Against Genocide

We can play ostrich or we can blog, tweet, re-tweet, like, post, re-post, share, protest, sit-in or occupy. whatever it takes to get our governments to recognise and react, to pressurise, persuade, coerce or simply take out tyrants that commit, condone, turn a blind eye to crimes against humanity in any crack, crevice or corner of the third rock.

That is what it should mean to be a global community… collectively we don't take shit being thrown at others like us... at home, in the next town or any other time zone.  Be it the Chagossians fighting for their right to return to their homeland in the courts of Britain, the Bahrainis protesting for representation in government, Syrians taking up arms against a tyrant, the shias of Pakistan clinging on to peaceful protests in the face of genocide being carried out against them. 

In Pakistan the educated shias are being systematically killed day in day out, the shia masses are being bombed, dragged off buses and shot, the only thing remaining is gassing them or putting them in giant ovens - the Pakistani government is undeniably inept at best or implicitly involved at worst, but the civil society in Pakistan is not far behind. Life is cheap, a minority's life is cheaper still.

Those who know me know my views on organised religion will find it curious as to why have I started beating this drum.. it is simple… I protested against the Serbs in 1990s not for the Bosnian muslims or the Christian croats but for the people being butchered and our governments reluctance to jump into it (eventually the governments across Europe had to relent), I started Peace Through Prosperity for I do not see hard-war as the solution to increasing radicalisation on the third rock and likewise it is not the shia that I was born as but the human that I try to be that will not be a silent witness to what is happening with minorities in Pakistan, systematic culling to drive them out of the lands they were born in, live in and belong to.

It was no different for the Jews in Nazi Germany, had I been around then I would have protested for them too till my government woke up, manned up, grew a pair and did something about it.Regardless of our beliefs, religious badges that we were born with or wear of our own choosing If we stay silent we will witness bloodshed the likes of which have not been seen since the second world war.

Three days after 100+ shias are killed in Quetta, a dozen odd gunned down in various parts of Pakistan, the government of Pakistan saw it fit to allow Malik Ishaq, a  preacher of hate to take to a stage and address a gathering of thousands in Karachi stoking flames of sectarian divide and hatred against the shia minority. 

Today it is shias, killing whom is fair game - road to heaven they say! tomorrow it will be Barelvis, Ahmedis, Ismailis, Hindus, Christians, Zorastrians… you and yours.The most I can do is protest  and write to my MP Michael Fallon, engage other MPs I know or know of, and ask my family, friends and acquaintances to blog, tweet, re-tweet, like, post, re-post, share, protest, sit-in or occupy... do whatever you can but do not play ostrich for this demon is not going away and none of us are invisible to its evil designs.

#againstshiagenocide #shia #shiagenocide #genocide #HRW #Amnesty