From Silent Majority to Innocent Civilians

Salman

Interesting Perspective, However one of the basic flaws in your argument remains, these wannabe joes give up their lives, families, past to migrate to inferior standard of lives and a lot of hardwork to provide for the families. Your conclusions about working and investing their efforts in our own land is flawed simply because the parity between the alternatives is too large. What is the alternative, job hunting day in , day out. Its not just that these wannabe joes you want to engage, but those who sit at the helm and are responsible for creating an atmosphere where these people can invest their lives and provide a reasonable living to their families. Or you could engage the media and society moguls who are whoring onto the society a globalist consumerist virus which is all about social standing and the shiniest cars.

Revolutions do not come segment by segment, they come from the collective efforts from all who consitute a given society.

Salman
I understand what you mean now. Sorry for misunderstanding earlier.

sadna #5

As someone who has been working more than two part time jobs since he was 16 and who could not and can not afford any foreign education, I can assure you that even pathetic Pakistani education is enough to work out that both Joe and the uneducated, unemployed and wronged in my own country are WRONG.

However, whereas I have some chance of convincing Joe to become a more responsible citizen (given his education, status above the poverty line and belief in democracy), I have NO CHANCE of even communicating with the sea of lost youth around me (believe me I have TRIED). You should try to talk sense to some youngster from Attock or even downtown Lahore sometime... it`s like banging your head against a brick wall. They are ever willing to blow themselves up or to become `jihadis` to kill Joe because they see his bucks ending up as AID packages providing the lifeline to corrupt and illegal regimes whose boots are crushing them and whose iron grip on the country`s economy, society and politics leaves no breathing space for them.

There are parallel universes existing in Pakistan: the elite live in the 21st century at the expense of the rest of the country, the middle class are a comfortably numb lot whose only objective in life is to become a Joe somewhere overseas and the rest is an ocean of ignorance, barbarism and poverty. (It is not with arrogance, self-righteousness or contempt that I make these observations but with a heavy heart.)

That`s why I wrote this serires of articles to try and prick the sleeping souls of the tiny but talented, educated and enlightened Pakistani segment of society. The object of my attention is not Joe at all... it is the Pakistani Joe-wannabe I am trying to reach out to. Pakistani youth`s dilemma is that they only see two options in life before them: either becoming Joe by hook or crook or killing Joe if they fail to become one themselves. (They will all be talking ``Jihad`` and ``Gora shaitan`` (White devil) with red eyes and fuming mouths, but once you offer them a visa to the US, they will be lining up to go to the land of the `shaitan`: not to do jihad but to become a Joe.)

I just want to make THEM THINK: broaden their vision and horizon. They should try to think for themselves, try to make some contribution to improve their own and their country`s plight. Unlike the `jengli` (barbarian) from rural Pakistan, these Joe-wannabe yuppies have a potential of bringing about some positive change so that the `jenglis` can be emancipated.

Please understand: I don`t want to become a Joe (I turned down an opportunity to do so two years ago) and neither do I want to kill a Joe (Some of my best friends have been Joes). I just want the Joes to be aware of where their tax money is ending up: to stop financing their Governemnts` efforts to strngthen and help those forces in my country that force me to make a choice between becoming a Joe-wannabe or a `jengli`. If the Joe can`t help me, the least he can do is not help those who won`t let me help myself.

Salman

reality_raker #4
As someone who has probably been able to afford a US college education(unlike American Joe with the 2 jobs), you should spend less time expanding upon Joe`s deficiencies and more time explaining to the uneducated, unemployed and wronged in your own country that attacking Joe will not bring them education, democracy and employment, in fact the reverse.

In response to #3 by sadna:

err... in fact, you are making the same point I am, but reaching the wrong conclusion: the rulers of the wronged people ARE the main culprits, but how come these rulers are still in power despite being oh so obviously criminals? In fact the US is the only pillar of strength that is keeping people like the Saudi monarchs, and Pervaiz Musharraf of Pakistan in power. (Not to forget the Saddam Husseins and the Zia-ul-Haqs in the 80s. BTW where are all the petro dollars and looted booty of these corrupt rulers ``stashed away``? In overseas accounts and portfolios in the US Europe or in welfare organizations in the 3rd world?)

My conclusion is simply this... the US should not become an accomplice in the violation of the basic rights of other countries` people just because their corrupt rulers are willing to do the US`s dirty work. In doing so, the US aligns itself with the corrupt regimes other countries` people are struggling against (as in Pakistan, 1980s Iraq, and Saudi Arabia). It should either support oppressed peoples` causes or remain neutral. It should stop supporting the oppressors.

Secondly, the white or blue collar worker with 2 jobs in the US is considered complicit by ``uneducated, unemployed and wronged people`` because he is always willing to pay taxes to the governemnt but he never takes the time out of his busy life to find out what his government is doing around the world with his tax money. (Incidentally, the US government uses the same argument to freeze the accounts and investigate the assets of those individuals who donated money to Muslim/Arab charities without knowing what these charities used the money for!)

hope you get my point of view better now
Salman

``Uneducated, unemployed and wronged young people are the least suited people to resolve the complications of modern democracy. No wonder they decide to believe in the classical paradigm of true democracy and target the people of the states that have wronged them. All of a sudden the silent majority turns into innocent civilians. ``


Its not clear why a white or blue collar worker in the US working 2 jobs for his child`s college fund while worrying about losing his job to someone overseas is considered complicit by `uneducated, unemployed and wronged people` .

The primary reason for people to be `wronged, uneducated and unemployed` are their own rulers, for example the billionaire shiekhs in S. Arabia living in palaces happily affording dozens of children or any one of the ministers or generals of the Pakistani government whose recent declaration of assets showed them to be billionaires in their own right.

Oh I get it. The rulers of these countries are also wronged by the US. They misgovern their countries, misuse public funds, keep their people illiterate, stop their govt. agencies from collecting poverty statistics and become billionaires instead because they are so wronged by the US. So sad.

Thanks for feeling sorry for me... I feel good that a paragraph of my article made you feel anything at all ;) I was kind of hoping that it would also illicit some thought...
Salman

I want to write a post because I feel sorry for Salman that nobody else has written a post on his article, which looks like it took a lot of effort to write.

(I have not read it myself, after one paragraph I could not be bothered)