Baby steps towards building bridges in the community

author : Muhammad Ayub topic : Islam

by Muhammad Ayub

Most people volunteering to be foot soldiers for the political campaigning of the Republican party have their hearts in the right place; they are God-fearing, patriotic folks who feel that they are doing the right thing. There are not very many opportunities for them to listen and to speak to other people with differing points of views and opinions. This forum was one such opportunity -- a tender baby step towards building bridges in the community.

On March 29, the St. Martin's University Young College Republicans Club hosted the showing of the movie Obsession -- Radical Islam's War with the West. The panelists and audience in attendance were dismayed and disturbed by the amount of hate, violence, and misconception that was unleashed in such a short time.

The film has a long list of problems: distortion of reality, maligning of a faith tradition, mistranslations of Arabic, lack of fairness, factual errors, absence of Middle East experts, and the parading of a short list of renowned Muslim-bashers like Daniel Pipes, Steve Emerson and Nonie Darwish. Muhammed Ayub, a local volunteer, commented, "Why are we making such a big deal out of this movie? Because this is the foundation of the same kind of propaganda lies that were used to justify the Iraq war; if we in the peace party had not been sleeping, we could have nipped it in the bud! Now, we need all your help and support to deconstruct the arguments for the upcoming 'new and improved' Iran invasion!"

Unfortunately, the organizers did not provide enough time after the movie for discussion. So Brother Nabil Azouz, the President of the Islamic Center of Olympia, invited the Young Republicans, the peace community, and the whole audience to the local mosque hall to continue the discussion. In organizing the event, the Outreach Committee of the Islamic Center of Olympia enlisted the assistance of several local peace and justice organizations, the local Jewish synagogue, and various Christian churches.

Process of listening

On the evening of April 5, the College Republicans arrived at the mosque. After a brief tour of the facilities and introductions to some local Muslims and the members of the peace community, ground rules and parameters were explained and people were divided into six discussion groups, each with a good mix of Republicans, Jewish visitors, peace movement activists, Muslim hosts and the general public.

The discussion began with each group listening carefully, without judgment, comment, rebuttals or interruptions. All parties were advised to tone down the rhetoric and speak from experience, not from news, emails, political speeches or hearsay. "An enemy is one whose story we have not heard. Please let us choose to communicate bilaterally!" begged Ayub. Two main questions to contemplate were: "What is your greatest concern?" and "What do you most want others to understand about what you need and value?"

The purpose of that night's meeting was for "listening", not "debate" or "dialogue." Participants were asked to speak as individuals, from their own experience. Listening allows the listener to understand and gain insight into the concerns of others. Quiet listening gives the speaker the experience of truly being heard, and can offer an opportunity for further self-reflection without dialogue. Questions are only posed by the speakers themselves for self-reflection purposes. New information may surface.

The first question, "What is your greatest concern?" prompted diverse answers. People expressed concern about the false portrayals of Muslims and Arabs in the film and how to counter them. It was noted that people should look to Muslims to learn about Islam like we go to Christians to learn about Christianity, and to Jews to learn about Judaism.

There was concern that the movie could increase violence here at home and justify more war in the Middle East. People who believe in violence feed each other in cycles; people in the US don't see how much this country contributes to those cycles. One family described how they are now homeschooling their children after their son was called a "terrorist." People cannot talk to their neighbors easily due to political and religious divisions. "My son believes he is hated."

The second question, "What do you most want others to understand about what you need and value?" showed wide-ranging responses as well. One common theme expressed was that humanity is our common denominator; all life has value. We should recognize our prejudices and replace ignorance with knowledge, understanding and mutual respect. We should avoid making generalizations about groups of people based on religion and other racial or ethnic identifiers.

Rome was not built in a day

Engaging in active listening demonstrated to the participants the hard work and the uphill road that lay ahead of them. Understanding that "peace" is not a spectator sport, some of them resolved to engage in it actively. These were the beginnings of baby steps to cross a chasm of political ideology that seems to have temporarily divided not just the Pacific Northwest, but our entire beloved country. Many concerns and desires for understanding were expressed, but possibly not all in attendance felt truly listened to (or heard). We look forward to improving our "listening without judging skills."

The meeting ended on several positive action items, including promises to continue dialogue, networking and bilateral communications. Many visitors were surprised to find the Muslim faith so close in belief and practice to the Jewish and Christian traditions. Fifty Quran copies and lots of pamphlets were distributed. When the Quran copies ran out, guests were requested to call 1-877-why-islam or log onto http://www.whyislam.org for getting a free Quran in English along with 10 other free educational literatures.

Many folks from the peace and justice organizations suggested that it might be time to shift from protesting downtown to planning such dialogue sessions with people whose opinions and views may be totally different from theirs. Since the Republican Party State Convention is going to be hosted this summer at St. Martin's University, avenues for meaningful exchange of discourse were summarized. Friendships were made, emails exchanged, pictures were posed for -- a good sense of love, affection, humanism and cooperative spirit prevailed!