WE typically start the new year by reflecting on the past 12 months and making resolutions for the new year. What did we achieve last year? What lessons can we learn from it?
For many, 2023 was a wake-up call, a year of change. It was also one in which we had to come to terms with a more overt presence of artificial intelligence, or AI. Will AI dehumanise us? That is the question.
I would like to reflect on one of the most vulnerable human experience we witnessed last year — that of the Palestinian war in Gaza.
For many years, the plight of the Palestinians had been gradually dimmed by other distractions.
The Palestinians too, like many other people of war-torn countries, became dehumanised. They became numbers, reported in the news.
How did our humanity get so eroded, so deteriorated, that we reduced people to numbers?
When discussions within society consistently portray marginalised groups in a certain light, their humanity is diminished, their exclusion and mistreatment normalised. The real danger lies in this process of normalisation.
Derogatory or dismissive language, when commonplace, is another step towards dehumanising marginalised people.
This extends beyond racism or aggression; everyday language perpetuates enduring stereotypes related to race, poverty, and immigration, quietly undermining empathy and understanding, paving the way for acts of discrimination and violence.
The normalisation of language that perpetuates acts of injustice, racism, and marginalisation, goes beyond high-profile conflicts or issues; it seeps into our existence.
When discussing issues such as homelessness, illnesses, refugees, or foreign workers, we tend to reduce them to stereotypes or statistical data, preventing us from recognising their humanity and understanding the complexities surrounding their situations.
This normalisation extends to areas like gender discrimination, where sexist language downplays problems such as harassment or inequality, making effective solutions more challenging to pursue.
Normalised dehumanising language doesn't solely impact those directly affected; it also shapes society's compass by diluting our empathy and diminishing our sense of justice.
For many years, we have been lulled by the media, with their choice of terminology, which could subtly normalise actions and policies, aligning opinions with those in positions of power.
This normalisation is particularly evident in conflicts where the language used by the media often downplays or conceals acts of aggression by those in power, thus framing our interpretation and subsequent reaction to matters.
What happened last year, though, was that we were no longer able to simply think of the Palestinians as numbers.
Through the powers of social media, we were confronted by images of the atrocities of war, of houses and schools and hospitals being bombed, of children killed senselessly in what is clearly an attempt at genocide. The dead had names, faces, stories.
One such number with a name and face I knew well was Dr Refaat Alareer—a writer, a critic, a poet, a professor of English, and my former student at Universiti Putra Malaysia.
He once said to me that "injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere". The profound weight of his words made me reflect on how we must remain concerned with and invested in fighting against any form of injustice, anywhere.
Refaat, whose words became his weapon, wrote untiringly of the situation in Palestine. He remains undefeated in death, as his words live on to speak for him, to combat and challenge narratives of injustice.
His last poem, "If I Must Die", has become a beacon to the Palestinian cause, calling attention to, and continuing to tell "his story" and the stories of many Palestinians in occupied Palestine, as well as others around the world who suffer from any form of injustice.
May his legacy live on, and may the people of Palestine find justice and peace in their lives.
The writer is Associate Professor at the English Department, Faculty Of Modern Languages and Communication, Universiti Putra Malaysia and can be reached at nomar@upm.edu.my