Author's note: I was going to title this Indian and Arab cultural invasions of Pakistan, but reading on my post readers will hopefully see why I picked this title instead.
This is my second post on the subject of Indianization and Arabization of Pakistan. My first post mostly covered the phenomenon on political levels while in this post I aim to cover both the cultural and political influence of Indianization and Arabization in Pakistan.
Pakistan's identity crisis stems from the lack of education on the genesis of our people. Very little is taught on the ways of our ancient ancestors and who they were. Unlike most other countries, the people of Pakistan appeal to religion as a substitute for racial and cultural identity.
Even our leadership has little or no knowledge on our country's ancient past and so they turn to religion or a certain political ideology as our unifying factor without realizing these things only create more division than unity.
Much of Pakistanis' ignorance to their roots is due to Middle Easternization (mostly Arabization) which works under the false guise of religion.
Our knowledge of our ancient ancestors and civilizations has been traded for knowledge on Islamic history and the history of the people of the Middle East which we hold a strong but false affinity towards.
We have traded our identity for an artificial Middle Eastern identity from the false belief that we Pakistanis are derived from Arabs, Turks, Persians and other Muslim armies that occupied the Subcontinent.
According to official government policy, Pakistani history begins in the 6th and 7th centuries AD when the Arab conqueror Muhammed Bin Qasim invaded Sindh in southeastern Pakistan. All this is done in the name of religion.
In the process of rejecting our pre-Islamic history and trying to fit in amongst the people of the Middle East, the Indians have claimed all our pre-historic heritage as "Indian" or "Hindu" on the simple principle that our ancient ancestors were not Muslim.
The idea of all pre-Islamic civilizations in the subcontinent being "Hindu" is a product of the Brahmanist Hindutva propaganda. The idea of the existence of a religion called "Hinduism" is the work of British misconceptions and later a political agenda. See the meaning and origins of Hinduism.
The so-called "partition" is also another idea created by the fascist Brahman Hindutva force and often promoted by many in Pakistan's Muhajir community who feel regret for leaving their home country for Pakistan.
The Hindutvas have a tendency to claim almost every ancient prehistoric civilization inside Asia as their own and use pseudoscience as a means of promoting their false propaganda.
Due to massive brainwashing of Wahhabism and embracing of Middle Eastern cultures in the name of religion, we have little or no idea of our ancient heritage and often prone to Hindutva propaganda that our pre-Islamic history was "Hindu" and thus don't want to associate with it.
Often when we are reminded of our ancient history, we deny any association with it and claim Arab, Persian, Turkish and/or Central Asian roots out of fear that associating with our ancient history will make us "Hindu."
Then there are those from the Muhajir community who also believe that we were "Hindu" and more than happy to associate all our history with India and identify themselves as simply "South Asians" or "desis."
During the time line between the age of the Internet and the discovery of the Indus Valley Civilization and other civilizations in Pakistan, it was a worldwide belief that all of this was "Indian history."
Even many scholars from around the world turned to the Hindutva Brahmans to learn more about these civilizations out of the assumption that Indian people would know the history of their region better than outsiders or out of sheer ignorance.
School textbooks and other books on history published throughout the world were simply a repeat of the Brahman false claims over these civilizations.
Naturally we are taught to think the writing of a scholar is the ultimate truth hence we accept it without question. Then there are also those in Pakistan's Muhajir community who often aid the Brahman Hindutva propaganda against Pakistan such as the notable fifth columnist Ayesha Jalal.
Even Wikipedia has been used as a propaganda tool by the Hindutvas who hold many high ranking positions in the Wikipedia administration. That seems to have changed with the growing number of contributors/editors on Wikipedia, both Pakistani and non-Pakistani are opposed to Hindutva hegemonic claims.
From all this comes our identity crisis. We don't want to associate with our ancient ancestors because they were allegedly "Indian" or "Hindu" and so we have adopted Pan-Islamism as a substitute for national identity when we could have adopted Pan-Indo-Iranism.
With the use of religious dogma as a substitute for national identity comes this false pretense of trying to be Middle Eastern, mainly Arab.
Because we don't want to be associated with our alleged "Indian" or "Hindu" history, we convince ourselves and try to convince the rest of the world that we descend from Arabs, Persians, Turks and others.
Also within the process of adopting religious dogma and pretending to be from the Middle East, we also try to sell out ourselves and our country in the name of Islamic Ummah.
We are taught not to feel any sort of nationalism or even any sense of patriotism towards our country and culture because according to our Wahhabi segments who influence our policies and politics, Islam forbids nationalism or any sense of patriotism. Wahhabi Islam teaches us that devotion to religion comes above anything- unless you're an Arab.
