The Real Cost of the Olympics

This demands a genuine reconsideration of how we view the Olympics. Nothing wrong with sports and games per se, but we should demand higher moral and socially-conscious standards for how they are organized anywhere.

What is wrong with the Olympics?
http://olympicresistance.net/content/what-wrong-olympics-0

The Olympics are not about the human spirit and have little to do with athletic excellence. They are a multi-billion dollar industry backed by real estate, construction, hotel, tourism and media corporations, and powerful elites working hand in hand with government officials and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). While public pressure is unlikely to stop the 2010 Games from occupying Vancouver, critical resistance is needed to expose deceptions about the Games’ impact and purposes, voice our dissent to the world, and strengthen social movement solidarity.

Occupation of Stolen Native Land: The vast majority of B.C. is unceded Native land, unlawfully occupied by B.C. and Canada. By Canadian law, Native title exists unless yielded by treaty and little of B.C. is covered, even by flawed treaties. Neglect of First Nations’ social, environmental, and political rights by a state that benefits from Aboriginal resources is a serious political crisis ignored by Canada and the Games.

“Security” and Eroding Civil Liberties: Increasing political repression and security build-ups accompany modern Games. Estimates for Vancouver of at least 16,500 Canadian military, border guards, private security, VPD, RCMP, and CSIS agents (plus foreign security) are unrealistically low: the Sydney Games had 35,000 police and security (4 cops per athlete) with 4,000 troops and commando units and the Athens Games had 70,000 police, security, and military forces. There will be at least 40 km of crowd-control fencing, video surveillance, and airport-style security zones around the city, including on public property. The monitoring and intimidation of political opposition has already begun. Vancouver City Council has followed the IOC requests to create an environment free of protest by enhancing bylaws to restrict posters, signs, leaflets, marches, noise-makers, and any possible “disturbance” to Olympic entertainment. Many elements can become permanent (such as public video monitoring, new security bodies and policing rules, and the criminalization of protest) and security costs are up to $1 billion.

Environmental Destruction and Waste: The 2010 Games will be one of the most ecologically damaging in history, featuring clear cuts, mountain blasting, road construction (and expansion of traffic), gravel mining (damage to fish stocks), massive amounts of steel, plastics, cement, wood, etc., threats to animal populations, unnecessary luxury buildings, and expanded infrastructure (with accelerated approvals) for mining, logging, oil and gas exploration, ski resorts, and tourism. Approximately 100,000 trees have been cut down for Olympic development.

Corporatization: The Games are entirely commercialized, with pro athletes, exclusive corporate sponsors, and crony deals for development, construction, and media companies. Image control is crucial and all outdoor advertising in Vancouver has been sold to the Games and their sponsors for weeks around the Games. The anthem lyrics “with glowing hearts” and words like “friend” have become trademarks related to the Olympics. Games regularly benefit and are sponsored by companies with poor human rights and environmental records, like Nike, Shell, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Petro-Canada, Dow, Teck Cominco, TransCanada, and arms makers GE and GM.

Damage to Communities: Racial profiling and lock-downs of ethnic communities are common for the Games (black neighbourhoods in L.A. and Atlanta, Muslims in Athens, etc.). More tourists increase abuses in the sex trade. Host cities routinely criminalise the poor or homeless and socially cleanse their cities (Vancouver relocated the homeless out of sight for Expo 86 and Atlanta did the same for its Games). The Vancouver Police crackdown on visible poverty has led to hundreds of tickets for panhandling, jaywalking, second-hand sales on the streets, and sleeping in parks. The sacrifice of housing, social services, and environmental and labour laws also hurt the poor, homeless, women, minorities, Natives, and workers. Since the 1980s, Games and their construction have displaced over 2 million people.

Honouring Exploitation: Despite Olympic claims, Games occur in places that violate “international standards” (Nazi Germany in 1936, more than 300 students massacred in Mexico prior to the 1968 Games, political oppression in China during the 2008 Games, etc.). Games are used to rally for nationalist causes, impose social control, and attract corporate investment, more than to celebrate “pure sport.” Past presidents of the corrupt IOC (including colonialists, Nazi sympathisers, and officials of fascist states) have used the Games to suppress dissent and serve their political and economic interests. Like the WTO, FTAA, G8, and APEC, the Games will use public funds to honour leaders from repressive regimes.

