My end of week is crammed full of deadlines. In any case, my news interests are selective. However, it was a bad surprise to learn during a weekend party about the incident in Fort Hood. In the women's section, more so then the incident, the media coverage was discussed. In the men's section, fear of islamophobic backlash dominated the conversation.
It was on Monday that I read all the details online. And I was very angry. I was angry at the wreckage created by Nidal Hasan; I was angry that innocent people died for no reason - an old doctor, a pregnant young girl; I was angry that two of the victims were from Chicago - a place that I call home now and a city of great people. This is a terrible, terrible loss for which I have no words to express.
At this point, I'm immune to the media coverage. I've been here for 2 and half years now and I'm less outraged with the attacks on Muslims by the media. Do I feel afraid? Yes. Am I surprised? Not so much.
However, I'm not immune to what Nidal Hasan did. This was a man who was clearly disturbed by military harassment, psychiatric transference from his patients, and his own personal problems. He may even be torn between his American loyalty and the pain the American war on terrorism has inflicted on foreign Muslim populations. He may even have suffered from the ill-treatment of Muslims citizens after 9/11. I get it. It was hard. You were born and raised here. You knew nothing else but this country yet you were still treated like an alien. Studies show that alienated groups of people (either immigrants or minorities) suffer a range of psychological malaises from hating of the self, to depression. Men suffer schizophrenia while women are prone to depression.
Just because I get this side of the story – I don’t accept it. Nidal Hasan should have gotten help when he felt he was suffering. He needed to know better. He needed to have done better. This is not just about giving our religion a bad name – this is clearly a disturbing portrait of a man gone off the deep end. It’s scary in the same context as it’s scary to comprehend how a mother would fill a bathtub and drown five of her children, one after the other. Forget Islam, and forget what people think about Muslims. Although I know of the damage done, I don’t care. All I want to know is how anyone could do this?
The only sense of relief from this whole catastrophe is that Hasan is alive. More than anyone, Muslims want him to go to trial and face fifty lifetimes in prison. I agree with Arsalan Iftikhar – specifically on the point of having a Muslim lawyer on the military legal team trying Hasan. I will even go as far to say that we need American Muslim Community press releases and Religious body fatwas on the atrocity of Hasan’s act. The third step we need to take is to educate our Muslim community on recognizing psychological problems and depression – as a community of old-world immigrants, many of our families still stigmatize depression and psychological diseases.
Meanwhile, remember the victims in your prayers and pray Nidal Hasan lives to receive a trial.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/OPINION/11/09/iftikhar.fort.hood/index.html
1 comment:
I agree. It is sad and depressing, and the news coverage by the wstern media just pisses you off even more. He must have had issues, and he should have seen some one. In addition to being exposed to all the psychological probs from the Iraq war, being marginalized as a minority, and harassed too must have blown things out of proportion. Anyway lets see what happens when his hearing starts.
What I hate is why can't people accept this as probably an act by someone who was mentally unfit - why is it so easy to declare a gora killer as mentally unfit, but not a Muslim?
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