Bigotry 101 in the Land of the Pure.

Some time ago, at the end of my regular Friday class, I was having lunch with my friends when they brought up a presentation I’d given that morning. In that presentation, I’d mistakenly referred to a painting of the Aghakhani leader as that of a Chinese dignitary. (The website said it was the Chinese dignitary okay!)

From there, the conversation progressed further. A friend asked about the difference between Ismailis and Ahmedis, and you can only imagine how downhill the discussion went at that point. I was sitting with two other friends, and one fundo who btw, has also blogged on ET about how she was oh so enlightened after working on an interfaith project and understood other faiths so much better now. Here’s what they all had to say;

1. Ismailis don’t really count as Muslims because they make humans their prophets.
2. The government should do to them what they did to Ahmedis.
3. Its okay to treat Ahmedis the way we do because they try to propagate their religion and corrupt Islam.
4. Islam btw, is corrupted because apparently, its not strong enough to survive the honeyed propaganda of its enemies.
5. More importantly, the girl whose figure even I’ve admired in her skinny jeans and the tshirt clinging in all the right places and barely covering her ass pointed out that as Ismailis say one should be comfortable with their bodies and wear mini-skirts as well, they can’t be Muslims.
6. We need to have more laws like the anti-Ahmedi laws because this is the Islamic republic of Pakistan.
7. Interestingly enough, the fundo happens to be of a sect of Islam that many people declare a deviation/corruption; in fact, that sect even cuts down namaz to only 4 prayers a day, but even she was too small-minded to  support a sect that was persecuted just like she was. (Then again she’s a fundo so who’s surprised?)

After that conversation, I was seriously so depressed, I didn’t talk to those girls for a couple of weeks. Aside from the fundo, who everyone hates, the others are good friends of mine and I adore them, but it was absolutely heartbreaking to hear this kind of BS from them. What depressed me further was that this is the mentality a vast majority in Pakistan. We all know this, but it still tends to shock me when I come face to face with this mentality.

What’s saddening is that two of our seniors are Ismailis as well. They wish me Nauroz Mubarak, I wish them a happy Eid and Christmas. One is drop-dead gorgeous, and I constantly bitch at her for being so pretty. Another is really sweet and kind-hearted, and put up with my inane babbling so many times without a word of complaint. That’s what I see when I look at them. But this incident had me wondering what my friends saw when they looked at them. Non-Muslims? Kafirs? Evil enemies of Islam? Whores that wore mini-skirts while pretending to be Muslims? I personally know a lot of Muslim girls that wear mini-skirts, and the girls in question dress pretty moderately.

What do my friends see when they look at me? I’m a foul-mouthed, self proclaimed heretic, anti-religion, irreligious, anti-marriage, pretty much everything that’s against the traditional definition of a Pakistani woman. So what do they see when they look at me? The hyper chick who’s constantly talking? The friend that brings home-made food for everyone when we have 08:00-05:00 classes? The cat-lover who constantly gets into one pet mishap after the other?

Or, more likely, they see the kafir that has no business living in the Islamic republic and would be better off in a non-Muslim country, where my kind are welcome?

I try to be hopeful. I try to tell myself that with enough effort, this kind of thinking will change and be a thing of the past. But its honestly very difficult to imagine such a thing, specially when reality shoves itself in my face. It is increasingly difficult not to despair. How on earth can such extremist mentality ever change?

I just hope that despite such sickening instances of hate and bigotry, I don’t lose my naive, youthful ideals of a change being possible.