A Personal Letter to my Brother, Ahmed Mansour Al-Shehhi

 Dear Ahmed,

I am writing you this letter, my brother, as you and I are part of the same extended family, one shared by all Emiratis, with the same founding father.  And I am writing you this letter, shocked that a family member would cross the lines that you have crossed.  It is for this reason that I, and many others who feel the same shame that I do for your actions, stood and will continue to stand outside the courthouse where you are on trial, condemning your actions.  And as we feel a responsibility for the shame that you have brought to our family, Ahmed, so do we feel a responsibility to make sure that the stain you have brought to our name is wiped clean by showing our pride and respect for what this family represents.

When a father shares of his food and clothes to make sure all his family is fed and clothed, Ahmad, do you consider this to be a bribe?  When our late father Sheikh Zayed gave land and homes to the people of the UAE as citizens of our federated state, were those bribes? Exactly what was he bribing them for, starting as far back as 1972?  But this is exactly what you accuse Sheikh Mohammad bin Zayed of doing in his visit to the Northern Emirates, on the direction of our President.  So when our leaders continue the policies of our founder, for some reason it is only you who can see that the motivation has changed.  That is it not for the good of the people and the nation, but out of self-interest.  Surely you must have sound evidence for making such a claim; I hope it couldn’t simply be due to attention-seeking and arrogance.  But then your history speaks against you on those counts.

But in choosing to ignore our late father’s good will for all of our family and the natural continuation of this generosity in his successors today, you not only had the audacity to slander our leaders’ genuine efforts, you even had the audacity to say it on television.  But if you had the bad manners and poor taste to make such ungrounded accusations in public, I very much want to know what else you were willing to say behind our backs, behind closed doors.  I would be willing to bet that those things were far worse; it is probably very fortunate for you that these things have not been made public.   If they were, it would be a lot more difficult for you to hide behind the fiction that you made these slanderous and libelous remarks as an “activist,” when they are surely nothing more than insults of the gravest and most reprehensible type.   

But you have chosen to not only embarrass us inside our family, but to go outside and insult our family in front of the neighbors, without even trying to reconcile your concerns with our father directly; the act not only of a liar but of a coward.  Our family provides proper channels, some of which are more direct than those found almost anywhere else in the world, to sound our concerns; all of which are familiar to you. Yet you resorted to public betrayal, using the foreign media to present your one-sided and vicious criticism.

           

But I suppose this should be no surprise; the list of those with whom you choose to associate speaks as badly of you as your own mouth.  And if these groups and interests stand by you through their willingness to confuse your criminal charges with broader issues, be assured: if the full extent of your libel were known, you would watch this support melt away.  Even as it stands now, who do you see in your camp?  Intellectuals?  The business community?  Students? Make no mistake, Ahmed my brother: None of these people, whatever their other beliefs, support your libel.  You stand in that courtroom to face the evidence of your rudeness and disloyalty alone. 

That is why I have stood outside your trial each day you have been seated inside, that is why my other brothers and sisters stand there alongside me, and that is why the rest of our brothers and sisters throughout the nation stand united with us to condemn what you said, the disrespect and disloyalty that are the reasons you said it, and the type of person it shows you to be. You have crossed the line, my brother.  Now, for once, stand like the man you should be, and face the consequences of your actions.  A proud family could, and should, demand no less.

Sincerely,

Thabet 

(@Thabet_UAE) 

On Duties: The Professor

In response to my last blog post, I received this message on Twitter:

So I clicked on the link, and came up with this . . .

Comments below . . . 

In Stephen Law’s Believing Bullshit, he asks: “How reasonable a response is “I just know”?

It depends. Sometimes, by “I just know”, people mean you should just take their word for it, perhaps because time is short and the evidence supporting their beliefs too complex to present in a convenient sound bite.  So, what if there is enough time to provide evidence, and the evidence is not complex. Do we just believe an argument when someone says, “I just know”?

Over and over, I run into this conundrum with respect to a university professor, a well-recognized figure in UAE academia and public figure who, nonetheless, consistently fails to provide evidence for his “scholarly” opinions. This is unfortunate in an op-ed, and unjustifiable in a scholarly piece like Dr. Abdulkhaleq Abdullah’s “Contemporary Socio-Political Issues of The Arab Gulf Moment.”

In his paper, Abdulkhaleq raises a number of points related to the GCC states in general, and the UAE in particular, but generally fails to support his arguments. For example, he constantly mentions the middle class and its demands for greater democratization, but not surprisingly, fails to present any evidence for an identifiable social entity like a middle-class, not to mention any polling data or significant anecdotal experience to tell us what they (as a class) are actually demanding. In another example, the professor presents a comparison between the UAE and Kuwait, and questions how the UAE, a “political dwarf”, could be far more economically dynamic than  “politically liberal” Kuwait; in fact, he describes it as “strange.” But as this example clearly goes against his (mis)understanding of social development theory, he just admits that it is surprising and moves on.

In an effort to counter the argument for the status quo in the UAE, based on the obvious reasons why the people prefer the current situation to that of Kuwait, one might expect Abdulkhaleq to make an argument for the advantages of democratization.  But he never actually does this.  One might also wonder why Abdulkhaleq endorses the view that turning from tribalism was essential to the modernization of the Arab Gulf States, somehow missing its importance as part of the bedrock of UAE society and culture, happily integrated into our modern state. 

In these and a number of other cases, the professor not only puts forward weak or outright false claims, but also consistently fails to provide the reader any evidence for them. This is very poor scholarship indeed.  It would not matter so much if the stakes weren’t so high, but what the professor is arguing for ultimately represents fundamental changes to the very nature of our political system and historical culture.  Dr. Abdulkhaleq Abdulla should be reminded that while he is free to express his opinions, “I just know,” is not going to be good enough to guide the debate on political change in the UAE.

 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

(In case you’re interested, I went ahead and commented directly on the paper the doctor asked me to “read and comment” on.  The link is below; my comments in red.)

Click here to download: Comments on Dr. Abdulkhaleq's Article