not indigenous

i was reading this post at mellow yellow regarding indigenous people, which raises some really interesting issues re colonisers and indigenous people in the asian context.  and it led me to start thinking about my own place in the world.  is there any place where i could consider myself "indigenous"?

i was born in india, and am clearly not indigenous to new zealand.  only maori fit that description in this country.  when it comes to india, i'm certain that i don't belong to one of the indigenous tribes - not many indians do, something like 8% of the population are indigenous.  india has been colonised and ruled by so many different foreign forces, and i don't know that my family tree goes back enough centuries to tell exactly where my ancestry lies.  could be with the persians, could go back to the arabs, unlikely to be from the countries to the north of india.  and who knows what intermarriage might have added to the mix.

i'm certainly not aware of any british ancestry & very much doubt that could have been hidden.  and given the way marriage works in my district of india, where family connections, geographical location, social status, and economic status tended to be strong determinants in the choice of marriage partners, i'd say that there's not likely to have been much intermarriage, at least not in the last couple of hundred years.

the greatest likelihood is that by race/ethnicity, i could trace my roots back eventually to somewhere in the middle east or persia. but it would seem to be a nonsense to say that i'm indigenous to that part of the world, especially when i have no connection to it - neither by language, culture, family connections or anything really.

i'm finally left with the conclusion that i'm not really indigenous to anywhere, not in a way that is meaningful.  which feels a little sad, because it makes me feel like i don't really belong anywhere. somehow the notion of indigeneity invokes such a strong connection to place and tradition, to history and to the land.  it also invokes a strong sense of oppression and dispossession, because so many indigenous peoples have suffered from colonisation.

if i'm not indigenous to anywhere, then i guess any place can be home.  and while i can support the struggles of indigenous peoples, it will never really be my struggle.  which is ok.  there are plenty of other things to be advocating for.

a suffrage day post

suffrage day is almost over, but i'll sneak in a post.  while it's a day we celebrate nz women achieving the vote, it's also a time to think of women around the world who don't get to vote, and all that this means to them.  the lack of political participation and the lack of voice.

there's not many countries where men can vote but women can't - mostly it's that both can't vote.  those are countries without democracy, some them embroiled in civil war.  for some women, voting is not so much important as is trying to stay alive, and keeping their children alive. the right to vote is much lower down on their list of needs.

there are women who live in democracies but are afraid to vote.  they live in countries which see a significant amount of violence around election time.  or because it's too much of a risk to vote for any but the ruling party.



there are women who live in democracies but won't vote because they believe that casting their vote won't make the slightest bit of difference to their lives.  who are we to say they are wrong, particularly in countries where political parties of both the left and the right are appealing to the middle class voter, and it's not politically expedient to improve the lot of the poor.  and because single mothers are easily the most denigrated of beneficiary groups, the so-called welfare queens who struggle to manage, who are working hard but whose work is not acknoweldged because it is unpaid.

there are women who live in democracies who won't vote because they can't read or write.  they've missed out basic education, maybe because the system didn't work for them or because of issues at home, or because of learning difficulties.  some won't vote because the voting system isn't accessible to them. they might be working 2 or 3 jobs, or living in countries where voter registration laws are being used to disenfranchise them.

they might not vote because no-one they know has ever voted, they don't listen to the news, and election day comes and goes without them paying the slightest bit of attention.  they are rarely involved in political debates, not in a way that politics, parties and policies can be translated into the minutae of their daily struggles.

it's not enough to just have the right to vote.  that vote has to mean something: until women see the potential to engage and to cause meaningful change through the electoral system, they won't be voting.  we're lucky here to have retained the MMP system, which means fewer wasted votes and a greater ability for women to get into parliament.  but there are still so many who don't vote, who won't vote.  and it isn't because they are lazy, it's because they are disengaged.

we won the right to vote many years back.  but the question of how to translate that vote into wins for all women, and for society as a whole, is one that still needs to be addressed.

consequences

a quick couple of links tonight.  first, i was interviewed for this piece in the human rights commission newsletter to the media & diversity network.  the piece is about the dom post coverage of the exhibit at the dowse museum - one part of which included a video of no more than a few minutes which was not available for viewing by men.  i posted my thoughts on the whole thing at the hand mirror.

i've probably written this before many times, but one thing i notice most about the people who use the "freedom of speech" argument to support hateful, bigotted or discriminatory speech are usually the people who are not going to face any significant consequences as a result of the particular piece of "speech" they are so defending.  it's not going to be their kids bullied at school, it's not going to be them harassed at the supermarket or on the street, it's not them who is going to have to feel fear & anguish as the wider community is inflamed by that particular piece of speech.

