An inspiration but potentially not miraculous

An inspiration, but potentially not miraculous.
Anisah
19 January 2009, 23:05, +8GMT

Less than 24 hours away from Barack Obama's inauguration as USA's 44th president, and first black president (to be definitionally correct, non-white, mixed-race), many non-Americans, Muslims especially put their hopes on Obama for a more just American policy in the Middle East.  As the hour approaches, I could feel that these people around me are feeling scekptical, disillusioned and distraught (not necessarily in that progressional order!) that it would be the 'same old, same old'.   They would like to think that with a closer connection to Muslims in both his family and his travels, he would be unlike previous adminstrations who had been unwavering in their support of Zionist Israel.  His press conferences until now have not proven that.  Some say that the White House has merely changed colours. 

This is not an apologist article in support for Obama.  This is also not a refutation of the growing sceptism and very plausible disillussion that will follow, at least on the Middle Eastern front.  This is a call to the sceptics and the disillusioned to understand American politics and society.  This is also a call to appreciate what an Obama victory could do to inspire American societies and non-American societies. 

Understanding American politics and society.
Obama is elected by American citizens to be an American president.  He is not the president of Malaysia, or Qatar, or Egypt, or Pakistan, or Kenya, or any other country.  That is a fact.  He would be untrue to his country, which is the United States of America if as president, he does not serve American interests, even if those interests might not be the mutual interests of Malaysia, Qatar, etc.  If American interests are pro-Zionist, no matter how non-Americans dislike it, and Obama's adminstration remains pro-Zionist, or not antagonistic to Zionists, he would still be a good American president.  That is another fact.

American politics and society are such that it allows for political lobbying by interest groups.  American policies are also very tied to what, who and how the successful presidential candidate is funded.  The fact today is that pro-Zionist lobby groups have the money, have the people, and have the networks to secure an upper hand in all echelons of American politics, be it in the Democratic party, or the Republican, or independent candidates. 

This situation is not going to change anytime soon.  In politics, the usual senario is that a new agenda or new direction is rarely adopted, but it is the incumbent status quo which is lost.  So the political dependence of American politicians on pro-Zionist support, and therefore permeable to pro-Zionist persuasions and amicable to pro-Zionist policies are inevitable and more importantly, not going to disappear soon. 

Three years ago, I had a conversation with an American citizen of Arab descent who is a member of the Democratic party.  He has secured some funds to start a lobby group to bring out the issues that Arab-Americans or Muslim Americans are passionate about.  He was disappointed to share, and I am disappointed to know, but we should not be surprised, that his inniatives did not receive enthusiastic support from these very Arab-Americans!  The take-home message from this is that as non-Americans, we could not expect the American president to be passionate about what his fellow Americans are not. 

Does a Malaysian citizen think that it would be fair for the Malaysian prime minister to champion a cause which is contrary to what the majority of Malaysians are very vocally and demonstratively for?  If a Malaysian does not expect his/her Prime Minister to do that, then why is that same person expecting the American president to serve non-American interests?

A binary view
This is another problem with Americans and non-Americans.  "You are either with us or against us."  "This is either all wrong, or all correct."  "America is all bad."  "Americans support Zionists."  "Jews are bad."  "Muslims are bad."  It doesn't take too much intelligence to decipher who said what.  That is not the smoking gun issue.  It is the binary view of things.  People tend to conveniently over-generallised, and this trait has been used (rather misused) by politicians and lobby groups to get what they want. 

The fact is that there are Jews who are opposed to Zionism.  There are Israeli civil rights groups that are fighting for Palestian causes in Israeli courts.  But if one wishes to be elected in Malaysia, would this inconvenient truth be raised at all?  Perhaps in private circles, but never in quotable quotes. 

The fact is that there would not be any pious Muslims who would even quietly approve of the recent Israeli murderous incursions into Gaza, but there are Muslims who whilst disapproving (and condemning) of this Israeli action, who would work with Jewish groups to reduce Muslim-Jewish tension (almost entirely) caused by the more than 60-year Middle East unrest.  But would an American seeking election to public office highlight that? Perhaps in private circles, they could see the injustice to Palestinians, but would they publicly condemn Israel?

Most people, in their zeal to champion what they believe to be right, adopt a very convenient binary view of the other.  It might give one a better sleep at night, but it does not even begin to solve problems. 

Boycotting American consumer products
That is a very good micro-economic sanction which could be done by individual consumers to protest against something they do not wish to directly and indirectly support.  Such tactics have been used, and achieved somewhat success in certain issues.  For example, consumer action against shark's fin soup, or vegetarianism by people against cruelty to animals.  However, not drinking Coca-Cola, or not eating KFC, or not buying Nike shoes are not going to affect American interests or Israeli interests.  They are immediately going to affect the livelihood of Malaysians who are employed in factories in Malaysia producing those products.  When many people are out of jobs, and there many ARE products linked to American interests, what happens to the Malaysian economy?  Many people will not have a salary to purchase anything in the Malaysian economy.  The Malaysian economy will suffer a cold, before the American or Israeli economy even feel like a sneeze is coming!

