RELIGION + POLITICS + CULTURE

Our Dirty Lens on the World

Perspective should come from the heart but is shaped by externalities

“There is no truth. There is only perception.” — Gustave Flaubert

I live in a Muslim country.

I actually live on a Hindu island within a Muslim country. Every time we have visitors to Indonesia, they will ask me if it is safe.

I find this odd as Indonesia has a lower crime rate than the U.S. and the UK. From a murder point of view, Indonesia is one of the safest countries in the world with a rate 10X less than the U.S.

So why do people hold this perception?

Their lens is dirty.

I was recently in Penang, Malaysia, when Hamas attacked Israel.

Malaysia, like Indonesia, is a Muslim nation. The TV in my room was not showing any of the major US news outlets although this is a major US-branded hotel.

I read multiple US-based news sources each day that span the political spectrum. I also peruse independent and personal sources from around the world. Much like everywhere, the news in Penang was condemning the Hamas attacks. Unlike much of the world, they were already raising a red flag about the Israeli and Western response.

We have now seen that their concerns were valid as the death toll has surpassed 8,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians. This death toll will far exceed these numbers as Israel has already declared that this will be a long war.

What I was watching in Malaysia was not what others were watching in Israel, the US, or other parts of the world. They presented a narrative that was aligned with their audience and national beliefs.

My lens on the world that day was contextual. Every lens is contextual.

And our lenses are often smudged.

What has always struck me odd about religion is that one’s belief system has little to do with their deity but most everything to do with where they were born.

I was born in California to Christian parents. I was raised Christian, went to church, was introduced to the bible. I declared myself Christian until I eventually decided to follow my own beliefs that were not tied to any doctrine.

If I was born in Bali, Indonesia, I would most likely be Hindu. If I was born on any of the other Indonesian islands, I would be Muslim. Pakistan — Muslim. Israel — Jewish. Kenya — Christian.

Your parents and where you were raised strongly dictate your beliefs. This isn’t necessarily bad.

It is just strange that if there was an all-powerful god, shouldn’t he be able to transcend geography and ancestry?

With all these loving gods and inspirational texts, shouldn’t we be living a different existence? We seem to care little about doing right but only want to be right.

But we cannot operate from our genuine truth and see the world with clarity when we are so affected by externalities.

And media further tarnishes our lenses.

If you are liberal in the UK, your lens to the world is the Guardian. If conservative then it is The Times.

In the US if you are a Democrat then your channels of choice are MSNBC and CNN. Republican — Fox. Independents try to stay away from the hype by following Reuters and Axios but even these are biased.

We believe we are born with free will and make all of our choices. But how free are we with our choices?

How much of our life is pre-determined if we are born to conservative, Buddhist parents in Japan?

Typically we embrace our contextual beliefs or we swing the other way and reject them. Either way, we are wholly influenced by our immediate context.

How are we able to be our true selves, operating from the heart, when we are battling an endless flow of cultural, societal, political, and religious demands telling us what we are supposed to believe?

In general, the West, Jewish people, and Israelis support the response to Hamas. The US and UK have sent a fleet of warships to make this position very clear.

On the other side of the spectrum, anti-Western countries, Muslims, the Middle East, and Arabs support Palestine. Russia and Iran have publicly condemned Israel and voiced their support for Palestine.

But what if all of these people were born into and raised on the opposite end of the spectrum? Their beliefs would be fundamentally different.

Imagine a Jewish child born in Israel to Orthodox parents and given up for adoption to a Muslim family in Java. They would most likely be Muslim.

So where did their faith and belief go? I am not against religions and belief systems as long as they aren’t hurting anyone. The minute they cross that line, they cease to be relevant to me.

Why is all of this important?

Because beyond our skin color, sex, religion, nationalities, and beliefs, we are all the same.

When one group slaughters another group, they are effectively killing their own people. If we want to be completely truthful, we are just killing our own children.

People should be angry at Hamas for their attack. Similarly, people should be angry at Israel for their disproportionate response. And we should condemn any attack from any country or group on innocent people. Politics should not be playing a role.

But our lenses are so dirty, scraped, and blurred, that we don’t even realize what we are doing. We believe what we hear in our echo chambers.

And while a genocide unfolds in Palestine, we have other equally horrible disasters around the world in Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burkina Faso, Niger, Ukraine, Afghanistan, the US-Mexico border, and Armenia.

All of these areas — and more — are in dire need of humanitarian assistance. But our politics, religions, and beliefs prevent us from addressing the real problems in the world.

I was sitting in the hotel restaurant having breakfast in Penang. The majority of the customers were Muslim.

One Muslim couple sat next to my table and was feeding their infant. They had their back to me so didn’t notice that I was smiling and waving at their baby. The baby was distracted, giggling, and waving back at me.

That child had no concept of politics, history, religion, or god. She was a child, pure of heart and soul, placed on this earth only to be loved. Her lens on the world was crystal clear.

Her future is up to us. Her actions will come from our actions.

If we hate, she will hate. If we fight, she will fight.

If we love, she will love.

🙏 🦋 😢

I wrote these stories before the latest Palestinian-Israeli conflict began. I have long stated that we need to figure out a new path ahead not just for the current problem in Israel and Palestine but with all of our issues. Maybe these help to offer some solutions. What do you feel we can do to move towards solutions?