Seminar: Remembering Srebrenica: Islam's Response to Othering (2021-07-09) ​

0:00:37 all of you are well in good health and
0:00:39 in strong iman
0:00:40 um this is dr uthman and this is on
0:00:42 behalf of sapiens institute
0:00:45 we have a very important inshallah topic
0:00:47 of discussion today and i think all of
0:00:49 us inshallah
0:00:49 would be well prepared for this topic
0:00:53 because it's something that's in our
0:00:54 perhaps collective
0:00:55 memory collective imagination and that
0:00:58 of course is
0:00:59 uh the bonus the genocide of of serbia
0:01:01 nietzsche
0:01:02 the genocide of bosnia from the years of
0:01:04 1992-1995
0:01:06 uh what we're going to do today
0:01:07 inshallah is is is cover these kind of
0:01:09 steps so we're going to begin each other
0:01:10 by speaking about what exactly happened
0:01:13 during those very tragic years of those
0:01:16 years of the genocide in bosnia
0:01:18 what were the causes for the
0:01:21 insane violence enacted out meted out
0:01:23 against peoples
0:01:25 particularly muslims but also other
0:01:26 people as well um we're going to look at
0:01:28 the the the constructs of
0:01:32 othering and dehumanization that was a
0:01:34 major
0:01:35 role in fact in the motivations in the
0:01:39 ideologies in the sentiments in the
0:01:42 psychology
0:01:43 of the perpetrators of that genocide
0:01:45 we're going to look at the way that
0:01:47 we understand the the complexities
0:01:50 the subtleties of othering and
0:01:52 dehumanization and then we're going to
0:01:54 look at the
0:01:55 islamic response to othering what does
0:01:58 islam say about
0:01:59 how do we deal with those constructs in
0:02:01 fact as muslims
0:02:02 in our lives and so therefore that's the
0:02:05 that's on the agenda inshallah today i
0:02:06 pray allah
0:02:08 in our in our studies together uh
0:02:11 and here we go therefore from the
0:02:12 beginning the genocide of muslims in
0:02:15 bosnia 1995.
0:02:18 uh to begin with following the falling
0:02:20 apart of the
0:02:22 soviet union there was of course a
0:02:25 breakup of countries so therefore that
0:02:26 was something
0:02:27 that maybe we wouldn't remember uh it
0:02:29 depends on force how old
0:02:31 we are uh people tend to think of soviet
0:02:33 reunion as simply
0:02:34 russia nowadays but soviet union was
0:02:37 something quite different at that time
0:02:39 uh we have these smaller countries the
0:02:42 breakup of yugoslavia
0:02:43 serbia croatia slovenia that when the
0:02:46 soviet union broke up
0:02:47 partly because of the failure of its
0:02:51 you know its occupation of afghanistan
0:02:54 these countries sought independence from
0:02:56 the yugoslav republic
0:02:58 and so the subs therefore employed
0:03:02 in their attempt to push back and fight
0:03:04 against croatia
0:03:06 as slovenia and bosnia uh
0:03:09 an extreme form of nationalism
0:03:12 uh in ethnocentrism in their attacks
0:03:14 against elizabeth
0:03:16 slovenians the croatians and then of
0:03:18 course the the muslim bosnians as well
0:03:21 and so after the breakup of yugoslavia
0:03:23 uh there emerged a kind of ins
0:03:26 insane uh incense type of violence
0:03:29 uh carried out by military organizations
0:03:33 paramilitary organizations but not just
0:03:35 that
0:03:36 also the the average man in fact was
0:03:38 taking arms against
0:03:40 his fellow neighbor his fellow teacher
0:03:43 and this in fact is quite common
0:03:44 sometimes in general because we talk
0:03:46 about
0:03:46 genocide is a is a mass is a mass
0:03:49 killing
0:03:50 a mass killing a kind of upsurge of of
0:03:53 violence meted out against
0:03:55 against peoples uh so
0:03:58 what you find therefore happening from
0:04:00 the yugoslavia against
0:04:01 the the muslims of bosnia from from the
0:04:04 serbs
0:04:06 in in the in common people
0:04:09 in the average person not necessarily
0:04:11 attached to the military
0:04:13 but because there is an entrenched form
0:04:16 of
0:04:16 uh you know loyalty seeking loyalty
0:04:19 adhering to
0:04:20 uh that's going to create binaries
0:04:23 binaries
0:04:24 which become ossified and entrenched in
0:04:26 those times and that happens of course
0:04:29 happens of course with time the time of
0:04:30 the nazis happened
0:04:32 very much in time of rwanda uh this is
0:04:34 very much covered in my book on being
0:04:35 human as well
0:04:37 and so the aim was to ethnically cleanse
0:04:39 the area of muslims
0:04:41 here we have uh locations in 1992
0:04:44 prison door for example over 3 000
0:04:47 non-sub civilians were killed
0:04:49 in wizard 3 000 bosnian muslims were
0:04:52 killed
0:04:53 burned alive mass raped in fact became a
0:04:56 weapon of war
0:04:57 concentration camps were set up zvernick
0:05:00 versina and and tusla as well so
0:05:03 therefore these are locations where
0:05:05 uh you know great injustices were taking
0:05:07 place against the muslim population
0:05:09 and also other people as well including
0:05:12 uh you know some christians
0:05:13 as well but here we have an ethnic
0:05:16 conflict
0:05:17 being played out and and ethnic
0:05:19 cleansing taking place
0:05:21 now the strategy was to erase bosnian
0:05:23 muslims
0:05:24 lives heritage and identity what does
0:05:27 that mean
0:05:28 so we can understand what it means to
0:05:29 erase muslim
0:05:31 lives as in to exterminate a people to
0:05:34 kill people
0:05:36 but then you have with that the
0:05:38 extermination of heritage and identity
0:05:41 so it's not only about uh the physical
0:05:43 presence of the muslims being
0:05:46 annihilated and you know annulled
0:05:49 and becomes absent but
0:05:52 the heritage identity of a people so
0:05:55 this is quite similar in fact to what
0:05:57 you find in
0:05:58 uh in settler colonialism particularly
0:06:01 in palestine for example it wasn't so
0:06:03 much
0:06:03 only about ethnic cleansing of the
0:06:06 palestinians from 1948 nakba
0:06:08 onward in fact even from 1947 um
0:06:11 but then when you had those palestinian
0:06:14 muslims who were
0:06:16 displaced by force into other places uh
0:06:20 you know in the lebanon for example or
0:06:22 syria
0:06:23 uh the the locations where
0:06:26 inhabitants used to once live now become
0:06:30 other sites of of other things so
0:06:33 sometimes the sites with the
0:06:35 the the landscapes um homes farm lands
0:06:38 were transformed into
0:06:40 um uh city parks sometimes into
0:06:44 uh into forests even into forests even
0:06:48 car parks and so the destruction of
0:06:51 lives and heritage and identity so
0:06:54 removing therefore the identity of
0:06:58 the the bosom as if they didn't live
0:06:59 there ever in the first place
0:07:02 and so therefore you find it for the
0:07:03 transforming the changing of names
0:07:05 uh the uh refusal to have
0:07:09 uh burial sites uh plaques of
0:07:12 remembrance
0:07:13 and so on and so forth so serb militants
0:07:15 led by general radgo mladic
0:07:18 entered the eastern town of srebrenica
0:07:20 after it was declared the u.n safe zone
0:07:22 protected they said by a lightly armed
0:07:24 dutch peacekeeping force of around 600
0:07:26 troops
0:07:27 commissioned by the u.n and so therefore
0:07:30 the
0:07:30 the bosnian muslims were supposed to be
0:07:32 protected by the un
0:07:34 uh but they uh were
0:07:37 deemed themselves deemed themselves
0:07:39 incapable
0:07:40 unwilling or complicit and so therefore
0:07:43 the u.n
0:07:44 sanctioned sub-militants to enter the
0:07:47 military
0:07:47 safe haven embarked on premeditated mass
0:07:50 murder aided by the international
0:07:52 community's
0:07:53 indifference meaning not that they were
0:07:56 active participants perpetrators
0:07:58 themselves no
0:07:59 but because there was supposed to be a
0:08:01 peacekeeping force
0:08:02 uh then of course the the inhabitants
0:08:05 the
0:08:06 the subordinated ones in in this case
0:08:08 the victims
0:08:09 the muslim bosnians would have felt as
0:08:11 if they were
0:08:12 safely you know protected by those
0:08:15 peacekeeping forces
0:08:16 but then to be abandoned by them uh
0:08:20 you know of course is is is here
0:08:22 indicated
0:08:23 over five days 8 300 muslim men and boys
0:08:26 who are massacred by bosnian
0:08:28 military forces this is this is now the
0:08:30 genocide in srebrenica
0:08:32 so just think therefore this is the the
0:08:35 worst
0:08:36 uh human you know atrocity committed
0:08:39 as in war crime as in ethnic cleansing
0:08:42 as in genocide since the second world
0:08:44 war
0:08:45 more than 8 000 muslim men and boys
0:08:48 massacred in europe
0:08:49 over five days around 50 000 women and
0:08:52 girls
0:08:53 were raped in those five days one of the
0:08:56 worst cases of ethnic cleansing
0:08:57 and worst massacre in europe since the
0:09:00 second world
0:09:01 war now it's important for us therefore
0:09:04 if we go back and look at the history
0:09:06 behind this
0:09:07 understanding therefore the uh the
0:09:10 context understanding the motivations of
0:09:12 the perpetrators understand the
0:09:14 political dimensions with the breakup of
0:09:15 yugoslavia soviet union
0:09:17 and then of course the the violence that
0:09:19 takes place
0:09:21 off of the back of that so entrenched
0:09:23 forms of extreme nationalism
0:09:25 you know become become apparent and what
0:09:28 this does is it creates
0:09:30 or ossifies self and otherness
0:09:34 self and otherness constructs and so
0:09:37 when people feel that they have a sense
0:09:40 of belonging belonging in this case to
0:09:42 their own ethnicities
0:09:44 um then the others of course become
0:09:47 the ones who don't simply belong to
0:09:49 their own identities or those who are
0:09:51 different in in small ways or in big
0:09:53 ways but they would always be the
0:09:55 existential
0:09:56 others and this is something we're going
0:09:57 to talk about and exist in all
0:09:59 forms of of life and living in fact in
0:10:02 our in our worlds today
0:10:04 but if it's unchecked then it can lead
0:10:06 to and result in
0:10:07 in in the worst examples of it though in
0:10:10 human history which of course would be
0:10:11 genocides
0:10:12 as what happened to the muslims here in
0:10:14 bosnia
0:10:15 and so therefore we've seen the the
0:10:18 upsurge of violence
0:10:19 after the breakup of yugoslavia the the
0:10:22 beginning of killing sprees three
0:10:23 thousand kill three thousand kills there
0:10:26 uh burning alive burning homes alive
0:10:29 so uh in so kind of trapping muslims and
0:10:32 then locking barricading them and then
