Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

Bernardo Bertolucci (1941-2018) Bertolucci's epic Novecento

Baptism Could an eccentric group, born out as a reaction to state violence, now ineffective, be  "our" new born-again "freedom fighters"? At the annual “Free Iran” conference that the group stages in Paris each summer, dozens of elected US and UK representatives – along with retired politicians and military officials – openly call for the overthrow of the Islamic republic and the installation of Maryam Rajavi as the leader of Iran. At last year’s Paris rally, the Conservative MP David Amess announced that “regime change … is at long last within our grasp”. At the same event, Bolton – who championed war with Iran long before he joined the Trump administration – announced that he expected the MEK to be in power in Tehran before 2019. “The behaviour and the objectives of the regime are not going to change and, therefore, the only solution is to change the regime itself,” he declared. The main attraction at this year’s Paris conference was another longtime MEK

Amazon, Google & Big-Techs Productivity Paradox

"There is no state in Lebanon" There is a state in Lebanon. It is present in other spheres, but obviously it is not there when it comes to social inequality. In fact it perpetrates social inequality like in many other countries, including rich ones (look at poverty in Britain or France, for example). Labaki, the director, does not criticise the state. A critique of the state in the review is Ms Naggar's addition. Also, there is a lot of "emotional extortion" instead of including a bigger picture of the state structure and social relations which spawn such social diseases. I have found this review (in Arabic) much better. 

"Opposition Labour Party plots overthrow of Capitalism" —Reuters Note the use of the verb "to plot", which is defined by Oxford Dictionary as "a plan made in secret by a group of people to do something illegal or harmful." It is scary: we have just discovered that there is "a plot", "a secret plan", that Corbyn, McDonnell and their guerrillas have been organising a parallel underground organisation and an armed wing of the Labour Party in order to overthrow the system, possibly with the support of Cuba and China, with promises from North Korea that she will send advisors once the new regime is estabilshed.

CLR James, critical theory, and the dialectic

Condemn one and absolve the rest Related: Are We ISIS?

"Nine in 10 UK adults (91%) said that having sex with someone other than their partner was cheating," The following survey might not be accurate, but there is some truth in it:  Deep conservatism in the so-called liberal society. "Street and sexual life in the UK"

Enlightenment! The London School of Economics has just named a building after Emmeline Pankhurst. From John Stuart Mill to Emmeline Pankhurst. J. S. Mill: The gigantic "federation" albeit "unequal", that was the British empire "has the advantage, especially valuable at the present time, of adding to the moral influence, and weight in the councils of the world, of the Power which, of all in existence, best understands liberty—and whatever may have been its errors in the past, has attained the more of conscience and moral principle in its dealings with foreigners than any other great nation seems either to conceive as possible or recognise as desirable." —Mill, Utilitarianism , London 1972 ed. p. 380 E. Pankhurst: "Some talk about the Empire and  Imperialism  as if  it were something to decry and something to be ashamed of. [I]t is a great thing to be the inheritors of  an Empire like ours ... great in territory, great in potential wealth...If w

Just finished this interesting novel