Al-Jazeera Promoting Harmony outside the family?
Al-Jazeera has bought the right to show a British children’s show that basically promotes inter-tribal relationships. (Tribes are nothing more than extended families)
The pre-school series, which will be shown on the al-Jazeera’s children’s channel, is described by S4C as “a live action series following the exploits of an extended family of musical, multi-racial sheep”.
It follows Greek father Costas, his Welsh wife Baalween, their daughter and grandchildren - and the highs and lows of the family recycling business.
Is this Al-Jazeera’s way to try to promote some inter-tribal harmony amongst the children in the Middle East where all things (from business to marriage) are heavily done along blood ties and everyone else is viewed with the eye of disdain, so much so that consanguineous (cousin) marriage is seen as the ideal marriage in the lands targeted by Al-Jazeera with this children’s show. It represents over 50% of marriages in Muslim lands such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iraq. In contrast, consanguineous marriages are estimated to be about 0.2% of all marriages in the US. That number may well go up as more Muslim immigrants come to the US. In Britain, consanguineous marriages make us 55% of the British Pakistani marriages.
This is one of the reasons that Americans, have such a hard time understanding Middle Eastern Arabs and even the Muslim cultures in general. Converts, even those of us that have had an opportunity to travel to Muslim lands, also have a very hard time grasping the fierce tribal loyalty that many of us have seen, heard or read about.
Americans in general view the “Hatfield and McCoy” type family feuds between inbred mountaineer families as ignorant and backwards and simply can not conceive marrying a cousin. And in spite of knowing that it is permissible to marry a cousin, even some converts feel this way. So perhaps Al-Jazeera is doing this thing to fight against a mentality so extreme on family ties that it can prevent one from being fair to a member of another tribe. How many of us have experienced this in one form or another?
In Muslim countries, if one’s family member gets a plush job in the government, then he is expected to fill the best positions with his tribesmen (family members). And while a degree of that happens in
America, it is not a way of life like it is in the Muslim lands. Allahul Musta’an.
John Tierney wrote an interesting article on this subject:
“Americans just don’t understand what a different world Iraq is because of these highly unusual cousin marriages,” said Robin Fox of Rutgers University, the author of “Kinship and Marriage,” a widely used anthropology textbook. “Liberal democracy is based on the Western idea of autonomous individuals committed to a public good, but that’s not how members of these tight and bounded kin groups see the world. Their world is divided into two groups: kin and strangers.”
For those caught up in the phrase “liberal democracy”, simply replace that with “Khilaafah”, “Islamic Democracy” or whatever word you like to represent a greater government entity and you would still have the very same problem. (See the history of the Muslims and the tribal based rebellions that broke out.)
No one is questioning the permissibility of marrying a cousin or endogamy. The question is: should it be taken to the extreme that all cousins and nothing other than cousins marry each other for many generations? (Likewise, in the way red meat is permissible, but should we eat nothing but red meat at each and every meal?) Is this extreme tribalism, one of the reasons the Muslim lands are in the condition they are in?
Does over doing it create genetic disorders? This article states:
Widespread inbreeding in Saudi Arabia has produced several genetic disorders, Saudi public health officials said, including the blood diseases of thalassemia, a potentially fatal hemoglobin deficiency, and sickle cell anemia. Spinal muscular atrophy and diabetes are also common, especially in the regions with the longest traditions of marriage between relatives. Dr. Sakati said she had also found links between inbreeding and deafness and muteness
Other studies have suggested that heart disease may be related to this as well the infant mortality rate and other disorders. There was also an article in The Scientist about recessive genetic traits from consanguineous marriage causing a higher incidence of deafness among Palestinians.
The global average for hereditary hearing loss is one out of every 1,000. Among Palestinians the rate is 1.7 out of 1,000; in some Palestinian communities, the rate is as high as 2.5.1
On a last note, it is sad that racism and tribalism is so prevalent in the Muslim lands where the Qur’an is recited everyday and speaks against this. The issue, and the issue of mistreatment of other ethnicities, is very rarely addressed in circles of knowledge.
I hope that more programs that promote harmony amongst human beings in the Muslim lands for children will follow suit and they learn to act better than the adults, Insha Allah
Filed under: Muslim Isolation, Race
Another great post. There is a good reason for all of this, and an explaination, anyway. Most of these states have never really established a national identity, who you are is really based on sect and tribal affiliations. The states set up in the Middle East are just a continuation of this on a larger scale. Jordan is set up to advance the Hashemite family, Saudi Arabia the al-Saud family, the governments in Bahrain, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, and Egypt are all the same. State is set up and geared towards the advancement of one family of people, most often at the expense of everyone else in society.
