*This is the 1st part of a 2-part series that aims to elucidate postcolonial Malaysian history. The 2nd part will focus on Malaysian-Chinese relations as an elaboration of the history and contradictions discussed here.* > Each country in the region possesses its own unique and identifiable characteristic; Singapore is a hyper-capitalist dystopia, perhaps the only one in the region that could claim first-world status; Vietnam is a market socialist republic, ironically not unlike its bitter rival, China; Thailand is perhaps globally unique in its mix of royal and military authoritarianism; Brunei is akin to a Gulf State, with its oil wealth and Islamic absolute monarchy whereas the Philippines is more akin to a Latin American nation-state with its strongmen figures, cartel problems and US imperial interference. > Malaysia on the other hand can be identified by one particular characteristic: its profound mediocrity. It is rich, but not as rich as Singapore. It is authoritarian and corrupt, but never to the extent that can be found in its neighbours such as Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. Leaders incompetent as such that they cannot be counted on to save their ass, and reformers so dull it cannot be counted on to pursue. On the whole, Malaysia is always reliably second place to something, in all things good or bad it always falls short of excellence. A jack of all trades, master of none. If Malaysia had another name, one could surmise it to be “Asal Boleh”.[^1] Malaysia gained independence in 1957 with over 50% of the population living in poverty. The ruling classes, who collaborated with the colonizers in persecuting communists and left forces, were forced to embark on a series of developmentalist policies to negate rising class consciousness among the populace. Ghana and Malaysia were once taught of as twin brothers, having gained independence in the same year with an economy of a similar size and structure. Now, after more than 65 years have passed, the story could be anything but different. Malaysia’s GDP per capita is now 5 times larger, life expectancy 11 years longer and manufactured goods account for more than 80% of exports. In stark contrast to Ghana, which still is stuck in raw commodity exports, priamrily gold. Over the course of the 70s, 80s and 90s, a push for industrialisation saw the creation of a national car company, the establishment of semiconductor manufacturing in the northern state of Penang and the mechanisation of Palm Oil production, making Malaysia the world’s largest producer until 2006, when much more populous Indonesia finally overtook the country. Crucially, Malaysia also retained state control of its oil sector under the national banner of Petronas which continues to be a major source of foreign exchange and income. The aftermath of the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis prematurely ended this era of industrialisation. However unlike Malaysia’s neighbouring states, the nation’s state finances were largely positive and could afford to refuse the diktats of the IMF and World Bank that called for much more vast and expansive neoliberal structural adjustments. Additional competition from Chinese manufacturing meant Malaysia’s manufacturing sector was on the downturn during the 2000s and remained stagnant for much of the 2010s. As the government steps into its 12th 5-year plan in 2020, an emphasis on (re-)industrialisation has now begun. Coupled with its New Industrial Master Plan 2030, the government now seeks to transform the economy to finally graduate from its upper-middle income status by 2030. This would mark a first for a postcolonial country of a modest size and ethnic diversity to graduate to high-income. It would ultimately also be a first because it is a country that stood more in defiance than support of the West for much of its history. **The “New” Political Economy** However, this defiance in practice is quite restrained, as the country’s open economy means it is unable to antagonise any major economies, which includes the USA. This is reflected in the establishment’s reluctance in leaving the Five Powers Defence Arrangement (FDPA), a remnant of the country’s colonial history that stipulates military co-operation with it’s former colonial masters, the United Kingdom, and her other colonies, namely, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Furthermore, there are still structural blocks that are withholding the nation’s ability to bring general prosperity to all. The racialized economic base remains largely unchanged since the colonial era, with one major exception, which is the establishment of an indigenous Malay-Muslim bourgeosie that benefits heavily from the inflated government bureaucracy and extensive network of government-owned and government-linked companies. Outside the public sector, which remains Malay-Muslim dominated, the private sector is still dominated by local Chinese and Indian haute-bourgeoisie that benefit from this racial stratification of the economy. In the past, the British brought waves of Chinese, Indian and Javanese migrants to Malaya to work in the plantations and mines. Now, this pattern continues with Malaysia’s over-reliance and super-exploitation of foreign South Asian labour that depresses wages locally. Roughly 10% of Malaysia’s population are immigrants, amounting to 3 million, with an additional 2-3 million undocumented. Hosting the largest Bangladeshi population outside of Bangladesh itself. The successful urbanisation and proletarianisation of a large vast of the Malaysian population, lead to the rise of a modern political Islam that, similar to Mao’s famous saying, is “surrounding the cities from the countryside”. In contrast to this radical political Islam is the rise of an affluent urban middle class, whose ideological pretensions vacillate between comprador anglophilia to “secular” cultural nationalism. This is reflected in the numerous political parties that dot the landscape of Malaysian politics, all with it's own class and ideological affiliations. Malaysia is now at the crossroads of old and new. Questions of Marxism and Communism, which continue to be slandered in the political mainstream for being extremist, anti-thiest, and antithetical to “Asian culture”, is being countered at an astonishing rate for many who are tired of the old Cold War rhetorics. Figures that were sidelined and entire political histories ignored after the defeat of the left forces, are being rediscovered as many are fed up with the promises of development seemingly only benefiting those at the top. Malaysia is not exempt from the transformations taking place in the larger world economy. In fact, Malaysian history is defined by its location between trading destinations which caused it to be colonized in the first place. For better or for worse, this central location allowed Malaysia to have an open (political) economy of remarkable fluidity and diversity. Internationalism is never too far from home. [^1]:Sourced from an online essay titled "The New Cannot Be Born: Reflections on Politics in the Land of Mediocrities" by Anas Nor’Azim. [Link](https://jentayu.org/2024/02/06/the-new-cannot-be-born-reflections-on-politics-in-the-land-of-mediocrities/).
