Violent Jokes
A culture of violence creates its own spheres of interpersonal relationships. Culture is all around us and we live with it. We Iranian live with a culture of violence all around us. We just need to notice it and to be aware of how we talk. There are many situations we may not have influence to change, however, we can change our selves. We can change our reality by incorporating a language of peace into it.
We can prevent violence if we do not make peace with it and do not introduce it into our daily life. We can choose to live with the culture of peace and happiness. What do I mean? Our jokes reveal a lot of what I will try to say.
Have you noticed that war, killings, murders, death, hangings, executions, assassinations, and torture have found a way into our daily Iranian lives?
How? I will tell you!
We construct and perpetuate, deplore and defeat vanity, hopelessness, abuse, neglect, rape, and various deviations. We internalize violence and desensitize cruelty. We internalize our really hard once we tell those stories in form of jokes.
How many jokes do we hear about war and the way people are dismembered and disabled?
Instead of rejecting these dark areas impacting our lives, we are incorporating them into our lives. What do I mean?
How many jokes do we tell about the way people are killed by chemicals, gas, weapons of mass destruction, bombs, rockets, missiles and all that?
How many jokes do we share about how people are being punished and tortured in the hell or Jahanam as we say?
How many jokes do we know regarding how men and women would be punished differently due to the adult life they choose to have?
How many jokes do we tell about people who are being given a choice for the way they want to be dead? Those choices are about how less painful death could be.
How many jokes do we make about clothes restrictions for women in our home country and what the responses of those women would be?
How many jokes do we hear about child molestation, addictions, prostitution, theft, and other social issues that no one wants to deal with in our home country?
The lists go on and on...
We compare, contrast, confront, label, stigmatize, and generalize the negativity and violence forced upon us. We do all these acts once we get desensitized by jokes that are incongruent with the way we want our life to be.
There is a certain pattern in all these jokes; they are projecting the inhuman reality that is created by human-caused disasters.
Why is that?
Maybe we try to make light of these horrible experiences that make no sense whatsoever. Maybe we try to bring a tone of resiliency into our daily routines by laughing at the unfathomable life in migration all around us.
Now the question is:
When did killing and torture become this normal in our culture?
When did we lose feelings and emotions about people being punished for any reason?
Why should punishment be the response for everything?
Why are we so discouraged and hopeless?
Why have we let a culture of violence encompass our daily lives?
Why we are perpetuating all the inappropriate behaviors, all the inhuman acts, and all the dehumanizing stories?
What do we think we are passing down to our next generations?
This is worth thinking about it. What would our next generations say about us?
It is worth exploring what kind of idea is behind all the horrible jokes we tell one other?
I assume we can not joke around topics such as happiness, joy, love, partnership, and kindness. But do we have to go this far for having fun?
Some people may say, jokes are supposed to be this way.
For this reason we should ask what way?
Most of the jokes that we tell one another reflect what is going on in our home country and what has been the format of our life so far. Most of these jokes are only sad stories of lives that have been wasted.
Where is our dignity?
I guess we have lost the point of having fun.
Note: this article is modified version of what was written for the writer's own website.
Poran Poregbal
Vancouver, B.C
June 26, 2008
I would like to open up a healthy exploration of our Iranian culture and what is included. In doing so, we need to be able to challenge our beliefs about our own culture. Just by analyzing our own culture, we would be able to help our next generations in adjusting in wherever we live with the respect for our own Iranian culture. However, we need to set up new boundaries and define many concepts from scratch zero. I would like to encourage healthy communication, positive participation, and cooperation in respect to building healthy families within our Iranian community. Mental health issues are my main area of interest where I hope to offer a multicultural sensitive counseling. Poran Poregbal, RSW, MA (pending)
No comments:
Post a Comment