Thread on being stupid:

The issue is not that Muslims do not resist. The issue are the people who decide which 'actions' qualify as resistance and which don't. These people, mostly occupying central space in the anti BJP discourse in India,

1/n

have been there doing nothing but patronizing, schooling, appropriating and even disqualifying the anxieties, anger, struggle and resistance of Muslims since long. They appear to be woke and concerned at the outset but when you examine them closely,

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you'd find all the elements of ignorant Indian elites who say 'don't spread negativity, speak positive things also'. A Muslim woman languishing in jail on fictitious charges is a symbol of bravery but a Muslim youth fighting back to

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save lives of his people amidst a pogrom is pure stupidity. That means, they will speak of you (they rarely speak for you, and that too, when they are out of options) only when you can be presented as someone who couldn't do anything except becoming a victim of the state.

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If you did something nonetheless, you're stupid. You're stupid if you are not a victim, if you refuse to be one. Simply put, Muslims will fail to receive any solidarity, recognition, support or love if their being cannot evoke emotions of pity or helplessness.

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That is, a Muslim should die or get imprisoned or get released and say that he has full faith in the current structure and only that might bring the mic closer to your wife or son, daughter or husband. Anything else, anything that doesn't fall in the

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criteria designed by them, is bound to be stupid. In doing so, they are not just de-legitimizing some of the most powerful acts of resistance from the community and criminalizing the ones who led them, they are also defining the way Muslims should lead their struggle.

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This is nothing but social terror. Be stupid!

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I'll begin with the ancient history ... and it goes way back. Because modern humans - and before that, the ancestors of humans - almost certainly originated in Ethiopia. 🇪🇹 (sub-thread):


The first likely historical reference to Ethiopia is ancient Egyptian records of trade expeditions to the "Land of Punt" in search of gold, ebony, ivory, incense, and wild animals, starting in c 2500 BC 🇪🇹


Ethiopians themselves believe that the Queen of Sheba, who visited Israel's King Solomon in the Bible (c 950 BC), came from Ethiopia (not Yemen, as others believe). Here she is meeting Solomon in a stain-glassed window in Addis Ababa's Holy Trinity Church. 🇪🇹


References to the Queen of Sheba are everywhere in Ethiopia. The national airline's frequent flier miles are even called "ShebaMiles". 🇪🇹