0:10:34 burning those houses
0:10:36 so that the people inside them are
0:10:37 burned alive mass rapes
0:10:39 raped as a weapon of war concentration
0:10:41 camps
0:10:42 and then the strategy was therefore to
0:10:45 erase you know
0:10:46 bosnian muslims live heritage identity
0:10:49 from that landscape now
0:10:52 why is it important for us to remember
0:10:55 now
0:10:56 on july the 11th it would have of course
0:10:57 the remembrance day
0:10:59 for the genocide of serbanitsan is
0:11:01 something that we that happens every
0:11:02 single year as a form of remembrance
0:11:04 why is it important for us to remember
0:11:06 this because remember that the people
0:11:08 that we're talking about are not just
0:11:10 numbers they're more than just numbers
0:11:12 we can easily become desensitized if
0:11:14 we're always thinking about numbers
0:11:16 we can have a sense of uh kind of
0:11:20 a media fatigue or or compassion fatigue
0:11:23 even
0:11:23 we can become fatigued of always
0:11:25 exhibiting compassion
0:11:27 because it's tuned people to show
0:11:28 compassion towards or we become fatigued
0:11:30 by that
0:11:31 stanley kohen in his book states of
0:11:33 denial talks about that disgusted that
0:11:34 phenomenon
0:11:36 or media fatigue if we're having
0:11:39 the same images played out again and
0:11:41 again and again it could lead to
0:11:43 a sense of media fatigue because you're
0:11:45 you're fatigued of seeing the same
0:11:47 images again and again
0:11:48 but then that's the tragedy of becoming
0:11:50 desensitized therefore
0:11:51 to the to that tragedy
0:11:55 to kind of rise above that and realize
0:11:58 that the people that are being spoken of
0:11:59 are not just
0:12:01 numbers but are actually people human
0:12:04 beings they all had
0:12:05 families right they all had families
0:12:07 every one of them had
0:12:08 would have had a father or a mother
0:12:10 right or would have been a father and
0:12:12 would have been a mother
0:12:14 siblings children uncles aunts
0:12:17 grandfathers neighbors uh teachers
0:12:20 students all had these relationships
0:12:23 which gave them a sense of belonging
0:12:26 place importance in human society they
0:12:28 all had careers
0:12:29 they would have had careers or would
0:12:31 have been careers seeking people would
0:12:33 have
0:12:33 hoped to have a career they had dreams
0:12:35 and aspiration this is something that we
0:12:37 call these are
0:12:38 human codes of recognizability so
0:12:40 therefore when we think about
0:12:42 empathy empathy is built in many ways
0:12:45 because
0:12:45 not only when we see differences in
0:12:48 people but also when we see
0:12:49 things that are just patently similar
0:12:51 between us and them
0:12:53 right it's it's when we deny those
0:12:55 points of similarity and only focus on
0:12:58 differences
0:12:59 where we begin to think well where you
0:13:01 know the uh
0:13:02 the uh sentiments or the ideas of
0:13:06 othering or otherness you know might
0:13:07 creep
0:13:08 in and every single person's death of
0:13:10 course
0:13:11 matters and so therefore that's a key
0:13:12 thing for us to remember they're not
0:13:13 just numbers they all had families all
0:13:15 had careers
0:13:16 or they had careers or they were
0:13:17 career-seeking or their parents had
0:13:20 careers or they had dreams and
0:13:21 aspirations and every
0:13:23 single person's death of course matters
0:13:26 think about why it's important for us to
0:13:28 remember lives
0:13:29 memories places and spaces what makes us
0:13:33 in fact
0:13:34 what makes us living and human beings we
0:13:36 have lives and we have memories and so
0:13:38 within
0:13:39 lives of course memories are created
0:13:42 what gives our lives
0:13:43 meaning in many cases or importance
0:13:47 or happiness or even sadness but what
0:13:50 kind of represents the
0:13:52 the just the completion really i guess
0:13:55 of of living
0:13:56 is the fact that we're gonna have a
0:13:57 whole host of memories
0:13:59 that we recall that we we have nostalgia
0:14:02 we hearken back to we reflect on
0:14:05 uh these points of of remembering
0:14:07 ourselves and
0:14:08 and our places and our spaces it's a
0:14:11 remarkable book
0:14:12 that i that i discuss in fact in my book
0:14:14 here on being human uh
0:14:16 called kiribati kirbet kize was authored
0:14:19 by
0:14:19 uh s yizhar which is in fact it's an is
0:14:23 a pen name an anonymous author
0:14:25 he authored this book in around 19 uh
0:14:28 1965 i think it was and the book in fact
0:14:31 is in historic science fiction
0:14:33 on the necrobot 1948 and what he does is
0:14:37 he speaks about these
0:14:38 and of course he's against the
0:14:40 atrocities of what happened by the
0:14:42 settler colonizers but he speaks about
0:14:45 the fact that uh you know i remember he
0:14:48 says that when when these soldiers come
0:14:50 into
0:14:50 these new homes where there were people
0:14:54 who lived and the furnishings in the
0:14:56 homes are a proof
0:14:58 of the fact that other people used to
0:14:59 live here once upon a time
0:15:01 and they've just been forcibly removed
0:15:03 and he uses these words and he says
0:15:06 you know how will they feel when the
0:15:08 walls begin to scream
0:15:10 in their silence right because other
0:15:13 people
0:15:14 lived here it's hard that love was made
0:15:16 its head that love was
0:15:17 unmade broken his hair that tears were
0:15:20 shut his head up
0:15:21 you know people laughed people laughed
0:15:23 people celebrated together memories were
0:15:25 made
0:15:26 in these sites in these places right so
0:15:28 in lives therefore we have
0:15:30 memories right is what kind of keeps us
0:15:33 going in life we have these memories
0:15:34 that we harken back to we think
0:15:36 we reflect on places and spaces and
0:15:39 places and spaces of course
0:15:41 are crucial here uh i remember when i
0:15:44 was
0:15:45 in auschwitz but canal and we were doing
0:15:47 the tour of auschwitz but
0:15:49 now we were speaking about the fact that
0:15:52 the places and the spaces in fact of
0:15:54 auschwitz but canal
0:15:56 there is a remarkable uh set of there's
0:15:59 in some of the walls the memorial walls
0:16:01 and in birkenau
0:16:03 they have these portraits uh you know
0:16:05 stretched out against the walls uh
0:16:08 and and the and the victims of the
0:16:10 holocaust their portraits are all
0:16:12 you know together and i when i thought
0:16:15 about it and i wrote about it again
0:16:16 in in both of my more recent books i
0:16:18 spoke about the
0:16:20 the the juxtaposition between what the
0:16:23 nazis sought to create
0:16:25 in that place and space of
0:16:28 uh of otherness you know and and within
0:16:30 the constructs of otherness then would
0:16:32 be
0:16:33 uh separation would be separation would
0:16:36 be isolation would be
0:16:38 you know a lack of meaning a denial of
0:16:41 togetherness
0:16:42 because togetherness creates empathy
0:16:44 creates love and so on and so forth
0:16:46 but it's so tragically ironic that now
0:16:49 on those same walls the
0:16:51 the portraits of these victims are all
0:16:54 together
0:16:54 and i just had this i just had a sense
0:16:57 of feeling that
0:16:58 how tragic i ranked that is in
0:17:00 juxtaposition that is that in that same
0:17:02 place and space these two constructs are
0:17:04 created but it's created of course
0:17:06 through time because time has lapsed and
0:17:09 now of course there are
0:17:11 different dynamics and different actors
0:17:12 and so on and so forth other things are
0:17:14 happening
0:17:16 in this therefore the idea of
0:17:18 remembering the tragedy
0:17:20 within our lives more memories places
0:17:23 and spaces
0:17:24 remember that most were killed with
0:17:25 bullets or grenades in fields
0:17:27 warehouses and football pitches
0:17:30 bulldozers were used to bury
0:17:32 bodies in mass graves which were then
0:17:34 moved to try to hide evidence
0:17:36 of the genocide therefore that makes it
0:17:37 even more incumbent imperative on us
0:17:40 to remember the victims of that genocide
0:17:42 because there was a deliberate
0:17:44 effort on the part of the perpetrators
0:17:46 to hide the crimes
0:17:48 you know to hide the massacres uh in
0:17:51 auschwitz birkenau
0:17:52 if you're traveling from krakow to to
0:17:55 birkenau
0:17:56 you're going to pass through a village
0:17:59 uh called um oswegian
0:18:03 and we were told in fact that north
0:18:04 region uh
0:18:06 which is kind of on route to birkenau
0:18:08 from krakow
0:18:11 used to be a hub of industry in the time
0:18:14 of the nazis
0:18:15 and we were told therefore that it was
0:18:17 kind of like a buffer it was kind of a
0:18:19 way
0:18:19 of um creating a mental buffer you know
0:18:23 for
0:18:23 the people at that time so that they did
0:18:26 they wouldn't think
0:18:27 that auschwitz but canal is a place of
0:18:30 horrors
0:18:31 if just next to it just next to that
0:18:34 town adjacent to that town
0:18:35 to bakken or auschwitz is of course a
0:18:37 sweden
0:18:38 where there's so much happening of
0:18:40 civilization and
0:18:41 industry and happiness and so on and so
0:18:43 forth meaning we we
0:18:45 we can't see therefore the the horrors
0:18:47 taking place
0:18:48 because it's a deliberate effort to to
0:18:50 hide those crimes
0:18:52 again the point i made about 1948 nakba
0:18:55 it was the same policy
0:18:57 right so therefore the way that you
0:18:58 would hide the displacement
0:19:01 uh is by building over the sites
0:19:04 building over the sites with
0:19:06 uh with with city parks you know or car
0:19:09 parks
0:19:10 even car parks forests um
0:19:13 and so when that takes place therefore
0:19:15 that people wouldn't think that anybody
0:19:16 to live here
0:19:17 before now today for example in in west
0:19:20 jerusalem you have the
0:19:22 the big uh uh memorial uh
0:19:26 uh museum called vajashem which is
0:19:29 the the biggest uh memorial museum about
0:19:32 the tragedy of the holocaust
0:19:34 but one mile away from vadi hashem in
0:19:36 fact is the site of the dariasin
0:19:38 massacre of april 1948 and that's one of
0:19:42 the
0:19:43 the worst massacres that took place you
0:19:44 know with when you had the rise of
0:19:46 the stun gang and the organ and these
0:19:49 militia
0:19:50 but the the point is that in in um
0:19:53 in that one mile distance where the
0:19:56 where the sight of that muscle took
0:19:57 place
0:19:58 there is no memorial and there is no
0:20:00 there are no plaques of remembrance
