Category: Uncategorized

Nipple & Button – the decline & fall of the American Empire

X.T.M · August 14, 2018 · 31 comments

Ahead of a meeting with India’s prime minister, Trump mispronounced Nepal as “nipple” and laughingly referred to Bhutan as “button”, sources told Politico. He reportedly didn’t realise what Nepal and Bhutan were. One person familiar with the meeting said: 

He didn’t know what those were. He thought it was all part of India. He was like, ‘What is this stuff in between and these other countries

Trump ‘needs reminders about how time zones work’, according to White House aides

President Trump is single-handedly hastening the end of a unipolar world. The deft Obama-era diplomacy where the former President reached out to recalcitrant nations (Iran, Cuba) is swiftly coming to an end.

The world is shaping along the lines of a Hindutva-Zionist wet dream. The Anglospheric nations (Britain firmly at the centre because of Brexit) along with India & Israel. What prompts this vision of a Eurasian entity is the sudden collapse of Turkey by a single Trump Tweet.

This isn’t to say that Turkey didn’t have pre-existing political and economic issues but when the US is trying to twist the knife; well nations have very long memories. The US has antagonistic relationships with Iran, Russia and China; to add Pakistan and Turkey to the mix is to essentially recreate the Ghost of the Gunpowder Empires.

I was looking for Macaulay’s essay on Land Empires and came across this:

Of these 6 Empires; 5 will be firmly in an anti-Western anti-American camp. The other Great Powers are the EU, India, Israel (an important minor power) and Japan (and the Koreas).

Happy 71st birthday to the Mughal-Muslim Republic that is Pakistan. I would consider it to be the inheritor of the Land Empire of the Mughals whereas I see the modern Indian Republic to be more of an Indian Ocean Entity connected to the rest of the Anglosphere and more attuned to the time of the Mauryas. The level of animosity towards the Mughals in modern day India is reaching such histrionic levels that histories as well as geographies must now be partitioned.

Pakistan’s geopolitical importance can never be overstated and it will be interesting how India will be managing an intense relationship with Iran/Russia and a growing friendship with the US. For the US to lose Turkey is simply a strategic blunder because the latter is probably the most important Islamic country and the Turks are a generation ahead of the rest of the Muslim world. If in the medieval era the three great Islamic Imperiums (the Ottomans, Safavids & Mughals) had formed a stable alliance there probably would have been able to beat back any outsider power..

Let us see now how King Khan will navigate an increasingly interesting yet turbulent world.

V. S. Naipaul has died

Razib Khan · August 12, 2018 · 76 comments

Like many I have only read Naipaul’s nonfiction. His genius, as a literary intellectual, was to distill intuitions and observations that many of us have, but compress them into more economical and clear prose.

But, in my opinion, literary intellectuals’ genius lay not in uncovering new things, but unmasking what we already knew. Therefore Naipaul never presented me a startling insight that was totally novel, and much of his analysis I later rejected upon deeper study and thought. And yet if the question is the answer, then his prose definitely opened many mental doors.

Of course, others can speak to his fiction.

Has Manish Malhotra jumped the shark?

X.T.M · August 11, 2018 · 70 comments

Manish Malhotra has come out with a new “Indo-Persian” collection called “Zween.” I had never heard of the word before but apparently it’s Arabic and means beautiful.

Image result for zween arabic

Image result for zween arabic

I thought I would share some pictures from an actual “Indo-Persian” culture since I can’t find Iran in the above pictures; just Bollywood wearing a few floral motifs..

Image result for bunto kazmiImage result for aarij hashmi

Image result for bunto kazmi

Manish should have simply titled his exhibition; “back to Pakistan” or something such rather than unnecessarily exotify it with “Zween” and Indo-Persian. Like any good Delhite Punjabi he feels the tug of that hypnotic rich Mughlai high culture that has miraculously endured in Karachi..

However unfortunately Pakistan has failed as a country  and is rightfully perceived as a basket-case. On the hand the rise and rise of India continues..

https://www.facebook.com/India.usembassy/videos/1844235619025792/

 

An Interview on Bangladesh Street Protests

Shafiq R · August 10, 2018 · 14 comments

I think this short interview about Bangladesh Street protests pretty much sums up what is going on in Bangladesh. The interview led to predictable and dire consequences for the person foolish enough to speak his mind about Bangladesh to the foreign media while living within Bangladesh! I am posting the transcript of the interview and then posting the video.

Q: These protests were sparked by two teens who were killed in a road accident but is this all about road safety or is there something larger going on?

A: Very much larger. This has been going on for a very very long time. It is an unelected government so they do not really have a mandate to rule, But they have been clinging on by brute force. The looting of banks, the gagging of the media. You mentioned just now the mobile internet is currently switched off, the extra-judicial killings, the disappearances, the need to give protection money at all levels, bribery at all levels, corruption in education. It is a never ending list. It has been huge.

