Reviving the Lost Glory

The Muslim nations of yore were globally distinguished on the grounds of their unique characteristics and attributes such as faith, integrity, honour, moral standards, a civilized demeanour, and more of the same. However, today's Muslims have lost their sheen and are negatively projected in the media in particular, a cyclical phenomenon which could be witnessed across the world. Muslims, by my reckoning, are being subject to divine wrath owing to their errant deviation from the faith and practice as paid by Islam and therefore, the Muslims of today have largely been deprived of honour and dignity pro re nata.

The way I figure it, this has been the misuse of technology that has been failing today's Muslims being the overriding reason for their decline. The developed nations of the West, on the contrary, have been making the most of technology for their entire well-being, be it poverty eradication, education, employment or be it beefing up their defence strength and capability. Other way round, the well-to-do Muslims countries are merely using modern technology for entertainment and luxury only.

Thanks to the internet coupled with the social media revolution, most users in this part of the world tend to utilise the modern communication tools merely to access nudity and to be blown away by vulgar and obscene content available round the clock at our fingertips. Paradoxically speaking, the new generation is quite ignorant of the glorious history of Islam and of the great Muslim rulers of the past. Put it bluntly, it is more than a dilemma that the new generation is not even aware of our national heroes, let alone Islamic history.

So let me get this straight. For instance, the young people don't know about the Ottoman Caliphate, one of the world's most powerful states in the 15th and 16th centuries, and about the leading personalities behind the Ottoman Empire, such as Suleyman Shah, Ertuğrul Gazi, Turgut Alp, Bamsi Bey and Osman Ghazi?

Kudos to Turkish people who are now projecting our real heroes in mass media to get us reconnect with the past Muslim glory and golden heritage, in place of showing low-rent fiction, bombastic but unrealistic love stories and useless, inconsequential content. Packed with phenomenal acting performances with a perceptive and moving script, TV serials like "Dirilis: Ertugrul" and "Kuruluş: Osman" are good sources to serve as a guide and to inspire today's youth to help them get acquainted with our great Muslim leaders.

Making a long story short, we have been blessed with the impulse to propagate the true image and message of Islam by using all forms of media, including the internet, not to exclude the social media. Thus, Muslim mindset needs to be changed by exposing it to enriched TV programmes and history-based productions.