A student's comment from Friday and a film I viewed on DVD today bring me to reflect on the great joy that comes from opening the heart to appreciate others in the world quite different from ourselves, bringing us to discover hidden kinship with them, and the great tragedy that can result from clinging to preconceptions and prejudices that wall us off from others and leave us isolated, bitter and fearful towards the world and its many unknown others.
In a class discussion about the growing numbers of Americans being locked away year by year in our ever-expanding prison system, a student opined that it was easier for other countries to cope with crime and social problems of the sort that result in mass incarceration in the USA because they did not have the ethnic diversity that was, in his view, a great problem in the USA. I was taken aback because this student, a young white fellow transplanted from Brooklyn to the Lower Upstate area, was one who I had previously judged as one of the most intelligent,animated and inquisitive of the new semester's group. Now I feared that he might also be one of the most racist. He helpfully clarified, "I am not a racist," (Whew! great relief! glad that has been taken care of!) "but I just think it's natural that every group prefers to be with its own kind." I was really knocked off-balance by these sentiments, because I might have expected them from others in the class, Lower Upstate having its share of small-town conservative white folks who have been known to support groups like the KKK, but now this fellow, my would-be (in my imagination) Golden Child!I fumbled for a response and then the discussion moved on.
One reason I had some trouble coming up with a snappy and illuminating reply is that I am aware that some very peaceful, progressive, semi-socialist places like the countries of Scandinavia are indeed fairly (though not completely, and less so as time goes on) homogeneous places, ethnically speaking, and it may well be that the absence of ethnic division does make it easier for people to arrive at and maintain a sense of common welfare and human community. However, ethnic homogeneity is much more the exception than the rule in human history, and tends to be a temporary state that inevitably gives way to mixing, moving and intermarrying of people from different ethnic, cultural and religious origins. Think of ancient Rome's barbarian and African emperors; Byzantine rulers marrying daughters of Khazaria, the medieval Jewish state north of the Caucasus; think of Celtic + Roman + Moorish + Jewish Spain; think of the Ottoman Empire, the Russian and now the American. All mixed and mixing, and as a result, better or worse off?
Therein lies the rub. In many places in our present world and also in many times and places in the past, we can certainly find evidence of social conflict related to or even centered on ethnic divisions. Score one for the racist call for ethnic purity, it would seem. But it must also be noted that it is not self-evident that ethnic variety was the original cause of such conflicts; it might rather be argued that ethnic variety provided convenient scapegoats and political targets for those looking for a way to sow fear, division and hatred in their societies, as opposed to those many who did find it quite possible to interact peaceably and happily with their new, slightly or greatly different neighbors. People of different ethnic looks and origins may at times separate into warring groups, but this is no automatic thing; they may just as well come together and enjoy one another's company and see great advantages in joining forces. Or they may war at first and then mix together later.
Put a bunch of three year olds of different ethnic or cultural origins into the same room, and they are not likely to form into opposing military units and start making speeches about ethnic purity and the joys of dying for the fatherland ("Better than ice cream!" cried one hopeful young ethno-patriot, waving his diaper-banner proudly). However, put a group of fifteen or fifty year olds into a room, and they may well divide along racial and ethnic lines and regard each other with suspicion. Somewhere along the way, happy-go-lucky kids become suspicious and even hostile adults. How do you get that way? It seems to me that they are taught to be so by the previous generation: much more nurture than nature.
What I now wish I had had the presence of mind to answer my student with is something along the lines of, "Ethnic diversity is the reality of the human condition. The great tragedy of our world is that this diversity often becomes the convenient target of political opportunists and a mythological monster for those fearful of cultural and physical difference, often due to lack of experience with any such difference. The great hope of the human future is learning to enjoy and share our differences."
Too pollyanna-ish? Maybe so, but for my part, I truly believe there can be no doubt that the future belongs to diversity. I can see this among my students. For every one of my young scholars who might spout the occasional semi-racist sentiment, and then feel the need to apologize for it, I see many others socializing with members of other ethnic and racial groups and forming friendships and love relationships, with much more ease and much less self-consciousness than among those of my generation two or three decades ago when we were of comparable age and interracial dating was still somewhat taboo. I saw the same on the streets of Stockholm and Oslo when I visited those supposed hotbeds of total homogeneity in recent years: lots of mixed couples, with dusky-skinned, mixed-ethnic babies in baby carriages, and lots of Turkish kebab sandwiches the fast food of choice.
This brings me to my film review. What I watched that I found so moving and delightful was "Nobody Knows About Persian Cats" (2010) from the brilliant Iranian director Bahman Ghobadi. The film seemed boring at first, following two twenty-something rock-pop musicians, a man and a woman, driving around Tehran as they attempt to assemble a band and obtain illegal visas and passports to get out of Iran to perform their music in London and possibly elsewhere in Europe. As the story progressed I became hooked by the plight of these young Iranians, possessed of the same urges and instincts as young people in the USA or anywhere else, being stifled by a socially repressive regime for the horrible crime of wanting to sing and play modern pop music. There are increasingly troubling run-ins with the Iranian police, who do not seem to be big music fans, to say the least, and the story does not have a very happy ending. Lots of interesting music along the way,though, which tugs at the heart strings for the glimpses it gives into the longings and sorrows of Iranian youth today.
I was struck by the different picture of Iran and Iranians that one gets from a film like this compared to the one that we get from fear-mongers like Dick Cheney and his minions in the American news media who have been programming Americans to believe that Iran is Enemy #1 almost nonstop for the last four or five years, giving the impression that the only thing worth knowing about Iran is that it is a nation of Islamic fanatics who might be developing nuclear weapons that might be a threat someday, somehow to the USA, and that we might have to go to war against them to crush their maybe conditional someday threat. After seeing this film, I am sickened to think that this is the image Americans have in their minds about Iran. We may have disagreements with the government, but we should think more of the people. The others of Iran may be much more like us than we have been led to believe. It felt good to open my heart to feel a simple but profound human bond with people of Iran.
Though the politics of our times can be so very discouraging, I am willing to bet on human diversity and our capacity to develop empathy with the others of the world to guide us to a better place. The fear-mongers and war-mongers will always be with us, but we can change the station and listen to other tunes if we want to.
The film is very strongly recommended!
Showing posts with label Iran. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Iran. Show all posts
War and Peace in Paganism
As a dedicated peacenik and staunch foe of militarism, which I consider one of the greatest curses of modern life, but also a Pagan, I have often pondered how the ancient European Pagan traditions had gods of both war and of peace. Obviously, then as well as now, war was sometimes an unavoidable necessity, and then as now, it had an economic dimension as well, in that "to the victors go the spoils," to which we might add modern-day reflections on the military industrial complex and how much profit and employment is wrapped up in the war biz. The greater the number of people who depend on the military-industrial complex for their employment, education, housing, health insurance etc., the harder it becomes to cut back any aspect of the military, as it has become an ever-expanding social welfare program for soldiers and their families as well as all the people who work in military-related industries.
In the Pagan religious traditions I am closest to, the Norse-Germanic Asatru/Heathen tradition and the Baltic-Lithuanian Romuva movement, I have seen that what often seems to attract a certain number of men to these religious movements dealing with the Pagan past is the opportunity to play and pose with swords and other medieval weapons and imagine themselves great warriors of the distant past. A lot of this is just testosterone bluster in honor of the Gods of War, but I worry about how this kind of thing may drown out an appreciation of the Gods of Peace.
I cannot help but relate this to modern American culture, with its endless images of war and violence that are drilled into our heads 24 hours a day. I do understand that boys will be boys, and that they often do love to play with war toys. I had my toy soldiers as a boy too, and enjoyed my share of make-believe combat. But I do worry at how this ties in with our modern, post-9/11 military occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, because it seems to me that in this last decade, war and the military have gained a sort of sacrosanct status, as something sacred that cannot be questioned but must only and always be obeyed. We are all pressured to "support the troops" rather than to THINK about what these wars are based upon and what they are actually achieving or not achieving.
I find the Gods of War a pretty scary lot. Even Odin, one of my favorite Pagan deities, is described as sometimes being untrustworthy in his aspect as a war god, giving victory to the undeserving and sacrificing his own followers on the battlefield for his own mysterious purposes, including drafting them into the elite force that will battle frost giants and fire demons in the final battle of Ragnarok, which, according to the Eddic poem "Voluspa," will plunge the whole world into fiery chaos, prior to an eventual regeneration of the cosmos after its total destruction. I think that for many in the Heathen or Asatru community, the mythology of Odin, Valhalla and Ragnarok is seen as a straightforward glorification of war and warriors. I see darker, more ambiguous meanings here. Odin's shiftiness on the field of battle seems a perfect metaphor for the horrible uncertainty of war; the destruction on both sides, never knowing who will live or die, and in the aftermath, the grieving for the dead and the wounds both psychological and physical, the broken limbs and shattered minds that even the victors will carry home from the battle, and the possibility of renewed war in the near or distant future as the losing side nurses grievances and dreams of vengeance. Not exactly a good time for all. Not the great fun of "The World of Warfare" video game.