Neptium
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I made a comment in a Hexbear news megathread about this here. Although it’s mainly just referring to news articles.
The nature of the situation will not mirror that of Ukraine fortunately, however there are other risks involved.
I have now read 2 articles advocating for “security engagements” with the West for both Malaysia and Indonesia.
I suspect this entire facade is ultimately for this exact purpose. ASEAN has it’s faults but what the West wants to currently do is undermine ASEAN centrality (as much as they claim otherwise).
The escalation ultimately led by US-led monopoly capital, wants to break apart the long-standing neutrality and non-alignment that ASEAN was built on, with their current “Indo-Pacific Strategy” basically being the classic divide and conquer. They are using the Phillipines as their age-old pawn as not only an attack on China but also a threat on other major non-aligned states in the SCS, specifically Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.
Let us remind ourselves that this escalation is happening right when the ASEAN-China code of conduct negotiations has been finalising (news article in the aforementioned comment). The last thing the imperialists want is a truly free and independent Southeast Asia.
You are right that as Southeast Asians we must reject all forms of US imperialism, and this meaningless agitation does not help nor is the interest of the masses.
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> MELAKA, March 25 (Bernama) - Melaka will serve as the host for the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Malaysia-China diplomatic relations established since 1974, said Chief Minister Datuk Seri Ab Rauf Yusoh. > He said he had sent a letter to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim earlier to seek the Federal Government's approval for Melaka to be selected as the host for the celebration, considering that the state had established relations with the Great Wall country over 600 years ago. > "That's why I proposed to the Prime Minister to hold the 50th anniversary celebration of Malaysia-China diplomatic relations in Melaka and it has been generally agreed upon, and we have received a letter from the Foreign Ministry to propose the celebration events," he told Bernama. > Earlier, Ab Rauf had received a courtesy call from Bernama chairman Datuk Seri Wong Chun Wai at his office in Seri Negeri here today. Commenting further, Ab Rauf said Melaka is very famous among Chinese tourists as it is depicted in the history books of the country during the five visits of Admiral Cheng Ho to the state. > "The history books of China (studied from elementary school to university) show Admiral Cheng Ho's [Zheng He] route to Southeast Asia, he came to Melaka five times, that's why any Chinese leader who comes to Malaysia must set foot in Melaka. >"There are Chinese leaders who come to Malaysia, they take sand from Melaka and put it in a bottle, they take it back... (that's) how they appreciate the history between Melaka and China that began 600 years ago," he said. > Meanwhile, Wong said Bernama is committed to supporting all efforts undertaken by the Melaka state government in the tourism sector including the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Malaysia-China diplomatic ties, Visit Melaka Year 2024 (VMY2024), World Tourism Day, and the World Tourism Conference 2025 which will also be held in Melaka. >"I asked some Chinese tourists on Jonker Street (in Melaka) last night and they said they are more familiar with Melaka than Kuala Lumpur. > "For them, Melaka is a historical and very important city and in conjunction with the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Malaysia-China diplomatic relations, many events will be organised, so we assure that Bernama and other media will support the state of Melaka," he said. > Malaysia established diplomatic relations with China officially on May 31, 1974, thereby becoming the first ASEAN country to extend a hand of friendship to Beijing. Melaka is the city in which the Straits of Malacca gets its name from. Malacca is simply the old latinised spelling for it. China did not only interact with Islam in Central Asia, it had a a varied and influential history in Southeast Asia as part of the maritime Silk Road. Some scholars even argue that Chinese traders helped spread Islam in Southeast Asia. I have something in the pipeline that will hopefully be finished closer to the anniversary. It will cover Malaysia-China relations over the past hundreds of years - the good and the bad, the complexities and contradictions that I hope will give readers an appreciation of SEA history and politics. I also hope it will give a brief respite to the rampant Islamophobia and Sinophobia present in Western circles.
cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/2124249 Figured this should be shared here aswell. > Hello and warm greetings to my fellow news mega enjoyers and to the wider hexbear, lemmygrad and lemmy.ml community, > > I've been finding myself browsing the newsmega often and was often thinking of a way that would help me contextualize the discussions and news that I'm reading. I remembered an atlas I had in school that would show the location of industries and natural ressources (and more) and decided try to recreate a digital version similar to https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/. When I stumbled upon lemmy-js-client I found a fun way to display lemmy comments geographically, which I would like to share with you: > > https://hex-atlas.netlify.app/ > > ⚠️ **Spoiler Tags are not implemented** thus CWs are not hidden > > Nexus Features: > - [@SeventyTwoTrillion@hexbear.net](https://hexbear.net/u/SeventyTwoTrillion) Bulletins > - Hexbear Reading List (Thank you [@CARCOSA@hexbear.net](https://hexbear.net/u/CARCOSA) for the suggestions) > - ProleWiki (Thank you Lemmygrad for maintaining this) > - Wikipedia/Natopedia > - Anarchist Library > > I'm open for suggestions, but would like to continuously add new features: > - Mastodon.social (well documented) > - Marxists.org (will be difficult) > - ~~Moon of Alabama (looks easy)~~ (Thank you [@someone@hexbear.net](https://hexbear.net/u/someone) for pointing out the transphobia) > - Usability and performance improvements > - and maybe more cool features where the guiding ideas are: "IRL Victoria 3 UI" and a "cockpit for newsmega-enjoyers" (e.g. comparing regions and seeing commodity/capital flows, real-time 1% flight data, vessel data - to enjoy the ansar allah blockade, virgin chad ranking, etc.) > > > > Basic usage: > - use query to search location by query e. g. brics and find discussions pertaining to the selected location. > > - the query field can also be used to find and filter content by communities that are not listed > > - on Mobile long press pictures to unblur it (not fully tested) on desktop hover with mouse > > > It's in a prototype stage so please keep in mind: > > - ⚠️ **Spoiler Tags** are not implemented thus CWs are not hidden ⚠️ > > > - It's mostly optimized for desktops. Sry comrades with old hardware - no optimization, yet :( > [@kota@hexbear.net](https://hexbear.net/u/kota) post inspired me to look into this tho. > > > - **Provinces/Territories**: While I was doing manual edits to some regions I realized I'm doing something very political (duh). Following this, I'm looking for solutions to implement _user defined regions_ (if there's interest from you) e.g. #fromTheRiverToTheSea #brics #udssr #whatever Comrade [@SleeplessOne1917@lemmy.ml](https://lemmy.ml/u/SleeplessOne1917) offered help, but I have only experience with front-end and am not sure how and what to propose. All my ideas are leveraging the current state of development and might be annoying to you. If you have experience, suggestions, etc. on how to make this work, feel free to start a discussion, reach out, etc. > > > - **Provinces/Territories**: If you want something particularly aggravating changed asap, feel free to start a discussion and vOtE! I'll update manually. > > > - Countries that span two continents are only displayed as belonging to one e.g. Russia - Europe (Dataset used: https://github.com/lukes/ISO-3166-Countries-with-Regional-Codes) > > > - Right now this project is exclusive to hexbear, lemmygrad, lemmy.ml and their federated instances. I have an inner conflict: Generally, fuck intellectual property and I would like to make it foss, but this would make it available for lib/chud content as well. Should I? Help me resolve this. > > > - No login implemented > > > Please consider this a tribute to this community, which I've been lurking and a member since the r/CTH days (nevar forget). I started web development not too long ago and am deeply inspired by dev titans among others: > > [@nutomic@lemmy.ml](https://lemmy.ml/u/nutomic) > > [@dessalines@lemmy.ml](https://lemmy.ml/u/dessalines) > > [@SleeplessOne1917@lemmy.ml](https://lemmy.ml/u/SleeplessOne1917) > > Thank you and the mods and admins for making hexbear/lemmy what it is today. > >  > > > Enjoy your weekend :) > > > (After I post this I will leave the computer for a while and wont be able to really check and respond for a few hours) > > Death to fascism > > Death to capitalism > > Death to imperialism > > Trans rights are human rights > > 
Neptium
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Heritage, community… I’m not sure how to explain it other than it appeals to me.