for those people it's a theoretical argument about principles, but one that has no real and immediate impact on their daily lives.  because they don't live the reality of the consequences, they don't even consider the possibility of those consequences, and when someone points it all out to them, they either disbelieve or dismiss it because it's not part of their direct experience.  i wonder how much they would be prepared to use freedom of speech as a defense after they had been subjected to this:

An unnecessarily large police force – many of them very heavily‐armed – was sent to conduct the raids at the break of dawn. From the outset, it was quite obvious that a significant part of their role was merely to intimidate and frighten. In one example, up to thirty police officers, many of whom looked like military commandos with their heavy armour, barged into the house of a local family, shouting orders and intimidating the occupants. The family inside this house consisted of six young children, aged between three and fourteen, and their frightened and confused mother; the father was overseas, and the police were aware of this fact....

Carpets were torn out of the floor in the house of another family and ceilings damaged; cash – not belonging to the suspect – confiscated in yet another; a woman was denied the right to leave her house; children were forced to dress and undress in the presence of police; some women whose houses were raided were asked to become spies for ASIO; and general degrading treatment and language was experienced throughout. Importantly, most of the houses raided contained children, who, having been violently awoken at dawn by gun‐wielding police – armed with semi automatic military style weapons – were obviously traumatised as a result. Many of the other family members also reported feelings of shock, anxiety and trauma, and are too scared to even seek professional help. One mother, whose house was raided, suffered a stroke and was taken to hospital for treatment.

this happened in australia, a democratic country where there is supposed to be a protection against human rights abuses by the state.  i'd strongly recommend you read the full release by al-furqan which gives further details of these events, asks some pretty important questions about the lack of evidence & pre-judgement by the australian attorney general, and makes this point which i strongly agree with:

We have little doubt that these raids are directly connected to the problem of Islamophobia, and this is evidenced by the fact that, had any other group been exclusively targeted by the police as the Muslim community has been, there would have been much outrage and backlash – and rightly so.

this is not the first time i've heard of this kind of incident happening in australia.  there was one incident i heard of in perth some years back which was very similar: a woman whose husband was overseas had her house raided, property damaged to the extent that she was unable to even lock her front door, all while her children were watching on with her.  the authorities showed no interest in paying for the damage nor even any concern about where she might spend the night when her home was no longer secure.  and they found no evidence of anything whatsoever to justify the raid.

as the al-furqan press release states, many of the people subjected to this kind of treatment have little knowledge of their rights and are too afraid to go to the media for fear of further backlash.  when the state & its institutions are your enemy and are exercising their power against you without cause, then where do you turn?  who is there to go to for help?  how do you begin to fight back?  and where is the "freedom of speech" for these people - how does their story reach the public when the mainstream media are refusing to put it forward?

US embassy deaths

it's all very well keeping a positive frame of mind, and making a conscious decision to be happy.  which has been working quite well for me thus far.  but then you listen to the news and somehow it seems unfair to be happy when so many people are struggling.

there's the continuing news of job losses, the research coming out about child poverty, the constant nasty beneficiary-bashing policies being put out by the government, school closures in canterbury.  and overseas, workers being killed in factory fires in pakistan, and embassy staff under threat & some killed as protest rages in various countries in response to some stupid film produced by some random idiot in america.

i'm not sure i even have the energy to respond to the latter.  the protests in themselves i don't have a problem.  someone produces something stupid and offensive, then fine, gather a group of people and protest about how stupid and offensive that thing was.  make your point, express yourself.  don't have a problem with burning flags either, mostly because i don't attach a whole lot of emotional symbolism or meaning to flags.  they're just a piece of cloth after all.

but hurting people, and specifically, people who have taken no part in the financing, production or distribution of the film concerned makes no sense whatsoever.  in fact, it seems that many of the people who did take part were conned & had no idea what they were actually participating in.  not that i'm saying that it's ok to hurt the people who did know what they were doing and who deliberately set out to hurt and inflame.  of course it's not.  there are plenty of ways to protest against them without causing them physical harm.

i know we're talking about environments where violence is already a huge part of the mix.  the arab spring started in many countries with peaceful protest, but has led to violence by the state, which in turn has caused rebellion and further violence.  it gets to a stage where violence becomes the only response, an emotional gut response to a "we hate you" message from abroad.