Saudi Arabia, I believe, is the most extreme example of this. You have a country, named after one family, where every male in the family is on the government pay roll for no other reason than the family into which they were born. So you get over 10,000 male “princes” receiving a minimum of $20,000 (up to several million a month depending on status within the royal family) a month for no other reason than the fact that they were born. This, on top of draining the Saudi economy with their cuts in dirty business deals and the like, means that you have a majority of Saudis who are not well off, whilst one family and their lackies, live literally in palaces.
To the marriage issue, I know first hand a perfect example of what you are talking about here in the DC area. There is a high ranking Saudi official here at the Embassy, my wife’s family has known them for many years. He has two girls (three total I believe, but I have never met the third) here who are very well educated, both have masters degrees and are in the late 20’s and early 30’s. They have had all sorts of men come and ask for their hands in marriage. Doctors, lawyers, you name it, very well off. Both of the girls are rather good looking.
The father has refused them all. The situation has so stressed the girls that one had a good portion of her hair fall out at one point. Why wont he let these girls get married? Because he demands that they marry a Saudi, but not just any Saudi, but one from his tribe. The problems with this are several. First, being in the US this is going to be hard to arrange. Second, the very fact that the girls have spent so much time in the West will make them “tainted” to many of such tribal mind set. They have lived in the West for years, they must have been up to no good right? Third, they are long past the ideal marrying age in such cultural circles, late 20’s and early 30’s is almost spinsterhood. Fourth, they are just too intelligent and educated for many men with this cultural mindset.
So basically the father is setting these girls up to do haraam, to run off, get married on their own without permission, or to do haraam behind his back. What is the BIGGEST kicker of the whole situation, for this man who refuses to allow his daughters to marry anyone but a Saudi and a member of his tribe? The kicker is that this hypocrite is married to a Western white lady, from North America, and the daughters are half white.
So, he can marry not only outside his tribe, his nationality and his race, but his daughters cannot. Hypocrite. I feel really bad for the girls, they are really nice.
Abu Sinan:
You mentioned about 3 issues here: Nepotism, extreme tribalism and the issue of women finding it difficult to get married beyond their mid-late 20’s. All big problems.
On the issue of his daughters, this may be a lineage issue. He wants his daughter’s children to be from HIS tribe. In other words, he may not have as big a problem with sons marrying someone outside of the tribe since the children will still be from the tribe. But his daughter’s children will belong to another tribe.
Hard for Americans to grasp this kind of thinking, but he is probably trying to keep his blood-line from being “daughtered out”.
One presumes this show is in Welsh, as this is what S4C is - a Welsh-language television channel which is only available, other than on cable, in Wales. Here in London we cannot get it even with the multitude of empty digital channels we have. Where did they find someone able to do the translation?
Subhanallah! This post is the type of balanced inquiry that is completely consistent with the Sunnah, and at the same time, it should make us to look at solutions to social issues that should draw from wider range of fact based evidence beyond ‘urf’(e.g.) custom. This BLOG, in my opinion, from what I have read so far, is addressing some of the Major Issues for Muslims in general, and African American Muslims in particular…especially those ascribing to the creed and methodology of the Salaf. Barakallahu feek.
Thanks for your kind words, Br. Zaid.
Assalaamu alaikum,
You make some good points, but it’s quite over-reaching to say that all Muslim cultures are so tribal. I live in Kuwait, and part of the population is Bedu, and some of what you say is true of them. But much of the population is not Bedu, and this really doesn’t apply… it’s not even true of all Arabs, much less all Muslims.
wa alaykum as-salaam Sister Ann:
No, certainly ALL Muslim cultures are not that tribal. I didn’t intend to give the idea that ALL are like that, but many are in the Middle East and Pakistan. The populations targeted by Al-Jazeera’s children’s show tend to be pretty tribal though.
Tribalism is not just for Bedus, it is very prevalent in urban educated Arab populations as well and it is one reason the ulama of KSA are hostile to change because of the rampant tribalism in the community.
One more thing: marriage in most of the Muslim World is seen as a business contract minus the fairy-tale version of love and a part of this contact is adding more people to the tribe. There is no way i would marry a cousin, I'm not challenging the permissablity, but for me it would be the same as marrying a sibling.
Marrying within one’s tribe, particularly in the case of Saudi tribes, is not the same as marrying one’s cousin. Most of the tribes are huge and are geographically dispersed, such as al-Tamim, al-Utaibah, or al-Shammar.
The real ‘issue’ in KSA isn’t that people will only marry within their tribe but rather that most Saudis (who belong to a tribe) will only want to marry women/men from a tribe (there is already a lot of intermarriage between the various tribes and sub-tribes) and would pass on marrying one of the many Saudis who do not belong to any tribe. It’s important to remember that in some parts of the Kingdom, including Qaseem, up to 60% or more of the population can be ‘without a tribe’. This is usually because they are descended from migrants to the region, such as Egyptians or Africans, or because they were people who moved to the urban and took up crafts (at a time when most of the population remained nomadic thereby breaking their tribal ties).
