Hey there 🙂

According to Hamid, author of The Reluctant Fundamentalist, if readers consider the book as a thriller, then “they have already been afraid”. Instead of making a clear narration of the ending of his work, Hamid intentionally, as my classmate Anthony mentioned, left the “huge picture” for people to imagine and think. In other words, without any hint from the book, the only resource we can get to analyze the central idea is from both the cultural and political background of the world in recent years. In this case, if people feel strained and anxious after reading the book, then their response clearly demonstrates the fact that: we are now helplessly living in a tense situation filled with numerous security propaganda which we are suffered from. Then, here is the question, since a culture of fear has been swirling around the world, who are the real victims of it? And whether those so-called “victims” really fit into the frame?

The most magnificent point of The Reluctant Fundamentalist, in my perspective, is that Hamid depicts a culture of fear but with no further insights or explanations. Readers are exposed to such an inspiring condition to figure it out by themselves. No matter in the novel or real world, the United States seems like a permanent owner of the tag: a culture of fear. From national governments to local organizations, the propaganda of fighting against terrorism, including setting the Homeland Security Advisory System, indirectly push American people into the terror from time to time. Actually, what we cannot deny is that as a “favorite” attacking aim for terrorists, America can act as the victim of the game. However, instead of making a response like “Ok, you attacked me, then I will punish you attackers”, the United States took a much more radical attitude towards the attack: “Ok, you attacked me, then everyone sharing the same cultural or blood relationship with you will all go to heck”. To some extent, it seems that the real game has just begun after a series of terrorist attacks since 9/11 and this time America may not enjoy the title of “victim” anymore. So, where has the label gone?

Of course, innocent people like Changze who belong to Muslim but have nothing to do with the terrorism relay the baton. Raising the flag of Humanity (for its own citizens), America has taken an extremely sensitive position towards Muslims. Standing with American people, it is right and justifiable, but what about the situation of other innocent Muslims from the Middle East? It seems that these people are too foreign, like Changze, so they must be excluded from the scope of humanity by the United States. For instance, whenever people from the Middle East enter American airport, they are suffered from the fear of being detained. Why? Because they are Muslims with the beard, so they are treated as “bad” guys who may plant a bomb somewhere. Although the logic sounds unfair, that’s what actually happened nowadays. In The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Changze acts as a representative of a particular group, living a life that each Muslim who seeks for life opportunities and success in America may have to go through. Therefore, comparing to innocent Muslims, American people are definitely not or not the only one who bear the pressure of culture of fear.

There’s no reason to doubt the existence of the other side of a coin when we see a coin dropped on the ground with just one side upward, nor do our comprehensive perspectives of a culture of fear. No one owns the dominant power over the tag. Under the propaganda of American cultural of fear, Muslims, no matter you’re “good” or not, all have to walk in the shadow everyday. In order to provide security for their citizens, western countries make a huge effort to play up the negative image of countries which may be a hidden threat. Such a humanity, just like the coin on the ground, could show one side of it but hide another one forever as if it doesn’t exist. In other words, no one owns the privilege of humanity. Far from spreading and sharing the culture of fear like a joy to everyone, the real humanity is the one which still pursues justice for the innocent even if something unpleasant happens.

Thanks for reading.

Hey guys 🙂

Welcome back! This term my ASTU class starts with another political comic book Safe Area Gorazde (following the Persepolis) accomplished by a U.S. journalist, Joe Sacco. With the narrative, mainly the story related to Bosnian War from 1992 to 1995, inserted into the drawing, the book acts as a recount of local people’s terrible experiences during the wartime. As cruel as it can be, the war, in my perspective, shows us more than what could be perceived from the surface. For instance, the role of media, especially “foreign media” which looks like a “passer-by” of issues as well as events, should also be taken into consideration, and Joe actually pictured the relatively dark side of the phenomenon in his book, too.

On page 130, Joe drew some journalists who “blew in” in Gorazde in the morning but “blew out” with the U.N. convoy in the afternoon after taking some shots and short interviews there. Particularly, in order to get what they wanted in an instant, photographers threw candy which named as bon-bon at kids and “captured predictable mad scramble”. When I read here, I was really shocked and uncomfortable. The original emergence of media, I believe, symbolized people’s urgency to the REAL FACT, because a number of issues, as well as events, started to blur within the chaos made by the rapid development of the world. In this case, journalists and photographers ought to doubtlessly act as the defender of reality and purity. However, in Joe’s book, these “defenders” didn’t realize their responsibility but treat their interviews there as terrible tasks to be done. What could we expect from the interview, which may illustrate disastrous events, just accomplished in few hours? What could we get from the photographs where children are scrambling for candy thrown by the photographer? How could we trust the big picture in front of us? What’s the story behind fake story shown to us? It’s pretty hard to answer these cruel but sad questions, and it can be more dreadful if a lot of innocent people are deceived by the media.

Again, on page 217, a group of Spanish TV crew requested Riki to lead them around and told them the war in Gorazde before they left in the afternoon. In response, Riki pointed to some damaged buildings and said: “Look!”, which meant that the story these journalists sought for, was just around them. As I mentioned above, the TV crew saw their interviews as workload rather than a responsibility, and here is much more obvious when one of them begged Riki: “please help us”. In class, my classmate Nic mentioned that it looked like an irony that people from real safe areas asked survivors of the disastrous war to help them. Think about it, isn’t these journalists job to help and save people in Gorazde by doing real interviews about there? What’s more, there are almost no intact buildings around the crew; however, paradoxically, the damages seemed transparent and invisible to them at that moment. Then, what’s the consequence of phenomena like these? Yes, most of us, more or less, are fooled by what we could see in newspapers, journals or TV channels.

On the other hand, does it mean that we could trust nothing shown on media? Probably not, but to be honest, I’m not sure. A few days before, an Iraqi journalist was released from a kidnapping, and BBC commented that: “ Iraq is considered one of the most dangerous places to be a journalist”. I am deeply touched because no matter how hard it is, some people still choose to do what they think is right. To some extent, there seems a huge gap between Iraqi journalists and journalists from western countries; in other words, the severe pain just can not be felt by the passer-by.

Briefly, as a global citizen today, it’s my duty to be sensitive to the surroundings and the “worlds” far away from me, and I’m convinced that some of our media, those fake defenders, could not disguise themselves forever as long as we people do what we should do: appreciate but may not accept the entire picture in front of us completely.

Thanks for reading 🙂

Bibliography

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-38510102