Many people who
claim to be busy say that joining social medias is just a waste of time. Some
reasons are mentioned. First, people who are active in social medias tend to
hide their true identity so we cannot really get true friends. Second, people
who are social media addicts tend to be lousy in doing their jobs since their
concentration is divided into two: their ‘real’ world and ‘cyber’ world. They
also tend to gossip unimportant things online.
However, to me,
joining two social medias – facebook (FB) and multiply (MP) gave me a very
valuable lesson, especially related in spirituality/religiosity.
Since I was born in the so-called xenophobic family
and raised in an almost homogenous
environment, I often feel amazed by people who ‘seem’ to be religious (let’s
say wearing jilbab) but they do not ‘suffer from’ xenophobia*. In my naive
thinking, one can become only religious but
xenophobic or irreligious so free
from xenophobia.
Having an account
on FB and ‘making online friends’ with those who label themselves as ‘spiritual**
people’ have taught me a very good lesson. I – coming from ‘a boat full of
religious but xenophobic people – once thought that spiritual people are better
people since they are not xenophobic. But reading their posts taught me that
they can be as annoying as religious and xenophobic people. They can also
easily judge believers dumb, narrow-minded. In fact they can be snobbishly
spiritual creatures. Spiritual people can be fundamentalist too.
As someone
considering others mature, know their choices and be responsible with the
consequences, I would rather think that people are free to choose their spirituality/religiosity. People can choose to
be a religious adherent of one religion or to be a deist or to be a
non-believer. The most important thing is no one will force what they believe
to others and respect others’ choices.
Participating in
an essay writing on xenophobia on MP and reading essays submitted to the juries
gave me an answer why some religious people can be free from xenophobia; a very
simple reason, in fact. They were born and raised in a heterogeneous environment.
They started socializing with people from different religions since they were
kid and their parents as well as their (early) teachers never brainwashed them
about ‘the chosen people’ (are only Muslim, let’s say, or any other Abrahamic
faith adherents). They started seeing the beauty of rainbows in their different
colors since they were very young. Therefore, they beautifully see others with
their respective faiths without any judgment.
Very contradictory
from me who was born in a homogenous environment. The fear that perhaps I would
be an infidel – oh no, the fear that they would be thrown to hell if their kids
convert – my parents brainwashed me about being the chosen people since I was a
kid and sent me to an Islamic elementary school that completed my parents’
teaching on being religious. Of course I also learned about tolerance, but this
was really artificial.
To close this
writing, I can conclude that joining any social media does not only waste time.
As long as we choose to socialize with appropriate online friends, we can get
valuable lessons to live our lives.
*xenophobia here means feeling to be the only true
believers and considering the others wrong since they adhere other religions, moreover non-believers. In other words it can be said that
xenophobic people will easily judge others deviant or infidel.
** spiritual here
means thinking that it is not important to affiliate to any religion; be it a
deist or embracing ‘traditional’ beliefs, in Java island, for example: Kaharingan,
Kepercayaan pada Tuhan YME, etc.
P.S.:
This was written
to accompany my writings to be submitted to Wayan Lessy, the one who held the
essay writing competition on ‘xenophobia’.
GL7 16.39 050912
P.S.:
