“These alien and subversive ideas” is an expression that has been ringing in our ears for so long that we no longer give it any attention. The expression is used to serve many different objectives. Ideas and thoughts cannot be imported. An idea is like a seed. If the soil is good and other conditions for its growth are correct, the seed will grow into a flourishing plant. If not, the same seed will simply fail to grow and die.
Ideas take hold only in those societies that are willing to accept them and when the people are in need of new thoughts and concepts. People who are not ready to accept what they don’t want simply ignore them.
We import the methods and techniques that govern our education, monetary and economic systems, and no one objects. We import modern machinery, clothes and building materials as well as interior decoration and no one objects. But when such words and expressions as freedom, democracy, human rights are uttered, voices rise in objection and accusations fly to and fro.
Why such fury?
Such expressions are a threat to the purity and authenticity of society and those propagating these alien ideas are alienating themselves from their local community.
Why is my purity and authenticity not threatened when I import a car? Why is my special status not affected when I live in a house built on a Western design? Why does this special status suddenly develop wings and fly away the moment I find myself inspired by an idea whether from the West or from some other source? Most importantly, why do we refuse to measure things in the normal way by applying reason and logic and why don’t we try to identify purity and special status without demagoguery?
Our authenticity and special status are not solid rocks shackled to our bodies to prevent them from moving forward. No wall or barrier, no matter how solid, can succeed in blocking the flow of ideas. A flourishing civilization always attracts those who embrace it, each according to their tendencies and abilities to absorb, accommodate and adapt.
Arab News From the Local Press 14 April 2003