Because surprisingly, these very same Arab loving religious Pakistanis teach us to feel nationalistic on behalf of the Arabs. From Iraq to Palestine we Pakistanis rally for Arab self-determination and freedom. We are taught to stand up for our "Muslim brothers" and treat their fate as if it was our own.
Most of the time we give more importance to Middle Eastern problems than our own and pay them more attention than we do our own.
Even our traditionally pro-Western elites are influenced by such ideas. Most of them show more support and sympathy for the Palestinian cause than they do for the Kashmiri cause.
Our pro-Western elites even have an admiration for Iran and Iranian history alongside our pro-Iranian Shia minorities who are often self-proclaimed "descendants" from the Prophet Muhammad's family.
While living in imitation and worship of Middle Eastern people and rejecting our history, we are also taught to take pride in the history and cultures of the Middle East.
We often parrot the claims of our religious Wahhabi scholars on the glorious Islamic civilizations of the Middle East such as Baghdad when it was the seat of Islamic civilizations.
We take pride in various Arab empires, the Ottoman Turkish empire and many other Islamic empires from the Middle East and Central Asia. We Pakistanis boast to the world about these civilizations as if they were our own. This is again due to being brainwashed by our Islamist segments that we must take pride in the history of Islam.
I even recall two separate cases of friends in Pakistan being taken by their grandparents to Spain to see the Islamic sites in that country.
We Pakistanis take pride in Persian and Arab contributions to medicine and mathematics and often exaggerate these contributions by claiming "we Muslims 'invented' mathematics."
We repeat the ideas that we are taught about the world being a savage backward jungle before the Arabs spread Islam and supposedly "civilized" the world.
Even the conquest of our own lands by the Arabs, Persians and Turko-Mongols is glorified by the state under influence from the Islamists.
We are taught that before Islam we were mindless savages and depict the various Turkic and Arab armies that enslaved and slaughtered our people as "heroes."
What we Pakistanis are really made to believe when all our teachings are properly analyzed is that if you don't stand up and sacrifice for the people of the Middle East and Central Asia, you are not a true Muslim.
If you make any sort of attempt to preserve your culture or identity, you are not a true Muslim. If you show anymore care for your country over another Muslim's country, you are not a true Muslim.
Arab and Middle Eastern imperialism in Pakistan works as such under the false guise of religion. There are even those Pakistanis who are pushing for Arabic and/or Persian as state language because according to them Arabic is the holy language of Islam.
This is how thick their ignorance is as a result of religious dogma. What they don't realize is that it was only Muhammed, considered the last prophet of Islam, who was an ethnic Arab. The other people considered prophets by Islam such as Jesus/Isa or Moses/Musa were not Arabs, nor did they speak Arabic!
Jesus or Isa as he is known by Muslims spoke Aramaic. Though Aramaic is related to Arabic as a Semitic language, it is still a completely separate language from Arabic and even written in a different script. The similarity between Arabic and Aramaic is like that of English and Swedish, which are not really understandable to one another's speakers despite their common origin and grammar.
So by propagating Arabic as the language of Islam by our Wahhabi segments, they are indirectly suggesting that our older prophets cannot represent or be part of Islam because they did not speak Arabic.
This is quite a contradiction. But again this is how Arab imperialism (and to a lesser degree Iranian imperialism pushed by Pakistan's Shia minority) works. When religious dogma tries to project itself as the ultimate truth and labels anything to the contrary as "ignorance" or "propaganda," we are stuck with an ignorant and semi-literate population.
Our local names have almost entirely lost validity as "Muslim names" due to the fact that they are not Arab, Persian or Turkic names.
As examples Muhammad, Ali, Mushtaq, Javad, Javaid, Timur all Arab, Persian and Turkic names respectively and are accepted as "Muslim names" in Pakistan while local names have almost died out completely.
And even local names that are used are often branded as "Hindu" or "Kaffir" (infidel) names that we are afraid or ashamed to use them. I was reading that the name Aryan is still used in Afghanistan, Iran and India as a first name, while in Pakistan it is not used and regarded as a "Hindu" name.
This is just another of many examples on how we abandon our cultural traits and allow the Indians and others to steal them from us.
Non-Arab names in Iran, Turkey and Central Asia are commonly used and perfectly accepted as normal Muslim names and sometimes even more used than the Arabic names.
It is so strange that our idiotic beliefs of Islamic Ummah motivate us to rejecting our ancient history in favor of Islamic history since even the Arabs, Iranians and Turks take pride in their histories, both pre and post Islamic.
And even when they take pride in their Islamic histories, they still take pride in it as part of their ethnic or national histories.
