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+--- Thread: The dark side of Dubai (/thread-1308.html)
The dark side of Dubai - Peter Presland - 14-04-2009
A long but fascinating article on Dubai by Johann Hari in The Independent whose resulting status anywhere in the UAE is now likely to be very much persona-non-grata.
I found it a compelling read. The attitudes of the Emirati and the resident British ex-pats interviewed came as no surprise at all - utterly repulsive pur-blind self-righteous justifications of their privileged superiority over the hoi-polloi; similarly the other side of that same coin - the slave-like exploitation of, in ascending order of barbaric servitude, Philipino, Indian/Pakistani and Ethiopian workers and servants. A microcosm of Globalised 'free-trade' but with the indentured workforce in close (though largely hidden) proximity rather than a few thousand miles away.
As a microcosm of gross unsustainability it probably has no equal either, with per-capita oil/water usage and carbon footprint vastly greater than even the US. The desert beckons me thinks and I wonder what it will look like 20 years from now.
The dark side of Dubai - Magda Hassan - 14-04-2009
Thanks for posting this Peter. I believe it was Dubai also which was recently the centre of a ' Boycott Dubai' campaign by a French Swiss family who had lived and worked there and whose son was kidnapped and raped by several people including a family 'friend'. They got little to no justice and the laws are always very bad with regards to rape in any case. http://www.boycottdubai.com/index_new_E.php With the eventual prosecution of some of the rapists the family decided to drop their case against the Dubai state.
http://amboytimes.typepad.com/the_amboy_times/2007/11/boycott-dubai.html
Dubai pretty much sounds like my idea of hell at the best of times and seems to be an actual hell for most of the slave class. Disgusting that it is permitted or that another state would have dealings with this and similar places.