0:20:02 and there are no graves and there are no
0:20:04 names of the victims
0:20:06 so the the tragedy therefore that loss
0:20:09 of life that
0:20:10 killing is all hidden but it makes it
0:20:13 more incumbent upon us therefore to
0:20:15 remember that
0:20:16 because we have an obligation as human
0:20:18 beings to unearth the tragedies and to
0:20:20 reflect and to
0:20:21 and to you know to mourn the loss of
0:20:23 life but not just to do that but also to
0:20:25 think about how we're gonna
0:20:26 prevent this happening again by knowing
0:20:28 of course that it happened
0:20:29 once before in the first place and so
0:20:32 many bodies were
0:20:33 spread across multiple mass graves and
0:20:35 nearly two decades on
0:20:37 remains are still being uncovered
0:20:39 therefore
0:20:40 in in bosnia
0:20:43 now remember also the greatest that that
0:20:46 this
0:20:46 genocide was the greatest atrocity on
0:20:48 european soil since the holocaust
0:20:51 but it's rarely mentioned in any history
0:20:53 lesson when is the last time you heard
0:20:54 about that in the history lesson even
0:20:56 though of course
0:20:57 it's europe the demographics of course
0:20:59 is is europe
0:21:01 uh but you we tend not to hear about it
0:21:04 a lot in in schools
0:21:05 for example unless it's in in rare cases
0:21:08 if people are studying
0:21:09 uh you know genocide or something like
0:21:11 that but they probably wouldn't be
0:21:12 selling in school anyway
0:21:14 uh but just think about that the
0:21:15 greatest atrocity on european soil since
0:21:18 the holocaust but it's rarely mentioned
0:21:20 in any history lessons uh why should it
0:21:24 be remembered because
0:21:26 since rape was a weapon of war 50 000
0:21:29 women and girl
0:21:30 raped in those days that leaves behind
0:21:34 until today an indescribable trauma
0:21:37 you know for from not just the victims
0:21:39 but the descendants of those victims
0:21:42 right to know that that's in that kind
0:21:44 of part of their
0:21:46 their conscious state their
0:21:47 consciousness now
0:21:49 to know of course that that's their
0:21:50 legacy i mean that's not their legacy
0:21:52 but that's
0:21:52 that's what they've been subjected to
0:21:54 that of course has molded and shaped
0:21:56 them
0:21:57 influence them to become what they are
0:22:00 in in this situation now but just to
0:22:03 think about therefore
0:22:04 that that the indescribable trauma that
0:22:06 leaves that's
0:22:07 makes it more of an obligation upon us
0:22:09 uh the war in
0:22:11 the civil war in liberia in the 1990s
0:22:14 was
0:22:14 was a war also where where rape was used
0:22:16 as a weapon
0:22:17 of war um so you had these young girls
0:22:21 and you had mass rape in the 1990s in
0:22:23 liberia
0:22:24 um but there was a lack of media
0:22:26 attention towards that suffering
0:22:29 until of course you had the great
0:22:31 efforts of
0:22:32 lima gabawee the christian and um
0:22:36 and you also had the uh the muslim i
0:22:39 forgot the lady's name
0:22:40 but they had this kind of a partnership
0:22:42 between them and so lima
0:22:44 baby will bring out the women from the
0:22:45 churches and other one would call upon
0:22:47 the imams to bring out you know come out
0:22:49 from the mosque and they used
0:22:50 their radio as well as the platform and
0:22:52 then they would dress all in
0:22:54 white and then they would sit in the
0:22:55 street they would sit on the roads
0:22:57 right as a form of protest um so for
0:23:00 people to take
0:23:01 notice of what's happening until the
0:23:03 that you know that the media
0:23:05 from western countries became involved
0:23:07 in that but the whole point is therefore
0:23:08 that
0:23:09 um for them of course ah lima gabawi
0:23:12 has a very famous line and says that i'm
0:23:15 i'm doing what i'm doing because i don't
0:23:17 want
0:23:18 that my daughter says to me and later on
0:23:21 mama
0:23:22 what was your role during this crisis
0:23:25 right and of course that's uh a daughter
0:23:27 that's a mother
0:23:28 and there's of course some in a sense of
0:23:31 affinity in that respect you know when
0:23:32 you have
0:23:33 a rape as a weapon of war point number
0:23:37 three
0:23:37 never again auschwitz of course is a
0:23:40 very famous
0:23:41 uh kind of uh declarative
0:23:44 never again auschwitz meaning it should
0:23:46 never also should never happen
0:23:48 ever again and of course the point is
0:23:50 very true
0:23:51 theodore adorno here in his article
0:23:54 entitled education after auschwitz
0:23:56 um published a few decades after
0:23:58 auschwitz
0:23:59 he has an opening line in fact in his
0:24:02 article he says that the premier
0:24:04 demand upon all education is never again
0:24:07 auschwitz he says therefore the premier
0:24:09 demand upon all
0:24:10 education for mentors for teachers for
0:24:13 educators
0:24:14 is never again auschwitz in fact his
0:24:17 whole
0:24:18 premise and point is to outline um you
0:24:20 know for
0:24:22 uh primarily the german people uh
0:24:25 ways new ways of teaching of reteaching
0:24:28 empathy for those people because you
0:24:31 believe therefore there were
0:24:32 some things that acted to facilitate
0:24:37 the genocide against the jews and other
0:24:39 things
0:24:40 just simply made it easier for the nazis
0:24:42 to do that
0:24:43 one he believed therefore there was a
0:24:44 kind of an ideological hardness
0:24:47 in the german people in that they were
0:24:49 used to obedience to authority
0:24:51 and so when the nazis came into power it
0:24:53 was simply therefore another form of
0:24:55 authority
0:24:56 that they had to obey but the other one
0:24:58 therefore he i outlined is a lack of
0:25:00 empathy
0:25:01 meaning there was a lack of attention
0:25:03 from parents
0:25:04 principally mothers teaching their
0:25:06 children the importance of
0:25:07 empathy and therefore he believed this
0:25:10 was one of the
0:25:11 one of the reasons why
0:25:15 you know why something like that could
0:25:17 not necessarily take place but that when
0:25:20 genocidal tendencies begin to
0:25:22 emerge in society perhaps there is a
0:25:25 there is a lack of
0:25:27 ability uh in in pushing back against
0:25:30 those tendencies and that that's
0:25:31 his article interestingly henry giroux
0:25:35 uh wrote an article in in more recent
0:25:38 times called education after abu ghraib
0:25:41 in fact taking therefore the the idea
0:25:44 behind a donor's analysis and saying
0:25:46 well what about
0:25:48 uh if the if the state is not
0:25:50 necessarily
0:25:51 uh nazism in this case but it's american
0:25:55 exceptionalism or american hubris acting
0:25:59 out
0:25:59 its atrocities against another people
0:26:02 who it otherwise is
0:26:03 and dehumanizes in this case the iraqi
0:26:06 people
0:26:07 even today public knowledge of the
0:26:08 genocide is extremely limited
0:26:10 right extremely limited right we don't
0:26:13 simply don't have that same attention
0:26:15 that we might have towards other
0:26:17 examples of mass killing
0:26:19 when it comes to therefore to the
0:26:20 genocide of bosnia
0:26:22 it's important for us to raise awareness
0:26:24 of the genocide to help work towards a
0:26:26 rejection of the hatred
0:26:28 and islamophobia and that's therefore
0:26:31 why of course we should be remembering
0:26:32 it
0:26:33 so we can use it of course as a point of
0:26:35 study as a point of discussion as a
0:26:36 point of
0:26:37 raising awareness about the hate that
0:26:40 emerged in society at that time
0:26:42 the islamophobia the genocidal
0:26:44 tendencies
0:26:45 and there is really nothing more
0:26:46 islamophobic than
0:26:48 genocide itself all right so therefore
0:26:52 we've covered so far uh the history
0:26:55 the political context behind the
0:26:57 genocide the importance of remembering
0:26:59 the genocide and its victims as well and
0:27:02 now we come to our third point which is
0:27:04 othering understanding what othering
0:27:06 actually is what is
0:27:07 what is othering um
0:27:11 now othering is the relegating of
0:27:13 another to a marginalized place
0:27:15 so all of us of course we have a sense
0:27:18 of self
0:27:19 about us we see ourselves as
0:27:22 as who we are as as whoever we are
0:27:24 however you identify yourself but
0:27:26 that's what you give yourself you give
0:27:28 yourself a sense of
0:27:30 self appreciation self awareness a sense
0:27:33 of self
0:27:34 um you know uh self-autonomy perhaps you
0:27:38 know you give your own
0:27:39 sense of self uh its position its place
0:27:43 uh in society and people recognize you
0:27:46 for your sense of self and that's fine
0:27:48 because we all see ourselves as
0:27:50 ourselves
0:27:52 the other is the one who who we don't
0:27:54 believe
0:27:55 has the same or should be afforded the
0:27:58 same
0:27:59 rights and values as we afford to
0:28:02 ourselves
0:28:03 or to those that we love and respect
0:28:07 okay it is a seeing in the other much
0:28:10 less than sometimes a complete absence
0:28:12 of what one sees in oneself right so
0:28:15 however you
0:28:16 see yourself is is intrinsic to this
0:28:20 whole discussion
0:28:21 because whatever you see of yourself if
0:28:23 you see of yourself something that is
0:28:26 so so much of something without being
0:28:28 specific
0:28:29 um then you might never be able to see
0:28:33 the other outside of you being entitled
0:28:36 to or worthy of that thing
0:28:38 it's very interesting the prophet
0:28:39 muhammad said
0:28:41 in hadith
0:28:46 look to those who are under you have
0:28:48 lessened not to those who have more than
0:28:49 you because then you would undermine
0:28:50 allah's favor
0:28:52 upon you meaning be conscious of the way
0:28:54 that you're seeing
0:28:55 yourself in the first place because
0:28:58 that's going to have a very big bearing
0:28:59 on how you're going to see somebody else
0:29:02 meaning the other
0:29:03 outside of you um the prophet told us to
0:29:06 say when we see ourselves in the mirror
0:29:08 that we say
0:29:11 now this again is very important in
0:29:13 terms of self appreciation
0:29:14 oh allah make my
0:29:18 my my character beautiful
0:29:21 the way that you've made my form my
0:29:23 outer form
0:29:24 beautiful because if we're only carrying
0:29:27 our outer form
0:29:28 as a representation of the trueness or
0:29:31 the fullness
0:29:32 of our self then it's a problem because
0:29:36 we're gonna pay less attention to the
0:29:38 thing that is uh
0:29:40 overriding that the thing that is more
0:29:42 consequential the thing that is