Most Arabs from outside the Gulf region such as the Egyptians, the Lebanese and the Syrians are all proud of their ancient histories. Even the Arabs from the Gulf take more pride in being Arab than in being Muslim.
The people of Iran, though living under strict Islamic rule still preserve their culture. As examples they still celebrate Persian New Year which is also shared by other Iranic speaking peoples such as the Kurds. They even combine their cultural holidays with the Shia Islamic calendar.
Their national airline Iran Air depicts ancient Persian mythological creatures on it's logos. Egypt Air also depicts images of ancient Egyptian culture as it's logos despite it is today mainly an Arab speaking Muslim country.
Ever since independence has our national airline, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) or any other major Pakistani corporation depicted aspects of our Indo-Iranic cultures? When PIA did use cultural liveries from Pakistan's provinces, it generated an outcry from many in the public.
Our tanker trucks in Pakistan are painted by the drivers depicting Indo-Iranic mythological creatures spoken of in their village folklore, but never does any company used by the state weather in the tourism or transportation industry ever depict any aspects of our culture. And when they do depict anything at all, it is Quranic verses or anything from Islam. This just shows our government's reckless pro-Arab/Middle Eastern policy.
Our pro-Indian fifth column consists mainly of regretful Muslim immigrants from other parts of the subcontinent. They promote our ancient history as "Indian" or "South Asian."
They often promote Indian Brahman Hindutva propaganda and imperialism under the false guise of secularism and progress. This only helps Pakistanis in distancing themselves from their heritage and identity.
The pro-Indian fifth column also welcomes Indian cultural invasion of Pakistan through Bollywood or wearing of Indian clothes such as saris or eating Indian food or sometimes all of these. All this is promoted on the idea that Indians and Pakistanis are "the same people."
I have no problem with Indians wearing their own clothes, eating their own food, practicing their own traditions, but it is not our culture and I do have a problem when my people believe that it is theirs.
Just as I believe Arabs and other peoples of the Middle East have the right to practice their own customs and traditions as long as our people are not practicing customs and traditions that are not theirs.
This is the cultural and political tug of war Pakistanis face today. On the one side we are taught that our entire glorious pre-Islamic history is shared with the Indians or worse that it was all Indian history before the so-called "partition."
On the other side by resenting our history because we think it is "Indian" and "Hindu" and don't want to be known as "Indians," which we aren't, so we try to rewrite our history to try and make it Middle Eastern.
And either we have to be one or the other. Either we have to be "Indian" or Middle Eastern. We cannot seem to think of ourselves as just Pakistani.
We cannot seem to think of ourselves as heirs of the Indus Valley Civilization which later merged with the invading Indo-Iranic ("Aryan") armies leading to our birth as a hybrid race.
And when we do think of ourselves as simply Pakistani, our Islamist and pro-Indian elites insist there's no such thing because of provincial divisions. I believe I have refuted that rather self-contradictory idea in this post.
Even politically, the promotion of Indianization and Arab/Middle Easternization clouds our judgment.
Whenever I put forward my criticism of Arabs and Middle Eastern peoples for their racism towards Pakistanis, the typical Pakistani reply I get is "but not all Arabs are like that."
Strangely enough, when it comes to Israelis and Indians, our people are ready to lash out at "Hindus" and Jews with hateful slogans, cursing them all instead of saying "but not all of them are like that."
Our Pan-Islamists try to capitalize on the fact that Arabs give us aid when in times of need but when America or the West gives us even larger amounts of aid, we simply ignore it. We try to see all the positive things that the Middle Eastern people do for us and ignore the negative. But when it comes to non-Muslims we do just the opposite.
We only think about all the bad things the Americans have done to us and ignore any positive things they have given whether humanitarian aid or economic aid.
We even blame them for all the terrorist attacks in our country, yet remain silent on the presence of Arab Al-Queda terrorists hiding in our country and targeting our soldiers and people.
We also tend to side with Muslims in conflicts against non-Muslims simply as a result of the religious dogma that has been programmed into our minds.
Some Pakistanis have actually condemned China for it's mistreatment of the Uighurs simply because the Uighurs are Muslims and the Han Chinese are not.
This is despite that China has stood by Pakistan on the Kashmir crisis and other crises while all the other Muslim countries were silent. Also despite that the Uighurs have brought Pakistan nothing but trouble with many Uighurs, Uzbeks and Turks hiding in Northwestern Pakistan and involved in terrorist activities.
This is also despite the Arab Sudanese treating the non-Arab Sudanese with extreme brutality despite they are also Muslims, just not Arab.
This is also despite Turkey's atrocities in Kurdistan or even Pakistan's atrocities in Balochistan, we still go on criticizing other non-Muslim countries for attacking and occupying Muslim lands weather the Russian Federation in Chechnya or America in Iraq and Afghanistan or Israel in Palestine.