Personally, I don’t think there is anything wrong with tribes and there is lots of evidence that tribes existed and were an accepted part of the cultural landscape even at the time of the Prophet (saw). He (saw), for example, declared it a very major sin for a man to lie about his tribe and claim to be a member of a tribe to which he did not belong. There are also ahadith which mention the qualities of different tribes, such as Bani Tamim who would be the strongest and most fierce against ad-Dajjal. The tribe is simply an extended family and whatever loyalties Saudis feel towards their tribe is no different to what many Westerners might feel towards their extended clan.
The point at which tribalism does become a problem is when it becomes bigotry: where other people’s intrinsic worth is measured by their membership or lack of membership of a tribe. For example, declaring that someone is less worth as a human being because he doesn’t belong to a tribe. This is a problem. But I don’t see tribalism per se as problematic.
As for Umar’s comment regarding the ulema of KSA being hostile to change because of tribalism. I don’t think anyone who has lived in KSA and lived closely with Saudis would agree that belonging to a tribe equates with backwardness in a religious sense. It’s not that simple. If anything it is the tribes that offer the best chance of reform for KSA. The fact is that people’s loyalties go to their tribe before the nation state and, as can be seen by the regular pledges of allegiance offered by tribal leaders, the government really only rules by the permission of the tribes. If the tribes were to withdraw their support from the Saudi royal family, it would mean the end of Saudi rule. The Saudi tribe, after all, is just a sub-tribe within al-Anazah and would not possess the military or political power to hold power if such support was withdrawn.
Abu Umar, this was not an attack on the concept of tribes as this is how Allah created us. The thing that is not praisworthy is TRIBALISM when you think that your tribe is better. I never said that belonging to a tribe is backwards.
The fact that loyalty goes to the tribe first, was what was pointed out. And most people think that way, while everyone else is treated with mistrust.
I disagree about your contention that Westerners are as tribal as Saudis and other countries in the region. You will not find very often that kind of rabid loyalty to family in Western society. You will also not find that when one takes a government position, he fills all of the plum positions with his family members as a duty. This is frowned upon in Western society when/if it does happen. This is the reason many of us find it difficult to understand much of what goes on in countries like that.
Abu Umar,
Unfortunately Saudi Arabia is one of the most racist places in the Muslim world too. Still don’t see a problem?
Well, when you say ‘tribalism’, I understand that to mean the organisation of a society based on tribe. However, I agree with you that it is wrong to believe that membership of your particular tribe assures you a higher position than someone who was unfortunate enough to be born into another tribe.
What you describe is nepotism but I am not sure that it is a function of a tribal society so much as it is a function of a society that is rapidly modernising, lacks many of the social/political institutions that have taken centuries to evolve in the West, etc. The sort of nepotism you describe where people bring families or extended families into government also occurs in societies that are not organised along strict tribal lines such as Indonesia, Malaysia, or India. In some developing countries, the preferences go towards members of one’s own ethnic or religious group (such as in Syria), and, in others, it goes towards members of one’s extended family or tribe.
Whilst stacking Saudi government departments based on tribal connections may have occured in the early days, I am not sure that it is still as prevalent as it once was. If I take the Saudi Embassy in Washington or London, for example, they are staffed by people from a variety of tribal backgrounds and many that have no tribal affiliation.
My observation has been that, when recruiting people, tribal affiliation can be the final decider between candidates of equal qualification and background. “Well, Ali and Abdul Aziz both have Masters degrees, but Abdul Aziz is a Gahtani so I’ll give the job to him”.
My father in law was a diplomat at the Saudi Embassy for 25 years, so we know a bit about how things work there. In Saudi the alligences run at many different levels and filter down. First there is the superiority felt by many Saudis over other Arabs and Muslims, then within Saudi itself there is regional discrimination. My wife’s family has some experience with this. When her sister went to teach in Riyadh she was called “Hijazi vomit” by a local, and that is a pretty common sentiment.
Then it goes to a town by town issue and a region by region issue. As to people paying loyality to their tribal leaders, that is true, then these leaders then line up to pay their loyality to the al-Saud family.
At the Saudi Embassy here in the DC area, you’ll find that the majority of the staff, diplomats and the like come the Najd area and a large amount of them have close ties to the various well known tribal groupings. I suggest one takes a look at the current diplomatic role available at the US State Department website and see how many well known tribal names are represented. There are a lot of them.
