It’s the 21st century, and the world is much more advanced than ever. From self-driving cars to AI-powered robots. Everything is digitized. As Yuval Noah Harari underscores in his groundbreaking work, 21 Lessons from the 21st Century, authority is shifting from humans to algorithms, and truth is what Google’s top results tell. Battlefields and weapons are changed. Cyber warfare is taking over and digital battles are in vogue. War can be launched by sitting miles away from a hostile country. The Cambridge Analyatica Scandal tells us how elections can be manipulated. The Arab world serves as a glaring example of how governments can be installed and toppled by algorithms.
Now it’s all about algorithms and data. It’s a battle of narratives and big powers are investing in soft-power. Whoever controls technology, controls the world. Advances made by information technology and biotechnology have left us stunned. But amid all this, where do we stand? What’s our national psyche?
We as a nation are living in our self-contrived bubble of superiority where we are still enchanted by bogus stories. We might not publish research theories, but we are perfect at producing conspiracy theories. When countries like India and Israel are busy developing cutting-edge technologies, we are still living in a self-created bubble of superiority where we believe that the entire globe is plotting to bring us down from the pinnacle of glory. Propaganda mills are successful in making millions believe that “Hindu-Yahoodi Sazish” is the only thing that’s holding us back from developing and we should wage a jihad against them. Why on earth will an outsider plot against a country that is morally and economically bankrupt, when insiders are experienced in wreaking havoc?
In the former tribal areas, Baluchistan, and Azad Kashmir, South Punjab and many other areas, there are evil forces who are still working to contaminate young minds. Not only madrassa students, but university graduates, and unemployed youth are being radicalized to join militant outfits.
There is no shortage of hawkish analysts who are daydreaming about annihilating India and Israel, a country that’s leading the world in cutting edge technology. Neither Israel nor Hindustan can be wiped out from the face of earth. In fact, there are pretty good chances of us perishing if we don’t embrace technology and learn to keep up with the times.
There is always a very fine line between rhetoric and ground reality. We need to come to terms with the fact that Pakistan is ill-unequipped to fight digital wars. We are way behind than India whose IT exports were $194 billion in the financial year 2022-2023 compared to our $3.2 billion. You can’t daydream about wiping Israel from the face of the earth– a country that invests more than 6 percent of i’s GDP in education and is leading the world in cutting its edge technology. Traditional warfare tactics are taking back seats, even the once-called kings of battle, tanks, are slowly being replaced by drones.
We need to liberate our imaginations from the self-concocted stories about “fortress of Islam”, “annihilation of enemies from the face of the earth” and much more. We need to puncture the hot air balloon we have been living in for years and embrace technology to survive in this digitized world.
Hawkish religious leaders and their followers urge people to wage Jihad. They take the Quranic verses out of context. They misquote and misinterpret the Quranic verses regarding Jihad. They do talk about taking up arms against the enemy, but they don’t talk about holding a pen and book– Jihad-bil-Ilm. In today’s world, if you take up arms, even to defend yourself, you will be labeled as a terrorist in no time and defeated hands-down.
Recently, a video captured my sight where a so-called Maulana was explaining the hidden satanic meaning behind Facebook’s first letter “f”. We are so skeptical about technology that we think that it’s another satanic conspiracy launched by Dajal to destroy us. A lot of people don’t even acknowledge that Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates have done something worth appreciating. We neither innovate nor imitate–how come we can imitate “Kafirs”? The same holy book that talks about jihad, in a certain context, talks about acquiring knowledge. In fact, the very first world of the Holy Quran is “IQRA, which means s command to read.
In another saying, the Prophet (S.A.A.W) said,” Knowledge and wisdom are the inheritance of Muslims; take them from wherever you find them.” But our so-called Maulanas just pick up few lines from Quran, misinterpret and misquote them to make fools of their followers.
It’s high time we should reform or be ready to perish. History is full of examples where even the biggest empires, like the Mughals, perished when they didn’t embrace technology. The case study of Mughals serves as a glaring example to learn from. When Europe was stepping out of the dark ages and embracing technology, the Mughals shut their doors to reforms, and perished.
We need to liberate our imaginations from the self-concocted stories about “fortress of Islam”, “annihilation of enemies from the face of the earth” and much more. We need to puncture the hot air balloon we have been living in for years and embrace technology to survive in this digitized world.
