[New Word] Bracottobad

The city of the future, run entirely by an NGO, offering farticipatory development to the masses, staffed by the middling to keep the powerful undisturbed.

[New Word] Dumbographic

Race-to-the-bottom market-thinking targets these, as do folks technocratically preoccupied with 'grass roots'.

As we see the rise of the neoliberal muslim NGO in WarOnTerrorTimes, you must work on your self not to fall into somebody's target dumbographic.

Cultural commod(d)ity?

Audience under retardation?

Have-a-go NGO?

Spook?

Consumer?

Mid Ramadhan Movements at home and abroad

It is half way through Ramadhan, the moon has fattened up.


The Bangladesh Government is stopping groups from assisting Rohingyas it deems terrorist/ extremist, in line with that authority on mercy and humanity, the Myanmarese Buddhist Monk-Government complex. I understand that the Ansar approach is our starting point, and that the Awami League, who created Bangladesh largely with Indian Assistance and Refuge have turned the country into a porch of Developmentishire and beggardom.We know from the video below that all Bangladeshis aren't such arseholes.

To donate, the Turkish IHH is getting through, the Government of Bangladesh probably wouldn't dare close down its operations. However the political solution mustn't be sidelined and the debate must find its ovaries. We must pour scorn on the mean minded awami-think that has produced such a shameless approach to those fleeing despicable conditions.

On the Olympic front, The Brotherhood of neoliberal Muslims continues to suckle on the teat of its Olympic credibility cow, with FOSIS recently joining the fray with "Olympic Iftar" and the MCB leadership backing the ISBs Ramadhan Disasterval 'Inspired by London 2012'. Its dawa, mainstreaming and good apparently.

Meanwhile, last week, as many enjoyed Danny Boyle's Showcialist Opening Ceremony that completely airbrushed out British imperial legacy but gave the nearleft a warm glow inside,  scores of cyclists on a regular city ride with the #CriticalMass group were being kettled, arrested and bundled away outside the stadium.   For cycling.

In the next video we see a poetic Muslim articulating his need for iftar being denied by the police and arrested. Allahumma accept his roza and those of all your servants with a taste for justice.

Quilliam Responds to ‘Attempted Coup’ card played by Government of Bangladesh 19 January 2012 because that is todays date

Quilliam Responds to ‘Attempted Coup’ card played by Government of Bangladesh
 19 January 2012

We would like to expresses our excitement to hear the Awami League government is alleging that it has foiled a military coup in Bangladesh. This is not a ruse to deflect attention from them banging up Islamists left, right and centre. It means we can jump up and down and pretend that we know what is going on. The coup is said to have occurred on 22 December 2011, but has only been announced today by the Bangladeshi authorities. We do not find anything dubious in the previous sentence. BDNews 24, a Bangladeshi website is quoted as saying that on 22nd December 2011, Major Li-Miffed, an alleged Hizb ut-Tahrir leaflet holder, farted in the general direction of the gloriously liberated Bangladesh government. In company I tell you.

Some Army fellow that we met at a terrorisation and intimidation conference has confirmed to Quilliam that they have very strong suspicions that the coup is the work of Hizb ut-Tahrir.  This is because secular power in Bangladesh can’t tell its arse from its elbows. Quilliam knows, because we used to be members, that Hizb ut-Tahrir printed a few leaflets and talked to some army people in Bangladesh. We don’t know anything about the constellation of Islamic valued movements and shakements in Bangladesh. This is a game of language and power. Who promotes the use of military coups to gain power? [ Oh that was you the British government in Jan 2007]

[insert incomprehensible anonymous quote to mimic empirical insight]

"(change would) normally be...by the Party seeking to access the military in order to take the authority...After this the military would be capable of establishing the authority of Islām [did you see what I did to that a ?. smugface]. Hence a coup d'etat would be the manifestation of a political change...”

The anonymous source goes on to say that that Hizb ut-Tahrir has been actively targeting Bangladesh since the mutiny of the Bangladesh Rifle unit in 2009, when over 70 military personnel and civilians were killed. See we don’t know anything about Bangladesh, it was called the Bangladesh Rifles and there has been no independent investigation of this. Impossible with a pro-India regime.

This attempted military coup follows the 2011 Pakistani military coup attempt that wasn’t really an attempt, more of a dinner party. This charade was pinned on Brigadier Ailing Khandahar and four other senior military officers, all of whom were announced by the Armed Forces spokesperson as having ties to Hizb ut-Tahrir because they were handed a leaflet after juma prayers and thought the political parties were rubbish..