When it comes to false accusations from non-Muslim countries against us, we become defensive of ourselves and deny these accusations.
Yet when other Muslim countries such as the Iranian Islamic regime accuse us of harboring Baloch separatists and/or Sunni militants, our Pan-Islamist types get on their knees and blame our government for not doing enough to maintain good relations with our "Muslim brothers."
Even with venom being spewed against us and our country by the Afghan Mellat, our Pan-Islamist types again get down on their knees and claim we haven't done enough to earn the respect of the Afghans despite that we have taken millions of their refugees at our own expense.
Refugees who gave us only more trouble in return by stealing our jobs, committing crimes, selling drugs and spreading illegal firearms.
These are exactly the same apologetic, sellout sentiments promoted by our pro-Indian fifth columnists except the Pan-Islamists are like this towards other Muslims while the pro-Western/Indian fifth column is like this towards the Indians and the West and usually also to other Muslims.
On the subject of Afghanistan and the terrorist Afghan Mellat, whenever Afghan regimes throw accusations at Pakistan or send terrorists into Balochistan in order to further fuel the insurgency there, our Pan-Islamist types in turn always blame the Indians and the CIA, not knowing that Afghanistan has always claimed our Western provinces going back to our independence in 1947 as it sees the Durand Line as invalid.
The hatred for Pakistan amongst Afghans has nothing to do with India. Afghanistan joining hands with India against Pakistan is just another example of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend."
It's just as how China and Pakistan's friendship started off. Though China and Pakistan have a strong friendship and partnerships in many areas which have absolutely nothing to do with India, the friendship first started mainly because both countries were at odds against a common enemy.
But because Afghanistan happens to be another Muslim country, instead of standing up to them, we become more and more apologetic.
These are the kinds of results Indianization and Pan-Islamitization has created in Pakistan and amongst many Pakistanis worldwide influenced by religious extremism.
Always it has been that any kind of opposition towards Pan-Islamism or the nonsensical idea of Islamic Ummah is raised, you are accused of being a "Hindu agent" or a pro-Indian self-defeatist. On the other hand any sort of opposition to Indianization or patriotism towards Pakistan is linked with religious extremism by the pro-Indian fifth column and their supporters.
Our reckless government instead of countering anti-Pakistan propaganda or encouraging action against our pro-Indian fifth column who spread lies against our country in the name of free speech and secularism, still turn to religion as a unifying factor and a motivation.
The solution to a problem lies in fully identifying the problem first. And the problem in our case is what I have mentioned above. Religion alongside Pan-South Asianism often promoted by rich and powerful elites from the Muhajir community has completely buried our knowledge on who we are.
Whenever we have tried going back to our roots, the Indian Hindutva Brahmans next door alongside their pro-Indian fifth columnist puppets have hijacked our identity. They (Indians and their upper class Muhajir allies) believe that almost a century of common British rule suddenly changed the thousands of years of history of the Indus Valley/Pakistan.
Once the realities of the problems is accepted and properly studied can only a proper solution be formed.
Two generations from independence to now have been wasted on various dogmas particularly religious influence and influence from the powerful pro-Indian lobbies. All dogmas favored over the idea of national identity and commonality of our population which is almost entirely Indo-Iranic belonging mainly to the Iranic, Indo-Aryan and Dardic subfamilies.
With the age of the Internet giving faster flow of knowledge and information, we can hope that the next generation of Pakistanis snap out of the ignorance their forefathers lived in.
The solution to the Pakistani identity crisis lies in acceptance of who we are as a nation composed almost entirely of Indo-Iranic peoples weather Baloch, Pakhtun (Iranic) or Sindhi, Punjabi (Indo-Aryan) or the Dardic populations of the north.
This time we must take a journey back thousands of years back to the genesis of our country. This time it has to be without the interference of Arab/Iranian/Turkish wannabe Pan-Islamists and pro-Indian fifth columnists like Pervez Hoobhoy or Ayesha Jalal.
When any research into history and anthropology is tampered with to satisfy political agendas, the outcome can be harmful.
Once unbiased, factual, scientific research is done on our ancient ancestors and on who we are, things may turn out differently. Even if we are divided politically or even ethnically, we can still find a common basis on the fact that we stem from the same ancient Indo-Iranic tribes (who in turn were derived from the Proto-Indo-European/"Kurgan" people) that roamed Central Asia and later on merged with the natives of the Indus Valley, giving birth to the hybrid race that we are today.
I can guarantee the day the state, the people and the scholars do a full scale research on our Indo-Iranic roots is the day we can have stronger unity. The day we appeal to a common Indo-Iranic identity with the backing of the state, we will feel more strongly towards our country and the day the Pakistani identity crisis will be fully solved.
