It is hard to imagine the suffering and degradation of famine and how it continues to transform the spiritual, technological and intellectual traditions and futures that we nurture. When I read about famines of Bengal, at one level I wonder about all the friends and relatives I am missing out on, but also now the learning and teaching value of these disasters and what they demand of the decolonial eco-politics that remains in our dreams.
It is a peculiar, dizzying and colonial wound and bind. So I'm putting together this work-in-progress resource page to raise awareness, and creative resistance to the criminal individuals and infrastructures of arrogance celebrated by the new five pound note pictured below.
Progress is wider and higher recognition of the Bengal Famine of 1943 in the story Britain tells itself and the world about World War 2. I do not celebrate indentured foot soldiers of white supremacy as British Asian or British Indian or British Muslim history worth celebrating, though I wish them well in the afterlife.
Petniti: The Practical and Epistemic politics of hunger
A lot of decision-making still occurs in the mental shadows of famine. From adopting problematic agricultural technologies pushed at us as solutions to famine and climate doom, to acquiescing to tyrannical political relations just to survive/thrive, from falling into overpopulation-thinking, to taking that job that probably messes the world up further. Putting food on the table has a different meaning when political, economic and nutritional stunting is so apparent. Its even in the language.
The term petniti, which we use in Bangla to capture the politics (rajniti) of filling one's own stomach (pet), opens up new horizons of manipulation, which we can call developmentshire. Developmentshire comes into being not just in the conventional case of a donor, an implementing organisation and their hapless victim, but in the of knowledge itself, religion, war and art.
The region we call Bengal has hosted famines for millennia. In 3rd century BC Mahastangarh (near Bogra) we have evidence of government relief efforts. The intensity of famines upon the arrival of colonial systems of exploitation, and transition states has been of another order altogether, the three most awful of which are
The Great Bengal Famine of 1769-70, which unfolded alongside the rise of the British East India Company. 10 million, or a third of the then population is though to have died.
The Bengal Famine of 1943, which took place alongside British colonial policies of denial. An estimated 3.5 million lost their lives.
The Bangladesh Famine of 1974 occurred in the context of the aftermath of the Bangladesh war. Some estimate a million died, though the official number is 26 000 [Beware of number politics in this period]. [Source: Banglapedia]
The Resources
Eventually this section will include videos, podcasts, online books, the odd article and hopefully some primary sources.
Liberating Nadiya
I was watching the Chronicles of Nadiya recently and thinking about representations of Bangladesh in the international media, what they are, who they work for and what is actually real about them.
Reading about Bangladesh in most places you might think that the government there was a strong partner in The War on Terror, developing its people and that the only injustice was coming from the direction of deranged Muslims. Give or take a bit of white right left liberal frosting. That's the fiction that the Foreign Minister of the Occupied Turtle Island John Kerry dwelt in on his recent visit to the country. Its the fiction that people like Tahmima Anam write about and that Jeremy Corbynjaan says he reads, Lord guide him.
Begum Nadiya is real, talented, lovely, being commodified, and growing in agency and brilliance. Britain needs a good Muslim story to offset the awful ones and its mutating Islamophobia and she's generating feelings, even tears, of love among many. The Chronicles are well-shot two-parter that in my mind valourises the creative genius of our mothers and aunts and takes us on a trip from the mystical-material shini of the gonj, with kissing otters to the urban dystopias of culinarily challenged elite NGO workers and the North-South University ghetto.
I am all for integration. Therefore I wonder what meal I would cook up for the country's political prisoners in Kashempur and Dhaka Central Jail's, and their families, not to mention those of the assassinated, massacred and disappeared? After all, we usually recognise the vertical and the horizontal when we cook and eat, as well as when we see.
Who are you calling a one party state?
Over the past few months many have been enthusiastic to call Turkey a one party state. More recently we have observed Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov, who presided over the 2005 Andijan Massacre, transition towards a state of divine accountability. Karimov was a strong partner in the war on terror, and backed by The War on Terriors all the way, ex-British diplomat Craig Murray has a blog pretty much dedicated to this in all its colonial detail.
Well, desh actually IS a one party state, in which the state gets away with murders most foul, and the stench trail reaches well into these (English) shores: int development, culture and the political establishment . Every year, the British government puts a quarter of a billion into the hands of the country's NGOs. The niece of the Prime Minister is a sitting Labour Party MP.