And, Ragnarok is a failure, an absolute disaster for the gods. All the combined efforts of Odin and the other great gods like Thor and Freyr to protect the worlds of gods and of men are all in vain. Odin is swallowed by the great wolf Fenrir; Thor is slain by the Midgard Serpent. The other gods go down in defeat as well, and the fire-demon Surt runs wild, in what seems a medieval version of a nuclear holocaust. There are obviously different ways to interpret this, and my thoughts here are strictly my own. I read this as actually suggesting a weariness with war, a sense that war only leads to greater and greater destruction. Others may view this as prophesizing that some kind of all-destroying conflict (Israel versus Iran in the Middle East? India vs Pakistan? Yankees versus Red Sox? soccer versus football?) is inevitable, and that we should all sharpen our axes, shine our shields and prepare to go down fighting.
However, the peacenik in me finds other threads to follow in the Norse myths. When Odin gains mastery of the magical runes in the poem Havamal, one of the abilities he acquires is the ability to make peace. So he is not a 24/7, bloodthirsty war god who only knows how to rhyme "war" with "more." He knows the value of peace, when possible. There is also the tale of the battle between two families or tribes of divine beings, the Aesir (including Odin and Thor) and the Vanir (fertility gods all, sea-god Njord, brother and sister fertility deities Freyr and Freyja). It was the "first war in the world," and neither side could win. So they arranged a truce, exchanged prisoners, and Freyr and Freyja came to dwell among the Aesir. This truce, unlike the apocalyptic battle of Ragnarok, was a success. Peace worked, at least in this case.
Elsewhere in the mythology, a minor episode that I also find significant is that Freyr, in the course of wooing a maiden of interest, gives away his sword, and when the battle of Ragarok comes, he is without a proper weapon, and has to make do with the horn of a stag; we might jokingly say, Freyr has to "go stag" at the worst possible moment. He gave up his weapon for love. Now, this didn't end so well for Freyr, so it is not necessarily an argument that this was the best move to have made, but I find it expressive of Freyr's primary nature as a fertility god, who was often worshipped in the form of a giant phallus. He seems to have been a "make love not war" kind of god.
Therefore, I think that a cogent case can be made that the Norse tradition is not wholeheartedly pro-war or pro-military. There are also anti-military, pro-peace dimensions that deserve contemplation. Stepping back to our modern society, I think that pro-peace voices need to be bolder and louder. For too long now, the worship of the war god has dominated our political discourse. To be anti-war is seen as wimpy, traitorous, un-American. On the conservative side of politics, there is the strange, ironic coincidence of "pro-life" and pro-war points of view. I think that being truly pro-life should extend to opposing war, or at least being very cautious and reserved about the hellish mass murder that war is, and not celebrating it as if it were a big happy football game for the whole family to watch and cheer. In the Pagan world, I would personally like to join forces with other Pagans who feel that their spirituality calls them to promote peace and denounce war. I will stand with you. There was once a "Pagans for Peace" organization in the late 1990s, but I don't think it survived the Bush years. Perhaps it is time to try again?
In the Pagan religious traditions I am closest to, the Norse-Germanic Asatru/Heathen tradition and the Baltic-Lithuanian Romuva movement, I have seen that what often seems to attract a certain number of men to these religious movements dealing with the Pagan past is the opportunity to play and pose with swords and other medieval weapons and imagine themselves great warriors of the distant past. A lot of this is just testosterone bluster in honor of the Gods of War, but I worry about how this kind of thing may drown out an appreciation of the Gods of Peace.
I cannot help but relate this to modern American culture, with its endless images of war and violence that are drilled into our heads 24 hours a day. I do understand that boys will be boys, and that they often do love to play with war toys. I had my toy soldiers as a boy too, and enjoyed my share of make-believe combat. But I do worry at how this ties in with our modern, post-9/11 military occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, because it seems to me that in this last decade, war and the military have gained a sort of sacrosanct status, as something sacred that cannot be questioned but must only and always be obeyed. We are all pressured to "support the troops" rather than to THINK about what these wars are based upon and what they are actually achieving or not achieving.