Your connections, Wasta, are what help you get good jobs, they are also what get you ahead in the jobs that you get. A good example of wasta and tribal connections in action is the current editor in chief of Asharq al Awsat, a member of a well known and influential tribe who was appointed to this position by a Prince. His credentials dont stand up to most editors in chiefs out there, but he had the connections, hence he becomes editor in chief of one of the more important papers in the Arabic speaking world.
Often people are given jobs with little or no experience, that is why the Saudi economy and business world is in the state that it is. It might not be like it once was, but it hasnt changed that much.
As to racism in Saudi, it was from Saudis that I learned my first racist words in Arabic. They are known for it, and on a wider basis, all of the Khaleej is.
[...] - Scientists theorizing that poor diet, environment and too much cousin marriage are having cumulative effects in Pakistan [...]
Abu Sinan, I can easily believe what you say of the Gulf. The only people I have met more color-struck than they are are the Indians and Pakistanis. I’ve been told by a Meditarranean Arab living in Saudi Arabia that the Gulf Arabs don’t like each other very much, and that they’re used to being divided and divisive. They’re unaccustomed to being neutral with strangers or treating them fairly.
Then, I met this Emirati guy, and he would not admit that he was Black, even though he looked like a light-skinned Somali. He would deny it so staunchly, and then would call me a racist. But he assumed that being dark-skinned was naturally unattractive, and that Black people in his country and everywhere else were less intelligent.
[...] Likewise, the Islamic principle of maintaining good family ties and treating family members well got distorted into extreme tribalism where if one tribe/family member gets a management position, then he is expected to fill the positions with his family (tribe) members regardless of qualification. The importance Islam places on remaining chaste until marriage somehow became distorted to the point that entire families wait outside the bedroom on wedding night to see bloody sheets on wedding night and a previously married woman stands little chance of getting married. The Father will often parade down the streets with the bloody sheets he feels so proud that his daughter was confirmed to be a virgin. His “honor” has been maintained. [...]
Likewise, the Islamic principle of maintaining good family ties and treating family members well got distorted into extreme tribalism
As Salaamu alaikum
I would say it’s not a distortion of Islaam but Pre-Islaamic ignorance.
Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatoh
I’ve read this post..jumped to it from your post on ‘the new passing.’
We don’t just try to pass, we adopt ‘tribalism’ too.
Thus, for the longest time I wanted my 1/2 Palestinian daughter to be married to a Palestinian cousin. She’s too young to marry by the way (by my estimation, not some twisted souls, I’m sure) thinking that at least we would know how this boy was raised, we could keep it in the family, etc. No more. After having seen that being raised under occupation doesn’t make you more merciful, just or kind than the rest of the Arab world, I’m ‘done’ with Palestinians. Insha Allah she’s gonna choose her mate based on deen and I don’t care what color he is, as long as he’s decent to her.
That being said, I’m deathly afraid to let her run into Arabs, especially khaleej as she grows older. Being half Latina, she’ll be viewed as exotic and ‘loose’ because she must take after her mama (because aren’t all Latinas hot that way..even Muslimahs, authobillah), after all. Being raised in the West they will think she’s into ‘dating’ a euphemism Arabs use for pre-marital sex. But I’m sure you already knew that.
It is again, the conflict between being Arab and being Muslim and the realization that they are NOT one and the same is surprising to many.
As for being color struck, I was rarely as annoyed as I was to log into a women only Islamic clothing site to see that they had started a ‘beauty forum’ that included several recipes for lightening the skin. UGH.
‘What to Say’
You think that the adoption of tribalism is something more prevalent on the female side because the children are automatically the tribe of the father. This is part of what makes a female’s transition (’passing’
into the Muslim culture in many ways more seamless than a male’s.
Salaam alaykum
No doubt. Especially if we are already disenfranchised, marginalized females as it is. Either because of our former family situation or following rejection after adopting Islam.
Very thought provoking essays akhee. Jazak Allah Khair for saying what the rest of us quietly rage about.
Salaam alaykum
[...] cause your belly ache, God did, right?” More links (News & Scientific links) on the issue here @ [...]
Yes, well, unfortunately Black is rarely seen as beautiful in our communities.
Colorism should be stamped out.
I wanted to chime in on the expiration date for sisters. This is a huge problem. Families often encourage girls to focus on school and become educated, but once they’ve done so they are considered “too old” at 25, 27, 29, 30 to marry.
So that, I’ve met and tried to help marry, several attractive, intelligent, educated, accomplished, well-traveled sisters who cannot find a match because they have “expired.”
“I want to be able to have lots of kids.” the brothers when asked for an acceptable age range for their matches would say. They might be 40 year old brothers, but darned if they would consider any woman above 25.
One brother even told me that he preferred a teenager, as they have fewer of their own ideas and are easier to mold and control.