So it really it is that pent up energy, emotion, anger, that has been let lose. This particular incident, sad as it is, really is the valve that has allowed things to go through. Very recently there was another very big protest about the quota because the quota system is rigged in such a way that only people close to the party in power get to get government jobs and there is a disproportionate amount of jobs going to them so ordinary people protested. And that was very brutally brought down.

Under pressure the prime minister offered reforms but them reneged on them. So that is also part of the reason. So this time when students did go on protests, again it went to a situation where they could not control it and the Prime minister has promised that she will cede to their demands, but of course people no longer believe. She has no credibility. She has made promises before, it has not been accepted, so now they don’t do it.

But I think what we need is to look at is what is happening in the streets today. The police specifically asked for help from these armed goons to combat unarmed students demanding safe roads. I mean now ridiculous is that. Today I was in the street and there are people with machetes in their hands chasing unarmed students and the police are standing by watching it happen. In some cases they are actually helping it out. I mean …. this morning, there was tear-gassing and I saw the police ganging up trying to catch these un-armed students, whereas these armed goons, are going out, wielding sticks and machetes, are walking past and they [the police] are just standing by.

Q: So where do you think these things are going to go from here? These protests appear to have spread across the country quite spontaneously and without any kind of central leadership here. This is part of the challenge the government is dealing with, in that it is so grass-roots in the way that it has spread.

A: I think the Government has miscalculated. It certainly felt that fear was enough, repression would have been enough, but I think you cannot tame an entire nation in this manner. And of course they are approaching elections, so the nearer it gets to elections, the more sensitive they are. They know that if there is a fair and free election, they will lose. But they haven’t got an exit plan as they have misruled for so long so that if they do lose, they will be torn apart. So they have to hang on by any means, so that is exactly what they are doing. They are clinging on using the entire might of the system plus the armed goons at their disposal.

 

Short Thoughts –

X.T.M · August 9, 2018 · 37 comments

White people are not gods, they bleed: Razib makes important points about class and race.

In contrast, even South Asians who grow up poor in the United States, usually have an ancestral class background which is somewhat elite. While black Americans and South Asians may share common physical features as dark-skinned people of color, most black Americans descend from slaves, while most South Asian Americans are more likely to either be the scions of a genuinely elite family or a prosperous lineage from a rural backwater. If you buy Greg Clark’s argument in The Son Also Rises: Surnames and the History of Social Mobility, then you know that he makes the case that social status is highly heritable when you look across many generations, as opposed to focusing on single generation correlations.

The Universal Law that differentiates an Immigrant from an Expat. An Immigrant goes one social class lower when moving to a new country and an Expat goes one social class higher upon moving to a new country.

So an office worker in the US will be an office manager in Uganda. An office manager from South Asia won’t hold the same position upon emigrating to the US because the cultural adjustment will have to take place (unless it’s Facebook or Googles which is essentially Indian).

At BP our world is very narrowed back to the Desh but Diaspora issues are extraordinarily important. Race intersects with class and the non-Muslim Asian minority is rapidly ascending the ranks. Even among the Muslims one can distinguish certain sub-ethnicites (Mirpuri, Sylethi) as being the more backward variants.

As a final thought privilege can have a deadening effect on the soul. When I contrast myself to my white friends of a similar background; I notice the speed, grit and alacrity which I have is a gift of my immigrant background. The 9-5 paradigm and pub after work paradigm simply does not apply to my life and that’s a big asset. I’m constantly “on” all the time as opposed to alot of my white friends who seem addicted to leisure..

Mind you I don’t know if it’s a good thing that I don’t have an off button.

Other Links: Continue reading Short Thoughts –

Genetics is not about “dunking” on Hindu nationalists

Razib Khan · August 6, 2018 · 51 comments

I need to weigh in real quick about something I’ve been noticing: geneticists don’t do genetics because they are excited about debunking views promoted by some Hindu nationalists and other Indians of a variety of political stripes. In fact, most non-Indian scientists (as in people who don’t live in India) are not totally savvy to the political and social context in South Asia, and so are not aware of how their results may be taken.

Unlike some scientists, I tend to take a dim view of those who assert we need to be careful about how results are going to be interpreted. Science is science. Interpretation is society. Therefore, I don’t particularly care if someone’s cherished views are refuted.

That being said, I have seen on Twitter and elsewhere exultation by anti-Hindu nationalists about new genetic findings, where individuals are wrong in many details of the implications. In the general broad sketch, they understand some implications, but they clearly haven’t paid attention to the science closely, nor do they comprehend it.

There are many examples of confusions and misimpressions. Here is one: the idea that “Vedic civilization” is exogenous to South Asia. I think we need to be very careful about this because I think one can make the case (and this is my position) that by the time most of the archaic mythos of the Indian Aryans crystallized these people were already highly Indianized. To put the political implications on the table, they were much more assimilated in their elite culture than the Muslim rulers of India or the British ever were (and let’s be honest, these are the comparisons people care about).

Rough back-of-the-envelope calculations on my part suggest that ~15% of the total ancestry of all South Asians is steppe derived. That is, about 50% ANI, which is 30% steppe (70% Indus Periphery). Is this a lot? Or not a lot?

Interpretations differ.