I find the Gods of War a pretty scary lot. Even Odin, one of my favorite Pagan deities, is described as sometimes being untrustworthy in his aspect as a war god, giving victory to the undeserving and sacrificing his own followers on the battlefield for his own mysterious purposes, including drafting them into the elite force that will battle frost giants and fire demons in the final battle of Ragnarok, which, according to the Eddic poem "Voluspa," will plunge the whole world into fiery chaos, prior to an eventual regeneration of the cosmos after its total destruction. I think that for many in the Heathen or Asatru community, the mythology of Odin, Valhalla and Ragnarok is seen as a straightforward glorification of war and warriors. I see darker, more ambiguous meanings here. Odin's shiftiness on the field of battle seems a perfect metaphor for the horrible uncertainty of war; the destruction on both sides, never knowing who will live or die, and in the aftermath, the grieving for the dead and the wounds both psychological and physical, the broken limbs and shattered minds that even the victors will carry home from the battle, and the possibility of renewed war in the near or distant future as the losing side nurses grievances and dreams of vengeance. Not exactly a good time for all. Not the great fun of "The World of Warfare" video game.
And, Ragnarok is a failure, an absolute disaster for the gods. All the combined efforts of Odin and the other great gods like Thor and Freyr to protect the worlds of gods and of men are all in vain. Odin is swallowed by the great wolf Fenrir; Thor is slain by the Midgard Serpent. The other gods go down in defeat as well, and the fire-demon Surt runs wild, in what seems a medieval version of a nuclear holocaust. There are obviously different ways to interpret this, and my thoughts here are strictly my own. I read this as actually suggesting a weariness with war, a sense that war only leads to greater and greater destruction. Others may view this as prophesizing that some kind of all-destroying conflict (Israel versus Iran in the Middle East? India vs Pakistan? Yankees versus Red Sox? soccer versus football?) is inevitable, and that we should all sharpen our axes, shine our shields and prepare to go down fighting.
However, the peacenik in me finds other threads to follow in the Norse myths. When Odin gains mastery of the magical runes in the poem Havamal, one of the abilities he acquires is the ability to make peace. So he is not a 24/7, bloodthirsty war god who only knows how to rhyme "war" with "more." He knows the value of peace, when possible. There is also the tale of the battle between two families or tribes of divine beings, the Aesir (including Odin and Thor) and the Vanir (fertility gods all, sea-god Njord, brother and sister fertility deities Freyr and Freyja). It was the "first war in the world," and neither side could win. So they arranged a truce, exchanged prisoners, and Freyr and Freyja came to dwell among the Aesir. This truce, unlike the apocalyptic battle of Ragnarok, was a success. Peace worked, at least in this case.
Elsewhere in the mythology, a minor episode that I also find significant is that Freyr, in the course of wooing a maiden of interest, gives away his sword, and when the battle of Ragarok comes, he is without a proper weapon, and has to make do with the horn of a stag; we might jokingly say, Freyr has to "go stag" at the worst possible moment. He gave up his weapon for love. Now, this didn't end so well for Freyr, so it is not necessarily an argument that this was the best move to have made, but I find it expressive of Freyr's primary nature as a fertility god, who was often worshipped in the form of a giant phallus. He seems to have been a "make love not war" kind of god.
Therefore, I think that a cogent case can be made that the Norse tradition is not wholeheartedly pro-war or pro-military. There are also anti-military, pro-peace dimensions that deserve contemplation. Stepping back to our modern society, I think that pro-peace voices need to be bolder and louder. For too long now, the worship of the war god has dominated our political discourse. To be anti-war is seen as wimpy, traitorous, un-American. On the conservative side of politics, there is the strange, ironic coincidence of "pro-life" and pro-war points of view. I think that being truly pro-life should extend to opposing war, or at least being very cautious and reserved about the hellish mass murder that war is, and not celebrating it as if it were a big happy football game for the whole family to watch and cheer. In the Pagan world, I would personally like to join forces with other Pagans who feel that their spirituality calls them to promote peace and denounce war. I will stand with you. There was once a "Pagans for Peace" organization in the late 1990s, but I don't think it survived the Bush years. Perhaps it is time to try again?
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