Lack of Affordable Housing: During a housing crisis, single-room-occupancies (cheap hotels) and affordable rentals are torn-down or converted to high-priced housing while the City lends money to build Olympic condos. Promises of affordable and social housing and shelter spaces are rarely met by host cities and Vancouver has already admitted that commitments will not be met. In fact, since the bid in 2003, we have lost over 850 low-income housing units and homelessness has tripled. Salt Lake City Games planned for 2500 units of affordable housing and created only 150; prior to Sydney’s Games, tenant evictions increased 400%; and Calgary failed to build any of its pledged social housing.

Public Costs and Debt: The $6 billion cost of Vancouver’s Games keeps increasing with cost overruns and hidden transfers. Host cities take on huge debts: Montreal’s 1976 Games were only paid off in 2002; Calgary had a $910 million debt; Barcelona a $1.4 billion debt; Sydney a $2.3 billion debt; etc. Claims of long-term economic benefits have been proven false in previous Games. The Olympics are an expensive 17-day corporate circus (during an economic crisis) that will cost us all for years to come.

On History and Historiography

For sometime I wanted to list down articles and books related to the themes that I am interested in. Basically, a bibliography with titles that I have found useful or that I have read good reviews about and want to read soon. It's going to be a list of personal favorites, not a comprehensive list on the subject.

I start with Philosophy of History and Historiography in this post.

First, a quick note on how I distinguish the two. The philosophy of history, as it is understand here, is an attempt to find patterns and causes in social and historical changes. Historiography is about ways of writing history. It's about interrogating the research methodologies and social perspectives that inform selection of data, focus on certain historical agents (and not others), and questions that a historian/historical-sociologist pursues. The two - Philosophy of History and Historiography - are analytically separate enterprises, but closely related.

So, for example, Ibn Khaldun starts his "The Muqaddimah" with a critical appraisal of the history-writing of his time and proposes to present his own method, which he claims was based on ilm al-'Umran (Science of Population or Civilization). He outlines that science in 'The Muqaddimah' (the 'Prologue' to his Grand History, written in multiple volumes). The science was informed by his realistic and careful reading of history (realistic in terms of trying to find objective causes in history). He identified tribes and tribal solidarities as the core principle of social organization of his time and as a primary agent of historical change. His narrative focused on tribal groups to explain the rise and fall of dynasties.

The below list is in no ranked order:

"Trends of History in Qur'an" by Muhammad Baqir Sadr (Book, Online)

"The Muqaddimah" by Ibn Khaldun (Book, Online)

"On the Sociology of Islam" by Ali Shariati (Book, Citation)

"Social and Historical Change" by Murtaza Mutahhari (Book, Citation. Many parts are available Online. See "Man and Universe", Chapter V - "Society and History")

"On the Plight of the Oppressed People" by Ali Shariati (Article/Speech, Online)

"Marxism and other Western Fallacies" by Ali Shariati (Book, Citation)

"What is History?" by E. H. Carr (Book, Citation)

"Orientalism" by Edward Said (Book, Citation)

"Silencing the Past" by Michel-Rolph Trouillot (Book, Citation)

"Event, Metaphor, Memory: Chauri Chaura, 1922-1992" by Shahid Amin (Book, Citation)

"The Holocaust industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering" by Norman G. Finkelstein (Book, Citation)

"Remembering partition: violence, nationalism, and history in India" by Gyan Pandey (Book, Citation)

"Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference" by Dipesh Chakrabarty (Book, Citation)

"The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories" by Partha Chatterjee (Book, Citation)

"Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time" by Reinhart Koselleck (Book, Citation)

Historical Metaphors and Mythical Realities" by Marshall David Sahlins (Book, Citation)

"The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" by Max Weber (Book, Citation)

"Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison" by Michel Foucault (Book, Citation)