The porous border between Bangladesh and India is one that is being monopolised by extremist groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, to recruit Islamist fighters to carry out attacks similar to those in Mumbai in 2008. I who am writing this, am a shameless bastard, because I know that Bangladeshis are routinely killed, beaten and bribed at the border. Maybe I should have passed this over to ‘Ed’ Hussain, but he’s in the US and is passing himself off as Assamese, if not white, cant remember.

Raam Pant Nob-Jawqi, our Native Informant Paki said

‘I have visited Bangladesh several times to chat my usual shit, self publicise and serve white power. I am therefore extremely proud to hear that the government is using my former group in its eyewash’.

This political charade follows the British Government’s reduction in Dhaka-based counter development tourism. We were planning to link up with those bad boys in CRAP and Gram Mean  to hijack local ideas like we did in Pakistan with that khudi propaganda.

We would like to finger some cash off the government, to spy on Muslims and annoy them please. East London here we come.

Norman Terawala, who is older than me said this highly general wishy-washy statement because you probably care about the oil and domination in the Middle East, and we all think we’re Arabs. Did I tell you the one about my ancestor...

‘This attempted coup is contrary to recent democratization trends witnessed in the Arab Uprisings, and Hizb ut-Tahrir appears to be ignoring the new realities in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia and other Arab Muslim majority countries. As such, Hizb ut-Tahrir and its narrative are no longer relevant to the masses of youth striving for a third way [ HT Tony and late Mu’ammar] between extremism and dictatorships [ Zzzzz, are we done yet?]’.

On Prevent: What to do

Seems to me that resistance to this campaign particular campaign by the British Government to produce docile Muslim subjects is growing and needs to be both broadened and deepened.  I suspect its intimately tied with the discovery, creation and exercise of ummahtic mojo.

Here's what folks can do.

1. Read this dossier on PREVENT
2. Highlight the experiences and ordeals of those at the bum end of the Project to Produce Docile Muslims
3. Sharpen awareness of whats going on around us in legislation, institutional policies and everyday life
4. Convey the experiences of those who have previously engaged with this shit
5. Encourage radical forms of expression, action and imagination
6. Delegitimate engagement and engagers
7. Lampoon and spit upon ideological foundations of the project
8. Reward creative - disengagement with social dignity
9. Share best resistance practice

I do so hope that you share this good news with others.

Transparency International Bangladesh - National Household Survey 2010

So people are slightly miffed at Transparency International Bangladesh's (TIB) national household survey which fingers the judiciary as a highly corrupt sector, along with land administration, tax and customs, . You can read the breakdown in the executive summary here.

I wonder if TIB had to pay the court to find a technical fault in the plaintiff's application.

TIB has influenced knowledge-making on corruption for a long time. It considers itself a social movement yet in many ways is a case in point of the problems of NGOisation. However, whats interesting is that the findings concerning the judiciary come at a time in which the Government of Bangladesh and others would like to project the integrity of its judiciary.

A few years after the Caretaker Government adventure, its annoyingly clear that corruption is the carte blanch that apathetics use to stop giving a stuff about Bangladesh and what the World Bank uses to discipline and institute micro-surveillance on the Government of Bangladesh. 'Civil' society and the military used corruption as an important plank in their argument for the caretaker government. Quickly corruption becomes a dominating buzzword of disempowerment.

Ranking and surveying perceptions and experience with numbers within a eurocentric framework promoting 'transparency' has an audience of its own. But decolonial corruptionology must have other dimensions, sociological (eg. late Husain Alatas), embodied ethical and imaginal. I'm wondering what it might be.

like you can vote this away!

"If the ruling party is truly sincere about translating its pre-election promises into reality, it would be well-advised not to repeat the wrongs of the previous government including politicisation of different educational institutions along partisan lines and disregard for the rule of law. Otherwise, the people will call it to account come the next general elections, just as they did the previous elected government in the last parliamentary polls. "

Said the New Age, as an ngo report reports that the judiciary is quite corrupt and as the awami government show disregard for basic legal norms, drunk on empowered vengeful rage.

The press thing that the 'axe' of public voting is sufficient to keep a government in check?


Its quite pathetic really, almost as dubious as the military-sushil care taker government's reasoning behind the minus 2 formula.

What needs to happen is for there to be mass disenchantment from the clientelist political parties and new disciplined ideological formations and parties. The intellectual class, who are busy cashing in on private university teaching, consultancy and being dedicated foreign puppets have no credibility any more and need replacement.

Now step away from the NGO and put your hands in the air.

Against the NGOisation of Ummahtic Mojo

Its inspiring and heart warming that social engagement is on the increase. However, I feel so is development delusionalism amongst our people. I probably share it.

