The 2011 Arab Uprisings and the Persistence of Orientalism
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Forum on the 2011 “Arab Spring” The 2011 Arab Uprisings and the Persistence of Orientalism Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/awg/article-pdf/14/2/122/1449185/arwg_14_2_x8532r2804881h1l.pdf by guest on 28 September 2021 Paul Jahshan Notre Dame University, Zouk, Lebanon A friend recently sent me photos of a rally in Madison, Wisconsin, protesting against state governor Scott Walker’s attempt to pass a bill that “would infringe on the rights of state workers,” as the Huffington Post describes it (2011). Nothing very unusual, except that some demonstrators were carrying posters with the slogans “Fight like an Egyptian,” “Walk like an Egyptian, Stand with Wisconsin,” and “Riot like an Egyptian.” CNN’s Politicalticker blog reported that Republican Wisconsin representative Paul Ryan compared “the protests in his state’s capital to those in Egypt that led to the resignation of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak” (Schwarz 2011). Is 2011 the harbinger of a political and a cultural renaissance in the Arab world, and also of a radical change in the way the West has perceived its Oriental nemesis for the last four centuries, first as an Other to observe, clas - sify, and tame, and then, particularly since 11 September 2001, as an Adversary to demonize? It is the latter issue that I will be exploring here. The sudden realization, at the beginning of 2011, that the Arab uprisings were about to offer the world fresh strategies (on both discursive and prag - matic levels) to achieve democracy has effected two responses. First, Western protestors have discovered that from anti-Iraq-war to Davos to university fee rises in the United Kingdom, from ecological and nuclear disasters (BP and Tepco) to the infiltration of environmental activists by undercover police to the ongoing scandal of bank bonuses, rarely have their actions changed the ironclad systems in which they live; as a result of the events of 2011, they will undoubtedly have to reassess their existing strategies in light of the bewilder - ing successes of their Arab counterparts. If dictatorial figureheads such as Ben Ali, Mubarak, Saleh, Qaddafi, and others can ultimately be toppled by adamantly persevering crowds, then the relatively more benign miscreants of the Western world will stand little chance against similarly concerted efforts. Second, the Western world has equally suddenly found itself, paradoxi - cally, confronted with a face hitherto unknown and, by the same token, tacitly rejected: that of the strong, upright, fighting, and secular Arab—qualities, unfortunately, not associated with the “Oriental.” Edward Said’s whole oeuvre has delivered enough to unmask the theatrical stage—Orientalism— constructed by the successive Western superpowers as they set out to harvest The Arab World Geographer / Le Géographe du monde arab Vol 14, no 2 (2011) 122 -127 © 2011 AWG Publishing, Toronto Canada The 2011 Arab Uprisings and the Persistence of Orientalism 123 the resources under their colonial control. In this construction, the Arab is the opposite of what are seen as the noble qualities of the Western Man: the Arab is weak, convoluted, cowardly, and, most importantly, made totally impotent by a total submission and surrendering to religion. Indeed, in Covering Islam , Said summarized the prevailing assumption that “whereas ‘the West’ is greater than and has surpassed the stage of Christianity, its principal religion, Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/awg/article-pdf/14/2/122/1449185/arwg_14_2_x8532r2804881h1l.pdf by guest on 28 September 2021 the world of Islam—its varied societies, histories, and languages notwith - standing—is still mired in religion, primitivity, and backwardness” (1997, 10). The Arab world has been frozen as one entity that must conform to the construction given to it, which may explain why the West is now put in an unenviable—because essentially paradoxical—love–hate position whereby admiration for the Arab uprisings is tempered by a reluctance to come to terms with the long-cherished imaginary of the Oriental as inferior. That what the world is now witnessing is obviously a determined upris - ing against tyranny and a search for democratic solutions will surprise—and also dismay—proponents of the theory of the “Islamic Resurgence,” in which Muslims are pictured as organizing themselves to achieve the “much more extensive revival of Islamic ideas, practices, and rhetoric and the rededication to Islam by Muslim populations” (Huntington 2003, 110)—a surprise made by the fact that religion, to a large extent, has been conspicuously absent from most of the 2011 events. What has kept Western audiences from fully support - ing these uprisings may be the gloomy prediction by self-styled Middle East “experts” that the “Resurgence” is “mainstream not extremist, pervasive not isolated” (110), which appears to shut the door on any honest opportunity of understanding the new Arab democracies. The Muslim world, according to other “experts,” is