"Vision and Method in Historical Sociology" By Theda Skocpol (Book, Citation)

"Big Structures, Large Processes, Huge Comparisons" by Charles Tilly (Book, Citation)

"Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation" by William Hamilton Sewell (Book, Citation)

On Institutionalized Sufism in Pakistan

A little essentialism of Sufism here and there, but overall the article quite poignantly sheds light on the connection between sufism and institutionalized power in the Pakistani context. Other facets of Sufism - spiritually inclined and anti-status quo - also exist in Pakistan, although not as prominent in the social sphere (social relations, hierarchical structures). That other facet, however, is quite pronounced in the domain of cultural discourse (poetry, media), appropriated in a variety of ways by different groups, more recently by the pop culture and liberal elites of the Pakistani electronic media. Historically, at some places, the shrines also served as sites of mobilization and resistance against the powers-that-be.

See a relevant post here: "Good Muslim, Bad Muslim"

The bad Sufi
By Qalandar Bux Memon, Dawn, Jan 26, 2010


It is often assumed that Sufism stands opposed to Wahhabism. Wrong. Sufism and Wahhabism, in fact, share a fatal characteristic – they are religions of the status quo. In Pakistan, Sufism legitimises barbarities of inequality and starvation – ‘do nothing, it’s god’s will’ - while at the same time justifying structures of oppressive power, Pirism and landlordism, rather like Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia. Contemporary Sufism, rather than being a solution to Pakistan’s problems, is the cause.

I was sitting at the shrine of Shah Kamal in Lahore, with the dhol beats and whirling dervishes dancing to connect to the ‘centre of the universe in themselves’, when a friend turned and pointed to an old German fellow sitting a few meters from us. “He just delivered a lecture on Sufism. He is an expert on the subject, and talked about how it’s a religion of peace and love.”

I replied curtly: “Have you ever been in love? Have you had your heart broken? What peace is there in that state? What peace was there when Mansur had his head chopped off on the orders of the Baghdadi Emperor? What peace was there when Shah Inayat was fighting against the Mughal emperor for his life and that of his commune? What peace is there in Sassui’s peeling feet as she searches for her beloved through the desert of Sindh?”

My friend agreed and said: “But they pay me – I have to go along with them.”

Western and Pakistani policymakers think Islam can be codified as either a religion of peace and love and given the brand of Sufism, or as a religion of violent jihad. They think it’s better, at this point in time, to promote the peaceful religion of Sufism.

Note how the word Islam is taken out – Sufism is codified as not really Islam. Thus Sufism is considered a perfect native antidote to the violent religion of Islam.

Why are dollars, pounds, rupees and Euros going to promote Sufism? What is it about today’s Sufism that allows it to serve a purpose for the American empire, and what function does it play locally in Pakistan?

The answer was hard for me to stomach. I had spent much time researching aspects of Sufism, and I thought I’d found a touchstone from which to articulate a spirituality that was socially radical and politically challenging to Pakistan’s parasitic elite and the US/Nato invaders. Ziauddin Sardar, polymath writer and scholar of Islam, forced me to face the facts.

He called Sufism “docile”, acting as an opiate for the masses, with most Pirs/Syeds/Sufis amounting to nothing short of “confidence tricksters”. And indeed, Sufism is docile. A shopkeeper in Main Market, Gulberg, had an emblem of the Sufi saint Lal Qalandar hanging in his shop, which he had got from Sehraw Sharif, Sindh, the town where the saint is buried. He said that “what these people do not realise is that 80 per cent of what we pray at the shrine [of Lal Qalandar] comes true.” A popular song sung across the Punjab at Sufi shrines tells women that if they light a lantern at the shrine of saints, their desire for a ‘son’ will be answered.

Items given by holy Pirs - threads, rings, blessings, and even sexual induction before marriage (in the case of a notorious Sindhi landlord/Pir) - are taken as altering the universe and leading to the granting of prayers of health, wealth, and other worthy claims by this mass of the wretched that is the Pakistani citizen. It is not only candles and lanterns that are lit at the shrines; money is exchanged and power is sustained. It is this power that has created a “docile” Sufism.

