To the “superhuman” being who doesn’t like us grieving, crying, or screaming in pain over what we’ve witnessed…

Listen, my dear. If you’re some emotionless crocodile, then I’m nothing like you. If you’re made of cement or stone and you don’t feel or get affected, I am not like you—at all.

And if your level of “piety” or “faith” has numbed you to the point where you can rationalize all this pain, accept it without a natural reaction, and move on like it’s nothing—then I am your exact opposite. I feel things differently. Deeply.

You, my hero, are unfazed by your mother’s humiliation, your wife and family being insulted in displacement camps and on the streets by both the kind and the cruel, the stranger and the familiar. You’re unmoved by your sisters being forced to queue daily at filthy bathrooms to relieve themselves. Your father’s defeat doesn’t shake you. Nor does the shattered dignity of your uncle, the fading presence of your elders, or the hunger of your barefoot children—sick with anemia, broken by disease.

But I care—so much more than you could ever imagine. Beyond your fake patriotism. Beyond your twisted beliefs and empty “projects” and illusions. I swear to God, I care.

If the tears of children and their terrified faces don’t shake you, they shake me to the core.
If the screams of mothers crushed by the loss of their children don’t move you, they tear my heart apart.
If the scenes of death, destruction, corpses in the streets, and the loss of your own people don’t affect you—they destroy me.
They burn my soul. They shatter my mind.
They make me cry, constantly.
They keep me up at night.

Understand this—I am not like you.
Not like you, stone.
Not like you, plastic.
Not like you, cement.

I am a completely ordinary human being.
I can’t hide my emotions or reactions.
When I’m heartbroken, I don’t stop to think what the enemy might think of me. I don’t act for appearances.
No. No. No. I am just… normal.

Everyone around me is like me—except Your Highness, Mr. Stonehead.

I’m not weak. I’m not a defeatist. I’m not a traitor. I’m not a pessimist.
And if you don’t know me, that’s your problem—not mine.
And I’m not going to waste my breath trying to prove myself to you.

Also, for the record:
I’m not soft. I’m not flimsy. I’m not spineless like your sick mind tries to tell you.
I’m just a normal human being.
I grieve when it’s time to grieve.
I feel pain.
I get sad.
I break.
I fall into despair—like every normal person would.

Did you know I cry? Just like the Prophet Muhammad cried—if you’re actually Muslim and believe in him.

And no, whoever you think you are—you do not have the right to stop me from feeling sorrow or anger.
You do not have the right to stop me from screaming, crying, mourning, or weeping.

I am not like you.
You are the one who’s strange.
You are the “other.”
You’re a being I don’t recognize.
I swear to God, I see nothing of myself in you. Nothing at all.

You’re a shell of a human—empty of all humanity.
A monster.
Cold.
Rigid.
Impossible to understand.

But me? No.
I am not that.
I am just… normal.
Natural.
Fragile, like every living being.
Not dead inside like you.

You are the one who’s left the realm of reason.
You’ve stepped outside of everything we were raised to believe.
You’re something I can’t understand or even engage with.
There will never be harmony between us.

So stay in your corner, you superhuman.
And I’ll stay in mine—practicing my raw, human spontaneity with people like me.

I won’t come near you, and I don’t want you near me.

“To you be your way, and to me mine.”

— A normal human being,
 Dr. Ahmed Hesham Hilis