Just like we do not need to prove ourselves not to be paedophiles and register on naff 'mentoring schemes' to be effective brothers and sisters to our youth, we do not need to create development industry NGOs to affect transformation in our societies, at home and abroad.

We can construct alternative, superior arrangements for Islah. We are.

Some reasons to seek alternative means to development industry NGOs.

• They depoliticise people and problems, stifling the development of powerful, internally fueled socially valued positive change.
  
• Subverting the development of an effective state with their sticky plaster/intravenous drip approach they legitimise hegemonic homogenising secular liberal ideology through an NGOised class of people. Without foreign funds they wouldnt have the ability to do operate.
  
• They most often appeal to values drawn from imperial global frameworks and the unjust status quo, not necessarily local history, dignity and aspiration.
• Are essentially distractions from whats real and lend their adherents a dangerous sense of righteousness and practicality.
• Erode the basic human skill of social discernment, the ability to identify whats wrong and respond with heart, tongue and hand, without need for an intermediary.
• Create power complexes which are in turn unjust, unearned and uncontestable.
• Have played a critical role in the establishment of a multibillion dollar industry that perpetuates the problems it publically seeks to address.
• Work contained in corporatised, managed projects is often inflexible to local reality, "Plough your field with this lollipop brother".
  

Some reasons to not be so harsh on NGOs and their people

• It is difficult to imagine how to act collectively outside them.
• They provide facility girls with opportunities they might not otherwise have.
• 'They do a lot of good work'.
• They employ a lot of people, including graduates, who otherwise might be un(der) employed.
  
• Many do good work and its important to be able to tell.
• Getting involved with the state is LONG.
• We may not have the symbolic power, trust and connections to pursue alternative means.
  
• They are drenched in an intoxicating vocabulary of virtue.
• Large ambitions of decolonisation, autonomy and systemic supersession are not always shared by people who unpretentiously want to 'do good'.

UK Security Minister chats to (UK) Muslims through Islam Channel

There's a very strange youtube video, featuring the new Tory Minister for Security being interviewed by a very posh sounding chap, in what seem like her offices, for the Islam Channel.

click here for the 10 minute video/press release

The choice of channel is remarkable. The station suffered constant vilification during the previous regime. Journalists and politicians used to play Boycott Tennis and RadicaLinkage weaving at their Global Peace and Unity events. Not that I personally cared. Better without them I say. For this reason, I wonder how Islam channel came to carry the Minister's message? Who asked who? Did the channel have other options? What did viewers make of it? How much of it was true?

To get more of a flavour, listen to how she addresses israeli security policy platforms. Complicating isnt it? check out the 'Britain can learn from Israel' headline on the googlewhack and the building resilient communities vision.

With her Islam Channel statement the minister intended to create a new relationship between her work and UK Muslims and exert more than a bit of power. Its been a while since someone of her capability was in government addressing 'Securitising Muslim' issues, anyone remember Hazel Blears? Apparently current policies and their operations are going to be reviewed, and the security function of government community engagement will be separated from other ones. I wonder what that means...

The word 'operations' came up quite a bit, an artefact of the minister's previous roles in the diplomatic and intelligence communities, as well as the hi-tech military industrial complex.

Another baroness, Baroness Warsi came up in the context of a tick box, she's Muslim and she's female you know.

Sorry that should have been the other way around. Feminism first, then Matronisation.

This particular minister has probably come across quite a lot of 'privileged information', so should we trust her expertise? Whenever I've prodded pseudo powerful people about these matters, they always play the 'If you had read what I had read' argument. She certainly wields a great deal of symbolic capital in the establishment. But what about amongst us?

On the face of it there is some cause for optimism. Policies and operationalisation of policy are to be reviewed. Stop and search, pre-trial detentions etc and wait for it .... PREVENT.

PREVENT is interesting, depressing, revealing and inshAllah the worst is over. It is sad to see how cheaply folks will run for the money and be diverted from addressing the Ummahtic. Folks who should know better keep falling into an imposed guilt for some reason, for not aspiring towards liberal secular triumphalism. Scholars keep getting parachuted in on the advice of gatekeepers and meddled with. Lovely brothers and sisters keep going on foreign office jollies to legitimise military occupations. Organisations are created and nurtured for the specific purpose of policing the Ummah here and stifling its enhancement, cutting its relations and suffocating its politics. Its effective name is CO-OPT, filed under Intellectual Corruption along with NGOisation and Developmentia.

To prevent and subvert PREVENT/PVE and RAND type incursions from deforming Islam, rather Muslim subjectivity, again and again we might need...

A Potent Social Potion.

One part Tablighi Jamat - uncooptable

One part Suffragette - Forward

One part A-Team - Active

One part Royal Society - Learned, with Mastery