i can't say i'm impressed with hilary clinton's response, though mr obama's was somewhat better (& mr romney's reaction is purely appalling - please US voters, do not let this man be your president).  and i hated the coverage i saw on the tv news - which i know, i mostly try to avoid, and for good reason - which was all about these countries which the US has been so generous in helping turning around and doing this terrible stuff.  yes, it's terrible, but as to the latter, let us not forget the wholesale destruction of infrastructure, the death of civilians and the huge decrease in the standard of living that were the result of NATO bombing in libya (in which the US played a large part).  we can show sympathy towards those killed and currently living in fear and condemn violence, without the rewriting of history.

i can't even begin to understand the mentality of the people who made the film.  it was such a strong, clear "i hate you" message, and what they hoped to gain from it i'm not sure.  other than to hurt others and to inflame emotions.  as if there isn't already enough hatred and violence in the world.  what makes a person want to pile more on?  no, i really can't understand it.

still, i can do nothing by sitting around being miserable here in this country.  the answer is to keep on keeping on.  a positive bit of news was an article in the community newspaper - the hamilton press - about the diversity award given to the waikato interfaith council (online version here if you register - pg 14, 12/9/12 edition).  if anything, the events above clearly reinforce just how important interfaith work is, and how much it is needed to provide an alternative model to the ones we've seen above.

and finally, my sincere condolences to the families of those embassy staff who have died, and my sympathy to those who are currently living in fear of attack & to their friends and family anxiously waiting and hoping for their safety.  i know this is a difficult time for you and i'm sorry that you have to deal with this.

catching up

so i haven't been posting much here because i was posting at the hand mirror last week, here, here and here.  i've also been feeling much more relaxed since i resigned from the position that caused me so much angst.  suddenly i feel like i'm getting done the things i need to do, and that i'm actually on top of things rather than feeling guilty about all the things that should already have been done last week, or last month.  which means that other people now have those problems to deal with, but i'm finding not the slightest need to feel guilty about that.

with the relief has also come a determination to be thankful for the things i have and to enjoy life a lot more.  which doesn't mean i'm doing a lot of different things as such, but more that i'm being positive in my mind about the things i am doing.  it takes a little effort now and then, but mostly not.  it just generally means a happier me.

one of the things i've been doing over the last few weeks is catching up on sports stuff.  youtube is great for those of us who don't think we should have to pay for the privilege to watch quality sport, and thankfully we now have access to the olympics events on you tube.  so i've been catching up on the men's & women's 10m diving, the all-round men's & women's gymnastics, and various track events like the men's 4 x100; the men's & women's 100 & 200.  i'm still looking forward to watching some table tennis & badminton, as well as some of the long-distance running.

and of course i couldn't resist this 23 minute clip of roger federer winning wimbledon:

pity that he lost in the semi-finals at the US open, and hoping some clips of that should be up soon.  but yay serena williams for managing to take out the women's title.

on a more serious note, a couple of pieces worth reading:  this op-ed at al-jazeera about white supremacy in the US is really well written; and this is a must read post about zeena & zainab al-hilli, the young iraqi girls whose parents were shot recently in france, with zeena not being found until 7 hours later.

a lovely day

after my post of yesterday at the hand mirror, we've now had the last of the islam awareness week events.  and what a great day it was.  we had the mosque open day in the morning, and while it would have been nice to see more people there, i was still happy to meet and greet our visitors.

in the afternoon we went to the interfaith tree planting at Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park.  it's an amazing project of reclamation and restoration by the hamilton city council, and we would have had at least 100 people turn up to plant 500 trees.  there were people of all faiths: jewish, hindu, christian & muslim all working together to get the trees planted in the space of an hour or so.

i'm definitely not a gardener, and planting 2 trees was about as much as i could cope with.  they were pretty crooked, and i really hope they survive!  one was a kahikatea & i don't know what the other one was.  but it was an incredible event to be part of, and it just showed us what a wonderful place this planet could be if people worked on projects like this together instead of wasting time hating on each other.

in the evening i was invited to a wedding, where one half of the couple was of lebanese heritage and the other was of european heritage, born in nz.  the guests were a lovely mix of arab, african, south asian and european.  it was a segregated event, which meant the women took off their headscarves and abayas, & shone in their beautiful clothes.  the room was alive with colour, music, dance, laughter, and a freedom that comes from escaping the male gaze.  the men were no doubt having fun in their own part of the building, but we weren't interested, and for any one of them to enter at that time would indeed have been a violation.

