It may be hypocritical to commence any writing by declaring words to be insufficient. But indeed, when it comes to articulating the emotions one feels regarding the injustice that has taken place in almost our own hearth, against members of our own family, words truly fail. I refer, of course, to the murders on Tuesday evening in Chapel Hill of the recently married Deah Barakat and Yusor Abu-Salha, and Abu-Salha’s sister, Razan Abu-Salha—the former two being recent NC State graduates and the latter, a sophomore in the College of Design. No matter what one attempts to say, there remains the sensation that one is not capturing the profound sorrow and indignation one feels; and, justifiably, feel is all one can initially do. On occasions of mourning, as we woke up to Wednesday, silence is the language that can unite us all.
However, as we pick up our lives again out of strands of grief and the callings of routine responsibility, we can move forward with the right articulations of our attitudes, with intelligent thoughts corresponding to noble emotion. Based on the general discourse, there are three that stand out pertaining to this tragedy.
First, we must refer to this incident as terrorism. It is true that three lives were lost here, while 12, say, were lost in the case of the Charlie Hebdo shootings. But is it not terror if it cannot boast of two digits? Indeed, by the FBI’s own tripartite definition of the word—“involving acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law,” “appearing intended … to intimidate or coerce a civilian population,” and “occurring … primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the U.S.”—this was a terrorist attack. The first and third components are obvious, but the second is also true: The victims’ religion was a nigh undeniable factor in their murders. Indeed, with three neat bullets to the head, the style of execution points to ideologically influenced slaughter, rather than mere dispute. The victims would not have been sought out if they were not Muslims. And I am not a Muslim, but I know that if I were, I would be intimidated. After all, despite being Muslim, I would still—contrary to what agents of such hostility may want to drill into us—be human.
Labeling this incident as terrorism would not only be factual, though. It would also have the advantage of altering the conceptualization of Muslim as terrorist, and terrorist as Muslim. Such a perception was bred especially after 9/11 by the political establishment—with the aid of its puppets in the mainstream media and its unwitting lackeys in the Dawkins-and-Hitchens-inspired New Atheist movement—to justify the West’s latest wave of imperialist (politically) and neoliberal (economically) policies. This conception of “terrorist” does not include white people, who, when responsible for the killings of specific group-members, are frequently described as lone, mentally ill gunmen (without reference to their ethnicity), but rarely, if ever, as terrorists. As a corollary, much of the enmity toward Muslims around the world today is founded on the basis of this equivalence between Islam and terrorism. And so, altering the conception—however slightly we could—would have the effect of fostering a more accurate picture of the kinds of people that commit such acts of brutality, and thus, lessening the propaganda-driven misperception, and consequent discrimination and persecution of Muslims.
Second, we still must not say that all lives matter. Over social media on Wednesday, the hashtag #MuslimLivesMatter rose to prominence, which is the apt message. But still, there were usages of the #AllLivesMatter hashtag response, even among those who had not used it last year, when it rose to prominence (opposing the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag) for its usage by those who denied the racial aspect to police violence around the U.S., particularly the Michael Brown and Eric Garner killings. But now, it may seem fitting—after all, if we must say that not only black lives matter, but also, apparently, Muslim lives, then, we have to admit it now, all lives matter.
But that is not how discourse needs to be framed right now. Promoting a vision of a level field where all lives matter equally ignores the fact that some lives are in far more need of being valued today than others. An “AllLivesMatter” narrative—even if we must talk about a multitude of groups that matter—would be no different than a narrative that we must pay equal attention to the disadvantage and abuse faced by all genders—a false and dangerous narrative, because, simply, women face more disadvantage and abuse than men.
Third, and finally, deriving from the acknowledgement that the field is not level for all, we must not wed ourselves to an unconditional commitment to compassion and nonviolence. Of course, misplaced hatred and unjust violence, such as that of Tuesday evening, must always be denounced, and with tears, we manifest our humanity. But this was not a freak incident of oppression, and there are ways of thinking and social structures that systematically generate such suffering around the world. If these are not acted against, such tragedies will continue. So, they should be acted against—with, perhaps, force and will that we would rather not adopt—so that one day, indeed, the field may be level for all. With properly directed rage, after all—the kind of rage, which, perhaps not intuitively, is motivated by the yet unattained possibility of indiscriminate love and ubiquitous welfare—we can act on our humanity.