0:29:44 more has more of a bearing in fact on
0:29:47 who we're going to be remembered as
0:29:49 being and how we're going to treat
0:29:50 others
0:29:51 and that's going to be the the heart of
0:29:53 a person the heart of a person
0:29:55 you know his character and and so on and
0:29:57 so forth
0:29:58 so all that is morally reprehensible can
0:30:00 sometimes be defined
0:30:02 in that other in the essence what it is
0:30:05 is that
0:30:05 the thing that are morally irreplaceable
0:30:07 in yourself we tend to impute on that
0:30:10 other
0:30:10 right so therefore there's a kind of a
0:30:12 one is perfect and the other is is
0:30:14 lacking all perfection
0:30:16 othering is um
0:30:25 othering is a construct of
0:30:27 dehumanization
0:30:28 all right so and these of course are our
0:30:31 constructs together demonization
0:30:33 and and othering so
0:30:36 othering again still is number one a
0:30:38 negating of another's individual and
0:30:40 social worth
0:30:42 right to deny another person as having
0:30:45 you know intrinsic um worth
0:30:49 social worth meaning if social worth is
0:30:52 like
0:30:53 that person cannot fit into
0:30:57 a social identity model that person
0:30:59 can't fit into a social grouping
0:31:02 that's worthy you know uh that person
0:31:05 can't fit into
0:31:06 a kind of a social
0:31:10 framework that's deemed to be worthy
0:31:13 in the time of the holocaust we call
0:31:14 that social death and social dying
0:31:17 so before even hitler came to power 1933
0:31:20 uh there was the beginning of social
0:31:23 death and social dying
0:31:24 of the jewish people to be ostracized to
0:31:27 be castigated to be separated from the
0:31:29 others
0:31:30 meaning that you're going to become now
0:31:32 get wise people and it's like what
0:31:34 happened so in the warsaw ghetto
0:31:36 uh even palestinians for example in the
0:31:39 other that they're subjected to are seen
0:31:41 to be
0:31:43 you know uneducated or
0:31:46 you know ghetto get wise people and this
0:31:49 in fact
0:31:49 only stems from the idea that one people
0:31:53 have afforded themselves a sense of
0:31:55 individual place and individual
0:31:57 importance
0:31:59 a sense of being in their place and
0:32:02 spaces
0:32:03 and the others are not afforded that
0:32:05 same same sense of
0:32:07 individuality because everything
0:32:09 everything becomes generalized
0:32:10 and nor are they given a sense of social
0:32:12 work but instead
0:32:14 what what tends to happen is a social
0:32:17 dying a social death of those people
0:32:19 meaning even before
0:32:21 anybody commits an act of a physical
0:32:25 abuse or
0:32:26 killing of those people those people are
0:32:29 becoming
0:32:30 non-entities in people's imagination in
0:32:33 people's minds
0:32:35 othering is in grouping and out grouping
0:32:38 and so when these things take place
0:32:40 as in the example of of bosnia where you
0:32:43 have a very extreme
0:32:44 forms of nationalism uh in an an
0:32:47 ethnic kind of uh solidarity between
0:32:51 between groups um it's going to mean
0:32:53 therefore that the in group
0:32:55 the in this case the uh the serbs
0:32:59 uh the serbs and their in their at
0:33:01 attempts to
0:33:02 take over from slovenia or croatia or or
0:33:05 them or muslim
0:33:06 uh bosnia would of course
0:33:09 herald themselves as being worthy or
0:33:13 herald themselves as being
0:33:14 superior in their in groups and then
0:33:18 the others belong to the out groups and
0:33:20 the outgroups are
0:33:22 distant not only physically distant but
0:33:24 also culturally
0:33:25 different as well sorry culturally
0:33:28 distant as well
0:33:29 so physically uh distant and culturally
0:33:32 distant as well
0:33:33 it doesn't mean for cultural distance to
0:33:35 exist that people have to be physically
0:33:38 distant it doesn't mean that but what it
0:33:40 means is that
0:33:41 there's so much of a sense of
0:33:45 um generalizing around those people
0:33:48 or a sense of castigating or a
0:33:51 vilification
0:33:52 of those people that
0:33:55 that the sense of closeness between one
0:33:58 people and another
0:33:59 is is compromised that sense of
0:34:02 closeness
0:34:03 is now stretched far and wide so in
0:34:06 people's
0:34:06 mental imaginations they don't see those
0:34:09 people as
0:34:10 belonging to them therefore they're the
0:34:12 outcasts
0:34:13 their outcast is out and they're out
0:34:15 grouped uh
0:34:16 number three marginalization therefore
0:34:19 to
0:34:20 to um you know to deny people
0:34:24 a sense of place and belonging that you
0:34:26 deem to be worthy for yourself
0:34:28 means of course is people going to
0:34:30 become marginalized
0:34:31 in a very famous poem uh called
0:34:34 nothing's changed about the south
0:34:36 african apartheid i remember the lines
0:34:38 of the poet
0:34:39 who said that the narrator is speaking
0:34:41 and he's of course a black african
0:34:43 and he's he's troubled of course as he
0:34:46 would be
0:34:47 by the south african apartheid uh that
0:34:50 he says he speaks about
0:34:51 a an area called district six he says no
0:34:54 sign
0:34:55 says it is but we know where we belong
0:34:57 so
0:34:58 no sign says it is but we know where we
0:35:00 belong right so
0:35:02 in one area you're going to have the
0:35:05 wealthy
0:35:06 whites dining and eating in in fancy
0:35:09 restaurants
0:35:10 but in in his area where
0:35:13 he and his people have become ghettoized
0:35:16 and marginalized
0:35:18 he says and the words he uses are
0:35:21 over there he says eat it with a eat it
0:35:24 on a plastic tables top
0:35:26 spit a little on the floor meaning and
0:35:29 you can hear the consonants of the t
0:35:31 which which
0:35:32 kind of reflects the sense of
0:35:33 disgruntlement you know in the tone of
0:35:35 voice there
0:35:36 he says take it with you eat it at a
0:35:39 plastic
0:35:40 table stop spit a little on the floor
0:35:43 meaning
0:35:44 it's all quite rough it's all quite
0:35:46 rough and it's all quite kind of
0:35:48 uh downgraded in those areas and that's
0:35:51 because of
0:35:52 marginalizing those people and then
0:35:54 generalizing them
0:35:56 and so to dehumanize and to otherize
0:35:59 means that you
0:36:01 do not afford those people a sense of
0:36:04 individuality
0:36:05 an individual person an individual
0:36:08 character
0:36:09 that a person is who he is because of
0:36:11 his own merits of his own
0:36:12 traditions of his own beliefs of his own
0:36:14 values of his own life
0:36:16 and living and own memories but we tend
0:36:19 to generalize them
0:36:20 that they're all the same right that if
0:36:23 one people
0:36:23 are uh are in in people's eyes seen as
0:36:28 uh as the other it means
0:36:31 everybody who is in that same
0:36:35 space of existence that same society or
0:36:38 that same land
0:36:40 or of that same complexion or of that
0:36:42 same ethnicity
0:36:43 are all the same generalize them right
0:36:46 and that's exactly what happens with
0:36:48 othering to generalize people
0:36:51 you can probably you notice i mean in
0:36:53 your own readings i remember
0:36:55 when i was in school and we would read
0:36:57 uh
0:36:58 harpalis to kill a mockingbird the way
0:37:00 that macomb county of course had
0:37:02 generalized
0:37:04 uh black people at that time and so when
0:37:07 um
0:37:08 when uh what's his name is tom robinson
0:37:12 the one who was
0:37:14 uh convicted of a crime he didn't commit
0:37:17 against
0:37:17 mayella ewell um when he
0:37:20 when he is now uh castigated for being
0:37:24 this
0:37:24 horrendous criminal and dehumanizing
0:37:27 people's minds
0:37:28 it's all black people in macomb county
0:37:31 in fact were tarnished by this
0:37:33 uh bad reputation because of
0:37:35 generalizing in them
0:37:37 and it's interesting how happily
0:37:38 therefore seeks to push back against
0:37:40 that because
0:37:41 atticus finch who is the white lawyer
0:37:44 and then defends of course
0:37:46 tom robinson uh i think his name is tom
0:37:48 robinson isn't it uh
0:37:50 he he and so therefore the idea is a way
0:37:52 of kind of showing
0:37:54 us an offsetting against the tendency of
0:37:57 tendencies of generalizing because uh
0:38:00 because atticus finch is a white person
0:38:01 defending of course
0:38:03 a a black person and then the other one
0:38:05 of course is boo radley and blue radley
0:38:07 remember was
0:38:08 is like the is he's a mockingbird
0:38:10 because a mockingbird has no song of its
0:38:12 own it copies the song of the jaybird
0:38:15 and so that's what happens if people are
0:38:18 generalized they have no voice they have
0:38:21 no voice of their own
0:38:23 boo radley interestingly enough of
0:38:25 course is the one who is
0:38:28 also marginalized
0:38:31 not generalized in this sense because he
0:38:33 is quite an aloof person
0:38:35 individual in his strangeness
0:38:38 uh an aloof um and but it's interesting
0:38:41 that even though people have
0:38:43 these suspicions of him he ends up
0:38:45 saving you know the life of one of the
0:38:47 the key characters and so the idea is
0:38:49 therefore that generalizing
0:38:51 is is what really leads to or is a
0:38:53 consequence of othering
0:38:56 othering can be based on anything really
0:38:58 a disability
0:38:59 you might see uh you might see
0:39:03 handicapped people or wheelchair-bound
0:39:05 people
0:39:06 as so removed from your own sense
0:39:10 of social you know living
0:39:14 that you have not ever kept in company
0:39:17 with
0:39:18 a person on a wheelchair or handicapped
0:39:20 that they haven't
0:39:21 lived near you like physically and
0:39:24 mentally and spiritually
0:39:26 that you can't see them as ever
0:39:29 occupying that same space
0:39:30 as you therefore the disabled could
0:39:33 become
0:39:34 othered in the sense that they're just
0:39:35 too far away
0:39:38 far away physically far away culturally
0:39:41 um you know to be included in my own my
0:39:43 own space
0:39:45 um think about race races is an obvious
0:39:48 one
0:39:48 is an obvious one uh you know and so
0:39:51 there's just so much about race and
0:39:53 racism
0:39:54 uh and and othering and dehumanization
0:39:57 and
0:39:57 and it's a lot to be spoken of here i
0:39:59 have an article
0:40:00 um and also someone i've delivered
0:40:02 before uh
0:40:04 on um sapience institute website called
0:40:07 i can't
0:40:08 breathe and this of course following the
0:40:10 tragic
0:40:11 killing and murder of of george floyd
0:40:14 and then before him of eric garner and
0:40:16 so many others as well