In 2014, the ruling Awami League ran the fakest general election in the country's history, possibly giving the British Labour party purge a run for its money in the ridiculousness department. It was so fake that they had to ask their coalition ally, The Jatiya Party to form a pretend opposition whilst they blocked political gatherings by their political opponents by blockading their homes with trucks filled with sand [watch here]. This is a regime that massacres people, most heart-breakingly during the Dhaka Massacre, which claimed the lives of countless unarmed sit-in protesters as they slept and prayed in the early hours of 6th May 2013 [archive here]. This is a regime which has introduced new legislation to enforce a self-serving and rather lobotomising perspective on history as national liberation delivery.
The Judicial Murder of Mir Quasem Ali
This is a regime that just a few hours ago judicially murdered the media pioneer and philanthropist Mir Quasem Ali, in a blood sacrifice to their Islamophobic [Article] political idol of Bengali Nationalism. His son, Arman or Mir Ahmad Bin Quasem, who was also one of his father's defence barristers, was illegally detained by state agencies on August 9 , nobody knows where they've put him and they are denying holding him [HRW Report]. It is a new level of cruelty that he will (probably) not be able to lead his fathers funeral prayer. Altogether, a sorrowful and terrifying time for the family, who have been on the receiving end of state persecution since the tribunals were established in 2010.
We believe that the ongoing impacts of our deeds continue to benefit us in the after life. Shaheed Mir Quasem Ali was an institution builder in health, media and banking and I'm beginning to learn about how generous in spirit and material he was. In so many ways he embodied the brighter practical side of the country's Political Islam tradition and so my guess is that he is deed rich.
I will write about the case specifics in more depth at a later time, but two points before dropping some resources at your feet. First off, the tribunal that convicted Mir Quasem is a kangaroo court concerned with killing opposition politicians, manipulating the public and the judiciary, consolidating power and extending hegemony over history, bodies and resources. Secondly, I'm still not sure how to make truths, restorative justice and reconciliation out of the Bangladesh War, but Yasmin Saikia has got an idea [Video]. The family campaign website is here. David Bergman's hole-prone archive of the tribunals is here. The Tribunal's 2014 judgement in here and the 2012 Skype Scandal is here.
Responses
The early responses from Bangladeshis are mixed, as one would expect. I suspect a lot of people are sick to death with them. The prayerfully sympathetic are asking the Almighty to accept Mir Quasem as a martyr, because he was killed in the path of truth and social service. People on Twitter are expressing solidarity on #WeAreMirQuasemAli and are smaller group is reproducing hatred against him with stale Shahbag-era quotes. My guess is that we will learn a lot more about his work and legacy with time.
Meanwhile the local, tightly monitored media compete with each other for horror honours, putting a new gloss on the term Sustainable Lievelihood Framework. Diaspora Awami League institutions are even more surreal, with ATN Bangla UK broadcasting a pro-government report with hindi melodrama music. Small groups of ultra nationalist hangsters celebrate their Independence and Liberation from Pakistan. With no sense of irony.
Decided it might be
fun to unread Mayor of London Sadiq Khan’s public entry onto the Labour
leadership catwalk in today's Observer. As Owen Smith is very unlikely to win in next month’s
election, these kinds of statements can help us speculate as to what’s really going
on and what the performance of challenge is about. Paul Mason’s recent Sound
of Blairite Silence medium blog makes for interesting rune-reading, but lets focus on Khan's public reasoning of his unsurprising support for the establishment coup candidate.
Having this week inaugurated London’s Night Tube, Mayor Khan (mashAllah) has in many ways had
a markedly easier ride than Labour Leader Corbynjaan, though he has enjoyed
his party leader’s political slipstream in London. His job is also
a lot more fun and capitalist sucky. I haven’t heard Khan talk about the
workings and alternatives to neoliberalism in the city he governs. That said, Corbyn does possess a racial privilege that has made his experience and rise possible.
What are the chances of coming across a Spirit of Bandung diasporic MP in such pole position? Have you ever heard of a Mayor of a major modern city
conclude that cities are inherently engines of inequality and unreformable?
Me
neither
We Cannot Win with Jeremy ... so I will vote for Owen Smith
I’ve thought hard
about my role in the Labour leadership election. I considered staying neutral
because, as mayor, I need to work with everyone to get the best deal for
London. But I’ve been asked how I’ll vote by many of the Labour
members and supporters who helped me throughout my campaign, and they deserve
an answer.
I played no part in
the Labour turmoil earlier this summer. I’ve had the honour of being elected as
a Labour councillor, MP and mayor, thanks to the hard work of Labour members,
and I believe that the will of our membership should be respected. I value
loyalty, and believe that internal disagreements shouldn’t be voiced in the
media – because divided parties lose elections. But there is now an open and
democratic contest for the leadership, and Labour members deserve to know how I
intend to vote.[That’s two
paragraph’s of ‘with respect’, now to business]
Jeremy Corbyn is a principled Labour man.