Uneducated protest methods
A Muslim man from Pahang called into IKIM's radio talkshow (Institut Kefahaman Islam Malaysia) to express his displeasure that religious scholars in Malaysia are wearing lounge suits with the Muslim skullcap (kopiah).  Why wear louge suits?  It's their clothes! 

Opinions like this demonstrate how shallow people see a very complex issue.  It tacitly summarises our collective (non)comprehension of the issue, our uneducated response.  After all such responses and protest methods, when the Palestians still suffer, when the Zionists still murder without fear, we say the Western (America) world is unfair to them?  After Obama's inaguration, we say that Obama did not do anything despite all the hopes?  Who are we to express hope on an American president? This is not to say America's inaction is explicable and hence forgivable.  This is to say that we have not planned and have not done anything that could plausibly turn things round for the Palestinians!

This is also not to say that we should stop hoping that America really does stop its unwavering support of the Zionist state.  This is to say that we should not simply lash out at the American president for not doing anything about it.  This is to say that among other strategies, continuous diplomatic pressures efforts to persuade America should be kept up.

Obama victory an inspiration
Instead of writing off Obama because of what he could not do for Palestinians, why don't we see his election victory as an inspiration for positive civil society movements?  For the believe that in a democracy, a struggle for a more just society is possible?  This is not to say that a (half)black man is in the White House, all African Americans' problems will go away over night, or at the end of Obama's presidency. 

This is to say that it is indeed an inspiration, that less than 50 years, after the American Civil Rights movement, that American citizens of African descent who were denied a vote, who could not even hope to register to become a presidential candidate (not even about winning the Presidency), these people who are still alive today, could in their lifetime see a black man in the White House.  That is an achievement in American society. 

Despite our better hopes, and what a few of us in close circles are freely sharing, that any, and any Malaysian could be a Prime Minister, we don't see that day coming in our lifetime.  No Malaysian law has ever disallowed that.  But an American law within living memory did.  And yet, the same could not be achieved in Malaysia because of inter-ethnic issues.  The majority ethnic group could not accept a member of a non-majority ethnic group in the PM's seat because of nationalistic or religious reasons, or both.  It is not that nationalism and religion is at fault, it is the perception of people who claim to be nationalistic and religious.  Again, a distintion must be clearly stated here, for fear of purposive misinterpretation.  It is not nationalism or religion which are the stumbling blocks, or the faults of this societal deadlock.  It is what and how people think nationalism should be positively manifested, and how religion should be sincerely observed.  Again, nothing wrong with these in themselves.  It is the binary, often simplistic approach to problems and their proposed solutions which are the problems. 

Last word
As I write this, the BBC is showing live pictures of Obama doing some ordinary painting with normal Americans in a homeless shelter in Washington DC.  In the words of the journalist, "On other occassions, this would be the most mundane thing, but this is anything but."  The Civil Rights movement, what Martin Luther King started has enabled Obama to become a president in one generation.  That is how far that country has come since the days of King's non-violent movement to remove an American racist law.  Incidentally, a day before the inaguration is the Martin Luther King day.  White supremacists placed a bomb in a Baptist church in September 1963 which went on to kill four black female children in a church within living memory.  The parishers who survived it are today singing in jubilance for what is going to happen today.  That memory is still very recent.  More than two million Americans, of all colours, will line the two-mile route to the inauguration. 

James Clyburn, the Majority Whip in the House of Representatives and a member of the Congressional Black Caucus Congressman, while being interviewed by Stephen Sackur in BBC's Hardtalk on 19 January 2009, said that (not exact quote) Obama should not have to suffer what the Civil Rights generation had to.  He is where he is today, made possible because of that generation.  His children should not have to suffer what he has to today.  Each generation should strive to make it better for the next.  

An African American man at the Mall interviewed by the BBC journalist said this:  "Obama said that 'I'm an ordinary man, doing an extraordinary thing.  Everything is possible."  How inspirational to any society in the world could that be?  His African American friend beside him said, "It wasn't so long ago we had to sit at the back of the bus.  It wasn't so long ago that we wouldn't be able to walk on this Mall." 

On the 5th of November 2008, while recovering from bronchitis, I wrote this about Obama's election victory, and I still sand by it.

5th November 2008

This is a short entry, a prelude to a longer one.  It's so phenomenal that I need to write this now.  I came in from the doctor's at one o'clock, despite my bronchitis, I postponed my sleep to listen to Obama's victory speech, live.  Fourty odd years after the U.S. gave its African American citizens the vote, a black man is in the White House. Yes, in a country that politics should be colourless, there are still pockets of American voters who could not bring themselves to vote for a black man.  But, they are in the minority.  Good sense has prevailed over time, education, and shared dreams.  I lament the fact that in my own country a Lim Guan Eng or a Sivakumar, could hardly aspire to be the Prime Minister.  African Americans who once lived through being chased like dogs in America lived to see the day when they elect in a black President without any untoward incidence or suggestions of untoward public unrest by politicians.  My admiration for the American people for collectively working towards this.  My hope, my prayers are that in my own country, I will live to see the day when proponents of race-based politics are in a minority and we could vote in the best man, or woman, regardless of ethnicity and religious convictions.