The Hype of Hatred vs. Identity (Part 1)
Preface: The Hype of Hatred vs. Identity
By Thiik Mou Giir, Melbourne, Australia
March 13, 2016 (SSB) —– I have finally become a mechanic, a real overall-wearing, hard-working, sweating, groaning and spanner-holding mechanic. Just as a mechanic sees everything, as if it was the case of which nuts need to be tightened or loosened with a spanner, so do I see our social and political issues, as if they were cases from which I could come up with some solutions that may assist us to construct our new identity. Our country is in turmoil; our communities around the world are fractured. It is a loose and a wobbling situation and some nut tightening work need to be carried out by all of us.
In 2014 I came up with a vision, Construct Our New Identity, which I think should replace the vision “unity within diversity” and other visions that have been around for quite a long time and have waned to nothingness. We need a new vision for without a vision, I do not know where we will end up. I have proposed this new vision and shared some ideas with South Sudanese community members in Victoria, Australia, hoping that it would change our miserable lives. Although people have responded positively to them, they have told me honestly that, unless things are settled in our home country, nothing will move on here.
I soon realized that we are stuck as we see, in alarming rate, that many of our school children are dropping out of schools and some have gone into jail, others are on drugs. I am convinced, beyond reasonable doubt, that this situation is being induced out of hopelessness. Many people have encouraged me to keep going and share the vision and the ideas that are inspired and informed by this vision, not only with our people in Melbourne, but also with our people in South Sudan and in other countries.
In this piece of writing, I want to shed light on some of the things, things that have intensified the hype of hatred in our society in South Sudan as well as in our communities in Diaspora. These things are being thrown around all the time in social media. In this piece, I also would like to demonstrate that when we look at these issues through the perspective of this new vision, we will see things differently and if we are willing, we can solve these issues in much more different way than the way most of our people try to do things nowadays, a tendency of resorting to violence.
What are the things that have fueled this hype of hatred that have engulfed our people? There could be more, but here I will focus on six issues. They are:
- Some Dinka people say that some members of other tribes are calling them that they are “the foolish majority”;
- Some members of other tribes sometimes say, this Dinka or that Dinka person is “cow-headed”;
- Some Equatorians complain that “Dinka people have grabbed our ancestral lands;”
- Some members of other tribes sometimes say that Dinka people believe that they are “Born to rule”;
- Members of other tribes have complained that Dinka people say, “We have liberated you!”
- Some members of other tribes have used abusive language, in that they call Jieng Council of Elders (JCE) as “jieng council of evil”.
All these things are pointing to one thing – we have become our own worst enemies of ourselves. I have found it necessary to suggest to you that we should struggle to liberate ourselves once more, not only from Arabs (remember, they are still meddling in our affairs), but also from own ourselves. The starting point, therefore, is to start from within oneself before one can face members of one’s family, members of one’s clan, members of one’s tribe and all members of other tribes. Let me personalize the statement I have just made, “I start to liberate myself from the enemy that is within me!” Ok? As you can imagine, it will be the toughest of all the liberation struggles that our people have ever experienced.
The goal is to win the hearts and the minds of us. The method is to do this through dialogue and persuasion. As you can see, no one will go to UN refugee camps as a result of this kind of struggle. Some people may go to jail and even be killed, but not to the refugee camps in their hundreds and thousands. Nothing good comes from a liberation struggle without a price.
This piece of writing is divided into eight sections: preface, part one to part six topics, and a conclusion. I will post one section each of the coming weeks.
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