I’ve been disturbed by the nasty abuse that has been hurled in all directions
over the last 12 months. There should be no place for this in our party. I
nominated Jeremy for leader last year – but did not vote for him – and I do not
regret nominating him because party members deserved that choice [Better than Beckett who called herself a
mug, but stunningly Blairite in that this, structural, choice now no longer
matters] . His campaign last summer was a breath of fresh air and offered hope
to many.
I have little time
for those who say that Jeremy is only leader because of “entryism” [Nice dig at Labour nutcases like Tom Watson
and Mike Gapes]. It is undoubtedly a good thing that our party membership
is growing. Vibrant political parties are vital to the health of our democracy.
Our new members, like all of us, are desperate for a Labour government to make
Britain fairer.
And that is why I
have decided to vote for Owen
Smith – because Labour party members, and the British people,
need Labour to win the next general election.
By every available
measure [Coup determined polls are the
new murky facts on the ground], if Jeremy remains as leader, Labour is
extremely unlikely to win the next general election. The hopes of the members
who have joined our party would be dashed again [This is a strange convolution of reality. If the establishment wins, new
members hopes will be crushed, but I’m sure they will push back stronger].
Jeremy has already proved that he is unable to organise an effective team, and
has failed to win the trust and respect of the British people [Labour PLP are not the people, the more
people encounter him without mediation, the more they like him, like on the
Victoria Derbyshire show this week]. We need to be honest and recognise
that means it will be more likely that the NHS will come under even greater
attack from the Tories. More likely that we will see even deeper Tory cuts.
More likely that our industrial heartlands will continue to decline, and that
zero-hours contracts and job insecurity will become the norm. Because the
Tories will stay in power, and Labour will stay in opposition. [The coup, which started when the new
leadership started, has done more to ensure this that anything else, so quit
with the disaster capitalism and project fear]
Jeremy’s personal
ratings [Poll bias again, coup
determined polls, polls failed to predict GE2015 and EU referendum result, they
are designed to/by fool] are the worst of any opposition leader on record –
and the Labour party is suffering badly as a result. He has lost the confidence
of more than 80% of Labour’s MPs in parliament – and I am afraid we simply
cannot afford to go on like this. [Labour
MPs can come in differing degrees of evil, weak and stupid. Post EU referendum
they would do anything to distract themselves from their own failures and
inadequacies, their bubble had burst and as a group their capacity for
foolishness was higher than on an average day.]
This failure was
most starkly demonstrated in a heartbreaking way throughout the EU referendum.
Like most Labour activists, I campaigned hard for Britain to stay in the EU.
Campaigners told me [Classic way to
distance yourself from bullshit refusal to recognise the effectiveness of Remain
and Reform and the folly of EUvangelism] that Jeremy was failing to
persuade Labour supporters outside London, so I went to campaign in Manchester,
Leeds and Bradford. I was devastated by the result, and have spent every minute
of the last two months trying to salvage the best possible outcome for London
and our country – and reassuring EU citizens already living in Britain that
they will remain welcome. [It’s not the
end of the world bro, much of the fear was a consequence of the fearmongering
nature of the stupid Remain campaign].
Throughout the
campaign and aftermath, Jeremy failed to show the leadership we desperately
needed. His position on EU membership was never clear – and voters didn’t
believe him. A third of Labour voters said they didn’t know where the party
stood on the referendum just a week before polling day [ Coup determined polls do not count as trustworthy data… but I suppose
you are speaking to a certain kind of poll maker/reader] . And you can’t
just blame a “hostile media” and let Jeremy and his team off the hook. I know
from my own election – up against a nasty and divisive Tory campaign – that, if
we are strong and clear enough in our convictions, the message will get through
to the public [nearly a million crude
white supremacist in London voted for Crosby framed Goldsmith]. That’s a
test that Jeremy totally failed in the EU referendum. Why would things be
different in a general election? [Because
you aren’t fighting an internal tory power game with your hands tied behind
your backs by incompetent MBEs like Will Straw and Alan Johnson. GE2020 will could
present and articulate beautiful political horizon, but that’s a future you
want to kill in the bud, to Prevent].
To make matters
worse, the next day I was astonished to see Jeremy on television calling for
the government to immediately invoke article 50 and take Britain out of the EU [That’s what a decisive government would do,
with a contingency plan, that respected its voters and partners in the EU. The
real abdicator here was Cameron, but you seem to have forgotten him altogether….
Or your predecessor Boris Johnson]. This would be devastating. It would
cause economic chaos, a huge increase in unemployment, and would really hurt
the most vulnerable people – as well as cause EU citizens in Britain terrible
uncertainty over their future. [Capital probably wants more wiggle room to
profit from uncertainty and put off the inevitable.]
