Dear World,
In nearly a decade of doing Humanitarian aid and disaster relief work in Pakistan, including weeks at a time spent in places like Swat and Bannu not far from the border with Afghanistan, the first time I ever saw a black-colored shuttlecock-style fully sight-impairing burqa was on a trip back to the U.S. on a ridiculous poster for the award-winning Showtime television program "Homeland." And in the middle of this pack of burqa-cloaked "subhuman Muslim she-wolves" (as the creators of "Homeland" would have us believe) was this innocent, frightened, lily white, blond-haired, blue-eyed little red riding hood, trying valiantly to make her way back through the terrorist forest to the safety of the U.S. Embassy. I wanted to throw up all over the poster and its "thinly-veiled" propaganda disguised as entertainment. I walked away with a mixture of sadness and disgust- and sarcastically thought to myself, "Congratulations you jerks, this sort of bunk is exactly why such a large number of Americans are Islamophobic, Pakistan-hating idiots."
I love America. That's why I'm not backing off from a little tough love for my country. Not all medicine that is good for you tastes good, sometimes it tastes horrible. I realize that a frighteningly large number of Americans are so far gone down the rabbit hole of fear, hatred and official lies, they don't even realize just how lost America is from what it wishes to believe it is, and they seem to perpetually need a boogeyman to justify their aggression and hatred. Americans so love to hate our boogeymen (in the 60s, 70s and 80s it was Russians, then Pakistan helped us win the cold war and the Russian boogeyman just disappeared POOF! Hollywood helped then to create our boogeymen and shape and amplify our hatred and fear of them. Now today it's Muslims who have been handed the boogeyman baton, and Hollywood plays its role right on cue with shows like "Homeland," and the money they collect from their sacred cash cows is astronomical, for fear and hate SELLS- so let all of us get collective amnesia and forget about the fact that it was our own government that was key in creating, funding, empowering, strengthening and growing the Frankensteinesque monsters of Al Qaeda and The Taliban and their offspring ISIS who have torn a path of death and destruction throughout much of the Muslim World and killed more Muslims than anyone else. And then of course we fight them when they get out of control and more Muslims die and are dismissed with the sanitized term "collateral damage." And forget about the fact that modern Muslims have been the victims of oppression and white supremacist colonialism, not the other way around. And forget about the fact that Muslims didn't create or enable ISIS. Muslims overwhelmingly opposed the Iraq War, which America's leaders lied about to justify their war and in the process ruined a country and created the vacuum which gave birth to ISIS). So Americans just seem to be in a self-deluding state of constantly suspending disbelief in order to evade responsibility and keep believing the myth that America can do no wrong and always stands up for freedom, liberty and justice for all. Who installed and supported all those tyrants and dictators after WWII that the Arab Spring took out or tried to take out? Who is the BFF of the most oppressive and freedom-hating regimes on the planet? Definitely I'm not expecting these folks to swallow, digest or even taste the bitter pill of truth that I am offering, but it's clear to me the popularity of "Homeland" is hard evidence of just how far off the path of righteousness and fairness we are as a nation. Still, I hope that some people will consider my words and won't re-actively make the convenient assumption that I should be dismissed as nothing more than some clueless radical leftist flowerchild terrorist-sympathizing apologist idiot- because nothing could be further from the truth and I'd be willing to bet I believe in America's principles of truth and justice for ALL and put myself on the line for them more than any Islamophobic American could ever think to do.
I know for a fact that no non-Pakistani American has spent more time on-ground in "The Real Pakistan" during the last decade than I have. I'm taking about walking among the People of Pakistan out in the open with no security anywhere near, in the mountains and the plains, the rivers and the back roads, deep within the catacombs of old cities and in hundreds of the most remote villages NOT holed up in the secure fortifications of the diplomatic enclave or driving around like a CIA-Blackwater badass in some jacked up black government-issue SUV with tinted windows and containing enough weaponry to wage a small war. I am a relative unknown to nearly all Americans- except a fair number of Pakistani Americans who support my Humanitarian work. I speak with authority and credibility on the subject of "Homeland" and its portrayal of Pakistanis because I live among the everyday People of Pakistan, meeting them and respecting them as Human Beings in places where no other white American dares to go because they've bought over-the-top exaggerated bulloney the Western Media/Entertainment/Military/Industrial Complex have been spewing about Pakistan for years and years- at the expense of Pakistani children just like Malala and good and decent but isolated and too-trusting-of-their-govt everyday People of America.
