BHAINS is urdu for water buffalo, commonly found in the punjab region.
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“Oh, I know. You don’t care about me. It is that farmer standing next to my dead carcass that interests you more, isn’t it? You think that now that his life is ruined by this flood, his cattle is dead, his land is covered in waist high mud and soil, his crops are ruined, his body is racked with dysentery and cholera, he will become a Taliban and attack America. Yes. That is who you really want to hear about. Sadly, even though I have a voice (beyond the carcass, even!), he doesn’t. He needs someone else to speak for him.
I hear you. You are a hammer and every thing else is a nail. More precisely, every Pakistani is a infected with HIT-virus – full blown disease is just a matter of time.
What is the point then? I cannot tell you anything that can change your mind. He is poor. He is easily bought by Wahabi or Opium money. He works hard for his meager food. He will swallow whole the dialectic of revolution or of Khilafa. He is traditional in his outlook, in his customs. He is a fundamentalist and a sectarian. He spent some time in the Gulf doing labor. He was indoctrinated with Wahabi ideology. He can recite Bulleh Shah or listen to the Heer for days. He what? He is a human being with a past, a present, a culture, a society, a vision of the good life, a sense of community, a method of belonging, a routine of daily practices, a collection of stories for his children, a corpus of songs for his friends, a set of possessions, a love for radio or tv, a daily grind and an early night. He is waiting to attack us in New York.
You see his suffering through your security, your strategy, your politics. You don’t see him as a human. Just as you don’t see me as more than cattle. You don’t know who he is, so he must be your worst nightmare. If you saw him as human, if you granted him agency, thought, you wouldn’t be so afraid. You would want to help him. Not because he might become Taliban, but because he is your kind, and he needs your help.” Full article.
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for those non-urdu speakers who get the brilliance of this piece, here is a translation of the urdu proverbs:
You may have heard of me. They routinely say: ‘aql bari kay bhains. Am I right? What an insult. Of course, I am bigger than “intelligence”. But these city-folks who can only see me as a street nuisance, while they sip on the delicious milk I provide, are so very keen to make up insulting proverbs about me.
[aql bari kay bhains: what’s bigger – human intelligence or a bhains? — thru intelligence we can learn to maneuver/conquer things that r much bigger than us.]
Or you may have heard, jis ki lathi uss ki bhains. Another insult. Just because someone has a stick, I do not become his possession. I do have a functioning brain! I do recognize, know and love my owner.
[jis ki lathi uss ki bhains: he who possesses a stick, will by default own the bhains. — might is right.]
The most insulting, however, is, bhains kay aagay been bajana. Insulting for the sad, pathetic human, of course. I am not sure why they think I am immune to the charms of a good tune on the flute. I love music.
[bhains kay aagay been bajana: to play the flute for a bhains. — to waste one’s breath on someone who’s too obtuse to be swayed by intelligence or art.]