I served with Owen
Smith in the shadow cabinet and he has the strongest Labour values [Here we go, the one paragraph endorsement,
it must really be hard to commit to someone the establishment probably won’t
allow through to 2020 in the unlikely event of his victory (as Frank Field makes clear on
Hard Talk the other day) ]. We were both politicised in the 1980s [You were born in the same year, the world
is round, well done.]. Throughout that decade an ineffective and split
Labour party allowed a Tory government to do untold damage to our country [That is a myopic parallel reading, try
this one ] . On the big issues Owen and I have been on the same side of
the argument, including opposing the Iraq war [Not noticeably]. Owen led and – more importantly – won our fight
against the Tories’ unfair cuts to tax credits and disability allowances, which
would have hurt the most disadvantaged people in our society [Interesting individual attribution].
And [coup-determined] poll after [coup-determined] poll shows that Owen
is far more popular with the public than Jeremy – and far more likely to win
the next election.
Simply opposing
Tory policies will never be enough to help the people we exist to support. At
best, you knock just the very sharpest edges off the Tory project [said the Mayor and Guardian of London’s
Capital]. Winning elections is how you really make a difference. Only then
are you in control – able to shape the agenda and implement Labour policies to
create a fairer and more equal society. If we give up on winning, we give up on
the very people who need us the most. [The
subliminal playground loser thesis, better pal up to the bully then… oh you
already are.]
On 24 September, no
matter who wins the leadership contest, the Labour party must ultimately unite
again, oppose this new Tory government and provide a vision to the British
public of how a Labour government would improve their lives [negating the 10 previous paragraphs of
reheat then?] Talk of a split or a new party is deeply irresponsible and
would make it easier for the Tories to win again.
We can’t afford to
spend another moment fighting each other. We need to put all our efforts into
fighting for a Labour government at the next election, and I believe that Owen
Smith is the best person to lead that fight. [There you go, backers happy not to be mentioned, Corbynjaan won’t hold
a grudge. Win-Win. Sunday morning tally soundbite done]
Another disappeared brother,
and struggler,
You stood your ground and didn't leave,
Despite years and years and years of grief
We pray you are well and strong,
along with those who for too long
Have been strained and fizzed.
by this Gopalganj Horror Show.
That specialises in making orphans.
Maybe,
God forbid,
They have murdered you already,
Like the garments martyr Aminul Islam
Or worse still the victims of the Motijheel Massacre.
Scores if not hundreds dead, buried and erased.
Do you know what the exchange rate is these days?
Desh's political cul de sac,
never fails to find new ways to suck
It is a killer's market,
Better still if the killer is the state.
Best of all with a War on Terror mandate
Maybe,
And I suppose this is the better case scenario,
They'll charge you with some epic bullshit offence,
Some say conspiracy and cock up theories are mutually exclusive
Oh to have the power,
To break you out of your confines,
Using nothing but the power of our minds.
Video footage of Fetullah Gulen and Tayeb Erdogan officiate the nikah ceremony of footballer Hakan Sukur and Esra Elbirlik in 1994. Erdogan, then mayor of istanbul performed the nikah, while Gelen acted as Sukur's witness. Alas the wedding didnt last long. Esra died in the Izmir earthquake of 1999. There's an arrest warrant out for Hakan over the coup attempt.
The #ChickenCoup against Jeremy Corbyn and company's leadership of the British Labour Party has hit the rocks, and in the words of Novara media, The Eagle Is Stranded.
It was fitting that Corbynjaan stood his ground to deliver an early and thoughtful response to the Chilcot Report on Britain's involvement in the 2003 war and occupation of Iraq (video below). It is hard to imagine a technocratic publication can do justice to 1.2 million dead Iraqi people, but we pray and do what we can. His leadership is something good in this world and long may it continue and catalyse others to realise political transformation. The shadow cabinet are a phalanx of hope against a tide of interconnected colonial entrenchment, neoliberal cloneliness and austerity killing. And its not just the leadership and the public who realise this. Geographer Danny Dorling's recent editorial in the British Medical Journal underlines Corbyn's Remain and Reform approach to the EU referendum about austerity being the problem, not immigration, with bucketfuls of data.
Amongst others things, the #ChickenCoup was intended to limit Chilcot damage to the Blairite pro-war wing of the Labour Party. It was partially effective in this sense, for example Jon Snow's c4 News fluffed up the guest panel consisting of Blairite Charles Falconer, ex general Jackson and a grieving mother of a British soldier killed by Blair's war. It is easy to conclude that journalists have been so caught up in covering Labour's inner turmoil that they took their eyes off the ball.
