From: nabeel@sce.carleton.ca (Bulbul)
Subject: Re: Arab intelletuals and the binary mind
Keywords: Bulbul, serious, sarcasm, Usenet Storm
Organization: Carleton University
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 19:19:43 GMT

In <1993Jan25.064347.22161@cs.umb.edu> ahmad@ra.cs.umb.edu (Ahmad Hashem) writes:

" In article <C1DEB6.Dn5@newsflash.concordia.ca> ilyess@ECE.Concordia.CA (Ilyess Bdira) writes:
" >
" >One problem I see with Arab intellectual is the fact they have  a binary mind,
" >this of course is not specific to Arabs, but I know my people more than others
" >and I can only talk about them. What I mean by a binary mind is a mind that
" >most of the time makes binary decisions: I like you or I hate you, It is bad
" >or it is good, I adopt everything that author says, I do not recommend 
" >anything that author says, etc...

" Agree 100%.  I do think that we Arabs in general don't have shades of gray:
" we see the world in black and white (with many exceptions, of course).  This 
" does reflect intolerance and extremism, I'm afraid.  Even when we get 
" educated, many of us show traces of the "binary mind" in some way or the
" other.  (Note for example how Joachim Martillo Ajami on this net takes
" the "black" extreme in his attacking Islam.)

   Using '100%' is a proof of what you say, aren't you Arabic in the first
place? I claim the right to attribute Bdira's statement above to his own
binarism, too; he, probably, tried to answer 'Who are the most binary
people in the world?' This is binary in itself. Do I need to remind the
readership how crude it is to try to make stereotypes about races? In
fact, this only reminds me of Arab media--most countries claim they are
angels and remove the rest of Arabs from anything good. Do you guys mean
that most Arabs are binary, but you are la creme de la creme? In fact,
binarism is a state of mind, and I do not think that there exist any
_strictly_ binary person. I would say that it is more likely that binarism
correlates with the level of effective education the _specific_ person 
has.

" Did you notice that the "double negative" is not used in the Arabic langauge?

   Probably, because it is awkward and the worst way to express yourself,
let me show you below.

" In English, for example, one could say:

" 1. It is likely that....
" 2. It is unlikely that....
" 3. It is not unlikely that....

" This third form, which denotes a shade between the first two, is not used 
" in Arabic.

1. You can say in Arabic: "laa 'astab`idu ..." which is equivalent to your
   shade between the shades.

2. This shows how knowledgeable of Arabic you are; probably, you've never
   heard of "'af`aalu al-.z.zanni wa al-rruj.haani" and never cared to
   check their meanings, not to mention more subtle ways in Arabic.

" As to Sheikh Albany, I agree with you that most (if not all) scholars 
" think he is a great MuHaddith but not a Faqih.  Knowing him and many of his 
" followers personally, I think Sheikh Albany is the best example for the
" binary mind you are talking about.  I am really not saying this to discredit
" such a great scholar, but only to acknowledge something that is unfortunately
" present in many of our scholars and that we should all guard against in our
" lives.

   Mr. Ahmad Al-Habbash took care of this. []

" Salaam, Ahmad

   Sorry to destroy your entire message, but you can not say whatever the hell
you feel like without thinking about it first (as Tamer once advised.)


P.S. The following is not a stereotype, it's poetry.

** `afat-i al-khaleeju wa naafaqa al-'a`raabu
       `amalu al-munafiqi fi al-.hayaati saraabu
    ka_daboo faqultu la`alla feehim .saadiqan
       fa'i_da al-.s.sadooqu munaafiqun ka_d_daabu
                                               --<NMG>, 1993


Newsgroups: soc.culture.arabic