Observations on Arabs (Part Two)

Column by Stephen Browne - Oct 6, 2006

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In part one, Stephen Browne outlined his first five observations about Arabs. Now, he continues this discussion, and concludes with the implications that these differences hold for the futures of western and Arab civilizations. 

6) In warfare, we think they are sneaky cowards and they think we are hypocrites.

In our civilization, when two men get ready to fight, either seriously or just “woofing,” what do they say? Some variation of “I’m going to kick your butt.”

Here’s what I heard in the Kingdom, “Hey, don’t mess with me, or someday you’ll get a knife in the back.” I’m not saying that wouldn’t happen to you in the west, but most men would be ashamed to make a threat of that nature.

We don’t understand that direct shock battle is not necessarily the law of nature. When overwhelming force is brought to bear on them, they become cringing and obsequious. To put it bluntly, they lie their heads off to get you to turn your back on them.

Try to see it from their point of view — how else do you expect them to act when you have the overwhelming force? You expect them to meet you on equal terms when the situation is so unequal? What other tactics are available but prevarication and delay, followed by a sneak attack?

Folks, what we call “terrorism” is quite close to the historically normal way of warfare among these people.

7) In rhetoric, they don’t mean to be taken seriously and they don’t understand when we do.

Thus, an ultimatum is often not taken seriously and reality comes as a shock. Like many other Mediterranean peoples, Arabs don’t seem to mind making a scene in public and have a high blown sense of drama.

Paul Harvey once described how he had spent the Suez Crisis hiding under the bed in his hotel room because of the blood-curdling radio broadcasts, before he learned that Arabs talk like that when they’re arguing over a taxi. “This is my taxi and I will defend it to the death!” “You lie, it’s mine and rivers of blood will flow in the street before I give up my taxi!”

An Arab will scream at you, get into your personal space and sometimes kick dirt on your shoe — and then react with utter surprise when an American comes up and decks him. “What did I do?” To say the least, this makes negotiations difficult.

8) They don’t place the same value on an abstract conception of Truth as we do; they routinely believe things of breathtaking absurdity.

I cannot begin to tell you some of the things I’ve heard from Gulf Arabs or read in the English language press in the Kingdom. “The Jews want Medina back.” (Medina was a Jewish city in the time of the Prophet.) The Protocols of the Elders of Zion has been turned into an immensely popular miniseries on Egyptian TV.

The ‘Blood Libel’ (the medieval myth that Jews need the blood of non-Jewish babies to celebrate Passover) is widely reported in the Arab press, and widely believed. Allah will, of course, replenish the oil beneath Arabia when it runs out.

I’ve been assured, by well-educated and otherwise sensible people, that Winston Churchill was Jewish and that Anthony Quinn had been blacklisted and would never work again after making Lion of the Desert (just before he made that turkey with Kevin Costner).

9) They do not have the same notion of cause and effect as we do.

This involves some seriously weird implications about other people being responsible for their misery because they ill-wished them. I’ve read in the English-language press of the Kingdom serious admonitions against using Black Magic to win an advantage in a dispute with a neighbor. The columnist did not deny the efficacy of Black Magic, he just said it’s forbidden to use it.

On one occasion I was trying to explain the concept of “myth” to them and I used the example of the djinn. I wasn’t getting through to them at all and was concerned that I had mangled the pronunciation of the word when it dawned on me that the reason they didn't understand what I was getting at, was that they had no doubt that the djinn were real.

10) We take for granted that we are a dominant civilization still on the way up. They are acutely aware that they are a civilization on the skids.

Anyone who looks at the surviving architecture of Moorish Spain can tell that Islamic civilization has seen better days. There was a time when cultural transmission between Islam and the west went overwhelmingly from them to us. (Note the recent discoveries of Sufi symbols engraved on the structural members of European cathedrals.)

Now the situation is reversed, and it is humiliating for them.

11) We think that everybody has a right to their own point of view; they think that that idea is not only self-evidently absurd, but evil.

In the west, and America more than anyplace else, we have internalized the notion that everyone has a right to their own opinion, and that said opinion is perfectly valid for them. When we meet a people who think that that idea is insane and evil, we are sometimes left in the absurd position of defending their stance as “perfectly valid for them.”

It doesn’t work that way for Arabs. God’s Truth is laid out in some detail in the Koran, and not to believe it is a sin. Yes, in America you can find lots of Christian Fundamentalists who believe that God will cast you into hell for holding the wrong opinions about Him, but even those who would make their religion into an established church seldom desire the level of detailed enforcement as the Kingdom does or the Taliban did.

12) Our civilization is destroying theirs. We cannot share a world in peace. They understand this; we have yet to learn it.

Another culturally-imposed blindness we have is the notion that everybody can get along with enough good will. There is absolutely no evidence to support this and a great deal to oppose it.

Can the subjugation of women coexist with western civilization and western media ubiquitous throughout the world? Can a pluralistic and tolerant society be governed by Islamic law? Can a modern economy exist where interest is forbidden and many forms of business risk-taking are considered gambling, and thus forbidden?

Can a society that educates its young men by a process of rote recitation produce critically thinking, technically educated men to build and operate a modern economy? Can you even teach elementary concepts of maintenance to a people who believe that anything that happens is inshalla (As God wills it)?

To compete, or even just survive in the world they must become more like us and less like themselves — and they know this.

  

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