That’s an essential part of Islam. The ummah as it is called.
Which is also why Islam is deeply supported by the masses. Because it is embedded in the community.
Islam is something you can’t practice in private, well up to a certain extent, there are exceptions to this, but that’s why in my primary comment, your first avenue to understanding Islam should be a local masjid and their imam.
Neptium
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I’ll try answering your questions from my point of view, being raised muslim, however atheistic in practice. This is thus a non-expert view and my only formal Islamic classes would have been in school, which was very barebones and westernised, and also weekend saturday schools. I have also lived a majority of my life in Islamic countries but also a minority in the West.
I have limited knowledge regarding Da’wah so any more knowledgeable comrades can correct me where I am wrong.
I’ll start with your first question because I think it is the most important out of all of them.
How can I call myself a Muslim without compromising my beliefs?
I think this is a wrong approach to Islam.
In Islam, belief and faith, is encapsulated in the word iman.
An important aspect of iman is that it goes beyond superficial acceptance. It is not enough to say the shahada and be done with it. You gotta live and breathe it.
And judging from your post you already encapsulate an important part of Iman, which is seeking knowledge. This is why if you read any introduction to Islamic philosophy, their first and foremost topic would be on knowledge production and reproduction. Because the way to showcase your faith is through learning and teaching - through practice.
My point is, whatever you allegedly think Islam is against - firstly, as mentioned by @Aru it’s not about your current perceived faults or unorthodoxy that requires you to compromise. One idea that separates Islam and Christianity is that, in Islam you are born pure but corrupted by material reality. Unless you extricate yourself from reality, everyday you will be making mistakes and faults which requires you to constantly reaffirm your iman. This important emphasis on action, on doing stuff in reality, rather than just in mental masturbation, makes Islam a versatile and realist religion.
Secondly, Islam continues to change and be reformed. As of now, it’s true that a majority of muslims may not approve of those exhibiting same-sex attraction or identifying as different from your assigned gender or outside the binary. But disapproval doesn’t mean excommunication, doesn’t mean dehumanization. There is a clear understanding that separates the private from the public. And there are those that view LGBT identities as perfectly compatible with Islam - that depends on the individual and eventually the community to figure out.
Is there a sect or denomination I can seek guidance from? Am I just wasting my - and your - time?
Your primary guidance will be the Quran. Your secondary guidance will ideally be any imam from a local Masjid.
As for the sects and denominations - they don’t really matter. And what I mean by that is that the basics are the same across denominations. You shouldn’t really concern yourself with it right now unless you are specifically interested because it becomes a really specialised affair. There’s a reason why there are scholars that specialise specifically in matters of fiqh, or jurisprudence.
Also Sufism is not a separate “sect” of Islam, it forms an essential part of the Islamic experience and Islamic history for ALL muslims. Certain muslims, especially those that follow orthodox Sunni jurists, often sideline Sufi thought which were then re-propagated by Orientalist scholars. It is important to recognise this lest we fall back in the colonialist trap.
It feels like appropriation for me to want to convert to a faith, but then pick and choose which parts of it I want to believe and follow. I dabble in tarot and the occult. I’m poly. I believe all consensual love is valid and sacred.
It may shock you to find out that muslims also practice black magic and the like. There have of course been a process “standardization” of such practices, and they are less common now as they are being dissuaded by mainstream Islamic councils.
But it’s definitely not appropriation. What we need now especially with the rising tide of Islamaphobia is those with humility, introspection and courage to understand Islam. In the end, you may decide to not get into it - and that’s fine, but the journey is as valuable as the destination.
I think this blog post, Interrogating The Border Between Rationality And Faith, will be helpful for you.
If you want to know more about my personal experience and thoughts, feel free to DM me or message me on Matrix.
