their first significant pay raise since the late 1970s when Taco Bell ended a consumer boycott by agreeing to pay an extra penny per pound for its tomatoes, with the extra cent going directly to the farm workers. Last April, McDonald’s agreed to a similar arrangement, increasing the wages of its tomato pickers to about 77 cents per bucket. But Burger King, whose headquarters are in Florida, has adamantly refused to pay the extra penny — and its refusal has encouraged tomato growers to cancel the deals already struck with Taco Bell and McDonald’s.

This month the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange, representing 90 percent of the state’s growers, announced that it will not allow any of its members to collect the extra penny for farm workers. Reggie Brown, the executive vice president of the group, described the surcharge for poor migrants as “pretty much near un-American.”

Migrant farm laborers have long been among America’s most impoverished workers. Perhaps 80 percent of the migrants in Florida are illegal immigrants and thus especially vulnerable to abuse. During the past decade, the United States Justice Department has prosecuted half a dozen cases of slavery among farm workers in Florida. Migrants have been driven into debt, forced to work for nothing and kept in chained trailers at night. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers — a farm worker alliance based in Immokalee, Fla. — has done a heroic job improving the lives of migrants in the state, investigating slavery cases and negotiating the penny-per-pound surcharge with fast food chains.

Now the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange has threatened a fine of $100,000 for any grower who accepts an extra penny per pound for migrant wages. The organization claims that such a surcharge would violate “federal and state laws related to antitrust, labor and racketeering.” It has not explained how that extra penny would break those laws; nor has it explained why other surcharges routinely imposed by the growers (for things like higher fuel costs) are perfectly legal.

The prominent role that Burger King has played in rescinding the pay raise offers a spectacle of yuletide greed worthy of Charles Dickens. Burger King has justified its behavior by claiming that it has no control over the labor practices of its suppliers. “Florida growers have a right to run their businesses how they see fit,” a Burger King spokesman told The St. Petersburg Times.

Yet the company has adopted a far more activist approach when the issue is the well-being of livestock. In March, Burger King announced strict new rules on how its meatpacking suppliers should treat chickens and hogs. As for human rights abuses, Burger King has suggested that if the poor farm workers of southern Florida need more money, they should apply for jobs at its restaurants.

Three private equity firms — Bain Capital, the Texas Pacific Group and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners — control most of Burger King’s stock. Last year, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd C. Blankfein, earned the largest annual bonus in Wall Street history, and this year he stands to receive an even larger one. Goldman Sachs has served its investors well lately, avoiding the subprime mortgage meltdown and, according to Business Week, doubling the value of its Burger King investment within three years.

Telling Burger King to pay an extra penny for tomatoes and provide a decent wage to migrant workers would hardly bankrupt the company. Indeed, it would cost Burger King only $250,000 a year. At Goldman Sachs, that sort of money shouldn’t be too hard to find. In 2006, the bonuses of the top 12 Goldman Sachs executives exceeded $200 million — more than twice as much money as all of the roughly 10,000 tomato pickers in southern Florida earned that year. Now Mr. Blankfein should find a way to share some of his company’s good fortune with the workers at the bottom of the food chain.

Eric Schlosser is the author of “Fast Food Nation” and “Reefer Madness.”

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MATERIALISM AS ZEITGEIST

What is this 'Matrix', this 'Hegemony' (or ‘dominance without hegemony,’ if you prefer), this 'Totalizing System' of Materialism that I refer to in my previous posts?

The phenomenon of Materialism that I have in mind is the resultant of a particular historical development in the West, which is generally referred to as 'Modernity'. Materialism is one of the defining characteristics of this modernity. Materialism is not just an intellectual mode of thought or a cultural discourse - that's just one component of it. It is rather an all-encompassing phenomenon that functions at the (analytically distinct) levels of structure, culture, and individual instincts, intentions, and actions. Hence, my choice of the broad heuristic terms like 'matrix', 'hegemony', and 'totalizing system'.