the men did come in later, after we'd been giving enough warning to put our headscarves back on.  and then in lebanese tradition, they danced for the women.  and it struck me how nice it was for the women to get to be the gazers and the men to be the entertainers for once.  but it was sweetly done, and some of the wives later joined in with their husbands.  it was a much different experience from an indian muslim wedding, and a lovely end to a wonderful day.

celebrate good times, come on!

it's certainly been a week of celebrations.  sunday was eid, celebrating the end of a month of fasting, and i had a lovely day with friends and family.  everything just seemed to go right, and there was a lot of joy and laughter being shared.  i can't believe another ramadan is over already, though it did seem to last forever while it was going.  i guess it's because the shorter days means a lot of rushing around.

monday i went to auckland to celebrate the human rights commission diversity awards.  at the link, you'll find a word document giving details of the recipients.  there's a lot of good work being done by so many organisations, but the one that really resonated with me was migrante aotearoa nz, so i've included part of the background information below:

Migrate Aotearoa is an organisation of Filipino workers and their families with membership around the country. It was formed in 2009 in Auckland in response to cases of agents being unscrupulous in their dealings with migrant workers and reports of unfair labour practices. Migrante Aotearoa is part of Migrante International which has affiliates around the world. Migrante International was formed in 1996.

The group’s programmes are:

Organising and Education which is focussed on empowering Filipino migrants and their families by providing information about settling in New Zealand but also keeping our Filipino heritage alive.

Their Campaigns are focussed on building awareness and concern about the plight of poor and marginalised Filipinos asserting their welfare and promoting their holistic development. In 2010, they gathered in Christchurch to speak out against proposed employment law changes. Migrante also opposed the changes including 90 day trial extended to all employees in new jobs; limiting access to union representatives; and weakening rights if dismissed or disadvantaged.

of course i can't forget to mention that the waikato interfaith council (wifco) received an award for the work done by it's members over the last year.  i was lucky enough to be part of the group present to accept the award.  wifco has some great events coming up in the next couple of months, which you can check out at the link above.  the next event coming us is an interfaith treeplanting, happening on 1 september as part of the islam awareness week activities.  if you live in or around hamilton, i'd really encourage you to come.  details are at the website.

the final celebration this week was the 10th anniversary celebration tonight.  i can't believe it's been 10 years already.  it's certainly not been an easy 10 years - it's a lot of work, tension, and time.  but we've not only survived the 10 years, we've thrived.  that vision that was in our minds when we started this journey has really come to life - a centre that provides support for ethnic minority women, that provides a range of programmes and most importantly, provides services for victims of domestic violence.  i can only hope that we continue to stay strong and be there for the women of our communities, and their families.

in light of the issue of domestic violence, and brought to my mind because of this post by LJ at the handmirror, i'm posting a rather sad song by toni child, which i love:

black & british

how great it was to watch a black british person by the name of mohamed farah win the 5000m at the olympics this morning.  for several reasons.  first, because it was a great peformance.  but second, because in that moment, he was completely accepted as british by the whole of the british-supporting crowd.  it was a moment where he got to belong.

mr farah was not born in britain - he is somali by birth.  he is the kind of person that the anti-immigration crowd complains about.  one of those "mooslems" that are let into the country to steal jobs and ruin the uniquely british way of life.  a potential terrorist even?  but i haven't seen any noise from that lot today.  i haven't seen any implication that this particular gold medal (or the one he won for the 2000 metres) are any less british gold medals that any of the others.  in this moment of victory, he is completely embraced as british, without any hint of the foreign.

i have no idea if mr farah identifies as muslim or if faith plays a large part in his life.  but one thing i've found when googling the correct spelling of his first name is that it isn't that easy to find.  he is known across all the papers, and on his wikipedia page as "mo".  i only managed to find the "mohamed" in a footnote on wikepedia.  on the face of it, it seems quite erasing of his muslim heritage.

what would be interesting is how this came about.  it is quite possibly a firm decision by mr farah, made for any number of reasons.  it could be that by erasing his identity made his own life easier, made acceptance that much less difficult.  it could be that his cultural and/or religious identity just doesn't matter to him, and he prefers the snappy one syllable moniker.  it could be that "mo" sounds that much more anglicised, and helped him fit.  or it could be that it's a name that has been foisted on him by the media, in much the same way as "brangelina" or "posh & becks". of course i can only speculate, and i certainly am not going to be judging him for his choices.