Game of Leaks
With nothing to lose, somebody, presumably a ChickenCouper, recorded Neil Kinnock, a former party (double loser) leader screaming his head off and thumping a table. The way that the Guardian (embroiled in its own civil war over Corbynjaan) and VICE have disseminated it, I think they hope it will damage Corbyn.
Maybe it will, however, it is also good field data to examine the political cosmology of its author and an 80s throwback to previous failures that haunt a lot of people. A critical analysis of the Kinnock family in British and European politics and their continuing influence on newish members of the PLP is long due but for now note how he's battling his peers: the ghost of Tony Benn, who is dead, and Dennis skinner. He skips over the New Labour project and neoliberalism, and his primary explicit beef with Corbynjaan is to quote someone saying he was weird, and egotistically defending his percentage increase of PLP approval for turning right after losing the 87 election to Thatcher.
This is the Guardian's sanitised transcript...
God knows, everybody here, no matter how old or how young, should understand the lessons. And never repeat that again. But there are some who, for whatever reason, are incapable of the instruction of reality. So they better wake up.
I don’t know what case is being made by saying that – and I quote - ‘Jeremy had the biggest majority in history’ – he didn’t. In 1988 - in a different electoral system, admittedly – my majority against Tony Benn was 88.6%. Tony got 11.4%, with the assistance of Dennis [Skinner], of course, and the assistance of Jeremy Corbyn, of course. No talk of unity or loyalty could suppress their enthusiasm. [Loud applause] [Bit of a self and PLP centered approach which failed in 1992]
In the constituency parties, that in 1981 had overwhelmingly voted for Tony’s leadership candidature, the result was Kinnock 82%, Benn 18%. Why? Because the constituency parties, the rank and file, had decided they’d had enough of posturing and hectoring and they wanted to give the Labour party a real chance of securing advance and power. And we gained 3.1m votes because of those people. [There is another analysis of Kinnock's turn right]
Now then, we can take further instruction from modern history, the way in which, in the supermarket, people said: ‘I want to vote Labour, but I can’t vote for Ed Miliband’. I heard it, oh yes I heard it. Apply the supermarket test for Jeremy Corbyn and see what answer you get.[which supermarket?]
We know what answer we’re getting on the doorstep. Yes I’ve been around raising money like you Dennis [Skinner], for many, many, many years – I think it’s probably a bit more than a million. I’ve been around raising money and I go on the doorstep and I talk to people. I quote one person, just one, out of hundreds in Cardiff three weeks ago. Well, he complained about Jeremy and I said, ‘Honestly, his heart’s in the right place, he wants to help people, he wants to help people like you.’ He’s a working-class guy, a fitter on what remains of the docks. And he said: ‘I know he’s saying it, because he thinks we’re easy. We’re not bloody easy. We’re not listening, especially since he’s weird.’ [Weird? is that it?]
Now that is unfortunate. But you know. Everybody in this room knows, canvassing in the Welsh elections, in the Scottish elections, in the local elections, in the referendum – you know that is what you’re getting from people who yearn to vote Labour but are inhibited by the fact that Jeremy is still our leader. [Scotland sailed a long time ago and tbf you dont have any substantial evidence. want to acknowledge your people's role in undermining him]
Let’s face the facts. So here’s some very, very, very recent history. I could explore it more but I’m not going to take everybody’s time with this speech.
Nobody has ever said, Dennis, that this parliamentary party considers itself or should be considered to be more important than the rank and file, whether they paid three quid or whether they’ve given their lives to this movement [Not true, there's plenty of hostility to newbies, like being referred to as dogs]. Whether they’ve threatened their managers, whether they’ve ruined their careers through their commitment to this movement [perhaps you risked stuff once, but the folks you've patronised haven't risked or fought for anything recently]. Nobody has said, ever, however recent or long-established members’ party membership is, that we are superior. [Well now that you've made it clear...]
More history [but presumably not about your own failures]. Perhaps this is a time to a remind. In 1906 and then in the constitution of 1918, in Clause 1 they laid down that it would be the purpose of the Labour party to establish and retain, in parliament and in the country, a political Labour party. Everybody’s happy. [At this point Kinnock is asked to finish.] I’m finishing now in a moment – well, I’m finishing the speech in a moment. [Loud applause]
In 1918, in the shadow of the Russian Revolution, they made a deliberate, conscious, ideological choice, that they would not pursue the syndicalist road, that they would not pursue the revolutionary road – it was a real choice in those days. They would pursue the parliamentary road to socialism. [and in the event of the PLP being colonised by neoliberalism?]