This is a repost of [my comment](https://lemmygrad.ml/comment/3823945) on Hexbear’s news megathread. I figured it would be good to post it here aswell for further visibility and perhaps invite more responses. Euros being delusional as per usual. [Malaysia’s PM Anwar Ibrahim makes ‘no apology’ for Hamas links on Germany visit](https://archive.is/2024.03.12-083415/https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3255064/malaysias-pm-anwar-ibrahim-makes-no-apology-hamas-links-germany-visit) The Malaysian PM visits Germany and gets accused of supporting Hamas by an audience member - but are these westerners completely illiterate? > Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has defended Malaysia's relations with Hamas, saying he made "no apologies" for his nation's historical links with the Palestinian militant group and reiterating his stance that the Middle East conflict predates the October 7 attack on Israel. > "What I reject strongly is this narrative, this obsession, as if the entire problem begins and ends with the 7th of October," the prime minister said. There had been decades of "atrocities, plunder and dispossession of Palestinians," he added at a press conference alongside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin. Despite the hysteria that the “geopolitics understanders” made about Anwar Ibrahim’s NED credentials months ago, Westerners seemingly forget that his initial rise came from the radical student organizations in the 1970s which were in-part connected with the Muslim Brotherhood, the Iranian Revolution and other influential Islamic movements at the time. Of course he will be anti-Israel. That has been the hallmark of Malaysian foreign policy since the beginning - even with our 1st PM in 1957 - and he was the most Western friendly of them all. As the article mentions: > Anwar's staunch support for the Palestinians can be traced back to his years as a student leader in the 1970s including as the leader of the Malaysian Islamic Youth Movement. > Muslim-majority Malaysia does not recognise Israel's statehood. It has long been a vocal supporter of the Palestinian cause, hosting Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in 1984 and 2001 and welcoming Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Mashal, leaders of the political wing of Hamas, in 2020. This reminded me of when multiple “Israeli” news outlets accused Malaysia of [being the most anti-semitic country on Earth](https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/anti-semitism-in-malaysia), despite historically having no native Jewish population, and a residential population that at it’s peak only reached the teens. Completely unhinged and insane. And [then there’s the palm oil issue](https://www.bernama.com/en/business/news.php?id=2278111). Banning our palm oil will not change the fact that we were able to succesfully industrialize its production and outcompete your local biofuel industry. Europeans needs to stop barking like a rabid dog. It isn’t the 1800s or even the neocolonial late 1900s anymore. These deindustrialization policies will not work, especially when you yourself have lost any capabilities of enacting economic warfare. Hiding behind a facade of environmentalism doesn’t change reality. As [Bloomberg noted](https://archive.is/2024.03.05-001353/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-03-04/malaysia-sees-asia-africa-taking-palm-oil-europe-doesn-t-want), there will be other markets that the palm oil could be sold to. You are kneecapping yourself just to appear “environmentally friendly”. Perhaps it’s just the final cries of a region declining into subordination. The garden after all, will inevitably be reclaimed by the jungle. It just takes time. Also I read the worst thing ever when I was researching for the post, titled “[A Close Encounter With Asia’s Anti-Semitic Capital](https://forward.com/culture/327354/a-close-encounter-with-asias-anti-semitic-capital/)”. Warning: Terminal crackerism.
Neptium
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Kind of funny that there are those in West that still cling onto the notion that Chinese production is inferior while over here people say if you want shit done you call China lol
Neptium
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Nationalisation might be one of their few good proposed policies along with land reform.
And that’s all that is needed. A complete reformation of the relations of production will have a profound effect in elevating the productive forces.
Your critique on the manifesto seems lazy because most bourgeois democracies and their parties over-inflate and exaggerate in their manifestoes. Doesn’t say much about their class character.
Many things can happen when a large mass movement built on consensus is in charge.
I am not saying the EFF is one either, but the critique you bring forward doesn’t showcase your points well.
Bringing back military conscription? For what?
It is answered in the quote you mentioned.
offering life skills and discipline.
Teaching the masses life skills is GOOD.
Military conscription (which in the cited quote doesn’t necessarily imply “conscription”) is not only about invading other countries or protecting sovereignty. That’s colonizer talk.
The army can help with a lot of people’s projects, mobilizing resources for the betterment of the country. Furthermore, most places that have conscription also have options to participate in other governmental bodies, like firefighting. It is not strictly just into the army.
Furthermore, all AES countries have mandatory military conscription.
The countries that do not have military conscription are often those tainted with liberal individualism, prioritising the rights of the “individual” rather than the service to the community especially wrt to Global South countries.
many of which have very little to do with Marxism.
May I get specific examples of which policies “are not relevant” to Marxism? And I want something that is unequivocally and undeniably for the empowerment of the comprador classes and Capital.
Neptium
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And in the other way, especially accounting for costs of living.
See my comment above.
Poland, Lithuania and Estonia in the same cathegory as Switzerland or Luxembourg is like the joke about man and dog having averagely three legs.
You are merely arguing against the presentation of the data on the map, not the methodology of the data or the conclusions made from the data.
