Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

“[T]he vilification of migrants and Muslims forms part of a primitive persecutory phantasy, shaped by the UK’s colonial history and by its entrenched material disparities.” “[I]t would be more accurate to view contemporary British bordering as a continuation of colonial violence: an attempt to police the nation’s last frontier, so that the wealth and status gained from imperial conquest is preserved, materially and symbolically – and withheld from former colonial subjects.” This goes with the rhetoric of politicians who stress that UK needs migrants, but they have to be skilled ones and the country ‘legally’. They did not mind before – in fact encouraged – the hundreds of thousands of Polish and others, many of whom were unskilled, when British capital needed cheap labour. During the ‘great boom’ of capitalism in the 1959s and 1960s liberal democracy could thrive at home without the need to scapegoat the Other. On the contrary, many workers from India, Pakistan and the Caribbean were e...

The bigger picture in this article is not big enough. While nurses and other workers go on strike in Britain, for example, one has to compare the social value of a professional football player to a nurse and their incomes, and how such obscene injustice has become acceptable and normal. The world Cup and the champion leagues are a capitalist industry run on the 5 basis of competition and profit. The question of class, exploitation and ideology are also at play. Money’s chokehold on modern football Related “We are all complicit in the system” in one way or another. We clap and cheer. We succumb to amnesia. We fill in our day with hypocrisy.

“Exploitation under temporary migration regimes is far from exceptional and should be understood as structural. Certainly, we should highlight exploitation and be enraged about abuse, but this should not be exoticised as something uniquely Qatari. This, after all, is not about Qatar. It’s about the geographies of exploitation inherent in a global economy that succeeds or fails based on its ability to gain the most for the least amount of cost.” The Orientalist discourse hides structural exploitation Related Italy’s Migrant Boot Camp Raped, beaten, exploited “Italy’s Sikh Slaves” Spain: “If you don’t want to work like a slave …”

“ Sri Lanka —like so many other countries struggling for solvency —remains a colony with administration outsourced to the International Monetary Fund. We still export cheap labor and resources, and import expensive finished goods —the basic colonial model. The country is still divided and conquered by local elites, while real economic control is held abroad. The I.M.F. has extended loans to Sri Lanka 16 times, always with stringent conditions. They just keep restructuring us for further exploitation by creditors.” Sri Lanka Collapsed First, but It Won’ Be the Last By Indrajit Samarajiva  The New York Times,  NYTimes.com   15 August 2022 As a Sri Lankan, watching international news coverage of my country’ economic and political implosion is like showing up at your own funeral, with everybody speculating on how you died. The Western media accuse China of luring us into a debt trap. Tucker Carlson says environmental, social and corporate governance programs killed us. Everyb...

 82 major brands have slaves working in their supply chains