This is my second post on the subject of Indianization and Arabization of Pakistan. My first post mostly covered the phenomenon on political levels while in this post I aim to cover both the cultural and political influence of Indianization and Arabization in Pakistan.
Pakistan's identity crisis stems from the lack of education on the genesis of our people. Very little is taught on the ways of our ancient ancestors and who they were. Unlike most other countries, the people of Pakistan appeal to religion as a substitute for racial and cultural identity.
Even our leadership has little or no knowledge on our country's ancient past and so they turn to religion or a certain political ideology as our unifying factor without realizing these things only create more division than unity.
Much of Pakistanis' ignorance to their roots is due to Middle Easternization (mostly Arabization) which works under the false guise of religion.
Our knowledge of our ancient ancestors and civilizations has been traded for knowledge on Islamic history and the history of the people of the Middle East which we hold a strong but false affinity towards.
We have traded our identity for an artificial Middle Eastern identity from the false belief that we Pakistanis are derived from Arabs, Turks, Persians and other Muslim armies that occupied the Subcontinent.
According to official government policy, Pakistani history begins in the 6th and 7th centuries AD when the Arab conqueror Muhammed Bin Qasim invaded Sindh in southeastern Pakistan. All this is done in the name of religion.
In the process of rejecting our pre-Islamic history and trying to fit in amongst the people of the Middle East, the Indians have claimed all our pre-historic heritage as "Indian" or "Hindu" on the simple principle that our ancient ancestors were not Muslim.
The idea of all pre-Islamic civilizations in the subcontinent being "Hindu" is a product of the Brahmanist Hindutva propaganda. The idea of the existence of a religion called "Hinduism" is the work of British misconceptions and later a political agenda. See the meaning and origins of Hinduism.
The so-called "partition" is also another idea created by the fascist Brahman Hindutva force and often promoted by many in Pakistan's Muhajir community who feel regret for leaving their home country for Pakistan.
The Hindutvas have a tendency to claim almost every ancient prehistoric civilization inside Asia as their own and use pseudoscience as a means of promoting their false propaganda.
Due to massive brainwashing of Wahhabism and embracing of Middle Eastern cultures in the name of religion, we have little or no idea of our ancient heritage and often prone to Hindutva propaganda that our pre-Islamic history was "Hindu" and thus don't want to associate with it.
Often when we are reminded of our ancient history, we deny any association with it and claim Arab, Persian, Turkish and/or Central Asian roots out of fear that associating with our ancient history will make us "Hindu."
Then there are those from the Muhajir community who also believe that we were "Hindu" and more than happy to associate all our history with India and identify themselves as simply "South Asians" or "desis."
During the time line between the age of the Internet and the discovery of the Indus Valley Civilization and other civilizations in Pakistan, it was a worldwide belief that all of this was "Indian history."
Even many scholars from around the world turned to the Hindutva Brahmans to learn more about these civilizations out of the assumption that Indian people would know the history of their region better than outsiders or out of sheer ignorance.
School textbooks and other books on history published throughout the world were simply a repeat of the Brahman false claims over these civilizations.
Naturally we are taught to think the writing of a scholar is the ultimate truth hence we accept it without question. Then there are also those in Pakistan's Muhajir community who often aid the Brahman Hindutva propaganda against Pakistan such as the notable fifth columnist Ayesha Jalal.
Even Wikipedia has been used as a propaganda tool by the Hindutvas who hold many high ranking positions in the Wikipedia administration. That seems to have changed with the growing number of contributors/editors on Wikipedia, both Pakistani and non-Pakistani are opposed to Hindutva hegemonic claims.
From all this comes our identity crisis. We don't want to associate with our ancient ancestors because they were allegedly "Indian" or "Hindu" and so we have adopted Pan-Islamism as a substitute for national identity when we could have adopted Pan-Indo-Iranism.
With the use of religious dogma as a substitute for national identity comes this false pretense of trying to be Middle Eastern, mainly Arab.
Because we don't want to be associated with our alleged "Indian" or "Hindu" history, we convince ourselves and try to convince the rest of the world that we descend from Arabs, Persians, Turks and others.
Also within the process of adopting religious dogma and pretending to be from the Middle East, we also try to sell out ourselves and our country in the name of Islamic Ummah.
We are taught not to feel any sort of nationalism or even any sense of patriotism towards our country and culture because according to our Wahhabi segments who influence our policies and politics, Islam forbids nationalism or any sense of patriotism. Wahhabi Islam teaches us that devotion to religion comes above anything- unless you're an Arab.