PERCENTAGE OF THE NATIONAL POPULATION BELOW WORLD AVERAGE INCOME OR CONSUMPTION
In this image found in the article I sourced the map from, it is made perfectly clear that Poland, with a population of 15% earning below the world average, is obviously vastly different than that of Switzerland of around 2%. In other words, proportionally, there are 7.5x more people in Poland that live with wages below the world average.
It is purely arbitrary that the author made the cutting off point for the legend 20%, when it could easily be in 10%, which would seperate Poland and Lithuania (but not Estonia) from Switzerland. The author could also have based it on quartile ranges (which would defeat the nature of this analysis).
Neptium
8mo ago
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It doesn’t consider the subsistence farmers
I am unsure how this helps your argument.
If anything this all further reinforces the nature of unequal exchange and imperialism.
There are rarely any "true" full-time subsistence farmers in the Global South, for example, during periods of drought, or after seasonal harvests, - subsistance farming doesn't guarantee full-time job security nor does it entail that (for example) the farmer is able to pay for school or healthcare for the farmer or their family.
and people who obtain resources without the market.
That is of statistical insignificance, unless you are going to argue that Capitalism and Imperialism (what you call the "market") have not infilitrated atleast 5% of the world populace (400 million people). And if so - may I get a source? I must read about the 400 million people or more that escaped Capitalism!
Even if 80million people were not counted, 1% of the world population or the entire population of Germany, it would still not affect the conclusions made from the article and the map.
As described in the article:
To broaden the focus, we can apply the same reasoning, not only to the United States, but to the rich nations as a whole. We follow the World Bank’s classification of high-income countries:
The average national income per capita in high-income countries in 2021 is $55,225 per year (this and the following figures are in 2023 international dollars).
The total world population is 7.888 billion people.
Repaying the entire world’s population with the average income of the average citizen in high-income countries would require about $436 trillion per year.
However, the total national income of the entire world amounts to just $146 trillion annually.
If all the world’s annual income – eliminating the parasitic counterparts of labor: profit, rent, interest rates, etc. – was destined to simple reproduction, and thus distributed equally among the entire world population, it would be enough to cover barely one third of the average income of high-income countries: that is, about $18,510 per capita per year.
As long as the "proletariat" in the Global North earns more than their labour - earn more in return than their labour is entitled for - their material interests are in direct contradiction to the interests of the Global South masses.
Nor does it take into account cost of living.
It is using 2023 international dollars - so it does take into account cost of living, unless you are arguing that the World Bank's "basket of goods" is flawed.
If you think about it, people who live “on less than a dollar per day” literally wouldn’t be able to live if they faced the same cost of living as people in western societies.
There is a difference between "living" and "surviving".
The question we must ask ourselves is why is that? What makes their lives different from ours? What is considered essential, abundant or normal here that isn't in the Global South?
To quote Unequal Exchange and the Prospects of Socialism by Communist Working Group and Arghiri Emmanuel.
The commodities which represent the reproduction costs of ther working class do more or less cost the same all over the world. generally speaking, the costs of maintaining a living as a Danish worker are the same in Denmark, Tanzania, Brazil or Hong Kong. The price for one kilo of wheat, one kilo of meat, one watch, or a transistor radio varies by 10, 20, 50 percent from country to country. However, the wages are 5, 10, 20 or 50, times higher in the imperialist countries.
Truthfully, that does not need to be quoted by I did anyways because the main point is that "living costs" is defined as the level needed for basic social reproduction. It does not entail short working hours, safe working conditions, the price of buying a meal at a restaurant, strong environmental regulations, the price of consumer goods or rent, etc.
The calculations in the main article explicitly mentions that it eliminated "the parasitic counterparts of labor: profit, rent, interest rates, etc." by utilzing only data on production.
but the gap is exaggerated by the liberal worldview.
What is considered liberalism here?
It’s important to remember that a lot of this data is biased.
Yes but not necessarily for your own argument that the data is "exaggerated".
The official data is given to the World Bank by member states, in which for Third World states, due to centuries of imperialist sabatoge, is unable to provide fully accurate statistics and often overrepresent organized workers. This means the disparity may even be larger in real life.
I recommend reading this article on the Labour Aristocracy and the book I quoted prior.
There has also been other extensive works on Imperialism in the late 20th and early 21st century that I think may help you understand the arguments being conveyed here.
Source: [Imperialism and the international split of the proletariat](https://anti-imperialist.net/blog/2023/05/23/imperialism-and-the-international-split-of-the-proletariat/).