Since I've been living in Pakistan for the last nine and a half years, including the last four years in Islamabad (a beautiful planned city which looks NOTHING like what is portrayed in "Homeland") where I have my office and base, you can compare my credibility on the matter at hand with the makers of Homeland" when it comes to the Pakistan-themed episodes of "Homeland." For anyone who sincerely wishes to hold a fair, proportional, educated and truthful perspective about Pakistan, please don't make the sad mistake of believing you've gotten anything other than an absolutely worthless view of Pakistan and Pakistanis from watching the soulless, sensationalist mindless Hollywood garbage dump known as "Homeland."
I don't have any personal experience with the CIA (Thank God), but I can say if the CIA operatives in "Homeland" are anything like the real CIA operatives, then I guess that would explain a lot about why the World is in such a pathetic condition. One thing is for sure: war is a profitable business for a relative few, and business has never been better. Shows like "Homeland" are just the perfect vehicles to steer and prime the general public to willingly march towards devastating visions that need not become realities- realities that have brought us all to perpetual war and a constant state of fear which will bring us all to eventual destruction if we remain on this manipulated path.
The xenophobic, hateful, irresponsible and intentionally untruthful portrayal of Muslims and Pakistanis, and the city of Islamabad in "Homeland" is pathological lying at its worst- and very disturbing for me to watch. ANYONE watching anything that they know damn well is perpetuating a dangerous lie would be similarly disturbed. I had never never watched "Homeland" before, but not long after I saw the poster, I "stumbled" upon the show while it happened to on the TV at a friend's home that I was staying in during a trip to London late last year (ironically, to raise awareness regarding the suffering of the People of North Waziristan, who are perhaps the most suffering, misunderstood and unjustly reviled victims of counterproductive and stupid American Foreign Policy that exist on the face of the Earth). In one scene, a "just outed" CIA agent is set upon by a raging mob and torn to pieces while a few of the "Pakistani bad guys" drop dead from gunshots to the head. This was stolen right out of the scripts of every cheap zombie show out there, and to portray Pakistanis in such a way is one of the most insulting, bigoted, extremist and offensive visual lies I've ever seen on a TV Screen. Even when CIA-Blackwater thug Raymond Davis shot two young men in the back in Lahore, the crowd that gathered at the scene of the incident didn't rip him to shreds. They ceratinaly had the chance. But what did they ACTUALLY do. They blocked his escape. They held him and called the police. He was promptly arrested while his friends mowed down a third victim while trying to get their "asset" outa there and back to the refuge of the Lahore U.S. Consulate and "Diplomatic Immunity."
The artistic license of this show is now REVOKED as far as I'm concerned. The real monster in the real-life scene was Raymond Davis, and the Government of the United States of America is responsible for putting that monster on the streets of Pakistan with his arrogant attitude, racist worldview, state-of-the-art weapons and a license to kill. He was an "accident" just waiting to happen, or more like a "time bomb" waiting to go off. Well now, was our wonderful Mr. Davis ever mistreated by Pakistan in any way? Nope. He was treated like a guest by the Lahore Police and eventually released by the Pakistani Government, under great pressure from the U.S. The only reason he didn't stand trial as he should have is because of America's arrogance and disrespect for the rule of law when it doesn't suit them. "Might is Right" has become the American principle that has trounced all our founding principles. So, if Pakistanis are the ravenous foaming-mouthed, wild-eyed evil zombies that "Homeland" wants you to think they are, then why didn't Raymond Davis get torn to bloody shreds by a voracious terrorist mob when they had their chance? The inconvenient truth for the ass-brained hate-peddling, white supremacy glorifying creators, producers, directors and actors of "Homeland" is that Raymond Davis went home and nearly killed an American citizen on our shores, breaking the guy's neck in front of his wife and young children OVER A PARKING SPACE at a coffee shop. Once again HE WALKED as the CIA got him out of FELONY charges SCOT-FREE. NOW I ASK YOU PRODUCERS OF HOMELAND, "WHO ARE THE REAL MONSTERS IN THIS BAD MOVIE???"