0:40:17 whose final words were i can't breathe
0:40:20 but race of course has a big
0:40:22 bearing here and it's so interesting in
0:40:24 fact it's not interesting but it's
0:40:26 it's haunting in a sense that the the
0:40:29 bosnian
0:40:29 and the the serbian perpetrators of the
0:40:32 genocide
0:40:33 disallowed uh the the bosnian muslims
0:40:36 and ethnic identity you know and they
0:40:39 they said that these people are not
0:40:40 really
0:40:41 uh you know slovak people that they're
0:40:44 turks
0:40:45 and so they use the the famine label of
0:40:48 tugs or dirty turks
0:40:50 as a way of excluding them
0:40:53 from the ethnic ethnicity to which they
0:40:57 belonged and so therefore it's
0:40:58 creating an out group because the in
0:41:01 group
0:41:02 is are are the only ones uh in this case
0:41:05 the serbs
0:41:06 serbs and not other slovak people
0:41:09 uh ethnicity of course this of course
0:41:11 was a case of ethnic
0:41:12 cleansing and so we're speaking about
0:41:14 that social economic status and so many
0:41:16 others
0:41:17 as well uh associated with the last one
0:41:20 here socioeconomic status
0:41:21 uh there's a very famous poem uh called
0:41:24 uh uh it's called by
0:41:29 zulfiqar ghost if i remember and in that
0:41:32 poem
0:41:33 the the poet speaks about a um
0:41:38 a father and a son who notice uh
0:41:41 a a beggar on the streets
0:41:44 and uh and that beggar uh
0:41:48 and these and they and and it describes
0:41:50 if i remember it describes
0:41:52 the father saying uh that we
0:41:55 we cross parts but our eyes
0:41:58 uh what did he say that you know our
0:42:02 eyes
0:42:03 deliberately avoid you know the glance
0:42:07 of looking upon one another meaning we
0:42:08 we
0:42:09 deliberately have a way of avoiding
0:42:12 coming into close proximity to him
0:42:14 by simply not looking at him but looking
0:42:17 through him and past him
0:42:19 and he says that that beggar he has
0:42:22 uh you know he's wearing a dirty jacket
0:42:25 or he has
0:42:27 um you know he's unkempt uh
0:42:30 and he ends the poem by saying that no
0:42:32 place for him in our heaven
0:42:34 there is clean and empty and that's a
0:42:37 kind of a
0:42:38 good question striking point there in
0:42:40 the sense that
0:42:41 the the heaven that is speaking about is
0:42:44 the heaven of their
0:42:45 own social place spacing right so their
0:42:48 own society
0:42:50 that of course is heaven is you know
0:42:53 for the dispossessed person the beggar
0:42:56 the homeless person
0:42:57 that's like the heaven but he says that
0:42:59 in our heaven it's clean and it's empty
0:43:01 clean you might understand but empty is
0:43:03 interesting because
0:43:04 the idea is that if we disallow
0:43:08 people of other socio-economic status as
0:43:12 poorer people perhaps
0:43:13 into our own spaces our own worlds our
0:43:16 own
0:43:17 sense of you know living um then
0:43:21 we're going to live very lonely lives
0:43:23 because
0:43:24 most people if it's speaking about you
0:43:27 know the poor and the wealthy most
0:43:28 people are not going to be wealthy
0:43:30 most people are going to be of the ones
0:43:33 struggling and so on and so forth
0:43:35 um but but othering can take place in
0:43:37 each of these and then so many others as
0:43:39 well
0:43:40 um now a bit of a historical uthering so
0:43:43 we spoke about therefore what othering
0:43:45 is
0:43:46 the types of othering now what about the
0:43:48 historical othering
0:43:50 that made the genocide in bosnia you
0:43:52 know so
0:43:53 surreal now in the spanish inquisition
0:43:56 during the 16th century muslims were
0:43:57 depicted as saracens
0:43:59 hagarians and hagarine beasts now just a
0:44:02 bit about
0:44:03 spanish inquisition remember that the
0:44:06 genesis of the crusades that took place
0:44:08 in the um in the 11th century
0:44:11 were not uh would not begin in claremont
0:44:15 in france when pope evan ii made its
0:44:17 proclamation 1095
0:44:19 the genesis of the crusade in fact begin
0:44:21 in al andalus in islamic spain
0:44:23 and this happens when the muslims divide
0:44:26 become divided into the muluk of the
0:44:28 wife into the party kingdoms
0:44:30 and when this happens they lose their
0:44:32 major states you know of
0:44:34 of toledo and and and seville and and
0:44:38 uh and korotoba and and smaller states
0:44:41 and they become like
0:44:42 just dozens of small independent states
0:44:45 when this happens the the the catholic
0:44:49 popes alexander iii gregory the seventh
0:44:52 they call for uh what came to be known
0:44:56 as a crusade
0:44:57 because they granted indulgences to the
0:45:00 participants
0:45:02 or for the spanish crusaders to go and
0:45:06 fight against these uh muslim
0:45:09 party kingdoms to recapture some states
0:45:12 that they took from the christians
0:45:14 but the point is that the idea of the
0:45:16 crusades was in fact from that point
0:45:18 onwards right because that's when the
0:45:21 indulgence was granted the remission of
0:45:22 sins was granted
0:45:24 and then after that you had after
0:45:26 gregory the seventh you had then who in
0:45:28 fact was
0:45:29 uh one of the mentors of eben ii who
0:45:31 then pronounced his crusade in 1095
0:45:34 um and then they came into 99 and they
0:45:36 and they took jerusalem from the muslims
0:45:38 but again that the language of
0:45:40 dehumanization is very very powerful
0:45:42 in the surviving accounts of the uh
0:45:45 letters
0:45:46 but the spanish inquisition which
0:45:48 happened later than in spain
0:45:50 uh you know from the the fifth uh the
0:45:53 15th and 16th centuries um
0:45:56 muslims were depicted as saracens
0:45:58 hagarins hagreens as
0:46:00 in the wife of ibrahim al-islam
0:46:03 and thus of course it's uh ismail islam
0:46:06 who comes from hajjar and then isak
0:46:08 comes from uh
0:46:09 from sarah ibrahim's wife but called
0:46:12 hagarines as in their
0:46:14 other as in they're different as in
0:46:15 their they're they're not the same as us
0:46:18 and hagarian beasts and beasts of course
0:46:20 is very typical
0:46:21 in the language of dehumanization
0:46:23 because a beast means
0:46:24 a sub in fact a beast is a non-human you
0:46:28 know you have
0:46:29 dehumanizing as in sub-human entities
0:46:31 but a beast
0:46:32 is an animal and a beast is not just a
0:46:35 beast is a wild animal
0:46:37 a beast is an animal that you would fear
0:46:39 a beast is an animal that
0:46:41 should be kept far from you in the 16th
0:46:43 century
0:46:44 hapsec empire muslim turks were
0:46:46 portrayed as terrible turk
0:46:48 spaniards described the moors as greedy
0:46:50 and sadistic
0:46:52 and in bosnia interestingly they said
0:46:54 you're not really ethnic slavic people
0:46:56 but turks right so it's hearkening back
0:46:59 therefore
0:47:00 to that old very old
0:47:03 um you know dehumanizing of
0:47:06 labels and castigating and othering of
0:47:10 of of turkish people you know from
0:47:13 centuries before
0:47:14 you know in muslim interaction sometimes
0:47:16 conflict with people
0:47:18 but that's the image being built up and
0:47:20 created in the minds of of these
0:47:22 europeans towards muslims
0:47:24 in official documents of morisco's were
0:47:26 routinely referred to as
0:47:28 pestilence moriscos were the ones who
0:47:31 following the inquisition
0:47:33 uh and the rise of the grand inquisitors
0:47:35 like tomasito kamada
0:47:41 and the other ones uh it became you know
0:47:45 the muslims were unable therefore to
0:47:46 remain as muslims because islam was a
0:47:49 banned religion arabic was banned
0:47:51 muslims were forced to eat pork and
0:47:53 drink wine and
0:47:54 and were unable to say the word allah to
0:47:56 pray or anything like that this was the
0:47:58 this was the terrible dark days of the
0:48:01 inquisition
0:48:02 and the moriscos and the muriscas were
0:48:04 the were the ones who held out
0:48:06 uh holding on to their faith in such
0:48:08 difficult situations
0:48:10 um and then of course there was the the
0:48:13 big fatwa of uh ahmed ibn bujuma
0:48:15 uh the fatwa of iran where he gave you
0:48:18 know license for them to
0:48:19 to to to hold their faith in secrecy
0:48:23 outwardly they would look like
0:48:24 christians but inwardly they would be
0:48:26 muslim then they would pray in secret
0:48:27 and so on and so forth
0:48:28 but they're referred to as pestilence
0:48:31 plague
0:48:32 a fever pestilential horde beasts
0:48:35 vipers within the bosom of spain and if
0:48:38 you think about when you think about
0:48:39 these words
0:48:40 uh you think about an infestation
0:48:44 and everybody knows that infestation has
0:48:46 to be you know removed
0:48:48 you know for the safety of the people
0:48:50 you have to remove what's infesting
0:48:52 and therefore that by having by calling
0:48:54 them these kind of words a plague a
0:48:55 fever
0:48:57 beasts vipers pestilence it gives that
0:49:00 impression
0:49:01 now this was a kind of language used in
0:49:03 polemical texts in facts
0:49:04 and texts written in support of the
0:49:07 expulsion of the muslims
0:49:09 one of them for example a former
0:49:11 preacher in valencia
0:49:13 francesca wrote how the treason and bad
0:49:16 customs of the
0:49:17 moriscos were inherited in their
0:49:19 corrupted blood
0:49:20 and their mothers uh
0:49:24 what is that i can't see that and their
0:49:26 mother's milk
0:49:28 right and their mother's milk look at
0:49:29 that right so
0:49:31 it's it's so tragic therefore and and
0:49:33 it's so tragically ironic
0:49:34 actually because the the whole
0:49:38 you know the moriscos in fact were also
0:49:41 native these are not
0:49:42 arabs these are converts you know to
0:49:45 islam over centuries right so they're
0:49:49 actually
0:49:49 spanish they're spanish just as spanish
0:49:52 as the catholics
0:49:54 and their native inhabitants who had
0:49:55 embraced islam hundreds of years ago
0:49:58 and then they only knew of course islam
0:50:00 as a religion the only new arabic as a
0:50:01 language
0:50:02 and this is why when you had the the
0:50:05 banning of arabic language
0:50:07 um you know they they put up a fight
0:50:09 they were they had to pay fifty
0:50:11 to cuddles you know to have to have that
0:50:13 suspended for 50 years and it was
0:50:16 but the ones who were speaking are our
0:50:18 native
0:50:19 inhabitants are spaniards right and so
0:50:22 to say therefore
0:50:23 that they were inherited in their
0:50:25 corrupted blood and their mother's milk
0:50:27 it gives the impression that these
