We read a passage about the slaughter of animals during Eid ul-Adha (the Feast of Sacrifice) one of two major celebrations (Eid) in the Muslim calendar. The passage vividly described what the author witnessed: vast amounts of bulls and goats killed by men while children were running around them. This was the first time the author ever saw or partook in this event – an annual and traditional family celebration in the Muslim world.
To Westerners, or those who have never experienced Eid ul-Adha, it is shocking to see for the first time. In the west – animals are not killed for or during celebrations … in public spaces. We don’t really stop to think about the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of turkeys, geese and chickens in the Americas or Europe for Christmas. The killing of animals happens only on farms and slaughterhouses, away from the eyes of citizens.
Sitting in my Great Journalism class I couldn’t help but notice that most of the class … “was white and western.” I don't thinkanybody in the room has ever taken part or celebrated Eid ul-Adha. They have never seen a Muslim celebration before. A couple of students in my class may be of Eastern background – Hindi - and one Caucasian Canadian student grew up in Dubai, but hails from Calgary, but I don’t think any are Muslim.
I felt like I was sitting in a predominantly white, Caucasian, western civilized group of students. I wondered: if this passage were discussed amongst Muslims – how differently it would be discussed, analyzed and perceived. Nobody in the room seemed to grasp the ‘normalcy’ of the slaughter of animals. It was interesting to discuss this passage, which was written by an Indian man who had left Bombay as a teenager and returned as an adult. It’s interesting to see how different west and east really is.
I have seen this slaughter myself – in Istanbul. I would not have believed it if I didn’t see it. I was crossing the city by bus, going home from a friend’s house. There were sheep everywhere! Every park, parking lot, any open field – was being used to slaughter these animals. There was blood everywhere – rivers of blood, trickling downward with the pull of gravity – colouring the city streets red. This was happening in a city of 11 million people and in just one part of a Muslim country. At the very same time every other city, town and village in the Muslim world was also slaughtering cattle – and not just in Turkey, but in Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, India, Morocco, Egypt, Bosnia … Indonesia … Algeria, Morocco … Malaysia, Singapore …
It made me think: How funny to be sitting in a room full of Westerners who have never experienced anything like this before – while half the world experiences this yearly.
The slaughter at Eid ul-Adha is truly is a sight for the senses: the procession from living creature to dead carcass - seeing a live animal’s throat slit – the spillage of blood, the gutting and cleaning of insides – the division and distribution of organs … (all parts are used, eaten).
And eaten well – it is a delicious feast for the senses!
In Istanbul during Eid ul-Adha (called Kurban Bayram in Turkey) the evening news shows footage from hospitals, where men are treated for injuries succumbed from mishandling animals and cutting themselves instead.
A previous passage we read and discussed in class about Maximum City was Mehta Suketu’s description of Bombayan police interrogation and torture.
The previous two nights I watched the season premier of 24. The show had a wonderful scene where Jack Bauer violently interrogates a man. Only he starts feeling compassion and stops his brutality against him. Bauer’s colleague sees his reluctance and … picks up where Bauer left off: he plunges a knife in the man’s knee and demands he tell him what he knows.
It was a pretty graphic scene. Just like the passage in the book.
I was also reminded of the torture scene in Casino Royale: James Bond is tied naked to a chair. His privates hang out of the opening of the seat. His interrogator then whips Bond beneath the chair.
In another class I am taking (Ethics) I had to write a paper about the first ethical dilemma I have experienced as a journalist. I wrote about my experiences publishing photos of dead bodies/people.
I have spent the past year interning at CanWest Media Works – at the Leader-Post newspaper in Regina and Canada.com in Toronto.
At the Leader-Post I was going to run a photo of a man looking at a heap of bodies charred to death from a gas pipeline blast in Nigeria (Friday, May 13, 2006). I was told I couldn’t run the photo as is because the paper has a policy of not publishing photos of dead bodies. To publish the picture in the next day’s paper I cropped the dead bodies out of the photo.
Two months later I am working at Canada.com posting news online. The Dawson shooting happens. There are photos of Kimveer Gill, the 25-year-old gunman who shot and killed a student at Dawson high school in Montreal (Sept. 13, 2006). The photos are of his dead body covered up by a sheet lying next to a cruiser after police shot and killed him.
This is the first time I knowingly come across publishing photos of dead bodies. I recall the Leader-Post’s policy. My boss at Canada.com says the policy is to post photos relevant to the breaking news story. I post the photos of Kimveer Gill.
Three months later – another pipeline blast kills hundreds in Nigeria. I prepare photos to publish illustrating the story. I come across a handful of pictures of black charred bodies. I am working at Canada.com. I recall the ‘no dead body’ policy at the Leader-Post. I ask my immediate supervisor if I can publish the photos to the web, he says ‘yes’ without hesitating.
The week I was writing my paper the Globe and Mail runs a photo of a covered up dead body on its front page (U.S. steps up the fight – Thursday, January 11, 2007).
Is there a difference between publishing photos of dead people and publishing photos of dead people covered up?
I walked by a stack of newspapers at school. The Toronto Star ran an article ‘Too Graphic For Kids?’ (Jan.18, 2007) and the accompanying photos on the front page were of violent and graphic images – stills taken from TV shows, video games and movies. When I saw this I did a double take: I wasn’t sure whether I was seeing news or entertainment photos.
I have become (de)sensitized by the world around me.
Whether a passage in a required school reading, my own experience in a Muslim country, the front pages of daily newspapers, TV shows – I am visually assaulted by violence. I understand it as a part of real life – albeit in the news, book or TV show. One reality mirrors the other.
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I remeber arriving at Heathrow airport after living in Turkey for 10 months.
It was really surreal being surrounded by so many Caucasian people, by western civilization.
I can hardly imagine how and what Jack Bauer felt after his release from a Chinese prison.
Let alone Arar Mahar.
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