It is why, in all of the subsequent constitutions, we had a provision that requires the leader of the Labour party – that used to be, as Dennis will recall, to be elected only by the PLP. We worked like hell – Dennis, myself and many others – to change that to make sure that the rank and file would have a direct voice, that trade unions would be part of it, councils would be part of it, activists would be part of it, so we got one member one vote. [now you are going to negate what you've just said]
Because we are a democratic socialist party, committed to a parliamentary road to power, it is vital, essential, irreplaceable, that the leader of this party has substantial – at least substantial, if not majority – support from those who go to the country and seek election to become lawmakers, the way chosen by the people who established the Labour party. [doesn't factor for Blairite hollowing out of PLP]
Now remember history, remember that history, remember the people that joined the party are joining a party committed to the parliamentary road [Corbyns a revolutionary? come on] and that makes it crucial to have a leader that enjoys the support of the parliamentary Labour party.
A final, final point. Steve Reed made a very fine contribution. There will be no split! There will be no retreat! Dammit this is our party! I’ve been in it for 60 years, I’m not leaving it to anybody! [Bakwas over]
Reporting islamophobic and racial offenses,
Are the currency of the Liberidinal Economy.
Our parents salved far deeper wounds than these.
He said, to the chimes of the Fasting Bell
Commodify the structure of your oppression,
For somebody else's database, and dismissal.
But don't forget to whiten it up, for good measure.
Said Mama and the good cop to the libtard horn section of the bremoaning snorus.
This is practical suggestion
Not simply decolonial dismissal.
Our pain receptors are networked after all.
Just overloaded with current bums.
Ohms aren't my favourite unit of resistance to Power.
So take that zulm, geopoetically,
Pull back,
And fire your nuron cannons into the eyes of white supremacy.
Tomorrow (Monday 27th July) at 6pm in Parliament Square, Momentum have called for an emergency action expressing solidarity and confidence in Jeremy Corbyn's leadership. Corbyn - and what his rise means - is a vital trajectory of hope in this increasingly despairing society.
A ray of hope that the media and Labour Right establishments are committed to stamping out.
With the shocking results ( .csv) of last Thursday's EU referendum still being ingested, and a spike in right-wing violence and intimidation of eastern European and non-white people, Tony Blair's political children in the Parliamentary Labour Party have decided that now is the best time to try a coup.
It is pretty sickening, but hopefully demonstrates the truth of the matter.
The Chilcot Report into the UK decision to go to war on Iraq is due in little over a week, we can think of Tony Blair' Labour bots as accessories to his acts of national destruction and ISIS creation. Coloniality and imperialism overseas is connected to the political game afoot here today, and we can no because the technocrats.
For a few months now we have been pondering the costs, benefits and horizons of the UK leaving the EU. My tendency is to cross the remain box, not out of support for enwhitenment values, or the white supremacy that the project represents, but because an empowered Govinator would wreak havoc on Muslims, minorities and the marginalised in the UK, not to mention everything and everyone else. I have some time for Corybnjaan and Varoufakis' respective transformation and transparency proposals, and think in terms of post-Newtonion politics of assemblage, alliance and multiplication with folks on the mainland. There is also the matter of convenience and uncertainty on close ones.
Fundamentally, this referendum is not an epistemological referendum on Eurocentricity, thats not what the Euroskeptic wing of the Tory party have been pushing for all these years.
Perhaps the Benazir effect and Halography of last week's political establishment false flag? assassination of innocent MP Jo Cox will prove an important factor to galvanise and clinch it for the cringeworthy Remain campaign this Thursday. It is hard to know how much disgust will have influenced turnout and decisions and difficult to have much faith in pollsters given their failures last year and propensity to poll superficially, pushily and counter democratically.
That Day humankind shall issue forth upon diverse paths to witness their deeds.
So whosoever does a mote's weight of good shall see it.
And whosoever does a mote's weight of evil shall see it.
Here, the Qur'an speaks about the Day of Judgement and Accountability, detailing the Earth herself as an ultra high resolution, female, divinely inspired, live, witness of human deeds. Personally this is an epic chapter to me. Muslims prostrate their heads upon her surface more than 40 times every day, in recognition of the vertical relationship between humanity and The Most High. In another sense, it is an expression of solidarity and horizontal relations with the rest of creation.
12 June 2016 was "Sacred Earth Day of Prayer and Action for People and the Planet", a mobilisation of more-than-material ecological remembrance and embodiment #sacredearth2016. A coalition of religious formations, catalysed mainly by OurVoices, the idea is to compel power holders to commit to deeper global climate safety by building a practical and moral movement. Over one hundred official events were scheduled all over the world which makes my heart smile.
