The Possibilities of Privilege

Yesterday, I went along to the Oxford & Cambridge Club in Pall Mall, London to a networking/social event held by the Oxbridge Muslim Alumni. The OMA has had a storied history going back about a decade with several well-intentioned management teams lasting an enthusiastic couple of years before life caught up with them and the OMA had to take a back-seat. As a former Secretary, it happened to me too*.

Mingling as we did yesterday, surrounded by the very tasteful interior decor of the O&C Club, it was quite easy to recognise that every single person in the room was in an uncommon and closed-off position of privilege. Everyone I spoke to seemed comfortable. Perhaps not happy but firmly comfortable and assured. Naturally, each person will have their own issues, but certainly with the environment and the atmosphere, it was several worlds away from the Children of Adam homeless food project that I help out with.

Privilege is a tricky beast to control and can be used for positive or for negative. We've seen very recently with the release of the Panamanian Mossack Fonseca Papers just how much privilege and access can be used to preserve that privilege for a select few. When a lone miser, who has been blessed with the light of a candle and doesn't use it to help others if they can, the world may not notice. But when many candles are hidden away, the world becomes a much darker place for everyone. Inequality has existed in all previous societies and, given scarcity of economic resources, will probably always exist. But that doesn't mean it's not worth trying to make a difference.

Which brings us back to OMA and other similar networks/communities. I had a really enjoyable evening reminiscing about university life with old friends, making new friends from the Other Place and I was very pleased to hear that the access and mentoring dreams of the previous incarnations of OMA are still strong in the new committee.

It's an excellent use of initiative to set up these kind organisations and I strongly believe they should do the best they can to help and develop their members but that in the long term it's vital to help others gain access to that privilege. When you've seen the abyss and you've seen the summit, it'd take a very cold soul to insist that people shouldn't be helped to climb to the top. To paraphrase from Spiderman - with great privilege comes great responsibility.

* The year was 2010 and I was innocent, fresh-faced, bright-eyed, had left Cambridge only the year before and was determined to try and continue the community that I'd gotten so involved with when I was Vice President of the University Islamic Society. My involvement lasted 3 up-and-down years and ended when I moved away from the hub of all things important (London).

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Learning and Commitment through Arabic

I returned to term 3 of my Arabic evening class on Monday this week. Several weeks had passed since the end of the previous term and despite my best intentions to revise and study all the material we'd worked through so far, I went to class without having opened the satchel-bag I use to carry my study material. I also happened to be running late.

A quick chat with a couple of my fellow students reassured me that I was not the only one hoping our teacher would go easy on us and as it happened we spent most of the lesson going over what we had studied previously. Given her experience as a teacher, I'd be quite surprised if our lack of diligent studying came as a surprise! Long story short, I survived and lived to post about it on Facebook.

I had reason to regret my lack of study the very next day. On Tuesday, I went along to a networking event organised by the PWC Muslim Network hoping to gain information and advice which might help in my efforts to start a Muslim network at my current employer. After the customary introductions and speeches reviewing the world economy and the state of the Middle East, there was a brief Q&A session with the guest speakers, followed by a buffet dinner and the networking.

Having eaten and drunk a decent amount of caffeine, my initial post-work lethargy had receded and I was in a networking state of mind. I chatted to some strangers and played the ethnicity guessing game (which is always a nice ice breaker), I made some new acquaintances and had some traditional Oxbridge banter with an Oxonian I came across and also sought out the PWCMN committee members from whom I was hoping to acquire valuable information and insight into the challenges of setting up a professional network. 

While doing my rounds, however, I stumbled upon a group who were chatting merrily away when I heard one of them mention Arabic classes. My interest aroused, I elbowed my way into the conversation and said something like "Ahlan" in my best arabic, hoping to dazzle them with my linguistic brilliance. It turned out the group was mostly Arab and fluent in Arabic. They were very gracious and we glossed over my very limited Arabic and rapidly moved on to more conventional networking conversation.

All in all, a fairly productive evening as I did made some good connections which should help in my Muslim network effort. But mostly I came away feeling that my awkward encounter with Arabs had highlighted my novice status and that any sort of learning should be done with serious intention and serious effort and serious commitment. Anything less and I'm doing myself a serious disservice. 

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No fancy title today.

For most of today I was avoiding the details...

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Yesterday, I went along to the Oxford & Cambridge Club in Pall Mall, London to a networking/social event held by the Oxbridge Muslim Alumni.