0:50:28 people are are different in
0:50:30 all in all ways uh but you wouldn't get
0:50:34 the impression that they're speaking
0:50:35 about
0:50:36 a people who look like them right who
0:50:38 just
0:50:39 like them ethnically and everything else
0:50:41 um
0:50:42 all right so that's some historical
0:50:45 uttering behind the european context
0:50:47 there
0:50:48 now here we have
0:50:52 uh yeah so in one horrifying case which
0:50:56 reflects the extent of othering as a
0:50:58 process to legitimize violence
0:51:00 is the siege of sarajevo
0:51:03 uh the state-run belgrade tv aired a
0:51:06 false story
0:51:07 intended to fuel hatred and justify the
0:51:10 siege including the line
0:51:12 muslim extremists have come up with the
0:51:14 most horrifying way
0:51:16 in the world of torturing people
0:51:20 last night they fed the sub children to
0:51:22 the lions in the cities
0:51:24 uh pure nurse gaz delino's zoo
0:51:28 now of course this is complete
0:51:30 fabrication this is complete nonsense
0:51:31 and none of this
0:51:32 nothing like this ever happened but the
0:51:34 fact that that story could be run
0:51:37 you know on on belgrade tv and reached
0:51:39 millions of people
0:51:41 men of course that an impression of
0:51:43 those muslims
0:51:44 would have been built up right so the
0:51:46 fact that it's reflecting
0:51:48 something so savage as in feeding
0:51:51 children to
0:51:52 wild animals in the zoo is something so
0:51:55 savage
0:51:56 that they're going to have this
0:51:57 impression built that of course stems
0:51:58 from
0:51:59 ignorance ignorance of course is a root
0:52:01 of all problems
0:52:02 um and in fact urban a second when he's
0:52:06 proclaiming his crusade what came to
0:52:08 benue's crusade
0:52:09 to those people in in france and
0:52:12 claremont and other places
0:52:14 he's speaking in many cases and many of
0:52:17 his audience members
0:52:18 in fact are going to be uh brigands and
0:52:20 thieves
0:52:21 and rapists and murderers you know as
0:52:24 well as of course monks and and
0:52:26 and more upright knights but he's
0:52:27 speaking to people who
0:52:29 who want a chance of remission of sins
0:52:31 and redemption this is why there is
0:52:32 speaking to them as appealing to them
0:52:35 but is using a language of dehumanizing
0:52:37 of muslim jesus and muslims are like
0:52:40 are our heathen people muslims worship a
0:52:42 man called muhammad
0:52:44 muslims sacrifice babies at the altars
0:52:46 you know i mean crazy things that you
0:52:48 would never imagine of
0:52:49 but but when they're hearing these
0:52:51 stories it's building up an image
0:52:53 in their minds and people are just so
0:52:54 horrific and so sadistic
0:52:56 that they have to be fought back have to
0:52:58 be fought again so therefore
0:53:00 we can you know save ourselves from them
0:53:03 uh as well uh here's another one so this
0:53:06 is from
0:53:06 uh bill gianna plavsky's guilty plea
0:53:09 before the icty
0:53:11 um so this is when you know people were
0:53:14 convicted
0:53:15 on war crimes committed against the
0:53:17 muslims her words are very interesting
0:53:20 she says that i've i highlighted in red
0:53:23 uh to emphasize the point she's making
0:53:26 here
0:53:27 at the time i easily convinced myself
0:53:28 that this was a matter of survival and
0:53:30 self-defense
0:53:31 in fact it was more our leadership of
0:53:34 which i was necessary apart
0:53:36 let an effort which victimized countless
0:53:38 innocent people
0:53:40 explanations of self-defense and
0:53:42 survival of the justification
0:53:44 by the end it was said even among your
0:53:46 own our own people
0:53:48 that in this war we had lost our
0:53:50 nobility of
0:53:52 character of course it would happen the
0:53:54 obvious questions become if this truth
0:53:56 is now so
0:53:57 evident why did i not see it earlier
0:53:59 what's what happens
0:54:00 so when people are in the frenzy of
0:54:02 violence and murder and the frenzy of
0:54:04 propaganda in the frenzy of
0:54:06 characterizing of others and othering
0:54:09 people and humanizing
0:54:10 they can't see you can't see yourself
0:54:14 right i mean the islam is always telling
0:54:16 us to
0:54:17 step back and stop patiently reflect and
0:54:20 think
0:54:20 think about yourself but you can't see
0:54:23 that happening and and
0:54:24 the the worst i've read in fact of this
0:54:26 in fact is from the genocide of
0:54:28 rwanda 1994 and i would encourage you to
0:54:31 read because in in the book on being
0:54:32 human which is available for free
0:54:34 download
0:54:34 from sap institute website i have a very
0:54:37 lengthy chapter on that genocide
0:54:39 and and and i have a lot of reports from
0:54:42 them
0:54:43 mouths from the words of the
0:54:45 perpetrators who did the evil and the
0:54:47 killing
0:54:48 explaining the psychology their own
0:54:50 psychology of why they didn't have and
0:54:52 you'd find similarity in fact with what
0:54:53 she's saying over here
0:54:55 right um if this truth is now
0:54:57 surveillance why did i not see it
0:54:59 earlier
0:54:59 and how could our leaders and those who
0:55:01 followed have committed such acts the
0:55:03 answer to both questions is i believe
0:55:06 fair a blinding fear that led to an
0:55:09 obsession
0:55:11 fair irrational fear of the other
0:55:15 irrational fear of the other especially
0:55:18 for those of us who
0:55:20 for whom the second world war was a
0:55:22 living memory that serbs would never
0:55:24 again allow themselves to become victims
0:55:27 in this we in the leadership violated
0:55:29 the most basic duty of every human being
0:55:32 the duty to restrain ourselves to
0:55:34 restrain oneself and to respect the
0:55:36 human dignity
0:55:37 of others restrain oneself and respect
0:55:40 the human dignity of others
0:55:42 we were committed to do whatever was
0:55:43 necessary to
0:55:45 prevail very interesting words there
0:55:48 all right so this is now radovan and
0:55:51 karajik
0:55:52 the perpetrator himself and the genocide
0:55:54 of bosnia he says muslims will disappear
0:55:57 that people will disappear from the face
0:56:00 of
0:56:00 the earth this will disappear that
0:56:02 people despair from the physical that's
0:56:04 what he says all right
0:56:05 now i want us to
0:56:09 think about this over here um
0:56:15 remember that
0:56:19 uh my book here published by simpson
0:56:22 institute
0:56:23 called on being human was
0:56:26 written because of what happened in
0:56:31 in christchurch new zealand in 2019
0:56:35 when brent and taran committed his act
0:56:38 of
0:56:38 insane mass killing violence
0:56:42 terrorism uh against uh
0:56:45 more than 50 muslims praying in in two
0:56:47 mosques
0:56:48 um the the book in fact was launched on
0:56:51 the first
0:56:52 anniversary of that killing in
0:56:54 christchurch in new zealand it was
0:56:56 launched there now the concept of
0:56:58 othering and dehumanization is central
0:57:00 to understanding the ideology behind the
0:57:02 genocide of muslims in bosnia
0:57:04 right with this we've learned about that
0:57:06 already so we went there for from number
0:57:08 one
0:57:08 understanding what happened in those
0:57:10 years number two why they happened
0:57:12 number three what is othering number
0:57:15 four historical examples
0:57:17 of that othering and now we come to
0:57:19 understanding
0:57:21 that the concept right of othering
0:57:24 is critical understanding the mindset of
0:57:26 the new zealand mosque and man
0:57:28 brenton taran so what's the correlation
0:57:31 what is it
0:57:32 now what is he carries out the christ
0:57:34 church terror acts which claimed the
0:57:36 lives of 50 muslims praying at the
0:57:37 al-nuru mosque
0:57:39 and the linwood islamic center in 2019
0:57:42 now for him there existed an entrenched
0:57:45 sense of othering of muslims
0:57:47 in his when he writes a manifesto and
0:57:50 in that manifesto there is an entrenched
0:57:54 sense of othering of muslims it's called
0:57:57 the great replacement
0:57:58 there is much that connects the
0:58:00 mastermind of the bosnian genocide
0:58:02 radhavan karachik and brenton tarrant
0:58:05 himself
0:58:06 right so what happens radhavan karajik
0:58:09 was infamous in describing bosnian
0:58:10 muslims as
0:58:11 filth as traitors and vermin
0:58:15 that needed to be and this is a
0:58:16 psychology of genocide the language of
0:58:18 genocide
0:58:19 right the language of dehumanization
0:58:21 calling people
0:58:23 uh cockroaches vermin
0:58:26 rats right so again it gives this
0:58:29 impression of an
0:58:30 infestation of something that needs to
0:58:32 be removed everybody's
0:58:34 is is you know repulsed by those kinds
0:58:36 of things um
0:58:38 in the words of biljana plovjak kurjic's
0:58:41 deputy
0:58:42 it was serb genetically deformed
0:58:45 material that embraced islam all right
0:58:48 so look at that
0:58:48 now this of course is very interesting
0:58:51 because remember that they're denying
0:58:53 they're denying the bosnian muslims as
0:58:55 being
0:58:56 from slavic people same ethnicity as
0:58:58 them
0:58:59 and so therefore the way to do that is
0:59:01 to say
0:59:02 that since they converted to islam it
0:59:05 was
0:59:07 serb their own of because you know that
0:59:10 they're slavic people
0:59:11 obviously so serb genetically deformed
0:59:13 material meaning it was the worst of us
0:59:16 it was the the rotten of us it was the
0:59:19 filthy
0:59:20 and the foul of us that led them
0:59:24 to become muslim it was
0:59:27 the the most rotten form
0:59:30 or most rotten um people from us
0:59:34 they ended up becoming muslims the
0:59:36 deformed of us
0:59:37 became became muslim right that's what
0:59:40 they what
0:59:40 what they're saying therefore as a way
0:59:42 of justifying the fact that
0:59:44 they clearly are the same ethnicity as
0:59:48 you they have the same colored skin as
0:59:49 you they have blonde hair like you they
0:59:51 have blue eyes like you
0:59:52 uh but you have to deny that in order
0:59:55 for the other ring therefore to be
0:59:57 to be you know to be met and then
0:59:59 therefore the
1:00:01 the abuse and killing to be meted out
1:00:03 against those people
1:00:05 uh brendan tara says this is from his uh
1:00:07 manifesto great replacement
1:00:09 he says but if you attempt to live in
1:00:11 european lands anywhere west of the
1:00:13 bosphorus
1:00:14 we will kill you and drive you roaches
1:00:16 from our land meaning cockroaches
1:00:18 therefore the language is the same the
1:00:21 same language that