Sons of Pakistani Bus Drivers

X.T.M · August 6, 2018 · 16 comments

How ‘ministerial flop’ became favourite to succeed Theresa May as PM

It’s an interesting article about Sajid Javed and the fact that he is the favorite to succeed TM as PM.

Of course I’m dismissing the hype but the battle between the sons of the Pakistani Bus Drivers is going to be an interesting feature in British Politics. Even though my politics are quite Tory I’m quite sympathetic to Sadiq Khan as I find him more “authentic” than Sajid Javid.

I am of course at risk of hypocrisy because I’m suspect of assimilation while I welcome integration.

As an aside both Sadiq Khan and Sajid Javed were favourites of the Chancellors, Brown and Osborne. Sajid Javed was arm-twisted by David Cameron and George Osborne into supporting the Remain while he was a Eurosceptic but they guilted him into the fact that he owed his political career to them. Mind you Sajid Javed’s last paycheck in the private sector was apparently £3mn and he is self-made (unlike most Tory Politicians) so he’s probably talented than most but there is this earnestness to fit in that is very typical of coloured Tories (to be whiter than white).

They deeply relied on the patronage of wily white men to get through the party and the dramatic ethnic shifts we are seeing in the West must seem like something out of the Roman Empire.

I do remember that there were an astonishing high number of Pakistanis who were interested in politics (both parties). It does make sense Pakistani culture is very extroverted, loves to network and we are usually able to do it without drinking (heavily). Not drinking in a culture drenched in alcohol has distinct advantages..

Why I don’t accept the para-Munda hypothesis

Razib Khan · August 4, 2018 · 28 comments


There has been a discussion of Michael Witzel’s ideas in the comments below. Long familiar with his thesis that a Munda-like language was dominant in the northern Indus valley and in the Gangetic plain, I have also been long skeptical of it.

The reason for me is simple: I have leaned to the position that Munda are intrusive from Southeast Asia. Over the past 10 years my confidence in this proposition as grown. Let’s review

1) They speak an Austro-Asiatic language. Most Austro-Asiatic languages are in Southeast Asia and seem to have spread from the north to the south

2) The Munda have genetic signatures on the Y chromosome and some of their traits which are distinctive to East Asians and totally unrelated to any other South Asians. These genetic signatures are not found in South Asia outside of the Munda areas, and northeast India (i.e., they are not present in the Indus or Gangetic plains).

3) The most common Y chromosome of the Munda seems to be from Southeast Asia. That is, Southeast Asian lineages are basal and more diverse than the ones in India.

4) Genetic data from ancient DNA indicate that Austro-Asiatic people did not arrive in northern Vietnam until 4,000 years ago. To me this, this implies they arrived in India well after 4,000 years ago.

5) We now suspect that Indo-Aryans arrived well after 4,000 years ago to the Indus valley. The Munda and Indo-Aryans could not have met in that region 3,500 years ago in any reasonable scenario.

Let’s assume that Witzel and others are correct that the early Indo-Aryans and the languages/toponyms of the Gangetic plains do not show Dravidian influence. How could that be? It could be that in the northern Indus valley a non-Dravidian language was dominant. Consider Burusho, a linguistic isolate. Mesopotamia was long divided between a Semitic north and a Sumerian south.

Second, the genetic data seem to suggest that some Indo-Aryan groups have more AASI and more steppe than groups to their west. North Indian Brahmins vs. Sindhis are an example. To me, this is indicative of the possibility that the Indo-Aryans pushed past areas where Dravidian languages were dominant, and only AASI hunter-gatherers were flourishing. The lack of a Dravidian substrate is because the AASI groups the Indo-Aryans encountered were not Dravidian speakers.

 

Lawyer Asama Javed is ‘fixer for forced marriage’

X.T.M · August 3, 2018 · 7 comments

Lawyer Asama Javed is ‘fixer for forced marriage’

The video in the link is 5 minutes long and worth seeing. This is pretty shocking since the lawyer, Asma Javed, is (and I’m excerpting):

On the surface Asma Javed 44, appears to be an upstanding member of her community, a political career with the Labour Party, now a partner in a law firm, a governor at a local primary school and on the fostering panel at Bradford Council. Yet her ‘marital advice’ exposes a complete disregard for basic human rights and utter contempt for British values.

What struck me is that Ms. Javed is obviously British born & bred since she easily slips into the Bradistani patois. But her Punjabi/Mirpuri is at native levels; this wasn’t supposed to happen after so many generations in the UK.

Since I’m a BritPak I’m quite the integrationist but in this case something’s got to give.  My thoughts on integration versus assimilation are mainly concerned with High Culture; even though I can understand Shakespeare and actually like it, I’ll ultimately still identify with Ferdowsi & Ghalib (probably the two poster boys for Turanistan)

The Augean Stables that is the British Muslim community needs to be cleansed. This is not a “Pakistani” issue but a Muslim one as we can see in this bit of news as well. Teenager jailed for life over British Museum bomb plot. When did Muslim culture in Europe become so degenerate?

 

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