Neptium
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PKK and Imperialism https://en.rnp-f.org/2015/03/24/pkk-and-imperialism/
Neptium
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💯
However I'd like to add your analysis a bit. Excerpt from my other comment again:
the material harm NGOs cause to people are two-fold.
On a societal level, they aim to circumvent and build alternative structures to the current government and thus without the “democratic accountability” that these governments have to face (even if they are bourgeois dictatorships, they still have to manage the contradictions within society to remain in power). This can be seen in many colour revolutions that have occurred the past 50 years.
They also introduce and import foreign concepts, what I call “academic lib phraseology”, without the democratic consultation and “diffusion” to the masses. The masses here aren’t dumb when they realise that these NGO liberals speak the same as any other NGO liberal in other countries or those in the West. This is not a coincidence.
On a local level, despite their claim to the contrary, they actually maintain and sustain the oppression of LGBT people. Since they do not address the material basis of the oppression and are funded by foreign elements, their only justification and purpose for existing IS the existence of the oppression of LGBT people in the targeted Global South country.
Why would an LGBT rights NGO founder want to achieve LGBT liberation? The founder would lose their only source of income and their entire career!
This is similar to when the labour aristocrats in a trade union stops representing the interests of the rank-and-file.
This also means that the NGOs feature the worst of the liberal activists, who are often groomed by the West in the first place through their scholarship programmes. They are filled with opportunists and careerists, because to them, civil society is their way of climbing the corporate ladder and for their “professional development”.
Neptium
9mo ago
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Neptium
9mo ago
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So there's this popular Ex-Muslim youtuber that I used to watch a while back.
They became a raging Zionist.
Average "Ex-Muslim" Westerner be like.
Neptium
9mo ago
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8%
Neptium
9mo ago
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They make some noise about it sometimes but when you country is fully intertwined with Global Capital liberal media tends to look the other way.
Neptium
9mo ago
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the size of Italy
Speaking of which…
Neptium
9mo ago
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100%
It is up to the specific society, nation, civilisation and state to determine how it will handle “religious” affairs.
Religion is in quotes because how religion is understood in the East is different and often misconstrued to how it is understood in the West.
And as such, questions like if “dialectical materialism and a belief in God mutually exclusive” is unanswerable once you get into the specifics because it is broad ranging and implies too many things at once.
Let the masses of every culture on Earth determine their own path to modernisation. It is not up to us that is the least affected and the most encumbered with dubious assertions to dictate how other people handle their internal and communal affairs.
I realise my mistake in engaging with questions that pretend to be universal while yet ultimately being situated in an Anglophone, western-dominated space. As such it is best to not put my nose where it doesn’t belong.
This will be my final answer on this topic and I will stop commenting on such matters directly on this site.
Neptium
9mo ago
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I have a very similar background to you.
I don’t have solutions per se but I realised later on that my lack of interest in my own origin and culture stems from mainly personal trauma and scarce engagement with people from my country.
Like you, since being taught abroad, it meant that there was no singular nation or country to identify with and I assume, as typical for international kids in the Arabian Peninsula, you’d grow up either in a “international” private school and your high school would end in either IAL or IB.
This means a severe disconnection and ignorance of your own history and culture. You’d be taught a Eurocentric and often “globalized” (neoliberal) image of both yourself and society at large. I myself was bombarded with notions of “global citizenship” (which was an actual subject you could study).
A step towards appreciating and recognising my own identity was reading the history of my own country. Understanding what my ancestors been through, understanding the dynamics in which have shaped people before me, and understanding how it affected my self-perception and how I ended up where I am (in this case, West Asia).
It is not easy. But fortunately for both you and I, we have our work cut out short by being from countries colonized by Anglophones. There is an extensive corpus of books written in English that you are able to engage with dealing with your own culture and country.
I myself struggle to learn a language - and I envy those who can pick up multiple relatively easily - so I say this as no easy step, but learning your native tongue and it’s nuances and specifities will undoubtedly boost your own “cultural self-confidence” but also allow you to engage with the masses of people where you are from.
I’ll have to say though that I was able to return to my home country for a few years, and that also helped slowly chipped the alienation I had felt prior.
Neptium
12mo ago
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92%
[Long post ahead]
Frankly, I was a bit confused at first at the responses to Hakim's supposed misdeed. I saw practically nothing wrong with his post.
This is speaking as someone who considers themself "ex-muslim" and rarely practices any of the daily rituals of being muslim.
I have read through both the Hexbear thread and this one here on Lemmygrad. Firstly, I would like to say I agree with Aru's comment on the other parallel thread running right now.