1:00:22 karadik is using in fact in the genocide
1:00:25 in bosnia
1:00:26 taran is using hair as well meaning
1:00:28 drive you cockroaches roaches from our
1:00:30 lands
1:00:32 taran drew much inspiration from the
1:00:34 convicted war criminal
1:00:35 radovan karajik in fact on route to his
1:00:39 killing spree
1:00:40 and of course you've probably seen
1:00:42 you've probably heard because it was
1:00:43 uploaded live for people to watch
1:00:45 taran played a serbian nationalist song
1:00:48 in which radivan and karajuk is
1:00:50 glorified and called on to lead the subs
1:00:52 the song further glorifies serbian
1:00:55 fighters and calls for the killing of
1:00:56 turks
1:00:57 who hardlines sub-nationalists used to
1:00:59 refer to
1:01:00 bosnian muslims all right so to see how
1:01:04 it's all being played out here
1:01:05 so the song is glorifying serbian
1:01:07 fighters and calls for the killing of
1:01:09 turks
1:01:10 but obviously they're not turks they're
1:01:13 they're actually
1:01:14 slavic people right like the serbs like
1:01:17 the croatians
1:01:18 the bosnians who hardline sub
1:01:21 nationalists used to refer to bosnian
1:01:23 muslims therefore you have to create
1:01:25 that other
1:01:26 remember that the way this happens is
1:01:28 like this every one of us
1:01:29 has a mental canvas in our minds
1:01:33 if we are painting on our mental
1:01:36 canvases with
1:01:38 broad strokes and with with wide brushes
1:01:40 and with one color
1:01:42 we are disallowing identification we're
1:01:44 disallowing
1:01:45 uh grays we're disallowing finer grades
1:01:48 of distinction we're just allowing color
1:01:50 we're disallowing identity all we have
1:01:52 is one
1:01:53 one mesh of one thing and it's all
1:01:57 uh a characterization and that's what's
1:02:00 happening here so in the great
1:02:01 replacement he describes that the motive
1:02:03 for his attack was to create fair
1:02:07 was to create fair the fairer of the
1:02:09 other
1:02:10 right the fairer of the other right
1:02:12 that's exactly how it works
1:02:14 so when you have l groups created it's
1:02:17 because the in groups
1:02:18 are creating these mythological
1:02:22 you know narratives caricatures about
1:02:24 that out group
1:02:26 the out group those people they them
1:02:29 those ones over there they do this they
1:02:32 do that
1:02:33 and until people begin to think well
1:02:34 they're so
1:02:36 scared of those others they are so
1:02:38 different to them
1:02:39 they can't ever contemplate ever talking
1:02:42 to them because they are over there
1:02:44 wilfred owen has an interesting poem in
1:02:45 fact i remember reading
1:02:47 where he describes himself in a dream i
1:02:49 think it was where he
1:02:50 he goes into uh one of the trenches of
1:02:53 the germans if i remember
1:02:54 uh and um and i think it was
1:02:58 yeah i think it was and he describes uh
1:03:03 meeting somebody who uh
1:03:06 went to fight in the war for the same
1:03:08 reason as he did
1:03:09 you know just to make some money or to
1:03:11 please his girlfriend to please his meg
1:03:13 he says in one other poem
1:03:15 um but the idea is therefore that um
1:03:18 you know it was uh the idea of of him
1:03:21 because of course he was very anti-war
1:03:23 anti-first war tragically died in the
1:03:25 war and irregularity in the war
1:03:27 um the idea was the way of how do you
1:03:30 displace
1:03:31 how do you how does that the sentiments
1:03:34 of fair building become dissipated
1:03:36 through potential empathy that one could
1:03:39 have
1:03:39 i mean that's his idea as far as
1:03:41 understanding it from from that poem
1:03:43 but that's that's what's what he's
1:03:45 saying therefore he describes that the
1:03:47 motive for his attack was to
1:03:49 create fair um the fairer of
1:03:53 of the muslims you know fairer of the
1:03:55 others fairer of the turks and so on and
1:03:56 so forth
1:03:58 now this last line in fact is what he
1:04:00 incorporates this is brent and taran in
1:04:02 the great replacement it says in his
1:04:04 book
1:04:05 ask yourselves what would pope urban ii
1:04:08 do now this i thought was was quite uh
1:04:12 interesting in fact for brendan tarrant
1:04:15 to say that
1:04:17 because if he saw he's saying they ask
1:04:20 yourself
1:04:20 so purple second of course is the one
1:04:22 that launches the first crusade against
1:04:24 the muslims of
1:04:25 of jerusalem you know for the christians
1:04:28 to
1:04:30 fight them and to and to take jerusalem
1:04:33 you know from the muslims
1:04:35 um but there's just so many things
1:04:39 the uh i i don't think brendan tyrone
1:04:41 himself understands even who pop
1:04:43 in a second was or why he did what he
1:04:45 did his complexities here
1:04:47 open a second was a reform pope urban
1:04:50 the second in fact was a mentor
1:04:52 of uh or a student of gregory the
1:04:55 seventh there's a reformed papacy here
1:04:57 urban ii spent most of his day in fact
1:04:59 on the day that he's calling the crusade
1:05:01 also speaking about benedictine reform
1:05:04 the monastic order
1:05:05 right he there is there's in
1:05:09 pub urban ii in fact is also calling for
1:05:12 the crusade because
1:05:13 he there's a schism between the eastern
1:05:15 orthodox and the catholics
1:05:17 and this is a way for him to assert
1:05:19 himself as the leader of the
1:05:20 of the catholic christian world urban
1:05:23 the second of course is also fighting
1:05:24 against the
1:05:25 uh the you know imperial authorities
1:05:29 because this was the first time that a
1:05:31 pope would would
1:05:32 you know pronounce a military war
1:05:36 against a distant people as opposed to
1:05:39 the emperor doing that and there's this
1:05:42 so many complexities happening there
1:05:45 and so i think that this kind of some
1:05:48 ignorance
1:05:49 some simplicity in brent and taran's
1:05:51 words in in this kind of
1:05:53 declarative ask yourselves what would
1:05:55 urban a second
1:05:57 do um but but of course what he's trying
1:06:00 to create brent and taran is
1:06:02 is this sense of fair uh in about the
1:06:05 muslims that
1:06:06 uh that if if in a second he would of
1:06:09 course call for a crusade against
1:06:10 the these people these turks today or
1:06:13 muslims living in
1:06:14 in christchurch or new zealand they have
1:06:16 to be fought against
1:06:18 and of course when the crusaders arrived
1:06:20 in jerusalem the slogan the call of the
1:06:23 day
1:06:23 as they broke into the walls and as they
1:06:26 massacred the babies and the children
1:06:28 and the women
1:06:28 was duswalt dos vault which in latin
1:06:31 means
1:06:32 god wills it god wills it and by the way
1:06:35 the
1:06:35 in the spanish inquisition uh thomas to
1:06:38 commander the first grand inquisitor
1:06:40 that the call of the day was dios la
1:06:42 cuera dios la cuer
1:06:43 which means in spanish god wills it god
1:06:46 wills it
1:06:48 so dehumanization therefore as a
1:06:50 construct of othering
1:06:52 is what is the regating of another to a
1:06:54 distance some other
1:06:55 it is a seeing in the other much less
1:06:58 and sometimes a complete absence of what
1:06:59 one sees in oneself all this is morally
1:07:01 reprehensible
1:07:02 is you find it therefore it's the same
1:07:04 as othering but dehumanizing your voice
1:07:06 is a worse as a construct because you're
1:07:09 now
1:07:11 disallowing or you're denying or you're
1:07:14 removing
1:07:15 from that other the humanity that could
1:07:18 have existed you know in your in
1:07:20 people's minds
1:07:21 in that other therefore mental cannabis
1:07:23 is the human eyes other is painted with
1:07:25 broad strokes and white brushes there
1:07:26 are no identifications no
1:07:28 fine lines no nuances no grades and no
1:07:30 subtle outlines
1:07:31 the untermentia was to do uber mensch
1:07:34 right so the untorment were the under
1:07:36 men the uber mentioned were the upper
1:07:38 men
1:07:38 so the nazis therefore castigated the
1:07:40 jews the gypsies
1:07:42 the mentally handicapped as you
1:07:44 interment as the under men
1:07:46 as the sub-men as a sub-human people you
1:07:49 know
1:07:49 as those who are the unworthy who are
1:07:52 not strong enough
1:07:53 not fit enough not mentally not mentally
1:07:56 able enough
1:07:57 not white enough not aryan enough not
1:07:59 blondie enough
1:08:01 as uber mentioned uber mensch were the
1:08:03 upper men
1:08:04 the aryan races superior race right so
1:08:07 therefore the the
1:08:08 the delineating of these boundaries
1:08:12 between people are what creates this
1:08:15 sense of
1:08:16 othering that stretch so far if it's
1:08:18 unchecked
1:08:19 when situations arise this can
1:08:22 easily as it does lead to acts of
1:08:26 mass violence mass murder and and human
1:08:28 genocide as well
1:08:30 uh language of so we spoke about that
1:08:32 already therefore
1:08:33 giving people the animalistic
1:08:35 animalistic kind of
1:08:37 you know uh tendencies are using
1:08:40 um vocab using words that are
1:08:43 not simply demeaning but are castigating
1:08:46 of others
1:08:47 as being unhuman less human and
1:08:50 non-human
1:08:51 more animal-like rats rats
1:08:54 vermin you know
1:08:57 beasts and so on and so forth and then
1:09:00 of course for that to exist there has to
1:09:02 be a moral
1:09:03 disengagement what does that mean that
1:09:05 means that every one of us
1:09:07 and all people have this sense of uh a
1:09:10 moral
1:09:11 thing allah is created of course
1:09:12 everyone with the fitra fitra is that
1:09:14 pure
1:09:15 you know inherent nature right the
1:09:17 primordial state of man where he can
1:09:19 recognize
1:09:20 good and evil allah says
1:09:26 and allah says and and consider the self
1:09:29 uh
1:09:30 you know how it can be uh it can be
1:09:33 inspired with such depravity and evil
1:09:35 but also such
1:09:36 goodness and piety right but moral
1:09:39 disengagement means therefore that you
1:09:41 would
1:09:42 disengage yourself from all of these
1:09:45 moral
1:09:46 morals currents that should and
1:09:49 could and would prevent you from
1:09:52 showing such evil towards a person and
1:09:55 harming another person
1:09:57 meaning these are things that should
1:09:58 hold you back from that because
1:10:00 naturally speaking it's not in our
1:10:02 tendencies human tendencies
1:10:04 to uh dehumanize anybody you know we we
1:10:08 have
1:10:08 too much goodness and allah creates in
1:10:11 us that's holding us back from that you
1:10:12 know
1:10:13 we can see other people in ourselves but
