Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

Shaul Magid, Peter Beinart, Ta-Nehisi Coates and Pankaj Mishra

First we must study how colonization works to decivilize the colonizer, to brutalize him in the true sense of the word, to degrade him, to awaken him to buried instincts, to covetousness, violence, race hatred, and moral relativism; and we must show that each time a head is cut off or an eye put out in Vietnam and in France they accept the fact, each time a little girl is raped and in France they accept the fact, each time a Madagascan is tortured and in France they accept the fact, civilization acquires another dead weight, a universal regression takes place, a gangrene sets in, a center of infection begins to spread; and that at the end of all these treaties that have been violated, all these lies that have been propagated, all these punitive expeditions that have been tolerated, all these prisoners who have been tied up and interrogated, all these patriots who have been tortured, at the end of all the racial pride that has been encouraged, all the boastfulness that has been displaye...

Marco D’Eramo is excellent as usual. ‘It’s been a good day; I never dine better, I never sleep so peacefully, as when I have sullied myself sufficiently with what idiots call crimes.’ —Marquis de Sade, La philosophie dans le boudoir We are growing habituated to the savagery, day by day. Then we wonder how the Germans could have ignored the genocide that was being perpetrated all round them. This is a close cousin of greenwashing: we supply the bombs and we feel sorry for their victims. Call it compassionate bombing. [See, for instance, David Cameron’s and Emmanuel Macron’s tears] It is little wonder that the global South finds the West hypocritical. Denial is exercised when actions can only be performed if we deny to ourselves that we are doing them. Hypocrisy becomes all the more necessary when it comes to public opinion – its growth has been a fruit of the formation of public opinion , and has become an indispensable tool of politics. Perhaps today Westerners, and not only Germans, s...