Marziyeh Mousavi, in an article in the website takes aim at the western double standards in shining the spotlight on the conflict from the perspective of human rights, drawing comparisons with how western outlets cover similar episodes of war and violation of human rights in the Middle East, where the victims are non-white and non-European and the perpetrators are western governments. Here is the full translation of the article:
Sir, ma’am, you’re racist
“They are so like us and this is the shocking part. Ukraine is a European country; people here watch Netflix, use Instagram and vote in free elections and also read uncensored newspapers. War is no longer something for the poor and far-flung people; it can happen for anyone”
This is just one of the paragraphs and comments published by some European and American media about the Ukraine war; a sum-up of the racist look beneath the surface of the civilization, and now, amid these fears, is showing through.
What is repeated in these videos is a bitter concept that displays how politicians think about the Middle East: a “poor and far-flung” people; the geographical area where war, carnage, bombing and suicide attacks are considered natural, and basically, if any country is willing to engage in warmongering, it would better drop its bombs in one of the countries in this region and use the devices to get away with poor and far-flung women, men and children, there.
Comments by some European and American media over the past days show little trace of sympathy with the war-stricken people and rather deal with racial disparities. It is just like the in the middle of the 20th century and one is watching a world which Nazis are cleansing; like when the BBC guest talked of his pain and suffering for the killing of blue-eyed and blond Europeans.
It means if these bombs were dropped over the black-head Middle Easterns, no expert, legal expert or journalist would ever turn a hair?
Over the past days, there were also other sidelines to the comments about the war in Ukraine, which were mostly highlighted by Persian-speaking users and residents of the Middle East. The story is so bold that not only ordinary users, but also politicians and experts got trapped. They were entrapped by wrong analogies, especially between the behavior of Afghans in the face of civil war and the people of Ukraine.
These analogies, somehow, humiliate the war-weary countries of the Middle East, and on the other hand, give credit to the behavior of the people of Ukraine, as if the people who are making the analogies do not know the political and cultural, and even territorial, geography of the Middle East. They do not know Afghan women have no guaranteed security, even when trying to escape the Taliban and reach the airport, while people of Ukraine, by taking a land route, which is only a few kilometers long, can get to one of the member states of the European Union.
These days, if you wonder “what is a third world country?” or “what is the reaction of European countries regarding repeated wars in the Middle East?”, you can just take a look at these racist comments; an established injustice that only considers the blue-eyed and the White as not deserving tension and death, and believes that building nuclear bombs and its exports and its use in the Middle East is an ordinary issue that needs no explanation.
It is so ordinary that most of “us”, the people of the Middle East, have subconsciously accepted it, and without even knowing, use it to humiliate “ourselves”.