Because surprisingly, these very same Arab loving religious Pakistanis teach us to feel nationalistic on behalf of the Arabs. From Iraq to Palestine we Pakistanis rally for Arab self-determination and freedom. We are taught to stand up for our "Muslim brothers" and treat their fate as if it was our own.
Most of the time we give more importance to Middle Eastern problems than our own and pay them more attention than we do our own.
Even our traditionally pro-Western elites are influenced by such ideas. Most of them show more support and sympathy for the Palestinian cause than they do for the Kashmiri cause.
Our pro-Western elites even have an admiration for Iran and Iranian history alongside our pro-Iranian Shia minorities who are often self-proclaimed "descendants" from the Prophet Muhammad's family.
While living in imitation and worship of Middle Eastern people and rejecting our history, we are also taught to take pride in the history and cultures of the Middle East.
We often parrot the claims of our religious Wahhabi scholars on the glorious Islamic civilizations of the Middle East such as Baghdad when it was the seat of Islamic civilizations.
We take pride in various Arab empires, the Ottoman Turkish empire and many other Islamic empires from the Middle East and Central Asia. We Pakistanis boast to the world about these civilizations as if they were our own. This is again due to being brainwashed by our Islamist segments that we must take pride in the history of Islam.
I even recall two separate cases of friends in Pakistan being taken by their grandparents to Spain to see the Islamic sites in that country.
We Pakistanis take pride in Persian and Arab contributions to medicine and mathematics and often exaggerate these contributions by claiming "we Muslims 'invented' mathematics."
We repeat the ideas that we are taught about the world being a savage backward jungle before the Arabs spread Islam and supposedly "civilized" the world.
Even the conquest of our own lands by the Arabs, Persians and Turko-Mongols is glorified by the state under influence from the Islamists.
We are taught that before Islam we were mindless savages and depict the various Turkic and Arab armies that enslaved and slaughtered our people as "heroes."
What we Pakistanis are really made to believe when all our teachings are properly analyzed is that if you don't stand up and sacrifice for the people of the Middle East and Central Asia, you are not a true Muslim.
If you make any sort of attempt to preserve your culture or identity, you are not a true Muslim. If you show anymore care for your country over another Muslim's country, you are not a true Muslim.
Arab and Middle Eastern imperialism in Pakistan works as such under the false guise of religion. There are even those Pakistanis who are pushing for Arabic and/or Persian as state language because according to them Arabic is the holy language of Islam.
This is how thick their ignorance is as a result of religious dogma. What they don't realize is that it was only Muhammed, considered the last prophet of Islam, who was an ethnic Arab. The other people considered prophets by Islam such as Jesus/Isa or Moses/Musa were not Arabs, nor did they speak Arabic!
Jesus or Isa as he is known by Muslims spoke Aramaic. Though Aramaic is related to Arabic as a Semitic language, it is still a completely separate language from Arabic and even written in a different script. The similarity between Arabic and Aramaic is like that of English and Swedish, which are not really understandable to one another's speakers despite their common origin and grammar.
So by propagating Arabic as the language of Islam by our Wahhabi segments, they are indirectly suggesting that our older prophets cannot represent or be part of Islam because they did not speak Arabic.
This is quite a contradiction. But again this is how Arab imperialism (and to a lesser degree Iranian imperialism pushed by Pakistan's Shia minority) works. When religious dogma tries to project itself as the ultimate truth and labels anything to the contrary as "ignorance" or "propaganda," we are stuck with an ignorant and semi-literate population.
Our local names have almost entirely lost validity as "Muslim names" due to the fact that they are not Arab, Persian or Turkic names.
As examples Muhammad, Ali, Mushtaq, Javad, Javaid, Timur all Arab, Persian and Turkic names respectively and are accepted as "Muslim names" in Pakistan while local names have almost died out completely.
And even local names that are used are often branded as "Hindu" or "Kaffir" (infidel) names that we are afraid or ashamed to use them. I was reading that the name Aryan is still used in Afghanistan, Iran and India as a first name, while in Pakistan it is not used and regarded as a "Hindu" name.
This is just another of many examples on how we abandon our cultural traits and allow the Indians and others to steal them from us.
Non-Arab names in Iran, Turkey and Central Asia are commonly used and perfectly accepted as normal Muslim names and sometimes even more used than the Arabic names.
It is so strange that our idiotic beliefs of Islamic Ummah motivate us to rejecting our ancient history in favor of Islamic history since even the Arabs, Iranians and Turks take pride in their histories, both pre and post Islamic.
And even when they take pride in their Islamic histories, they still take pride in it as part of their ethnic or national histories.
Most Arabs from outside the Gulf region such as the Egyptians, the Lebanese and the Syrians are all proud of their ancient histories. Even the Arabs from the Gulf take more pride in being Arab than in being Muslim.