Pakistan is a vastly unequal society. Government figures put those below the poverty line at close to 40 per cent of the population, though the true figure may be closer to 50 per cent. Inequity is the hallmark of the Sindh province of Pakistan, which is celebrated as “the land of the Sufis” and is where Sufis and Pirs hold power. A recent World Bank report noted that Sindh has the narrowest distribution of land ownership, with the richest one per cent of farmers owning 150 per cent more land than the bottom 62 per cent of farmers put together. Feudal landlords in vast parts of Sindh have holdings of thousands of acres, and most of them are Syeds or Pirs. These lands were sometimes acquired during the Mughal era but were largely consolidated during the British colonial rule in India. The British, looking for local collaborators, found Sufi Pirs willing to oblige.

Sarah Ansari, in her book, Sufi Saints and State Power: The Pirs of Sind, 1843-1947, notes: ‘the Sindhi Pirs participated in the British system of control in order to protect their privileges and to extend them further whenever and wherever possible’.

Today’s feudalists are keen to protect and promote “docile” Sufism to sustain their wealth and power – this time with US help.

Wealth is created by a pool of landless serfs who toil thousands of acres for their spiritual masters, while seeing their own children starve. These serfs create the wealth that sends the Bhuttos and the Gilanis to universities such as Oxford and Harvard, while their children get “blessings” and threads of “Pirs”. This stream of inequity from generation to generation is based on a lame theological idea, which nonetheless has been promoted by the Mughal Empire, the British Empire, the landlords themselves, and now by the American Empire, and thanks to such patronage has gained far more ground than the Taliban. It states that the Prophet was given divine light/knowledge, which passes on to his descendents. These descendents append the honorific title of ‘Syed’ [literally, ‘master’], and claim divine and material privileges.

Pirs justify their superiority on a similar argument – they were given the light, and this light continues to radiate in their descendants. At a recital of the poetry of the radical Sufi Waris Shah held each year in Lahore, the descendents of Iman Bari Sarkar (a Pir) enter the arena to be received with awe and sought for blessings by the crowd. The recital stops and they are escorted to the front and seated. All eyes are on these holy men who are not only descendents of a Pir but also Syeds – thus, doubly blessed with ‘light’! And then they begin expounding their ideology: “We the Syeds get different treatment from God Almighty, for our good deeds we get double the reward compared to ‘murids’ [non-Syeds] who only get single reward for a single good deed … but, it’s not easy to be a Syed … [he laughs] … we have to suffer double the punishment for our any wrong deeds whereas you [non-Syeds] get only single punishment for a single wrong deed!”

There you have it! Our holy man explains why he has a Land Cruiser jeep and “non-Syeds” have donkey carts. He explains why most Pakistanis are living in poverty while he and his Syeds and Pirs are lapping it up in luxury.

Contemporary Sufism is the ideology of Sindh’s landlords. It is the ideology that is used to uphold their wealth and despotism, and keeps millions in serfdom. A similar pattern is repeated throughout Pakistan. Given the lack of proportional representation and the vast inequality in power in each district between Pirs and the rest, it is almost always the case that elections flood parliament with Pirs/Syeds/landlords. The current Pakistani Prime Minister (Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani) and Foreign Minister (Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi) are examples. Both have the claim of being descended from Holy Pirs as the basis of their wealth and distinction. As a result, we cannot expect parliament to challenge inequity and injustice in Pakistan.

Parliamentarians know that lack of education, coupled with the obscurantism of contemporary Sufism, sustains their power. Like the British before them, the Americans don’t care about Pakistan’s growing multitude of serfs and the underclass, they don’t care whether the Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister of Pakistan are deeply rooted in the cause of inequity and injustice in the country and part of the promotion of a system of starvation – a Sufism that tells people to take a blessing instead of demanding food, education, justice and liberty. Like the British, they will fund whoever furthers their interests. We, however, must care.

This is an article by Qalandar Bux Memon, editor of Naked Punch, from the The Samosa, a new UK-based politics, culture and arts journal, campaigning blog and website.