Often, perceptive foreigners spot social trends that escape us because we are too close to them to see the changes going on around us. For instance, Burke identifies the shift away from English, and sees ‘Mehran man’ as urban, middle class and educated outside the elite English-medium system. He sees Muslims being under attack from the West, and genuinely believes that the 9/11 attacks were a part of a CIA/Zionist plot. Actually, my experience is that many highly educated and sophisticated people share this theory.
Burke continues his dissection of the rising Pakistani middle class: “Mehran man is deeply proud of his country. A new identification with the ummah, or the global community of Muslims, paradoxically reinforces rather than degrades his nationalism. For him, Pakistan was founded as an Islamic state, not a state for South Asian Muslims. Mehran man is an ‘Islamo-nationalist’. His country possesses a nuclear bomb….”
Mehran man’s views about the region and the world reflect contradictions and confusion. While India is home to Bollywood and IPL cricket, it is also viewed as the historic enemy. And while increasingly Islamic jihadis who kill Pakistanis are seen as terrorists, those who kill westerners or Indians are called freedom fighters. Small surprise, then, that public opinion in Pakistan no longer favours a pro-western agenda.
In his encounters with army officers, Burke sees a growing alienation from western goals and aims. According to him, the army is now full of Mehran men, and this has dramatically changed the institution’s orientation.
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