Islam Baiting

Some pseudo-wise man in America makes a provocative video and sarcastically names it ‘Innocence of Muslims’ and immediately as if on cue the entire Muslim world dances with rage. Joining the fun and enjoying the desperation of the Muslims another one such wise guy makes some more cartoons in France. The Muslims are now going red beyond rage, but can very well see that the Christians are playing with them. The earlier Denmark cartoonist must be grinning widely on all his 32 teeth. The more the Muslims will agitate, the more the Christians will continue to poke fun. I guess Muslims and Christians share a great love for each other. They can’t live without each other. Otherwise there is no justifiable reason why one purposely provokes the other and the other gets provoked knowing fully well the intention and the consequence. It is said that love and hate are two sides of the same coin. Greater the love; greater is the hate. If there was no love there would not have been any hate. That makes the Muslims the greatest lovers on earth because there is always a simmering tension between the Hindus and Muslims in India as well.

On a serious note, I would say that both the groups are wrong and are being immature. One group uses the phrase ‘freedom of expression’ to say and get away with insults.  It is their sophisticated manner of expressing their anger. Since their civilization has evolved to a level that murder is looked down upon, they resort to ridicule. As they say, the pen is mightier than the sword. The other side is more basic and simplistic in their emotions and expression, shying away from sophistication and diplomacy and where killing is the ultimate way to resolve a dispute. Both the sides get angry very fast and react only to hurt. Both sides do not actually believe in God, do not respect and love God, inspite of arguments purported to the contrary.

Communal baiting has for centuries been seen all around the globe. It portrays the culture of groupism the propagation of a homogenous population which sees and does things in a common fashion and therefore results in reduced levels of survival related fears and tensions. To survive with safety and comfort has always been the basic instincts of humans and strength is always in the numbers. Any attempt to break this logic accentuates the fear and is therefore not tolerated. However as evolution progressed humans have learnt and realized that individual freedom is also possible and can be placed on the same pedestal as community freedom. But sadly some people have still not evolved.

For one group I would say that the term ‘freedom of expression’ is meant to allow the voice of the weak to be heard, against the atrocities of the powerful. It is not meant for hurting with an intention to hurt, especially when there is no ground to justify the resultant hurt. When the purpose is to ridicule, the idea of freedom of expression should be used wisely, lest someone else takes advantage of it and use it against them. Jesus has said to do onto others what you would want them to do onto you. Secondly the need to ridicule arises because of a feeling of superiority and inferiority on either side.  In a globalized world where man is dependent on each other for the survival of human race, who is superior and who is inferior? If nature wanted it so, then someone would have been born with an extra pair of arms.

For the other group I would suggest to look inwards, introspect. What is there to lose? Is the faith so fragile that a mere insult can destroy it? In India we say, when the Elephant walks the Dogs always bark, but that does not affect the Elephant. It has faith in itself and its strength. When the hurt community agitates and attacks the offender community, they end up giving too much importance to them as well as make them look justified, which is much unwarranted. To react to provocation and agitate betrays a sense of inherent weakness instead of any strength. Rather to ignore such irrational provocation would make the perpetrators look foolish as they really are.