I is for...Iwan...and...Image...

is for

Iwan, a Lebanese-Palestinian artiste – a youthful and expressive voice:

Image Issues!

If you have never been to an Arab country, I'd really like your Impressions here - what is the first word/image that comes to your mind when I say the word 'Arab'? 







Yeah, I thought so!

The Arabs have a serious image problem, boy do they get some bad press or what?! Backward, narrow-minded, holier-than-thou, fanatics, joyless, mindless, misogynistic, violent, over-entitled, too slick by half and gender segregated up to the gills. Anti-west, rage-crazed and out to kill off infidels left, right and centre to boot. Inaccurate doesn’t begin to sum this.  

“Oh, so you don’t have to wear a veil? You can go around in a sari?” 

“Arab women in the workplace?! They’re allowed to work?”

“Are girls allowed to get an education?”

Just some of the questions I have faced, and they were being asked long before 9/11 happened.  The answers, if they need any stating, are: I can wear what I like; women are a part of the workforce in most Arab countries; and Bahrain has the oldest education system in the Arabian peninsula, the first modern school was set up here in 1892, and the first girls’ school in 1930.

This is not to claim that the situation re women’s rights is all hunky-dory in MENA, of course not. But cripes! women are subject to gender discrimination regardless of their ethnicity, geography, religious affiliations, or politics, just a matter of degrees. Also not to dismiss that many Arab countries face major economic, political, sectarian and social problems at present.  There’s no denying that also. 

It’s patently unfortunate that a handful of conservative, orthodox countries - Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, have managed to distort the image of the whole.  The first two are not even Arab, and Saudi Arabia has a population of 27 million, that’s less than 10% of the total Arabs, people! A slim slice has hijacked the thread, just by being more shouty than the rest.  


In 20 years, the Arabs that I’ve met have been nothing like any media image, including the Saudis, I have to confess. Individually, most Arabs are unfailingly courteous, great fun to talk to, have a robust sense of humour and are helpful and warm towards foreigners. But that gets hardly any media space, naturally.


You don’t have to take my word for it. Read what Haifaa al Mansour, a young film-maker from Saudi Arabia itself, has to say:

We are rich in culture, fierce in our humour, burning in intelligence, full of love and hope, and driven by an indelible spirit that cannot be crushed by false narratives or misrepresentation…We are not victims, or extremists, or simpletons. (We are) a rich myriad of peoples, and all of us have important stories, ideas and perspectives. There is a special rhythm to our music and prose, and a tapestry of colours and textures that is uniquely our own.

- Haifaa al Mansour, Film-maker, in CNN.

(And I am nodding so hard to that 'special rhythm to our music and prose' that my head's practically falling off.  But let's stick to the point.) The deluge of misinformation is not really recent, been going on since forever. Read what Ahdaf Soueif, an Egyptian novelist and activist writes of her experience of moving to Britain in the 1980’s after marrying her Brit husband.

Where I found myself out of step was when (this) discourse had anything to do with Egypt, the Arabs, or Islam…in almost every book, article, film, TV or radio programme that claimed to be about the part of the world that I came from I could never recognise myself or anyone I knew. I was constantly coming face to face with distortions of my reality.

-  Ahdaf Soueif, Mezzaterra.

Or what the Palestinian-American intellectual, Edward Said, pointed out in his ground-breaking work - Orientalism, published 1978:

 Arabs, for example, are thought of as camel-riding, terroristic, hook-nosed, venal lechers whose undeserved wealth is an affront to real civilization. 

― Edward Said, Orientalism

Or take instead, this random BTL comment on this Economist article here. Which I kind of relate to word for word.

I once lived in Egypt and liked nearly every person I met. They were hospitable, courteous and pleasantly involved in their own lives in a constructive and very human manner. So far as I know, that is still true for 90+% of the Arab population.

-      A. Andros.

This whole misconception thing is just tiresome, and so very sad. So much Incorrect Information, swilling about at large, building distrust and dislike and hate.

Posted for the A-Z Challenge 2017