maybe there is some conclusion to be drawn here about sports & sporting events being able to overcome things like racism & bigotry.  but then, given the recent behaviour of certain sports fans in europe, and the testimony of various players of colour about how they are treated on a sports field, that certainly isn't universally true.  no, i think it's more about appreciating this one particular moment when a somali british person is embraced and celebrated by all his compatriots, and wishing this was how it is in all contexts.

muslim women at the olympics

i've just watched the first saudi women run at the olympics, in the 800 metres.  in the previous heat, there was a palestinian woman.  both women with their heads covered and fully clothed.  they both came last, by a very long margin.  but they were there, they took part, they were different, and it was ok.  more than ok - the saudi woman really did get more cheers and support as she came in than the women who qualified for the next round.  it brought tears to my eyes.

it's not that i don't see the flaws in the olympics.  the fact that the most medals are won by the countries that have the most money to spend on sports.  the fact that so many sports are inaccessible to so many different types of people - see this story about american gymnist gabby douglas & the struggle she faced (warning about the almost obligatory crotch shot in any story about young women gymnists).  there are issues about vast sums of money spent on stadiums and venues - money that could used for relief of poverty.  issues about corporates taking over the olympics, and the accessibility of being able to view all the sports - i would have loved to watch all the tennis, but i refuse to subscribe to pay tv, so i wasn't able to watch much of it.  video of various events should absolutely be available on-line, especially given that so much public funding is put in to support athletes to attend.

but despite all of these problems, it still meant something to see these muslim women, on a public stage as it were, just being part of the event.  it provides a narrative about us that is something different to the oppressed victims that permeates so much of the portrayal of muslim women.  but more than that, it's so inspirational and motivational for muslim women around the world - inspiring us to achieve but on our own terms.

my favourite athlete so far at the olympics is the russian gymnist aliya mustafina, who won the bronze medal for the individual all-round competition, a gold for the uneven bars and another bronze today for her floor routine.  i don't have a particular reason for this.  also impressive was seeing oscar pistorius compete, doing for people with disabilities what the young saudi woman has done for muslim women.

i've also been impressed by the good nature of the competition - the hand shaking & hugs, the support competitors have shown each other.  it looks pretty genuine, and isn't something i recall in previous olympics.  but i think it's really healthy.

oak creek

i've been caught up in the activities of ramadan, amongst other things, and blogging has been way down on the list.  with the days being so short in winter, everything is a big rush in the evenings, and then we're off to the mosque for extra prayers.  i have to say that i have rarely felt such a high level of serenity that when praying at the mosque this ramadan.  at peace with myself and the world, it's a kind of fulfilment that i can't imagine obtaining in any other way.

however, my serenity has been rather shattered today with news of the shooting at a sikh gurdwara in america.  the second mass shooting in a month, and this one seems to be a hate crime.  while a killing at any venue is a horrific and tragic event, shooting people at there place of worship at a time that is of particular significance to them? well that just seems to me to need a special degree of callousness.

the names of the dead, which have been posted on twitter, are Bhai Seeta Singh, Bhai Parkash Singh, Bhai Rangeet Singh, Satwant Singh Kaleka, Subegh Singh, Parmjeet Kaur Toor.  these are people belonging to families, with many & varied connections.  i can't begin to imagine the grief felt by this whole community.  i'd also like to acknowledge the police officer who was injured during the incident.

there's been much said at various places about the possibility that this sikh community was mistaken for muslims.  yes, that's possible, but it's not relevant to anything.  it would have been a terrible tragedy had it happened to a muslim community, or to any community.  there is no group of people who somehow are "more deserving" of a tragedy like this.  to set up groups targeted by hate crime against each other, in some kind of competition, is pretty nasty.

if anything, the fact that the sikh community has been targetted since 9/11 shows that all communities need better protection from hate-filled rhetoric.  this particular community has previous complained about harassment (link also from twitter), and i hope that some journalist in that community starts asking questions about what concrete steps were taken by law enforcement authorities to ensure the safety and security of this community.

here is a particularly touching piece written by a sikh american.  i strongly recommend you read the whole piece, but i thought this point was particularly well made:

Obviously, the Sikh community realized very quickly that fall that it wouldn't do to simply say, "Don't hate me, I'm not a Muslim." And by and large people have avoided that particular phrasing and rhetoric. The Sikh advocacy organizations that were organized shortly after 9/11, chief among them the Sikh Coalition, were very emphatic on the point that they were opposed to hate crimes directed against any group based on religious hostility.


the twitter hashtag which has some useful information is #templeshooting.  my condolences to the sikh community of oak creek.