Anyway, As I watched, it was clear that the show's producers didn't even remotely try to be accurate about anything regarding Pakistan or its citizens. It's touted as a realistic show based on true events, but what I saw in just one episode was nothing more than Pamela Gellar's fantasy of what your average dime-store Islamophobe imagines Pakistan to be. It's bigoted portrayals made me sick, and even more so because it's such a popular show and thus skews perceptions and does tremendous damage to Pakistan, as no doubt previous propaganda has been used to shape America's opinions and attitudes towards people to justify more war, more surveillance and more police state erosion of American rights. This kind of show stirs up lies and feeds the fear and hate that Americans have against Muslims and Pakistanis. It feeds the hatred of American Muslims, which in turn leads to intimidation, threats and violence against peaceful and innocent Human Beings. There were no beautiful children like Malala featured in the show, even though there are tens of millions of children just like her in Pakistan. It is just so wrong on so many levels and I am thoroughly outraged at this blatant bigotry not only NOT being rejected but actually being accepted and even hailed with awards in America. Shame Shame Shame on the producers of this show, their advertisers, the networks who broadcast it, the actors and actresses who are cast in it and the people who watch it. Because of the lies Western Media media spreads about Pakistan, no one believes me when I tell them that everywhere I go, Pakistanis tell me how much they love and respect Americans, even if they don't agree with our government. They seem to have a sixth sense that the common people are innocent and that its the politicians who do the evil and corruption. If only all Americans had the same maturity as most Pakistanis I've met over the years. It's very sad, that as "educated" as Americans supposedly are, Pakistanis are the group with more understanding and empathy. But in a country of 200 million people, CNN and Fox News only show Pakistan through the narrow lens that captures 100 angry shouting bearded men on a side street in Karachi burning an American flag as if those 100 people represent every Pakistani. By the camera footage and editing, they make it look like the whole of Pakistan is burning American flags. It is obviously by design. The images are powerful, and we don't do enough to dig deeper for the truth and question why our media and corporations and government and lobbyists WANT us to see only 2% of the truth 100% of the time when it comes to places like Pakistan. I don't know why these entertainment and news corporations do this dirty business, but I strongly suspect it has something to do with manipulating you, your family, your friends and your co-workers so you won't mind so much when bad things are done in your name. Some of you will even cheer as the bodies pile up, some of them beautiful children like Malala who just wanted to go to school and dream of a better life, perhaps in America.
That mass advertisement poster with the lead female character was shown everywhere, though it's too bad nobody could see what was actually hiding under those burqas. But they didn't fool me because I know what what was in there. It was the hateful hearts of Showtime and the creators of "Homeland" who could easily have found plenty of Pakistanis and Pakistani Americans to help them provide an accurate portrayal of Pakistan in their TV series. But obviously, we now know that they didn't want truth or accuracy, or fairness. The fact is, if they really wanted to do something good for America and create important cultural and geopolitical commentary to provide the American public with a better understanding of the heartbreaking wars and instability we're all suffering through, then they wouldn't have stopped at the bank to cash in on fear and bigotry and raise the level of hate that already existed in order to thoughtlessly, callously, indifferently, greedily peddle more of the same kind of stinking racist crap that has gotten us all into this mess in the first place.
Please Think About It,
Todd Shea
American Human Being and Inhabitant of a planet named Earth