Shaheed Mutahhari has given four excellent lectures on the causes of materialistic tendencies in the West (here - I, II, III, IV). Mutahhari makes it clear that these materialistic tendencies are a historical development, and certain political and doctrinal factors led to their rise in the West. That is, it is not just an outcome of a theological or philosophical outlook. Rather, it is a product of multiple causes. This specific history also explains the particular beliefs and attitudes in the West regarding the ‘separation of church and the state’, emphasis on secularism, rational thought, individualism, materialism, and capitalism. Together, these elements constitute the particular 'form' of modernity of the 'West', more specifically, America and Western Europe.

Following Mutahhari's sociological argument, I would add that religion had multiple kinds of roles in the development of materialistic tendencies in the West. Whereas modernity emerged in reaction to the suppresion of free thought and rights by Church dogma, certain religious idioms also played a pioneering role in modernity's construction. The German Sociologist, Max Weber, has in his book "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" compellingly argued that religion (as an institution, as a belief set, and an emotional force, all sociologically speaking) may have been an active force behind the rise of capitalism in the West.

As he describes, in certain Protestant Sects (particularly, Calvinism) materialistic accomplishments and worldly success were seen as a sign of Divine Favor. The pursuit of the materialistic accomplishments was the 'calling' for each person. And it was this calling that provided the impulse for accumulation of wealth and the efficiency and calculation in business dealings. (You see the same rigorous efficiency and calculation in the Protestant missions around the world which generated massive archives of numbers and descriptions for the regions in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and Americas they worked in.) This is of course a very simplified version of Weber's argument. But the point here is that religion, or certain religious understandings, can very well promote materialism in society.

Weber anticipated this development in his description of the “Iron Cage” of the 'disenchanted' future. In this particular book, Weber was mostly concerned about the development of capitalism: how it was shaped by certain religious idioms, and how “the spirit of capitalism” has, in turn, shaped societies and individuals. Weber anticipated an increasingly rationalized (in the Weberian sense) human life in the capitalist society, which he gloomily characterized in terms of an “iron cage” of large-scale, rule-based rational-control. I won’t go into the insightful implications of his argument here, although part of my argument is similar to his: that the force of materialism has become so pervasive today that it is now producing effects similar to that of an “iron cage”.

This is because the religious idioms may have promoted the spirit of materialism, but once materialism became the dominant logic of economics, after the shift from agrarian-feudal to capitalist-market economy, once it became dominant in the cultural discourse and political institutions, it assumed a life of its own, a logic of its own. It became a social force that now shapes the structure, culture, and individual subjectivities, and in turn, gets reproduced in each generation. It has assumed a force so enormous, so pervasive, so encompassing that it has become normal and invisible (see my earlier post, entitled ‘to consume or not to consume).

Hence, I use the German expression ‘Zeitgeist’ to describe it as the ‘spirit’ of our age, which is in a way close to, but not exactly in, the Hegelian sense of alive and active “World Spirit”. I intentionally want to use such a broad conceptual formulation of materialism here. Because, as I argued in an earlier post ('to consume or not to consume'), focusing on particular aspects of materialism, like consumerism, would not help with either understanding or solving the problems resulting from materialism today. Because materialism is so enormous and so pervasive that addressing its particular facets without addressing its deeper linkages to structures, cultures, and human nature would be like attempting to cure the symptoms without addressing the roots. To address that deeper linkages require that we look at materialism in its full enormity, and the solution would require a substantial qualitative transformation into how we engage in our social relations and how we build our societies.

However, it is both beyond the scope of this space and my abilities at the moment to even attempt to do this task. My focus therefore is limited to the sociology of materialism, trying to look at how materialism is affecting our lives and social relations. The questions I examine are: Who are the individuals and institutional actors here, what are their interests and agendas, who is benefitting from its spread, how are people on the receiving end engaging (accomodating or resisting) the increasingly globalized materialism in their lives, coming through capital, media, education, politics and policies?

Implications

One, we need to analyze materialism not just at the individual level where many times the focus is on controlling our low desires (nafsani khawahishaat). But also on the level of cultural discourse (fikri ghulami) where sometimes people may genuinely believe that their religion allows them to live in a certain way. In the case of the 'Protestant Ethic', the religious idioms actually demanded that the followers accumulate wealth in order to be successful in this world and the hereafter. Religion, thus, as an ideology and as an emotional force, can take the followers in different directions depending on the content of the message. Therefore, it is important to analyze the content of the message too. (Analysis of other pertinent issues, like, unity among ourselves, domestic violence, youth issues, also require this multi-level approach in my opinion. As we work on the individual level (on nafsani khawahishaat), we also need to look at the cultural content of already existing discourse in our communities and the conflicting messages we are getting from outside, and compare both of them to the true teachings of Quran and Ahlulbayt. Similarly we also need to look at the structural arrangements in our communities that determine certain roles and possibilities for individuals).

