14-04-2009, 03:04 PM
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.
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.
Peter Presland
".....there is something far worse than Nazism, and that is the hubris of the Anglo-American fraternities, whose routine is to incite indigenous monsters to war, and steer the pandemonium to further their imperial aims"
Guido Preparata. Preface to 'Conjuring Hitler'[size=12][size=12]
"Never believe anything until it has been officially denied"
Claud Cockburn
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".....there is something far worse than Nazism, and that is the hubris of the Anglo-American fraternities, whose routine is to incite indigenous monsters to war, and steer the pandemonium to further their imperial aims"
Guido Preparata. Preface to 'Conjuring Hitler'[size=12][size=12]
"Never believe anything until it has been officially denied"
Claud Cockburn
[/SIZE][/SIZE]
