Voice of British Muslim Women

Danila Jonnud, Hampshire

A few years ago I thought the world had become a dystopia.

Even at 13 I knew that the crashing economy, the seemingly incompetent government, and the disparity between the wealthy elite making decisions for the less fortunate public didn’t sit right with me.

I told my friends, “this is how it started in the books. The only difference is we know it.”

We’d study novels about the power hungry making decisions for the oppressed population who had varying degrees of perceptiveness about their own situation, and we’d agree that the world our bravely rebellious characters lived in was one which should never exist.

Then the day would pass on.

Humans love to make books, films and TV shows about how awful we are, how governments will allow terrible things to happen, how villains will kill people, and self-righteous politicians will say it’s sad. We love it. We award the best and most emotional speeches that an actor gives for the sake of fictional people being tortured or suppressed by fictional sadists. We cry and we clap and we all agree that it was a poignant moment indeed.

And then the moment passes on.

We go back to the real world, and look at our phones, we scroll past a brownie recipe and a couple getting married, how technology is changing everything, the various genocides happening in the world, and the latest bombings, massacres, coups, speeches. And we scroll on and now a singer has released a new song, an influencer got a brand deal, now thousands are being killed, now McDonald’s has special offers, now the Met Gala has 5.3 million tweets about it, now people are tired of it all. And we laugh or cry or gasp as is appropriate.

And then the stream passes on.

In Primary School we used to sing a song about counting your blessings, and nowadays, when I’m feeling particularly tired or anxious, I think “at least I’m being allowed to live, at least I’m not being threatened or bombed, at least I’m begging to watch a certain TV programme and not begging to be saved from a genocide.”

Then I stop. And I don’t let the feeling pass on.

Because it’s sickening that according to our favourite movies, and articles, and anecdotes, I’m about to approach the best years of my life, but at the same time, many children in Palestine will never have the best years, they’ll never reach my age or beyond. And if they do, what universities can they go to when they’re all destroyed, what professors can they learn from when they’re all dead, what books can they read or computers can they browse when they’re starving and injured with nothing? What career can they dream of, if they’ve spent their lives dreaming of only having the freedom to exist?

The human race loves moral speeches. They love watching films and TV shows where a character stands for justice, peace, respect, equality and the right to be free from oppression. They feel inspired and motivated when Mr Miyagi teaches Daniel-san that self-defence is about avoiding a fight and protecting yourself, never for attack or revenge. Someone who has read or seen Harry Potter or The Hunger Games will never tell you they agree wholeheartedly with Voldemort or President Snow.

These stories remind us that upholding tyrannical states or thinking cold hearted assault, torture, or killing is acceptable, are the most repulsive traits in existence, and though humans can be bad, we should never allow this.

And that’s why I’m writing this; because the human race loves moral speeches. I’m writing this desperately, hopefully, angrily, to say stand up, be loud, and tell this somehow dystopian world it’s wrong. The world leaders are wrong for allowing Israel to go this far. They’re wrong for funding arms. They’re wrong for upholding lies and allowing biases in the media. They’re wrong for watching as thousands of innocent people have been murdered horrifically by an unrepentant state.

And if you know they’re wrong then say it. Because the reason for every dystopia is that the people think there’s nothing they can do. They get into a routine, learn to take everything silently, and allow the cycle to continue, and in those stories it takes one or two special people to fight back before everyone is fighting back.

Because even in our world – the real world – we are fighting back. People are being arrested on flimsy charges for daring to say that massacres and genocide shouldn’t be allowed. People of all ages, faiths, races are trying and trying.

They’re trying because we do live in a dystopia.

And whether the next chapter brings more suffering and cruelty, or whether it brings hope and change is up to us.

So I pray to our Creator to help us, to give us the strength and morals we so admire when it’s fictional, so that we can overcome the cowards and the power hungry, so that we can bring justice to the murderers and the complicit before it’s too late.