War of Words...


Language, words, baskets of sentences...individual perceptions, experiences, the subjective made objective, black on white...the subjective becomes my objective world, it becomes MY world. It becomes my Word...

What is so difficult to understand about that ? No really, seriously, what is so difficult about this very simple equation ?

July 2006 - July 2010, 4 years I've been spilling my guts, on paper...not just my guts, but also facts, proofs, historical tidbits, my own personal history meshing into a collective history, another window, a different window...

I've wanted my blog to be a window...and eventually a door...first you look and if you like what you see, you enter...into the world of an Iraqi, into the voice of an Iraqi who refuses your lies...and who is holding onto that house, that home with a window and a door, made of words...

Is that too complicated to comprehend ?

And yet, for 4 fucking years, I've been getting nothing but self proclaimed interior architects, interior designers seeking.. change the window, change the door, change the roof, change the rooms, change the partitions, change the walls, change the layout...change to fit..

Fit whom ?

Fit whom exactly ?

You see you need to speak a language people can relate to, you see you need to mitigate your sentences so as not to offend, you see you need to win over more people, you see you need to influence the greatest number, you see you need to appear as one of them, you see you need to, you see you ought to, you see you must, you see you should...

Fit whom and where ?

Which language are we talking about here ?

The standard language, the homogeneous language set by the Occupier and his media and his think tanks ?

Am I expected to use the same language that destroyed my land, that destroyed my home and that destroyed our lives ?

Like what am supposed to do, cordially invite the traitors, the rapists, the torturers and killers into my home of words and take them on a tour of the house ?

Or maybe am expected to invite the apathetic ones, the indifferent ones over tea and biscuits with - excuse me please make sure not to trip over the cadavers on your way in....

Am I to tailor my language, my style, my decor, to suit my invading guests and their sleeping farting cronies or am expected to copy the in vogue language while their bombs are blasting outside my window, smashing my walls and ripping through my garden ?

So which one is it, honorable ladies and gentlemen ?

You drop bombs and you fire bullets, I drop words and I fire them back...

Had I been interested in winning over the sheep, I would have joined an animal farm...had I been interested in becoming a star, I would have tailored my language to suit you, suit you enough, but not quite...just the way you like it cooked - medium rare.

But this is not about suiting you, this is about protecting and safeguarding my house...my territory, my memories, my loved ones, my land, my history...and this is about exposing you.

I could have easily, so easily opted for a different language...placed a little picture of myself, given you my real name, and jaywalked through the maze of your political labyrinth -- that would have even earned me a couple of appearances on CNN, BBC, Al-Jazeera and maybe even Fox News...it would have earned me several interviews, maybe a couple of prizes, and a few job offers in prominent establishments...I would have earned your respect...because you would have managed to mold me into something that is acceptable to you...something in line with your values and ideals...the same values and ideals that broke my home, turned it into rubble and exiled me...I would have become a star...a celebrity...the kind of stars and celebrities you stamp with your seal of approval...

But I resisted all of that...I resisted all the attempts, all of them...whatever their form and under whatever package they were presented to me...however ugly or seductive they may have been...I made abstraction of the language you use and slipped through the punctuations and paragraphs like dribbling ink, like mercury...

I saw the traps, they were easy to spot --I just needed to look outside my window and see the desolateness of it all...


Painting: Iraqi artist, Rafa Al-Nassiri

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