The people of Iran, though living under strict Islamic rule still preserve their culture. As examples they still celebrate Persian New Year which is also shared by other Iranic speaking peoples such as the Kurds. They even combine their cultural holidays with the Shia Islamic calendar.
Their national airline Iran Air depicts ancient Persian mythological creatures on it's logos. Egypt Air also depicts images of ancient Egyptian culture as it's logos despite it is today mainly an Arab speaking Muslim country.
Ever since independence has our national airline, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) or any other major Pakistani corporation depicted aspects of our Indo-Iranic cultures? When PIA did use cultural liveries from Pakistan's provinces, it generated an outcry from many in the public.
Our tanker trucks in Pakistan are painted by the drivers depicting Indo-Iranic mythological creatures spoken of in their village folklore, but never does any company used by the state weather in the tourism or transportation industry ever depict any aspects of our culture. And when they do depict anything at all, it is Quranic verses or anything from Islam. This just shows our government's reckless pro-Arab/Middle Eastern policy.
Our pro-Indian fifth column consists mainly of regretful Muslim immigrants from other parts of the subcontinent. They promote our ancient history as "Indian" or "South Asian."
They often promote Indian Brahman Hindutva propaganda and imperialism under the false guise of secularism and progress. This only helps Pakistanis in distancing themselves from their heritage and identity.
The pro-Indian fifth column also welcomes Indian cultural invasion of Pakistan through Bollywood or wearing of Indian clothes such as saris or eating Indian food or sometimes all of these. All this is promoted on the idea that Indians and Pakistanis are "the same people."
I have no problem with Indians wearing their own clothes, eating their own food, practicing their own traditions, but it is not our culture and I do have a problem when my people believe that it is theirs.
Just as I believe Arabs and other peoples of the Middle East have the right to practice their own customs and traditions as long as our people are not practicing customs and traditions that are not theirs.
This is the cultural and political tug of war Pakistanis face today. On the one side we are taught that our entire glorious pre-Islamic history is shared with the Indians or worse that it was all Indian history before the so-called "partition."
On the other side by resenting our history because we think it is "Indian" and "Hindu" and don't want to be known as "Indians," which we aren't, so we try to rewrite our history to try and make it Middle Eastern.
And either we have to be one or the other. Either we have to be "Indian" or Middle Eastern. We cannot seem to think of ourselves as just Pakistani.
We cannot seem to think of ourselves as heirs of the Indus Valley Civilization which later merged with the invading Indo-Iranic ("Aryan") armies leading to our birth as a hybrid race.
And when we do think of ourselves as simply Pakistani, our Islamist and pro-Indian elites insist there's no such thing because of provincial divisions. I believe I have refuted that rather self-contradictory idea in this post.
Even politically, the promotion of Indianization and Arab/Middle Easternization clouds our judgment.
Whenever I put forward my criticism of Arabs and Middle Eastern peoples for their racism towards Pakistanis, the typical Pakistani reply I get is "but not all Arabs are like that."
Strangely enough, when it comes to Israelis and Indians, our people are ready to lash out at "Hindus" and Jews with hateful slogans, cursing them all instead of saying "but not all of them are like that."
Our Pan-Islamists try to capitalize on the fact that Arabs give us aid when in times of need but when America or the West gives us even larger amounts of aid, we simply ignore it. We try to see all the positive things that the Middle Eastern people do for us and ignore the negative. But when it comes to non-Muslims we do just the opposite.
We only think about all the bad things the Americans have done to us and ignore any positive things they have given whether humanitarian aid or economic aid.
We even blame them for all the terrorist attacks in our country, yet remain silent on the presence of Arab Al-Queda terrorists hiding in our country and targeting our soldiers and people.
We also tend to side with Muslims in conflicts against non-Muslims simply as a result of the religious dogma that has been programmed into our minds.
Some Pakistanis have actually condemned China for it's mistreatment of the Uighurs simply because the Uighurs are Muslims and the Han Chinese are not.
This is despite that China has stood by Pakistan on the Kashmir crisis and other crises while all the other Muslim countries were silent. Also despite that the Uighurs have brought Pakistan nothing but trouble with many Uighurs, Uzbeks and Turks hiding in Northwestern Pakistan and involved in terrorist activities.
This is also despite the Arab Sudanese treating the non-Arab Sudanese with extreme brutality despite they are also Muslims, just not Arab.
This is also despite Turkey's atrocities in Kurdistan or even Pakistan's atrocities in Balochistan, we still go on criticizing other non-Muslim countries for attacking and occupying Muslim lands weather the Russian Federation in Chechnya or America in Iraq and Afghanistan or Israel in Palestine.
