A Nation's Destination: The State of Scoundrels and Scum

The poet al-Tughra’i, Mu’ayyad al-Din al-Kanani, in this famous verse from his renowned poem known as the “Lamiyyat al-Ajam,” was not referring to a specific state in the sense of our contemporary political concept, but rather pointing to the deterioration of conditions among his contemporaries and the rising voices of the foolish.

Al-Tughra’i, who served as a minister in the Seljuk state that emerged and concluded in the early centuries of the second millennium CE, and who headed the chancery and the seal office (“tughra”), was resentful of the elevated status of sycophants, the loud voices of hypocrites, and the advancement of panegyrists and those seeking personal gain over scholars and men of wisdom and counsel.

Perhaps we still suffer today, as al-Tughra’i complained, from the “state” of scoundrels and degenerates he spoke of in his famous Lamiyya. This is not a state in the modern political sense, but rather a reflection of the dominance and power of the ignorant in societies. We see them today on social media as examples of overt and covert electronic flies.

These figures demonize any resistance to the Zionists in occupied Arab lands, and malign any Arab or Muslim voice attempting to present a better image of Arabs and Muslims in Western countries. They are provoked when they see a people liberating themselves from the dominance of a military government, toppling a right-wing government, or protesting to express their livelihood needs.

This type of account, some of which may be funded by Zionist-aligned parties, views the development of awareness as a threat to their projects. They have ready-made, canned, and even comfortable responses for those who do not wish to tire their minds with analysis and thinking.

Thus, in their mindset, Abdulrahman al-Sayed, the winner of a U.S. Senate seat in Michigan, is an “Ikhwanji” (Muslim Brotherhood affiliate), despite the fact that Abdulrahman is classified as part of the liberal wing of the American Democratic Party. As for the protests in Europe, particularly in France, in the minds of these individuals, they are the result of sabotage by immigrants, not, as European governments and institutions claim, due to the growing hardships of living.

Moreover, these individuals fail to grasp the idea or capacity of student unions in Serbia to shape the country’s future by overthrowing a failed right-wing government and bringing in another, because students in a mindset limited to “Frigate” (a derogatory term implying narrow-mindedness or parochialism) should “focus on their studies and not engage in politics,” even though politics and its resulting jobs and opportunities are, in reality, their future.

Indeed, these models, which undoubtedly do not represent the majority but whose voices have grown louder as freedom of expression and societal capacity to voice opinions have declined, strive to prevent any good from reaching the needy, even through official channels. They never tire of digging up dirt to harm and injure anyone they can.

You will find these models among the lowest and most despicable of people, upon whom al-Tughra’i’s words apply. They incite the cutting off of livelihoods, suppress freedoms, strip away citizenship, divide society, and harm anyone they can reach. Therefore, this is not merely a matter of differing opinions, positions, or ideologies, but a necessary confrontation with a moral and values-based crisis that must not be allowed to spread throughout society.