This week was packed with topics and issues that could have formed the basis of an interesting commentary. We had a number of social issues and political controversies were not lacking, not least that surrounding the President of the Republic in his proposal to consider funding a scholarship to someone who works with him and is to an extent family related. However, the incident which occurred on the streets of Woolwich last Wednesday merits this week’s commentary, as this raises issues to which one can attribute many adjectives among which are, sad, terroristic and extremist, but none of which can encapsulate it as it is deeper than that. This is a problem that exists not only beyond our shores, it exists with us locally and will not go away unless everybody works at it.
I think we need to separate the terms to start unravelling what is happening and why. The issues we have here are those of racism, religious fundamentalism and intolerance.
Migration since the Second World War brought about new social realities in many countries around the world. Migration took various forms and shapes, but economic migration brought about a divide within the communities who accepted and hosted these migrants. The much vaunted or better still, hoped for integration did not materialise and we have ended up with mixed races creating communities within communities. England itself is a magnificent example of this failure to integrate the races it hosts. London has areas that are totally dedicated to particular ethnicities and races.
While with hindsight it could be said that this could have been expected, notably for reasons of language and solidarity between nationals finding themselves in a new and unknown foreign territory, it was believed that second generations taking up the citizenship of the host company would have considered themselves part and parcel of that new country and community. Evidently this has not happened for substantial numbers. To compound matters further, the infiltration of extremists within their communities has sowed the seeds of hatred, while religion has been used as a basis and excuse for such proliferation of thoughts.
These forms of extremist teachings have led to an unacceptable level of intolerance, which leads to violent happenings such as the Woolwich incident. This week’s horrendous act has transcended the barriers of expectation – it went beyond the motivations which may underlie an anonymous attack or a suicide bombing; it has now moved towards a brutal form of murder coupled with the thirst to be acknowledged for such act by standing by to take the glory and be acclaimed a hero within one’s circles for having committed same. Where else can we expect terrorist acts to head for?
It is too early to conclude whether this was organised crime or a solitary form of extremism; whatever it is, clearly somebody led these individuals up the extreme path. Somebody consciously led these naive gentlemen by the hand and convinced them to carry out such violent acts in the name of religion. This begs the question, why doesn’t the teacher of such extremism carry out such acts himself? Could it be that the teacher preaches death in the name of religion but is afraid to take that step himself?
The issue of racism is an issue we also have to face here. We are encountering too many situations of racism which, for a tolerant and hospitable people like the Maltese, remains inexplicable.
With respect to everyone’s right to form his or her own opinion, it is difficult to comprehend one’s racist attitude given the fact that our birth place, our race, our religious beliefs are not chosen by us but given to us. Who are we to look down on anyone else because we deem we are superior in some sort? How easily one forgets that he is what he is through no choice of his or hers and therefore one had no right to determine conclusions of superiority of one over the other.
Who gives us the right to be judgemental and, worse still, who gives one the right to be offensive to one another on this basis?
Our community has now experienced southern Mediterranean migration for the last decade or so and, notwithstanding general efforts to integrate these migrants in our communities, I term the success rate to be on the low side.
The comments one hears on a regular basis from the general public leave so much to be desired. These comments ring the awareness bell and raise the red flag of the vast progress we must achieve as a community.
The truth is that in our heart of hearts, as a community we are tolerant of different races only so long as they stay out of our way and do not pose any threat to us or to our patrimony. This is not an acceptable attitude; the facade we put up is different to the practical attitude many of us adopt when in similar situations.
There is no doubt that we require a culture change to accept and respect the rights of all human beings and to respect the fundamental freedom of choice of religion, thought and conscience. It is time to move from words to actions; it is time to seize the moment, put the past behind us and to accept everybody for the person he or she is, for what he or she stands for. To achieve this desired end, we require a change in the education process we are currently pursuing and implementing. This requires a mentality and culture change we have to instil in our younger generations; this is an acceptance that we have to grow up inside. We cannot waste more time.
Having said this, the effort needs to be done on either side, third country nationals have to do their part to integrate in their host communities, they must consider them not as a host communities but as their communities – this is the first step towards eradicating racism.