irrevocably doomed because of its total reliance on a backward religion that breeds a lack of free - dom on all levels: “freedom of the mind from constraint and indoctrination, to question and inquire and speak; freedom of the economy from corrupt and pervasive mismanagement; freedom of women from male oppression; free - dom of citizens from tyranny,” all of which are at the heart of “so many of the troubles of the Muslim world” (Lewis 2004, 177). To writers such as Bernard Lewis, “the road to democracy … is long and hard, full of pitfalls and obsta - cles” (177). In other words, Muslims, as long as they are Muslims, will never be free, and what the world is witnessing must boil down to anything but a straightforward uprising born precisely from clarity of mind; from a question - ing of values, truths, and principles; and from an urge to be free from tyranny. The most colonial of these contemporary views are those that go to the extreme of withholding democracy from the “many poor parts of the world,” as they will undoubtedly be “an integral part of a transformation toward new forms of authoritarianism” (Kaplan 2000, 60). It is the Western powers that will decide who is and who is not ready to enjoy political freedom, for “if a society is not in reasonable health, democracy can be not only risky but The Arab World Geographer / Le Géographe du monde arab Vol 14, no 2 (2011) 124 Paul Jahshan disastrous” (62). How “reasonable health” is measured, and by whose author - ity and standards, is another question. More to the point, many countries in the Middle East, according to this view, “will not instantly become stable democ - racies once their absolute dictators and medieval ruling families pass from the scene” (94); and even the concession Kaplan immediately makes—“as in the early centuries of Christianity, there will be a mess” (94)—only serves to Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/awg/article-pdf/14/2/122/1449185/arwg_14_2_x8532r2804881h1l.pdf by guest on 28 September 2021 highlight, in an otherwise not unreasonable assertion, the huge historical gap perceived between the West and the Orient. That these mythemes have resisted the events of 2011 is clear from even a perfunctory glance at the headlines of major Western TV channels and news agencies: talks of “civil wars” reminded audiences that Arabs are only good at bickering and at achieving mutual self-destruction; videos of mobs shout - ing “Allahu Akbar” squarely confirmed the belief that Arabs can never think outside of their religion, Islam; mentions of “Al-Shabaab” ominously brought to mind terrorist groups with similar-sounding names; warnings that Al- Qaeda or the shadowy Muslim Brotherhood will pounce on whatever gains are obtained by the popular uprisings and install caliphates and Shari’a law played on the worst European fears since the Battle of Tours; the vague but insistent threats of “tribal” warfare summoned images of backward horsemen or camel drivers miles away from civilization; and carefully edited scenes of male-only or fully veiled, female-only crowds comforted Western audiences that, at the end of the day, Arabs will remain Arabs, probably for a long time to come. Rarely have the Western media been keen on explaining that this “civil war” actually consisted, almost without exception, of unevenly matched confrontations between people bent on shaking decades of oppression, corruption, and militaristic states and the paid thugs—the now-famous balt - agiyya —of these regimes, along with any “loyalist” army remnants. If “Allahu Akbar” has been, thanks to decades of media indoctrination, almost exclusively linked to acts of mindless terrorism, anyone who has lived a few months in any Arab country will attest to the fact that the expression is part of the Arabic language and expresses, besides its obvious religious uses, a range of feelings from admiration to mild displeasure to anger. That Arabic-speak - ing Christians also occasionally use “Allahu Akbar” as a reaction to mundane events may give non-Arab audiences time to pause and think. As to the threats of terrorist, extremist, or fundamentalist groups seizing power, this has been a facile but so far groundless prediction meant, on the one hand, to keep dicta - tors in power and, on the other, to maintain the constructed image of the Arab as incapable of secular thought. Finally, if Western audiences were allowed, beyond the cinematic display of streaming, black-clad, faceless figures, a closer look at what veiled female protestors were actually saying, they would admit that theirs is an equally free, honest, outspoken, and legitimate outcry against political oppression. The Arab World Geographer / Le Géographe du monde arab Vol 14, no 2 (2011) The 2011 Arab Uprisings and the Persistence of Orientalism 125 More flagrant has been the media’s offhand treatment of the ups and downs that inevitably attend liberation wars. When following Western news, one is struck by the vocabulary used when the “rebels” are facing understand - ably stiff opposition, and one can detect barely hidden glee in descriptions of their battlefield losses.