#16. Eid al-Adha; Manchester; Trains
Oh great, more huge ethical dilemmas played out in small personal dramas.
Hi all!
Eid al-Adha
There is a story that has been told for thousands of years. For a story to stay alive that long, it holds some power. So here it is:
Imagine, if you need to, that you have a son. Your parents treated you very poorly, and so with this son you were determined to love him and treat him well. As such, he grows, reaches puberty. In the mean time your relationship with your partner deepens, and your work as a human being bears fruit. Life is good.
But then you start having a recurring dream. In the dream you are taking a knife to your most beloved son and killing him. Many people have disturbing dreams from time to time, and so you try to put it out of your mind, perhaps talk it over with your therapist. But then the dream comes again, and again, more and more vivid. You become horrifyingly aware that this isn't just a dream, nor even a premonition — it is a command. God is asking you to do this.
At this point, a bit of theology — in many Abrahamic religions (e.g. Christianity, Islam, Judaism) there is the idea that God set tests. This is because God essentially asks only one thing of his people — that they worship him before all others. Not just other gods or idols, but also people. So if you would choose anything before God, this goes against this. In return, everyone who truly in their heart puts God before all, will have everything fulfilled in the next life.
So if, for example, you get a great job and make lots of money, but then you lose it and suffer great financial loss, you can remember that God has set these tests for you, to show your faith in him before yourself, and that if you pass the test, though the suffering may be great, you will have proven yourself, and you will live close to God in the next life — and suffering will not be your lot as it is in this.
And also — the stronger you are, the harder the tests.
Back to the story. It dawns on you with despair that if God is asking you to do this, to sacrifice your beloved son, he must know that this is the test for you. That if you do love God before all others, this is the test to prove it.
So you go to your son and you tell him "I've been having these dreams in which I kill you, and I now know that these are commands from God." Remarkably, your son is so good and your bond so powerful, that he says something like "I see. If this is the test God has set you, then that's what you have to do. You will find me, I hope, as willing as I can be."
And so you go with a knife and your son to a suitable place, a mountain, full of sadness and despair. You lie your son down, tears in your eyes, and withdraw your knife. You both prepare, psychologically, for the next moment.
But then, a mysterious voice calls out: "That's far enough." You look behind you and there is a very robust looking ram. Joyfully, you embrace your son. You realise that this ram has been provided in his stead, and so you sacrifice it. Relieved, you head home.
And that's the story behind Eid al-Adha! Which literally means 'Feast of the Sacrifice'. There's this nice image of it too:
Eid al-adha was celebrated this year on July 31st. A traditional part of the celebration is the sacrifice of a (good) animal, and to share a third with family, a third with relatives, and a third with poor people. The symbolism here goes back to the story, of being willing to sacrifice something one cherishes (as a good animal would have been in the past) and to celebrate that last minute substitution of the ram for the son.
As you'd expect, the tradition gets all kinds of expression these days.
A thousand years ago, a man’s assets were made up of his goats, camels, and cattle. The ultimate sacrifice one would make was to give away his precious assets in gifts. Today, the most cherished possession is money, and people must be willing to part some of it to give the ability to the receiver to spend on his or her critical needs.
You can read a little more on that here.
There's actually another version of the above story — which exists in various forms in Christianity and Judaism too — where the angel's voice at the end doesn't say "You have fulfilled the vision." but instead "What the fuck Abraham that wasn't a command from God! That was just a random dream you had!! Appreciate the thought but yeesh wait for a burning bush or something."
Lockdown
So the reason this is all in my mind is because a couple hours before the celebrations of the above were to start, comedy-figure-turned-serious-faced-man Matt Hancock announced that a second wave was starting up in chunks of the North of England, incl Greater Manchester. This was due to people from different households meeting and not social distancing, and so the new policy was that people in these areas would be prohibited from meeting indoors.
Part of the celebration, as you'd expect from the above story, includes meeting and spending time with family and relatives, embracing, often sharing food etc and so many plans were made indoors. These had to be cancelled at the last minute. The general response was "OK sure, but this was a bit short notice."
And it is a little suspect — why with only a couple hours to spare? Why in these areas with lots of Muslims in? Why these specific restrictions rather than, for instance, closing pubs?
And you can see their point.
Let's look at the stats, for the UK first:
Then for Manchester (I think the 7-day average drops off at the end here due to recent days not having data yet, not because of a genuine drop)
Well, there's definitely a strong peak there isn't there. If you were looking at this data on July 30th, you'd see something like this (except without the line, and probably a bit lower than this at the recent end as it hadn't fully materialised yet)
And the week before, something like this:
I don't find it hugely hard to believe that, in the run-up to a holiday that would involve lots of people spending close time with elderly relatives, the govt noticed a change in that area and felt it necessary to take action at the last minute. It does seem like they played this one a bit slow, perhaps in the hope of avoiding upsetting a lot of people (not a very leaderly move, but somewhat understandable).
However, all this does remind me of the whole Dominic Cummings vs Neil Ferguson thing. Dom wants to go secretly drive around visiting relatives in his car, Neil Ferguson wants to secretly have his non-mongamous lover over. The levels of danger and hypocrisy were similar, but the reactions were very different, and from different groups.
It feels like we're all playing into an intensifying 'moralisation' of everyday life. There's a lot of photographs of pub gardens and crowded beaches going around, <'other' culture of your choice> gathered in the street celebrating. All of this when realistically the disease doesn’t spread much outdoors.
Feels horribly like we're going down the path of 'illness as metaphor' again, where COVID19 status becomes a sign of moral virtue or deficiency. Makes me nervous.
To the Second Wave
And what of my local area?
Hmmm. Well it's levelled off a bit but I'm not a big fan of this graph. Dr. Sandra Husbands, Hackney council's director of public health, is continuing to sensitively tread the line here. And realistically the City has little 'community' to speak of — perhaps they'll cancel a few wardmotes and send the aldermen home.
Howevs — second wave status: we're probably here! Though it's not evenly distributed. Some UK Muslim tweeters have been calling ahead to the idea of what might happen if the govt decided to enforce a lockdown a few hours before xmas eve. To which I say:
(JOKING)
More ethical dilemmas
Draw your own conclusions. If only they'd seen this.
BONUS: if you ever find yourself needing to steal candy from a baby, this experiment may give you a few ideas:
On a lighter note
Do you listen to music on Spotify? Do you feel bad about how little artists get? Try out Supportify, a very simple website that takes your top artists and links you to find them on bandcamp so you can buy stuff from them.
Through this, I discovered that an artist I rediscovered recently has a bunch of other stuff I'd not heard on Bandcamp! Here's one of my fave trax. It's glitchy, be warned. Also the whole abum is gr8.
Do you like bricks? Look at these bricks!
I received some feedback last week that I should have a call to action and a call to LOVE. So:
If you liked this newsletter, give me a HEART with this button: …actually there’s no button for this but there’s a heart below I think. This is supposed to help me find my true fans so if you’re a true fan hmu.
If you like this newsletter, why not SHARE it with a friend with this button:
If you were forwarded this email or read it online, feel free to SUBSCRIBE with this button:
That's all. Have a great week!
K
<3