Qaddafi’s regime is alleged to have been actively encouraging boatloads of migrants to leave the country’s shores since March 22, when the first vessel sailed from Tajoura, a suburb of Tripoli. Libyan armed forces and militias are reportedly turning a blind eye to the thousands of people, many of them sub-Saharan migrant workers who have lost their jobs, who assemble on beaches willing to pay several hundred pounds to be transported to Lampedusa.
….Libya appears to be making good on threats issued at the start of the coalition’s bombing campaign, when Moussa Ibrahim, the government spokesman, said the regime would no longer stop sub-Saharan and other refugees from trying to enter Europe by boat.
Best of all:
….Qaddafi warned two years ago that he had the ability to turn Europe “black” unless the European Union agreed to pay his regime at least $6.26 billion a year to block the arrival of illegal immigrants.
And Europe is indeed freaking out. It’s vital whiteness is threatened not only by the blacks flowing from ruptured Libya but also a wave of brown people from Tunisia. The West only wants top-down globalization, which is in fact a phony form of globalization. Internationalism (no borders) for those at the top; nationalism (borders) for those at the bottom. Real globalization can only move one way: bottom-up.
Spoken like a true black with unresolved colonial issues.
@1 Way to prove his point. And if you didn’t actually read either link, from the 2nd: “a divisive and little-understood aspect of contemporary French society” means French = WHITE.
Speaking as a resident of one of those countries that is “freaking out” I can say that I could give a fuck what color the illegal immigrants are but care a whole fuck lot more that they are people with little to no education or skills and by coming in in such an unregulated fashion, there’s no way to cull the minority of asshole criminals from the larger group. If every single fucking one of them was Aryan, I would feel the same way.
I would also add that when you attack the concerns of people about immigration as mere “they hatez the brown peoples. Theyz raaacist” you will make those people tune you out. It could well be that some or even many fears about large waves of illegal immigrants coming into very delicate economies are overblown or misunderstood, but you aren’t going to get to explain that to someone who you just spat “you fucking racist” at. I’m not going to listen very long to the argument of someone who incorrectly diagnosed my concern as pure racial animus.
Also some might travel to North Seattle.
@3 France passed a ban on wearing a burqa that affected an estimated FOUR HUNDRED French women, don’t try to tell me hundreds of years of racism/anti-Semitism has just gone away.
Didn’t De Palma’s Scarface start this way?
As a former resident and a passport holder of one those countries as well, I must say #3 nailed it.
If it was all about skin color, that all the armchair self-righteous crusaders here seems to be convinced of, than Brits and Germans wouldn’t not have been freaking out about Eastern European immigration wave back in 2004/2005.
Oh wait, they did. And still are freaking out, a lot.
And what about the Swedish minaret ban in 2009? THERE WERE FOUR MINARETS IN SWEDEN!!!
@8, you’re thinking Swiss minaret ban.
I too live in one of the countries that’s freaking out, and lemme tell you, it is a major overreaction. It makes it rather difficult to just live a normal life as an immigrant. When societies freak out about immigration, it’s not just the under-educated immigrant population that feels the crackdown – it’s also the college grad, full-time employed, completely bilingual immigrant population.
AND let us not forget that people from Africa and the Middle East have lived in some of these European countries for generations! When every single person of color who I know regularly gets asked ign’t shit about where they are from, how they learned the language so well, whether they are adjusting well to living in a country where women don’t all wear burkas – well. Let’s just say it’s fucking apparent there’s a problem, shall we?
Oh and #7, you don’t quite seem to grasp that in the eyes of Western Europe, Slavic/Eastern European does not necessarily equal “white”. Believe it or not xenophobia can apply to people with pale skin too, if they have a certain accent or a last name ending in -ski. So… your comment proves quite the opposite of what you think it does.
Immigrants are a scapegoat for larger social problems, and that’s as true in the US as in Europe. The reality is that the consensus in favor of finance capitalism over social democracy is killing jobs and economic development on both sides of the Atlantic, and a more liberal immigration policy that provides legal means for people to work in other countries so that their exploitation can’t be used to drive down wages.
The wise course for Europe in particular would be to embrace democratic change in North Africa, and extend European economic consolidation to that region so that those gains can be made permanent. Stable and prosperous North African countries mean a predictable rate of immigration, with most people staying where they were born because there are ample opportunities, but with the ability of people to live, work, and move throughout the Mediterranean because it’s a better way of living than borders and demonization of foreigners.
@5 The ban on the Burqa is about the seperation of church and state. In France seperation of church and state is perceived as forced secularization. Thew majority of catholic have restrictions about how they must behave as well. America has a much more personal freedom oriented constitution whereas the French constitution is more oriented towards societal good.
Don’t fucking chime in with your accusations of racism when you don’t know what you are fucking talking about. French society does have racist issues but the ban on the Burqa is not because of that.
Well-stated, Cascadian @10, about both the effect of shock capitalism and Europe’s vital interest in a stable, democratic North Africa.
Two observations about this sentence from Charles Mudede regarding Europe:
1. I swear some people deliberately interchange “its” and “it’s”–like they’re trying to thumb their nose at those of us who care about grammar.
2. Europe’s vital whiteness? Mr. Mudede apparently has not been to Western Europe lately because some of its capitals already are very black and very brown.
Accusing nations like France and the UK of wanting to retain their “vital whiteness” is a bit like accusing Texas A&M of still wanting to be a men’s only school after they just won the women’s NCAA basketball championship.
Good Afternoon Charles,
I agree with @3 & @12. In fact, I really wonder who’s more of the racist here the “old” xenophobic European or Gadaffi himself? Seems the civil war that Gadaffi is waging is driving out and making immigrants of all Libyans. Europe has long reckoned with immigrants from the Magreb. I ask is Col. Gadaffi actually driving out the “black” Libyans? Seems he is and it’s pretty racist to me. The man must depart. He is bad for Libyans and Africans as well.