 Savage darkies
Windfall
from dominating the Middle East: trillions of dollars. The prejudice
that makes it easy: priceless
Manesh
December 15, 2004
iranian.com
Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever be able to feel like I belong
living in the United States. I go back and forth trying to forget
my beloved Persia and adapting to my new home. It's not easy. It's
been 30 years already and my identity still hangs in the balance.
Last week was no help. I took four jolts in succession that awoke
in me my old insecurities.
First, the movie Alexander was released. It's hard to believe
that this absurd version of history could hold any attraction in
this day and age, but after the 2004 elections, I don't get surprised,
I just get depressed.
Then last Saturday night I watched Lawrence of Arabia on
TV. This time I looked past the fantastic acting and cinematography
and took a closer look at the content. "What do these savages
want?", wondered one picture-perfect, civilized, politic English
gentlemen during a military campaign to take the savage's land. "Freedom," answered
Lawrence, "and I'm going to give it to them." OK.
Sunday, I tried my hand at the Washington Post crossword
puzzle as a distraction. No such luck. 24 down: 11 letter word
for "Uncorrupted
Non-European"? The clue was intriguing enough but the answer
set me back considerably: "NOBLESAVAGE". That's right.
Uncorrupted = NOBLE, Non-European= SAVAGE. Puzzle solved.
The fourth jolt I got was on that Monday when I read a quote
from Vladimir Putin. He was warning the Ukraine not to stray too
far from Russia: "I don't want ... for us to divide Europe
into Westerners and Easterners, into first-class and second-class
people, where the first-class people have the opportunity to live
by stable, democratic laws and the second category of people are
those with, to speak metaphorically, dark political skin." Somehow,
I immediately knew what he meant by "dark political skin".
He meant Non-Europeans, savages. He meant people like ME.
I got to thinking that these notions have been going around for
a long time. Is it really out of ignorance, as I've always thought?
Not likely, I realize now. Oliver Stone is an Ivy League graduate.
In fact, he was President Bush's classmate at Yale. One leads Operation
Iraqi Freedom; the other makes a movie about Operation Persian
Freedom 2300 years earlier. T.E. Lawrence was an Oxford graduate.
Washington Post is considered quite the liberal and progressive
newspaper. What's going on?
I thought back to the days when I was still in college. Puzzled
by the notion of "Islamic Art", I went to the Metropolitan
Museum in New York. I counted 772 artifacts on display in
the gallery of Islamic Art on the second floor that Sunday. More
than 560 were from Persia. If there were such a thing as Islamic
Art, you'd
think it would have an even influence across the vast Empire. "Why
73% from Persia?", I asked Professor X of Harvard. "73%?",
he replied in his usual sarcastic way, "I thought it would
be more!"
Well, now I have to decide: if these prejudices are not out of
ignorance, then why are they so prevalent? Who gets what out of
perpetuating them? I'm getting old and, naturally, cynical. So,
I have a conspiracy theory.
The spear's tip from
Alexander to the British Empire and Lawrence, never delivered freedom,
civilization, democracy or any higher virtue to the subjugated
lands. That has always been obvious. But they did make a name for
themselves,
and a lot of money. A LOT! It has worked in the
past, and it's still working wonders today.
 If people did not think the
war in Iraq was part of the war on terrorism and 9/11, George W.
Bush would not have been re-elected. While there is no evidence
connecting Iraq to 9/11, and even the President says so, 62% of
population
still thinks there is a connection. There is a connection alright,
even though nobody talks about it openly. For the majority, Middle
Easterners "are all the same", savages. That's the connection
that makes the whole thing possible.
From the serene halls of museums and Ivy League
colleges, to shock & awe, there is a connection. It's time
movies like Midnight Express and Not Without
My Daughter paid off. From Afghanistan to Libya, they are
all savage darkies. To most, Osama bin Laden, Khomeini, Mullah
Omar, King Fahd, Saddam Hussein, Yasser Arafat, Mubarak and Kaddafi
sit around and eat couscous together at the end of the day.
Windfall
from dominating the Middle East: trillions of dollars. The prejudice
that makes it easy: priceless.
 If all this is true- if any of this is true, then that'll explain
why nobody ever asks for our input, even though we've lost more
to Islamic fundamentalists, know them better and have hated them
for longer. Seems like if they try to differentiate between us,
it will slow things down too much. There is no room for gray in
this black & white age. Seems like I'm worth more to my new
country as a bogeyman than a participating citizen; a partner in
the war against terror.
I realize now that the only way I can continue to live here and
raise my family is to get used to a life without dignity.
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Savage darkies
