Showing you care

Another day, another riot by Muslims. I realize that "one million Muslims riot" is a great headline; and "999 million Muslims spend their day peacefully" is not. And it is difficult for me to assess which of these two headlines is more accurate, since I don't actually live in a Muslim country. So I have a suggestion.

I would like to see an Islamic charity, which responds to perceived acts of sacrilege or blasphemy. Every member (which I would hope becomes a substantial fraction of all Muslims) donates some amount each time there is such an incident - cartoons, burning of a Koran, offensive videos, whatever. The amount could be quite small; it could depend on income and circumstances; but it should be every time this happens. Those who feel particularly incensed could work the day in a green cap or headscarf, say, and donate their day's pay to the charity. Instead of spending it burning buildings and killing people.

The response to a specific incident could be as simple as printing more Korans, to ensure the number never decreases; issuing press releases condemning the insults; organizing peaceful mass actions - imagine a few million letters sent to a newspaper explaining why their cartoons are offensive (not that this latest one needed much explanation as far as I know). What it should not include is calls for violence.

All of this would be pretty cheap to run. There would be a lot of money left over. This is the point; the extra money could be used to build schools and hospitals in the poorest and most neglected parts of the Islamic world (or anywhere that would get press coverage, frankly).

The benefits of this are manifold:

• People not being killed. Especially innocent people who had nothing to do with whatever the original insult was.
• Buildings not being burnt down.
• Much-needed infrastructure being built for the poorest of the world.
• A great moral example, pressuring the violent to instead channel their anger into work.
• An example to point at for the rest of the world, that most Muslims are not howling fanatical thugs, but ordinary people who would just like a little respect.
• Earning that respect.

The greater the contributions, and the more they are actually used for good works, the bigger the signal that Islam really is a religion of peace and its adherents are deeply offended by whatever it was.

Imagine that next time some idiot pastor decides to burn a Koran, the Muslim world replies that it is deeply offended and is working off its righteous anger by building a hospital. How embarrassing for the pastor; that the best he can think of to do is burn books when his targets are helping the desperate. What a permanent rebuke to him - a hospital for the needy.

I said I don't live in a Muslim country. I don't want to, either. I don't feel that it would be safe - for all that far more people are killed in traffic accidents in my city than get killed by mobs worldwide. Traffic accidents are a steady background, but mobs grow exponentially. A Muslim world that collectively announced in such a public and sincere way that it was peaceful would raise my opinion of it greatly. At the moment the view I have of them is summed up by Sam Harris - "We're a peaceful religion and we'll kill anyone who says we aren't". It may be inaccurate, but all I know is what I read.

Indeed, my reading of the Koran is that Mohamed would have greatly approved of this charity, although I am well aware that some parts of it suggest he would have engaged in both the charity and the violence - the translation I read contained the phrase "make wide slaughter" far too often for comfort.

At the moment the hot-heads on both sides are feeding on this stuff. Some troll in the west publishes anti-Muslim propaganda and decries Islam as violent and thuggish. And some shock-jock in the Islamic world uses it to whip up a frenzy, resulting in riots. The troll points to the riots; the shock-jock points to the propaganda; the uncivilized win, and the rest of us lose.
It would be wonderful if "the rest of us" could push them into the margins where they can wither for lack of attention.

Advice to the Bullied

This should really be taken with a pinch of salt, because I didn't get seriously bullied at school. A few individuals made a hobby out of trying to make my life miserable, but none of them had the kind of broad access to my life that you need to really do that. That said, I think the below is still true.

1: Just ignore them. This is the advice everyone gives, and there's something to it. The bully wants to show off how powerful they are, and the less they can make you miserable, the less they are going to get out of it. If their taunts and mockery are just ignored, they'll likely go away. Even if they don't, who cares? But you can't make real use of this advice without the next point.

2: Ignoring abuse is really, really hard. This is what hardly anyone will tell you. There's a word for people who don't care what others think of them, and that word is "sociopath". Adults often forget what bullying is like; in hindsight it doesn't seem so bad, because it's over, their tormentors are gone from their lives, and they have much more freedom to deal with hateful people. And the person bullying *you* is probably not important to *them*. That doesn't mean you have to be a sociopath to ignore a bully, but it does mean it will take a lot of hard work.

Of course, if the bully is using physical violence, point 1 is much less relevant, and point 2 is even more so. Which brings me to:

3: Fight back. This does not mean hitting the bully; often they will be bigger than you, or else more prepared to risk using violence. There's no reason why you should fight your battles on their chosen ground - they probably chose it because they perceived an advantage there. If you get in a fight and are both punished, it may be that you care deeply about the effect on your record, and they don't. Here you will need to make very careful judgements about consequences of actions. But the chances are that the misery they are inflicting on you is much greater than the benefit they get from it. It is often surprising just how little pain you need to inflict in return to make them stop. Most importantly -

4: Despite what the bully will tell you, they are the one that's in the wrong, and you are perfectly entitled to get authority involved. No, this doesn't make you a cheat or a coward. If they will be embarrassed by having their actions widely known, that's something they should be reflecting on. Mobile phones these days have magnificent recording ability. Sometimes you will find that those in authority ignore you (see point 2) or even share whatever prejudice your bully does. You are still entitled to be left alone and not bullied. Don't be fooled into fighting on their turf.

5: It gets better. All kinds of things are done by schoolchildren that would be considered assault in the adult world. The older you get, the more options you will have for redress or simple avoidance. You may still get bullied as an adult (sadly), but your ability to declare it intolerable and move away is much more absolute. Things and people that seem all-consumingly important now will fade with time - this is one reason why you get offered point 1 as advice.

6: Learn. The purpose of childhood in humans is not merely to eat and get bigger; otherwise it would be one long growth spurt, as it is in many other animals. Watch the people around you, and how they react. Some rare people will step in to help the bullied; others will do so for friends; some will offer sympathy but not help; and a few will join in. Nor are these categories absolute, or unchanging. Understand who you are dealing with, and who is worth knowing. Experiment. If you leave school knowing nothing more than how to defang a bully you will still have done well. You will make mistakes, but the same is true for everything you do in childhood.

7: Success is the best revenge. Take comfort in getting on with your life, and accomplishing what you need to do. Get the grades you need for your chosen career, or the experience you need for a better job somewhere else. It may also make it easier to get authority involved - if the bully is stopping you from getting your assigned work done, escalation will be easier.

But if you take away nothing else from this, remember point 2: being bullied is hard work. Advice that begins with "Just..." is unlikely to help.