Human beings are, for better or worse, tribal creatures at their core. Identity serves as the foundation for community, and community, in turn, serves one overriding purpose: survival. This was what the political leader on both sides tap into then, and taps into now. It does help that for both Sinhalese and Tamils this identity runs back thousands of years and is solidified in the genes of those who identify as such. Therefore we are mostly at the mercy of the few who have the ability to mobilize these deep ingrained sentiments — we call them our Leaders.

Past week I read many horrific stories of atrocities committed during the Black July in the darkest hour of recent Sri Lankan history. Many from first hand victims who survived the violent mob attacks of Sinhalese mobs and they all have their version of why or what led to these unspeakable acts. Yet, one thing is obvious neither the writers or commentators are able to zoom out and view these events in context beyond their own experiences and/or your impressions from hearing or reading about them. But the truth is that either the Sinhalese nor Tamils are really at fault here, it is human nature that is at fault. This is to say that human psychology created the conditions and the politicians exploited it to fulfill a very basic foundation of human nature - its thirst for power.

Some find roots of Black July in the divide and rule policy of the British which saw minority Tamil being put in charge of the majority Sinhalese and the resulting animosity. Some go future back to when multiple South Indian empires invaded the north of Sri Lanka and some comeback to the fact that 95 million Tamils aspire for a motherland where they would be a majority not a minority, or the Sinhala Only Act of SWRD Bandaranayake.

It’s important to remember that all these factors, along with others, played a role in what happened on and before July 24, 1983, and after. It didn’t happen in isolation but rather as a result of something that was “growing” for months if not years. But we shouldn’t overlook two key points:

  • first, some members of the ruling UNP Government planned it — it was premeditated not spontaneous;
  • second, the Tamil Militancy set it off — either unintentionally or deliberately walking into the landmine placed by the UNP — when the LTTE ambushed a Sri Lankan Army patrol, killing 13 soldiers. The bodies of these soldiers set blaze to a fire of hatred which already was building in the hearts of even the most normal Sinhalese in the South rendering them to be inactive, when mobs of goons were committing atrocities against their friends and neighbours.

This is why then President J.R. was able to proclaim this violence a “natural reaction.” But neither Tamils nor Sinhalese are inherently predisposed to violence against one another — not out of primal hatred, nor from any crude animalistic instinct. There are ample examples in the trajectory of Sri Lanka’s history to establish this truth. For instance, in the 70s and ’80s, it was the JVP cadres who stood among the most fervent opponents of Tamil aspirations, wielding a rare fusion of nationalism and Marxist-Leninist doctrine. Yet today, the very same party is positioned as an unlikely standard-bearer for Sinhalese-Tamil unity. This contradiction is not a paradox but it is a testament to the fact that it is politics, not ethnicity, that ultimately shapes the fault lines of conflict.

It is one thing to recognize that politicians — our so-called leaders — are the architects of division, driving polarizing policies not out of conviction, but out of a primal instinct for political survival. Sinhalese and Tamils are nothing more than pawns in a cynical game.

++But the more critical realization — and the one that matters — is that we, the people, still possess the power to deny them that authority. If we are not blinded by the shortness of our own experiences. ++

It demands, a willingness to engage with both sides of the narrative and to grasp the full, complex context in which these violence have formed. Only then can we begin to see not just the machinery of division, but the levers by which it might be dismantled. Otherwise we are doomed to walk ourselves into the same darkness of another Black July or a Black (whatever month that’s next).