Sacred Earth Day marked 6 months since the UN Climate Change talks in Paris, and arguably more inspiringly Yeb Sano and company's People's Pilgrimage. It has been about a year since the Roman Catholic Pope Francis published his AWESOME treatise on Socio-Climatic Justice, and the moving Multifaith Convergence on Rome organised by the Greenfaith team that connected Christianities, Hindu, Sikh, Jewish, Buddhist and Muslim environmentally curious, conscious and activisty types.
Yes, developmentia, coloniality and NGOisation are real, but that cannot overwhelm the sincerity and beauty of bringing action-orientated spirituality's together in convergence for climate justice.
The Ramadanoscope
As it is the month of Qur'anic revelation, Ramadan, there is another ocean of meaning through which Muslims and friends can access the Sacred Earth, without intermediaries or gatekeepers, calendars or colanders. All over the globe we attempt to organise our individual, and communal lives to attain greater piety through acts of devotion, particularly fasting. Though the daylight food cessation element gets a lot of the airplay, it is the spiritual struggle, of attaining excellence in behaviour and journeying through the Qur'an, that is the fundamental purpose of this month.
O you who believe!
Fasting is prescribed for you,
as it was prescribed for those before you,
That you may learn piety. (Chapter 2 Verse 183)
Islamic scholars have written about this month's movement for centuries, here's Maulana Rumi on the spiritual richness and empowerment of fasting.
There’s hidden sweetness in the stomach’s emptiness.
We are lutes, no more, no less.
If the soundbox is stuffed full of anything, no music.
If the brain and belly are burning clean with fasting,
every moment a new song comes out of the fire.
The fog clears, and new energy makes you
run up the steps in front of you.
Be emptier and cry like reed instruments cry.
Emptier, write secrets with the reed pen.
When you’re full of food and drink,
Satan sits where your spirit should,
an ugly metal statue in place of the Kaaba.
When you fast,
good habits gather like friends who want to help.
Fasting is Solomon’s ring.
Don’t give in to some illusion and lose your power,
but even if you have, if you’ve lost all will and control,
they come back when you fast, like soldiers appearing
out of the ground, pennants flying above them.
A table descends to your tents, Jesus’ table.
Expect to see it, when you fast, this table
spread with other food, better than the broth of cabbages.
The social sphere is an integral to enabling and sustaining transformations, and thats what the relatively small official Muslim participation in Sacred Earth 2016 is getting at. For example, yesterday in Zinj, Bahrain, women gathered to launch their own Sacred Earth initiative and toolkit to drive ecoakhlaq ( practical ecological ethics) back into local Ramadan practices of consumption and waste reduction. Meanwhile, Indonesians have been organising large Zero Waste Green Iftars sunset breakfasts), which sounds like a lot of washing up. Back in the UK of A and the NGO MADE have a short blog post that touches on coffee, vegetarianism, drinking tap water, gardening and eating greens.
Its hardly the green and golden age of eco Islam out there, for all number of unsatisfying reasons. However a lot of people have their ears open and dialogue is widening. There are some real jewels if you spend some time panning, for example a series of 20+ programmes from Iqraa TV channel called Repairing the Earth by Rhamis Kent.
Fasting not Feasting was a series of practical reminders, like Flashmob Iftars and Tarawih prayers with Trees, that continues to run through Ramadan life, pushing a socio-ecological solidarity and counter-consumer culture. Its 2010 website is still online and hosts resources that you might find a use for in family and community life.
Outdoor praying and Iftar picnics are becoming more common in the diasporic west, for pro Creation Relations reasons as well as racist ones (yes that's you Davis). And as a consequence, the opportunities to connect and commit to Islamic and civic eco-political-ethical trajectories will multiply. On the other hand, sole focus on personal and community resource austerity measures and lifestyle issues risks that eco Islam becomes yet another depoliticisation in our Age of Preventitude. I've seen a lot of this in the NGO discourse.
But, by connecting the spheres with decolonial tunnelling, accepting that climate change is fundamentally a problem of coloniality, I believe we can maintain integrity between our teachings, historical communities and futures. Just like they do in the People's Republic of Duriana.
Save the Dates
There are a few advanced notice events worth considering for the diary, thanks to various Muslim Scounts groups there is an action-packed 'Iftar under the Stars' in Luton next Saturday ( 18th) and in Chingford a week after that( 25th). A few weeks after Eid sees the return of the Willowbrook Arts and Music Festival (23/24th July).
