Hands off my BELLY

Last year when my wife and I were visiting Jordan, I got to see an old woman friend of the family whom I have not seen in years. The first thing she said when I entered the room was: “Allah yi-3wed 3laik.” This is an Arabic Jordanian phrase used for a variety of occasions that pertain to loss. The most common uses are for the death of a family member, the major loss of a car or house, and lastly but more commonly, for a couple who do not have children (as in my case).

The rough translation of the phrase may be something like: may God provide a substitute for your loss or may God grant you what you are missing.

Although anybody living native to Jordan, or even spending paying a short visit, would agree that there is very little regard to personal privacy. I would also argue that there is little regard to personal feelings of others who are usually bombarded by unsolicited opinions which cross the line of naïve curiosity to plain old rudeness and lack of consideration. Where else would somebody (can be a family member, casual acquaintance, or a total stranger) comment on very private attributes relating to your persona. Here are some examples of comment or question topics directed at me, often out of the blue:

Physical attributes

• You would look better if you lose a few kilos


• Your cheeks are too skinny you should gain a few kilos (this after my working my butt off to lose weight)


• Shoes too big
  These are not shoes you are wearing, they are more like boats
  You should park your shoes away from traffic
  Where can you find shoes to fit these monster feet?


• Butt too big or too small (depending on the day)


• Too tall – you have to bend down so we can kiss you

Clothes

• This color (name any color) does not look good on you


• This color make you look FAT (also old, young, etc)


• Do you ever wear decent clothes? (usually after arriving from 24 hour flying back from the U.S. in JEANS!)

Hair

• Too little hair (every time they see you, they make the discovery that heck he is bald)

Facial/body hair

• Too little facial/body hair
  It’s NOT nice for a man to be smooth like this (this pretty much raises doubt about my manhood)

There is so many more examples, but this post would get too long if I attempt to list them all. Keep in mind that I am a 43 year old man. Can you imagine how bad it could be for a woman????

Ok back to the pregnancy/children thing, I saw this article on MSNBC about a married woman's struggle with comments about pregnancy. I thought it was hilarious, especially the part about some woman touching her belly (in Jordan they tend to TOUCH too).

Why do they hate us?

I started my day by looking at the local newspaper this morning as I sipped my coffee. Like most small local newspapers, this paper tends to focus exhaustively on local news-every insignificant detail you could imagine. For the hard-core news addicts, this paper does not do any justice for national and international events. Therefore, our subscription to the paper is mainly to keep up with the opinion page to see what’s on the mind of our community and of course to keep up with the store specials and promotions. However, for the average local readers, this is their source of information.

Although I have gotten accustomed to seeing all kinds of misinformation—both by the newspaper staff or opinion pieces, today was even worse. The paper printed an op-ed piece by James Pinkerton, an ultra-conservative right-wing columnist who promotes an ideology of civilization wars vs. reconciliation. Read the article here (our local paper decided to title the article as “Chertoff’s gut might be right” in reference to recent comments by Department of Homeland Security about possible attacks in the U.S).

What troubles me most is that this poison laden article may not be too far off from public sentiments here, at least in private. Certainly, right-wing zealots have succeeded in brainwashing public opinion (beyond the point of no return?) into believing that: a) they are in dire and immediate danger, b) that Muslims and Islam are the source of this danger, and c) that the only way to face this danger is to fight it with overwhelming force.

Even with significant public opinion now against the Iraq war, the public is easily swayed by scare tactics. In this case, it is the bizarre events in the UK. So it is very convenient for a columnist with a not-so-hidden agenda to use this incident out of context to propose some outlandish and drastic measures – nothing short of banning any more Muslims from entering western countries and enacting a re-certification of all those who have entered in order to stop them from their harming their fellow citizens in their new communities.

I had the opportunity to discuss the UK event recently with a couple of Arab doctors in a small college town (which has embraced diversity). They were apprehensive about the prospects that their patients now view them with a tainted lens since the terrorist in the UK were mainly doctors. Interestingly enough, both of these doctors are Lebanese Christians, and one is actually a born-again.

Please understand that I acknowledge that there are plenty of examples of Arabs and Muslims whose deeds have directly contributed to a global negative perception of more than a billion people. These individuals are rotten not only for committing heinous acts, but also for claiming they did them in the name of Islam.

With that admission out of the way however, extremism and terror are by any means confined to Arab and Muslims. Therefore, it would be naive to believe that this vicious war on Arabic and Islamic heritage is simply a justified and measured reaction to the 2001 terrorist attacks on the U.S. There is more at play here and the factors range from protecting American world dominance to experimenting with defense and geopolitical models.

The Catholic Church just agreed to a $600 million dollar settlement in the abuse scandal that plagued its bishops. Yet, you don’t see anybody badmouthing Christianity or Catholicism as a religion that abuses children. If this were remotely related to Islam, can you imagine the reaction?