Two, I also want to emphasize that the three levels, the individual, the cultural, and the structural (various institutions), are all independent, causally speaking, and can influence the other levels to promote materialism. A change in the economic structure, for example, like neo-liberal reforms, can also bring about materialism in a society, even though that society may not have gone through the same historically specific experience of Western Modernity. This is the independent causal force that materialism has developed today. The particular history of the Western Modernity has definite implications on the form of materialism in the West, but it may not translate in exactly same terms in other parts of the world; other societies engage with this materialism (corporatization in the name of globalization) in their own ways, informed by their local histories, politics, and cultures.

Three, related to above, we need to understand that materialism cannot affect one level of the society without affecting others. It is not possible for the neo-liberal reforms to take full effect without changing the local culture and subjectivities of the individuals. The changing consumption behavior in Egypt, Turkey, and more recently in Pakistan after the neo-liberal reforms are the examples. Check out “Today’s Consumption in Egypt” by Mona Abaza for an illustration. Materialism in the name of 'development' or 'modernization' thus comes to a society with a multi-level agenda, as also pointed out by Shaheed Baqir Sadr in “Islam and Schools of Economics”. As a side note, I should note here that Shaheed Sadr did not consider “Islamic Economics” to be a “science” of economics; rather, to him it is a set of “ideals” and “values” involving justice and fair distribution of resources that through institutionalization into economy could help building the desired just and tawheedi society. Materialism, likewise, has its own set of values, including an emphasis on competition and profit making which it spreads wherever it goes.

Four, we also need to understand that any movement aimed at resisting this materialism may very well start from changing an individual self. That is, an effective movement would have to first de-construct the hegemony in the mind of the followers, to get a person out of the ‘matrix’ of materialism. So, granted, the first step is always to reform the individual self. But to induce changes in the larger society, the movement would need to have a plan – a plan for all three inter-connected levels that I describe above. This is the question of "What's next?" after we 'reform the individual self'. I would argue that working collectively to build alternative institutions and movements is a required condition of even making that first step to happen for a large number of people, realistically speaking. We need to work on both individual and collective levels simultaneously.

For examples of collective action, we can take ideas from the movements working for saving forests, clean productions, labor rights, conscious-consuming, fair trade, curtailing influence of corporations, movements promoting ideas of sustainability and equity, green-chemistry, renewable energy, and local living economy. The last one is about developing alternative institutions like Consumers' Coops to resist large corporations, to build markets and products that are environment-friendly and honor fair trade and fair wages.

The utility of building such resources and institutions is many-fold. One, it makes a point that alternatives are possible AND practical. Two, it makes it easier for people, who are chained by the current structures, to make opt-out choices. For example, the development and availability of an Islamic finance system would allow people to not depend/become slave of the mainstream commercial banking system. Three, like-minded people can come together to support each other, in living simple life-style, in upbringing 'saleh' (pious) children in this kind of environment. Remember, it takes a village to raise a child.

To follow this approach is not being materialistic (as some would say 'you are depending on the 'worldly' factors'), rather it is about being REALISTIC (see here and here).

Two Clarifications

One, when I refer to the ‘matrix’ of materialism, as experienced today, I do not specifically mean to refer to Christianity or Judaism, which if you look into, are often very anti-materialistic in their teachings. Materialism is a distinct phenomenon which I refer to with the expression 'zeitgeist' and its has its independent dynamics and force.

Two, as I mentioned earlier that although this materialism emerged in the west as part of the modernity, it is not restricted to the West anymore. It is now exported and experienced (albeit in multiple ways of accomodation and resistance) all throughout the world through Hollywood movies, cable tv, neoliberal reforms, corporatization, etc. So when I look at materialism in these posts, I have both the West and the rest of the world in mind.

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Click on the tag/label "Materialism" (right column on top) to find other related posts in this blog.