When it comes to false accusations from non-Muslim countries against us, we become defensive of ourselves and deny these accusations.
Yet when other Muslim countries such as the Iranian Islamic regime accuse us of harboring Baloch separatists and/or Sunni militants, our Pan-Islamist types get on their knees and blame our government for not doing enough to maintain good relations with our "Muslim brothers."
Even with venom being spewed against us and our country by the Afghan Mellat, our Pan-Islamist types again get down on their knees and claim we haven't done enough to earn the respect of the Afghans despite that we have taken millions of their refugees at our own expense.
Refugees who gave us only more trouble in return by stealing our jobs, committing crimes, selling drugs and spreading illegal firearms.
These are exactly the same apologetic, sellout sentiments promoted by our pro-Indian fifth columnists except the Pan-Islamists are like this towards other Muslims while the pro-Western/Indian fifth column is like this towards the Indians and the West and usually also to other Muslims.
On the subject of Afghanistan and the terrorist Afghan Mellat, whenever Afghan regimes throw accusations at Pakistan or send terrorists into Balochistan in order to further fuel the insurgency there, our Pan-Islamist types in turn always blame the Indians and the CIA, not knowing that Afghanistan has always claimed our Western provinces going back to our independence in 1947 as it sees the Durand Line as invalid.
The hatred for Pakistan amongst Afghans has nothing to do with India. Afghanistan joining hands with India against Pakistan is just another example of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend."
It's just as how China and Pakistan's friendship started off. Though China and Pakistan have a strong friendship and partnerships in many areas which have absolutely nothing to do with India, the friendship first started mainly because both countries were at odds against a common enemy.
But because Afghanistan happens to be another Muslim country, instead of standing up to them, we become more and more apologetic.
These are the kinds of results Indianization and Pan-Islamitization has created in Pakistan and amongst many Pakistanis worldwide influenced by religious extremism.
Always it has been that any kind of opposition towards Pan-Islamism or the nonsensical idea of Islamic Ummah is raised, you are accused of being a "Hindu agent" or a pro-Indian self-defeatist. On the other hand any sort of opposition to Indianization or patriotism towards Pakistan is linked with religious extremism by the pro-Indian fifth column and their supporters.
Our reckless government instead of countering anti-Pakistan propaganda or encouraging action against our pro-Indian fifth column who spread lies against our country in the name of free speech and secularism, still turn to religion as a unifying factor and a motivation.
The solution to a problem lies in fully identifying the problem first. And the problem in our case is what I have mentioned above. Religion alongside Pan-South Asianism often promoted by rich and powerful elites from the Muhajir community has completely buried our knowledge on who we are.
Whenever we have tried going back to our roots, the Indian Hindutva Brahmans next door alongside their pro-Indian fifth columnist puppets have hijacked our identity. They (Indians and their upper class Muhajir allies) believe that almost a century of common British rule suddenly changed the thousands of years of history of the Indus Valley/Pakistan.
Once the realities of the problems is accepted and properly studied can only a proper solution be formed.
Two generations from independence to now have been wasted on various dogmas particularly religious influence and influence from the powerful pro-Indian lobbies. All dogmas favored over the idea of national identity and commonality of our population which is almost entirely Indo-Iranic belonging mainly to the Iranic, Indo-Aryan and Dardic subfamilies.
With the age of the Internet giving faster flow of knowledge and information, we can hope that the next generation of Pakistanis snap out of the ignorance their forefathers lived in.
The solution to the Pakistani identity crisis lies in acceptance of who we are as a nation composed almost entirely of Indo-Iranic peoples weather Baloch, Pakhtun (Iranic) or Sindhi, Punjabi (Indo-Aryan) or the Dardic populations of the north.
This time we must take a journey back thousands of years back to the genesis of our country. This time it has to be without the interference of Arab/Iranian/Turkish wannabe Pan-Islamists and pro-Indian fifth columnists like Pervez Hoobhoy or Ayesha Jalal.
When any research into history and anthropology is tampered with to satisfy political agendas, the outcome can be harmful.
Once unbiased, factual, scientific research is done on our ancient ancestors and on who we are, things may turn out differently. Even if we are divided politically or even ethnically, we can still find a common basis on the fact that we stem from the same ancient Indo-Iranic tribes (who in turn were derived from the Proto-Indo-European/"Kurgan" people) that roamed Central Asia and later on merged with the natives of the Indus Valley, giving birth to the hybrid race that we are today.
I can guarantee the day the state, the people and the scholars do a full scale research on our Indo-Iranic roots is the day we can have stronger unity. The day we appeal to a common Indo-Iranic identity with the backing of the state, we will feel more strongly towards our country and the day the Pakistani identity crisis will be fully solved.
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