Saudi Arabia and The Social Change Process

Culture, Saudi 20 Comments

Intro

I hinted before that I would write about the Dissociative identity disorder that I and many others have noticed or experienced in my society, and I have been putting it off for way to long, but I’ve decided to give it a go.

Change, whether it is personal for fitness or health (inner or outer) or in a small business or big organization, is the subject of many books and some peoples life long study and income generator, just pass by the sections for self-help or business and you would know what I mean. The first thing they suggest is that small changes are introduced. If you want to run a marathon you cannot just get up and run it, you have to start by walking, then alternate between walking and jogging, then jog, then do half a marathon, etc. otherwise you risk injuring yourself.

As an engineer I understand that big things, need to be made first on a small scale before making them into massive structures, and that translates into social structures as well.

It is also nothing short of a miracle that Saudi is what it is today, no place in the history of the world has experienced this tremendous change in under a century.

Perspective

Almost everything is imported, and with the oil boom, the Saudi market was and still is very lucrative to manufacturers and marketers of every little and big thing. One country had the upper hand with imports into Saudi, and with trade, like early Muslim trade with the far East for example, comes products along with customs and language.

I am a product of that change, along with many others, just take a look at the Saudis writing in English. English is almost our first language, we grew up watching American shows and we dressed like the cool people we saw on TV. When we went out we ate fast food, and listened to American music, and watched Hollywood movies (not in theatres of course).

That is why, when you read blogs written by American ladies who married a Saudi, they would tell you that their husbands were at ease in the US, it is almost like going home for some.

Yet for others, it created a shock at what they or the society has become, and this is not unique. In the African American community, they label or tell a person that he/she are “acting white”, and it goes the other way also. The famous rapper Eminem was beaten at school for “trying to act black”. Then there is the Banana, and it goes on and on.

The Alternative

So what do those who experience the shock do? The only alternative would be to try to go back to the roots, quoting how glorious their people in the past were, and how if they embrace the old values, glory would be bestowed upon them again, forgetting that the only constant in life is change.

And again, there are those who make millions from promoting the old lifestyle, their books, tapes and lectures are sold, a TV appearance would make them a cool million, the mosque that they lead would be full, and what seems like a crazy fatwa would be the best advertisement, it makes people talk about them more, then they have to go on and explain themselves, and in this ever increasing traffic of media coming at us from every direction competing with their profits… a sheikh has bills to pay, kids to feed and a lifestyle to sustain.

The Negative

“They make us hate ourself and love they wealth” Kanye West said, while media in the western world makes people hate themselves for not being skinny enough, not having muscles that are big enough, not having the latest gadget and car or the biggest house or designer bag, those things are inflicted on our society, and a bit more.

That bit is the portrayal of Arabs and Muslims. As much as it leaves a negative impression on a person who has never met an Arab or Muslim, it also affects the psyche of a little Arab child growing up, making him/her hate what his/her culture represent, forgetting the many positive attributes that are available within the environment they live in and focussing on the negatives or the contorted realities provided by the media machine, and with the lack of balanced voices between the two extremes, it gets difficult, really difficult to get the positives from the past and the present to create a better now.

I have stumbled across a few Saudi blogs written by young Saudis and I could sense they suffer from what I just said.

Have a listen to this TED talk by Naif Al-Mutawa a clinical psychologist on why he created the Superheros, to better understand what I mean.

Equilibrium

Can it be achieved? Only time will tell, I believe that education and teaching people to think for themselves is a first step. No two generations are the same anywhere in the world, and each generation always tells the other they have it easy yet their generation was better :)

One has to be true to thyself first, as easy as it sounds it is not easy at all.

Questions

I think I have barely scratched the surface, as these are only my modest observations, can we get to where we want to get? and where is that and what does it look like exactly? I have many questions of my own, but I would love to hear your observations and questions.

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