Dark Side of Dubai - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

pj67coll · #1 06-02-2009, 02:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

But such is the conservative worship of their canon that such an obvious debacle could be dismissed as merely "the ravings of an extreme left winger looking for a new anti-capitalist crusade."

Wether or not Dubai is in fact an obvious debacle, depends largely, on wether or not the claims in this article have substance. If so I'd agree. The place sounds like crap. However you can easily look at other articles by the same reporter to get an idea of his ideological slant.

- Peter.

cmac2012 · #2 06-03-2009, 06:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

Wether or not Dubai is in fact an obvious debacle, depends largely, on wether or not the claims in this article have substance. If so I'd agree. The place sounds like crap. However you can easily look at other articles by the same reporter to get an idea of his ideological slant.

Oh dear. The man has a point of view? Well of course, anything he says is worthless.

I did a search for his other articles and I don't find him too far out there.

Plenty of other stories have come out about Dubai's wreckless "investing" and the army of expats building all of that stuff. This 60 Minutes piece has some interesting stuff:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/10/12/60minutes/main3361753.shtml

Nat. Geo. has had at least one good article about it complete with scenes and info on the housing for the enslaved South Asians building all those monstrosities.

Dubai is an aberration.

pj67coll · #3 06-03-2009, 07:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmac2012

Oh dear. The man has a point of view? Well of course, anything he says is worthless.

No. It's just because he has a left wing point of view that makes anything he says worthless

Seriously though. I'm quite sure the place is not the paradise it's cracked up to be. The descriptions amongst the ex-pats about their reasons for being there were universally shallow and sometimes downright offensive to me. I watched some stuff on the History Channel or maybe the Science Channel? on how they made the "world". It was fascinating from an engineering perspective (although it also seemed a bit like tilting at windmills) but at the same time so ridiculously artificial that it just didn't appeal to me at all.

As for the social issues. That may well be true. I have a hard time though believing that all the relevant countries governments are completely inured to their subjects involuntary servitude.

- Peter.

Hatterasguy · #4 06-04-2009, 07:43 PM

I think the article is pretty fair considering what I have heard from other sources. Like people I know who have been their for work.

Maybe a slight slant, but IMHO it probably pretty well done.

cmac2012 · #5 06-05-2009, 04:40 PM

About 6 months ago, Chilcutt and I were idly speculating about going to Dubai to make serious bucks. Lord, what a mistake that would have been.

I kept reading about the low waged imports and it occurred to me that the only way I would make any money over there would be in supervising a bunch of them, cracking the whip to get the maximum appearance of output, with quality only barely a concern. Oh golly, wouldn't that have been fun?

Too much money too fast has made many a person lose their mind, IMO.

On a completely unrelated note, I used to think that Cameron Diaz was a world class babe (the movie Mask, she was still innocent then) but I saw her on the tonight show a while back, and whoa. She's become unbearably full of herself. Too much money, too fast.

neanderthal · #6 06-06-2009, 08:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

...
As for the social issues. That may well be true. I have a hard time though believing that all the relevant countries governments are completely inured to their subjects involuntary servitude.

- Peter.

This coming from a white (former?) South African who lamented Zimbabwe being taken over by, and I quote, "the monkeys."

You could cut the hypocrisy with a sledgehammer. It might need something more thats more blunt and conveys more force. Its. that. thick.

pj67coll · #7 06-06-2009, 09:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neanderthal

This coming from a white (former?) South African who lamented Zimbabwe being taken over by, and I quote, "the monkeys."

You could cut the hypocrisy with a sledgehammer. It might need something more thats more blunt and conveys more force. Its. that. thick.

The fact that Zimbabwe has become a cluster ****, has exactly what to do with the apparent lack of concern of the governments of India, Bangladesh, Phillipines etc regarding the deplorable conditions their citizens face in Dubai - assuming the article is correct?

- Peter.

neanderthal · #8 06-08-2009, 12:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

The fact that Zimbabwe has become a cluster ****, has exactly what to do with the apparent lack of concern of the governments of India, Bangladesh, Phillipines etc regarding the deplorable conditions their citizens face in Dubai - assuming the article is correct?

- Peter.

I never alluded to the cluster**** In Zimbabwe in relation to the situation in Dubai. I merely commented on the rich hypocrisy of you believing the powers that be in Dubai could possibly be concerned with the welfare of people they import for what could ostensibly be called paid slavery. In fact, here is the comment that I quoted.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

As for the social issues. That may well be true. I have a hard time though believing that all the relevant countries governments are completely inured to their subjects involuntary servitude.

You then mentioned the governments of India, Bangladesh, Phillipines etc , afterwards (conveniently overlooking Dubai), whereas before you were questioning the journalistic integrity of the author.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

Wether or not Dubai is in fact an obvious debacle, depends largely, on wether or not the claims in this article have substance. If so I'd agree. The place sounds like crap. However you can easily look at other articles by the same reporter to get an idea of his ideological slant.

In doing so, basically condoning the conditions mentioned in the article.

It just paints a picture. Thats all.

Hits close to home, doesn't it? Isn't that what you said to me?

pj67coll · #9 06-08-2009, 01:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by neanderthal

I merely commented on the rich hypocrisy of you believing the powers that be in Dubai could possibly be concerned with the welfare of people they import for what could ostensibly be called paid slavery. In fact, here is the comment that I quoted.

The powers that be in Dubai may indeed be unconcerned with the plight of foreigners, however it was not those powers to whom I was referring, but to those foreigners governments. Who, if the article is correct, appear to be unconcerned about the plight of their own citizens in Dubai. I continue to find that strange if it is indeed true.

Quote:

You then mentioned the governments of India, Bangladesh, Phillipines etc

Yes. It is apparently their citizens that are being treated like indentured servants or worse assuming the article to be correct. Obviously if that is the way the Emirates treat them that's bad enough. If however that's true they why do their won governments apparently do nothing about it? They are after all not citizens of the country in question and I would assume thier governments would be looking out for them?

- Peter.