Manajat Wandering through your Beautiful Names, I call on You Al Mani', The Preventer of Harm, to make the pathways to protecting people easy for us, whether that is indigenous delta engineering in Bangladesh, social protection policies or the realisation of the rights of migrants and refugees. I call on You Al Matin, The Powerful, to empower the oppressed to voice and make their way in this world. I call on You Al Jabbar, The Compeller, to open the hearts and minds of climate tyrants, witting or unwitting, to realising a decolonial climate justice. Oh Al Musawwir, The Shaper of Beauty, assemble the courageous into an excellent movement, across your creation to restore balance, dignity and justice. Oh Ar Rashid, The Righteous Teacher, teach us how to speak with animals and plants, give our sciences life not neoliberal death.
I love Caroline Lucas, especially for her sincere support of detainee and extraditee poet Talha Ahsan during his ordeal through the British and US injustice systems. Yesterday she announced she would be running for co-leadership of the Green Party with Jonathan Bartley. I feel a bit annoyed that the new green leadership election looks cringey and predetermined from where I'm standing.
Co-Leader? FFS?!?!?
Bartley is an interesting running mate, not least for the nonsecular possibilities he conveys, but also his ahem ... experience working on John Major's conservative party election campaign fresh out of LSE. However, his whiteness is limiting to what the Green Party can achieve over the next 5 years and says what it is on the tin.
Fundamentally, the world's ecological crisis has a lot to do with white supremacy, and so race and decoloniality are more than decorative issues, they are integral to transformation. Clearly many of the people peopling the party don't really get it, from 'The Surge', to the Tower Hamlets group's silence during the coup on Lutfur while the BME group launched its manifesto from Bricklane, to their failure to select a non white person high up in their GLA list.
So why are they not an enwhitled bunch of neoMalthusianites again?
In the UK situation, Politically Black (PB) has come to be known as a term to cover the struggle of non-white racial groups to racial inequality. I used to think it was harmless enough, so long as folks delivered, but Afro Pessimism knows better. Politically Black is a sediment of an earlier consensus. I wish that I had been a closer witness the inception of this error which is propagating through life, art and politics and confusing matters.
Politically Black deletes the blackness of those who actually suffer anti-blackness. It complicates specific articulation and mobilisation against anti-blackness, an elemental form of oppression and grants weird licences to non black people to empower white supremacy's politics of containment.
Like the meeting of West India Dock Road and East India Dock Road, to become Commercial Road and the artery into the City of London, our histories are materially contributory to the white supremacy project. Yet there is a diversity to the nature and location of our colonial wounds, decolonial brotherhood means assisting with each other's healing, sharpening and blossoming processes, not obstructing. [The Three Pillars of White Supremacy is a useful way of beginning to thinking about this: Slavery/Capitalism, Genocide/Colonialism and Orientalism/War.]
So, at a moral level, it should be easy to divest political commitment from a term such as political black.
Following the good news of the election of the new president of the NUS (which has got supporters of Israel and white supremacists foaming at the mouth) there is the opportunity to reflect on and recraft our mental and political structure for the future. Just like after the West Indies cricket team of the 70s and 80s, there was actually no need to invest so much effort in cricket.
Political Black was one of those messy tactical compromises for a slightly earlier white supremacy. We are stronger together, but Politically Black is not The End of History, and the wrong binding agent is not durable under both external pressure and internal growth. It is no disrespect to the love and work of the more middle aged, nor the fiery younglings, to replace the term.
Colonially Wounded Communities (CWCs) must resist being white-mailed by acceptability politics and prevented from speaking the name of white supremacy to its prime beneficiaries, nor reminding them of the colonial realities of why we are here.
At the very least, people of decolonial commitment must never be traitor-shamed by Politically Black Enforcers, nor muffled by a Closed Eared Leaderships.
Lightened up and t shirtified
White supremacist Neoliberalism strikes again with ironic splendour.
A Queer universal chord
Struck across developmentshire
From core to semiperiphery,
Universal exclusivity.
Tormenting the other men and women put in their graves, pyres and asylums
By this regime of epic homocide.
We mourn and mark
With prayer and resolve.
For all souls and hopes
In His way.
Keep those selfies for Benazir.
Shaytan,
Ustad of hypocrisy
Laughs his head off.
"What do you know about justice?"
The death of two shall outweigh that of the hundreds thought massacred in Dhaka just three years ago at Shapla Chottor .
Two human bodies over hundreds invisible subhuman bodies
Monitoring & Evaluation report
Their value
multiplied by white
to the power three.
Upper middle class,
foreign embassy staff,
lgbt.
Shaytan,
Ustad of misdirecting rage
Laughing his head off again,
begins to fill in a very important
Socio-spiritual Impact Self Assessment form.
And abandons his tools to their fate.
