First World Tunnel Vision: An Avenue Into Orientalism
Growing up in the United States of America as a Pakistani person has allowed me to reflect on what true freedom looks like as a young woman. The media has always portrayed South Asian countries and the Middle East as violently oppressive countries, and I always believed that I was so lucky that my parents chose to raise me in America. However, when I was fifteen years old, I finally visited Pakistan, and to my surprise it was nothing like I’d imagined it to be.
Image Courtesy: Strike Magazine Chattanooga
A conversation that has stuck with me for quite some time is when I asked my Dadi Amma (grandmother on dad’s side) and Phuppo (aunt on dad’s side) about the oppression of women in Pakistan. Their answer made me feel ashamed for even asking such a question. They told me that they do not feel oppressed and everything that they do is for their faith. There are definitely some cultural norms that they follow, but that is what they know and they’re comfortable with that lifestyle. Since then, I have made more of an effort to shed my American ethnocentrism. Every single continent, country, city, and village has different cultures and beliefs, and assuming that my way of living is inherently better than anyone else’s way has warped my perspective on the world as a whole.
Orientalism is how the Western world views and defines the East, an approach that represents the East as fundamentally different while also self-defining the West as superior and more progressive. Mainstream media, politics, and even the way children are educated has distorted the image of Eastern and Islamic society. European orientalism has painted Eastern cultures to be inferior for centuries. They have created stereotypes that aim to make Islamic countries seem superstitious, extremely spiritual, and overtly sexual. They achieved this by creating paintings that depict naked women in harem’s, mystical men charming snakes, and other disturbing images involving children. In the 19th century, these paintings were the only insight of what the Eastern world looked like. This led to centuries of misinformation.
As I got older and processed this information, I realized that my perception of women in Pakistan was a form of internalized Islamophobia. I assumed my life was better because I can wear shorts, show my hair, eat pork, and drink alcohol. My life is not better than the women in Pakistan, it is just different. The women in my family are involved with education, they run their own businesses; they are surrounded by family members and are close to their communities. I had never before experienced three family meals a day until I visited Pakistan.
It is common to fear the things we do not understand. Most Americans are not educated on Islam and Asian culture. High schools primarily focus on American and European history; I was not able to learn about Islamic culture until I attended college. Many Americans have never left the country and explored a foreign society, and so many of us only know what we see online and what we are taught in school. It takes a commitment to immersing yourself without bias into a different culture to gain different perspectives of the world. There is a certain type of tunnel vision in Western society that encourages us to believe that we have figured out the best way to live. We are fed stories about how dangerous Islamic countries are. Is America not a dangerous country? Are women here happier simply because they don’t wear a scarf on their head? Every society has its own unique set of issues. It is important to understand the different types of privileges gained by one society, but it is vital to shed any ideas of superiority.
Strike Out,
Written by: Zay Naeems
Edited by: Sarah Singleton
Graphic by: Callie High