1:10:16 when these currents become so
1:10:18 uh popular in society with the with the
1:10:20 in groups
1:10:21 and the propaganda is there uh you know
1:10:24 and the
1:10:25 and in group becomes entrenched the
1:10:27 outgroup becomes
1:10:28 you know kind of a uh and an other
1:10:31 entity
1:10:32 then of course these things can of
1:10:33 course happen
1:10:35 uh now what is kind of the way that we
1:10:37 we respond to this i've incorporated
1:10:39 this i have a new book
1:10:40 uh which in fact i'm just just in fact
1:10:42 came out today
1:10:44 uh the book is called navigating war
1:10:47 descent and empathy
1:10:49 in arab u.s relations seeing our others
1:10:51 in dark and space and so we need to
1:10:53 finish them because of maghrib time now
1:10:54 inshallah
1:10:55 uh we're nearly done inshallah uh
1:10:58 and uh and this quote that i have is
1:11:01 from
1:11:02 uh a a lady that i i have very blessed
1:11:04 to have come to know and in fact now in
1:11:06 america new york
1:11:07 and now our parts crossed and and i've
1:11:11 used uh her
1:11:12 photographs in in my book uh remarkable
1:11:14 remarkable lady
1:11:16 uh eo's double field her name is and
1:11:20 and i've used this in fact from one of
1:11:22 her shows called no time for beauty
1:11:24 which
1:11:24 they all focus on the war in iraq and
1:11:27 and i've highlighted some things for us
1:11:28 to appreciate there was a particular
1:11:30 picture of a very old man made me think
1:11:32 of a grandfather
1:11:34 and he was holding a young girl that was
1:11:36 about the age of my granddaughter look
1:11:38 at that
1:11:38 right made me think of a grandfather and
1:11:41 the girl was about the age of my
1:11:43 granddaughter
1:11:44 and he was lifting her up and her legs
1:11:46 were dangling from her body she was dead
1:11:48 and somehow
1:11:49 i just transported into his body and
1:11:51 became him
1:11:52 the young girl that he was holding
1:11:54 became my granddaughter
1:11:55 that moment something fervently got into
1:11:58 my body
1:11:59 that this is so wrong this can't be done
1:12:01 and nobody is seeing actually who's been
1:12:03 killed and the numbers that are being
1:12:05 killed
1:12:06 the power of empathic responsiveness i
1:12:08 feel
1:12:09 your pain right that we we are there's
1:12:12 just
1:12:13 that's it we people have granddaughters
1:12:15 simply put
1:12:16 you know and all people have
1:12:17 granddaughters i mean simply poor that's
1:12:19 the idea
1:12:20 therefore the quranic paradigm is this
1:12:22 that we
1:12:23 the quran teaches us to undercut and
1:12:25 offset binary distinctions fueled by
1:12:27 hate
1:12:28 right these these are just temporary
1:12:29 these are temporary
1:12:31 right these are temporary superficial
1:12:33 right allen quran says
1:12:36 of allah is a creation of the heavens
1:12:38 and the earth and the alt
1:12:40 and the differences diversity of your
1:12:41 languages and your colors
1:12:43 and these truly are signs in this for
1:12:45 those who know
1:12:47 they truly are signs and this for those
1:12:49 who know diversity
1:12:51 of your languages and your colors not
1:12:53 for us to harbor
1:12:54 enmity and hostility to one another
1:12:56 because of these no but simply to use
1:12:58 these and think about the amazing
1:13:00 creation of allah
1:13:01 allah created us with these variations
1:13:04 the other words hang out oh people
1:13:06 we created you from a single male and a
1:13:09 single
1:13:10 woman and made you into races and tribes
1:13:13 so that you should recognize one another
1:13:16 and allah's eyes in god's eyes the most
1:13:18 honored of you are the ones most mindful
1:13:20 of him
1:13:22 right so therefore a person's dignity
1:13:25 is not on account of his ethnicity
1:13:28 a person is not because of the color of
1:13:30 his skin where he's born where he's
1:13:31 coming from no
1:13:33 none of these things in fact are
1:13:35 representation of his human dignity
1:13:37 but rather his connection or
1:13:39 understanding of himself of god
1:13:42 of doing acts of goodness of believing
1:13:44 the right thing all of these things in
1:13:46 fact are what allah is concerned with
1:13:48 here the most honored of you are the
1:13:49 ones most mindful of him
1:13:52 and allah god is all aware and all goes
1:13:54 all knowing and all aware
1:13:56 and then number two of course god man in
1:13:58 the pursuit of human dignity all people
1:14:00 all people aspire for human dignity and
1:14:03 allah and quran says from the very
1:14:04 beginning
1:14:06 we have certainly honored ennoble the
1:14:09 sons of adam
1:14:10 so even if people are not afforded
1:14:13 dignity by other people
1:14:14 allah has afforded them dignity
1:14:18 even if others even if you are not
1:14:20 affording somebody
1:14:21 your dignity allah has given that person
1:14:24 just simply because he is the son of
1:14:26 adam because allah created him as a son
1:14:28 of adam
1:14:29 all right so think about that think
1:14:31 about that you know
1:14:33 and then lastly we have
1:14:37 again the chronic paradigm principles of
1:14:39 justice to counter in-group biases
1:14:41 impediments of love and hate
1:14:43 you could love somebody so much it could
1:14:45 prevent you from seeing the wrong he's
1:14:47 doing
1:14:48 and the injustice is committing against
1:14:50 somebody else the verse in the quran
1:14:52 here
1:14:52 number one is not all the same no
1:14:55 people are all the same no two people
1:14:57 all are the same
1:14:59 everybody is different and number two
1:15:01 again the verse we have in noble sons of
1:15:03 adam
1:15:03 that the verse the key verses here about
1:15:05 the impediments of love and hate
1:15:07 are these that allah
1:15:13 you know for for justice as witnesses to
1:15:15 allah
1:15:16 even if it's against yourselves or
1:15:17 against the ones that or against your
1:15:19 parents
1:15:20 whether they're rich or poor or you're
1:15:22 near of kin meaning
1:15:24 allah you know don't let the impediment
1:15:27 of love prevent you
1:15:28 from being just towards people and
1:15:31 number two the other similar verse or
1:15:33 you who believe
1:15:34 be upright towards you know for allah as
1:15:36 witnesses to justice and never let the
1:15:38 hatred you have for people
1:15:39 swerve you from being just
1:15:43 aqua be just and that is closer to piety
1:15:46 so this is the impediment of hatred so
1:15:48 neither the impairment of love
1:15:50 or the impediment of hatred should have
1:15:52 a place right meaning
1:15:53 be upright for the sake of allah and
1:15:56 lastly
1:15:57 between bystanding versus rescuing
1:16:00 right in all human genocides there's
1:16:03 groups of people that emerge
1:16:04 bystanders perpetrators victims
1:16:07 bystanders and rescuers we're going to
1:16:10 be of the rescuers
1:16:11 right allah and this is the hadith the
1:16:13 prophet says beware of injustice
1:16:16 injustice will appear as darkness on the
1:16:17 day of judgement
1:16:19 fair average it destroyed those before
1:16:21 you and caused them to shed another's
1:16:23 blood
1:16:24 and to make lawful what was unlawful
1:16:27 right so
1:16:27 lulam any harm meted out against people
1:16:31 right genocide of course is the worst
1:16:32 form of all of it but
1:16:34 any injustice you could see i mean
1:16:36 that's for anyone in schools
1:16:38 you know in your workplace in society in
1:16:40 the streets
1:16:41 anybody being harmed it's your
1:16:43 responsibility to do something to
1:16:45 prevent
1:16:45 that harm taking place you know not to
1:16:48 be the bystander not to be the one who
1:16:50 is indifferent
1:16:52 the one who is complicit the one who's
1:16:53 simply looking and watching and
1:16:55 as a spectator no but to be the one who
1:16:58 is physically actively helping
1:17:00 verbally physical prophecy if you've
1:17:01 seen evil change it with your
1:17:04 hands if you can't with your mouths if
1:17:06 you can't hate it in your heart
1:17:08 that's the weakest of faith me try your
1:17:10 best to do something
1:17:12 you know so therefore and then of course
1:17:14 the last thing here
1:17:15 is about it's a beautiful lesson in the
1:17:17 quran
1:17:18 the constellations we have this taking
1:17:20 place because you have a mass murder
1:17:23 right and and allah is describing in
1:17:25 that surah when he says
1:17:27 that when the people would had dug a
1:17:30 trench and they were burning their
1:17:31 these believers alive and allah speaks
1:17:34 about those who were bystanders
1:17:36 and al and those who were active as well
1:17:39 is
1:17:41 and allah says when they're when they're
1:17:42 over the fire
1:17:44 but they but the scholars they say they
1:17:46 can't simply be over the fire
1:17:48 but they were so close to the fire that
1:17:50 they were enjoying
1:17:51 they were enjoying the roasting of human
1:17:54 skin they were enjoying
1:17:55 seeing evil committed against other
1:17:58 people never ever become desensitized to
1:18:00 that
1:18:01 you know by by these kinds of things you
1:18:03 know always remember the great
1:18:04 loss of life the great loss of dignity
1:18:07 great loss of
1:18:08 of a life allah says whoever you know
1:18:11 saves a life it's like he saved
1:18:13 all of humanity's life whoever takes a
1:18:15 life it's like he's taken everyone's
1:18:17 life
1:18:18 i mean that's that's just shows how
1:18:19 consequential it is in one
1:18:21 one single human life that had that life
1:18:23 had had a name
1:18:25 that life had a parent that life had
1:18:27 maybe a child that life had a
1:18:29 memory that life had a legacy life had
1:18:32 dreams and aspirations all
1:18:34 just the same as you right so therefore
1:18:36 these are
1:18:37 these are huge things to talk about
1:18:39 these are huge things for us to remember
1:18:41 these
1:18:41 huge huge things happen in human history
1:18:44 that should never happen
1:18:45 but it happened for us to learn a lesson
1:18:47 therefore that we would not want these
1:18:48 things happening ever ever again
1:18:51 and we've come now to the end and i
1:18:53 think it's appropriate because it's time
1:18:55 for maghrib
1:18:56 now inshallah uh i want to thank all of
1:18:58 you for your attendance inshaallah and
1:18:59 jazakallahu for
1:19:01 for listening patiently and allah bless
1:19:03 all of you please follow our working
1:19:05 show on sapiences.org
1:19:07 website and i look forward in shout out
1:19:09 to engaging each other with
1:19:10 with you at inshallah at another time um
1:19:13 allah bless all of you
1:19:18 allah