By Sonie Kharduit
The skies of Damascus were lit up with missile fire as the US, UK and France launched an attack on the city of Damascus (Syria), instantly killing half a million people and more so proudly claiming their righteous victory against barbarism and brutality. Any noble soul would find it difficult to comprehend and justify such an act. It has become a form of neo- terrorism conducted by these powerful countries justifying their age old philosophy of “white man’s burden” a responsibility to fix global order. In fact many parts of West Asia whether in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Tunisia etc have become the playground of so called first world countries, resulting only in death and destruction. As such the ISIS, the Taliban are all the unwanted progeny born out of their political and military game. US alone spends nearly $600 billion on military expenditure. Had this money been channelized for humanitarian efforts then the world would have been a better place.
Isn’t it fascinating that this type of mass murder by these so called developed nations never receives any kind of protest nor shakes our conscience, whereas when an ISIS beheaded one person we reacted as if they are the mother of all demons. I often wonder why only videos showing a victim being beheaded goes viral and not the mass killings resulting from bombings. Is it the censorship power of these countries controlling the internet or is it our hypocrisy not to see nor perceive such heinous acts as crimes against humanity? This double standard will only create more distrust and hatred in our global society.
We might always project a terror group with Islamic identity; a bearded guy means trouble and this is a general perception that we carry. Whereas when a Christian boy indiscriminately opens fire in school; when the US ransacked Iraq in the name of WMD (weapon of mass destruction) likewise the Syria crisis happening now are not labelled as terror acts at all. European countries, USA, Russia are mostly Christian dominated nations and whether we identify them as Eastern or Western churches makes no difference, and they are the one responsible for any modern day terrorism committed openly with no accountability. Terror crime is a crime whether committed by a white, black or brown person but it’s our pretence that we filter the terror of Christian origin from others.
Any kind of militancy or the birth of any terror group in the world is pure reaction to discontentment, injustice, agony, collectively grouped as socio-economic and political inequalities. But when mixed with religious ingredients by some fundamentalist and other radical groups, it causes an adrenalin rush in those aggrieved souls alleviating the whole momentum. In the Muslim community we have the Wahabi group, In Hinduism (VHP); in Christianity (Ku Klux Klan of American Civil war, the Pogroms of Romania, the anti-Balaka group in central Africa). These are some of the associated radical group bringing the idea of religious terrorism. In fact our very own NSCN, the erstwhile NLFT in Tripura, the God’s army in Myanmar are all armed revolutionary Christian insurgent groups but we tend to overlook such ugly truths. Stereotyping a terror activity with any particular religion is a wrong notion when it is clearly understood that any forms of terrorism or insurgency are the result of a powerful cocktail of people’s despair and exploitation of few malicious soul by taking refuge under people’s weakness i.e., religious sentiments.
The insurgency problem in our own backyard in Garo hills is the manifestation of the same plight mentioned above. There are no born terrorists; it’s all about the life’s brutal experience which turns a person into a monster. Can we imagine the anger, the pain of a lone surviving boy from a sudden bombing, that killed all members of his family in a split second. I’m sure from every such incident, millions of militants are born from the rubble in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria etc ready to terrorise the western soil. They just need to be polished to be ready for action; their body is the ammunition in itself, ready to be blown off anytime to avenge the death of the loved ones.
So the question is who is responsible for creating and supplying these anti-social elements, the perception that Muslim community is the bed rock of terrorism is not only an incorrect notion but it’s more of our brazenness to accept the facts what our Christians brothers from these mighty countries do to secure their interest in geopolitical sphere or their quest for another form of colonialism.
The idea of doing this comparative study is to highlight the fact that all is not right in Christianity as many of us perceive it to be the most superior faith. There is no problem with Christ per se but it is the quality of Christians around the world which is devoid of Christ’s philosophy .i.e., love and compassion. Gandhi himself was a big fan of Jesus but not of Christians, symbolising the fact that Jesus’ teaching has universal applications but sadly doesn’t reflect in our actions anymore.
In recent times many like minded people have openly put out their views through this news paper including the editor herself, about the flaws and hypocrisy inside the church system in our state. Its inspirational to witness such courageous steps to questions the church administration. The intention is not to demean the value of the church in spiritual upheaval but it’s more of identifying the gaps needed to be bridged especially at a time when politics has extended its claws even into the pulpit. Often we witness the speech and narrations of religious leaders like some sort of collusion with political issues more so in today’s scenario due to the fear psychosis of saffronisation. Such type of speeches/sermons will only breed hatred and distrust. On leaving the church premises the attitude of the congregation would have been one of suspicion and revenge. This will be heightened on seeing a person from a different faith. The truth about the suffering of Christians is known to all, it’s not needed to be deciphered again during church services. Moreover the truth is half- hearted; the suffering induced by Christians will never be shared with the faithful. Religious discourse also depends on the discretionary attitude of a speaker (Priest or Pastor), his in-born and upbringing, his likes and dislikes will reflect in his words which may swing the emotions of the faithful.
We are moving towards a very dangerous era, a multi-polar world dominated by the rich against the poor, the majority-minority dilemma, and a dominant religion against the minority religion. People only perceive one side of the coin because the shadow cast by the higher ups prevents us from seeing the other side. The suffering is felt in a graded manner. Double standards prevail in the evaluation process and makes its appear that Christian suffering is worth more than what a Muslim or Hindu or Jew feels in other parts of the world. The religious leaders instead of bridging the trust deficit gap have further widened it only to shatter the social cohesion. The God whom we pray to never wishes the world to be like this. He didn’t create a divided world. God’s teaching are polluted with political ideologues, the politicians dictating the religious celebrations, a local MLA’s name is remembered first in a thanks giving ceremony. Survival of humanity and spiritual eudemonia is in great danger unless some soul searching is done. Our moral compass is directionless. We see God in temples, churches, in statues but not in humankind. What happened in the past is not in our hand, but what’s going to happen in the present and future is in our hands. Hence we should take the opportunity to undo the wrong and give a chance to create a world aspired by God no matter which way we worship Him and by what name we call Him. Worship should be moulded by unconditional love, empathy, compassion, being non-judgemental and respectful.