I'd like to address some of the contentions people have about the post. Hakim starts his post with this statement:
How do the Palestinian people persist? As muslims...
Not because they ARE muslims, as in, Islam was the only way in which they were able to carry out anti-colonial struggle, but rather they carry out the anti-colonial struggle through BEING muslim. Islam in this context is a material force, precisely because it is imbedded in the people - the colonized and the working classes, in their decision-making and power. It becomes entrenched in the material base.
It is in the masjid where muslims congregate and form communal bonds. It is in the masjid where people recieve their political and cultural education. It is the masjid that organizes the local community. It is in the masjid grounds in which people partake in the political economy.
To say that if Palestine was fully christian or any other "religion", they would still reject colonization, misses the point. It doesn't matter about some hypotheticals that you concoct in your head. That's as useful as saying that if China was 100% Christian they would still be communist - what is the point in engaging in idealist hypotheticals? To simply compare it to Christianity, is idealism. Because you are not comparing the reality in which these cultural traditions, epistemologies, and beliefs operate. You are comparing one idea to another, utterly deaf to the material context behind it. The material reality of the ummah, the material reality of Palestine, means that Islam is the force in which anti-imperialist and anti-colonialism is carried out.
So yes, perhaps for many muslims, the Quran, the life of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) becomes the starting point of their political conciousness, and to somehow call it immature, backward, or a type of "false consciousness", is to fall into the orientalist idealist tropes of the days of direct colonization.
Throughout the entire Islamic world we have seen numerous secular and communist organizations that directly collaborated with the colonizer, that never gained support from the muslim masses and that also had to face a visceral reactionary force funded by the West. To say that secular movements only failed in the Islamic world because they were being pitted against reactionary Western-funded movements ignores the fact that if these secular movements truly had the mandate of the people - truly did listen to the working masses, they would have succeeded in maintaining power in the first place.
To act like this analysis is somehow "idealism", when it is actually idealism to ignore history and material conditions in favour of a dogmatic secular understanding of class warfare.
Why is it when state secularism and athiesm is mentioned, we only mention those in AES, like the conditions of the ummah is somehow exactly one-on-one the same as that of China or the USSR? Why doesn't anyone ever mention about the beacon of liberal modernity and secularism - France - in which if you ask anyone in the ummah what they think about it, they would vehemently reject associating with that Islamophobic "secular" state. Why is it immediately assumed that when someones says they want an Islamic country, it is immediately assumed they want a monoreligious populace with forced conversions on heretics and heathens? Why is it assumed when we say something is Islamic, it means that it cannot involve people of other faiths (or lack thereof)?
In my eyes, the answer is simple. It is because the Western left still carries the mental burden of colonization, of cultural genocide, and they project it onto the global south - onto the ummah.
Are we suppose to ignore the Islamic influence of for example Southeast Asian foreign policy, Arab nationalism, or North African decolonization? How about the Islamic Axis of Resistance pushing back against the Zionist Entity and other US imperial projects in West Asia? Islamic socialism and Islam has been, and continues to be, materially closer to anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism and communism than Western Marxism could ever even dream about (that is - if they even recognize imperialism). Islam is the form that the anti-imperialist essence of the ummah takes.
Is it the "muh slems" that are idealistic, or is it the Western's left misunderstanding of the "unity of opposites"? If you can only percieve reality in absolutes, in black-and-white, then "religion" is always "immaterial"; that means you will be unable to identify your friends from your enemies and it also means you will never understand Islam and the ummah.
Neptium
12mo ago
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100%
Thanks for the highlight! This was a really interesting video.
I also like to clarify a thing you mention.
Chinese Malay
isn't really used in Malaysia unless specifically referring to someone who was raised by a Malay speaking parent (often muslim and male) and Chinese speaking parent. Two different racialised groups.
This is because of the racialised definition of "Malay" that came after British colonization. I elaborated more about it here. You were right to call them Chinese Malay if the anti-colonial forces in the country won, which would have radically returned the term "Malay" back to it's indigenous meaning or if they fit the description I laid out above.
However, nowadays, the government recognized term and how most people identify themselves as is "Chinese Malaysian". Chinese Peranakans (sometimes just Peranakans only) could also be an alternative term for Chinese people that have inter-married with local peoples earlier in the colonization process, but that usually refer to those that typically have lost their ability to speak Chinese and have families in Peninsular Malaysia that date back atleast a few generations and practice "Peranakan" or "Baba-Nyonya" customs.
Neptium
1y ago
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100%
On the top right there is a drop-down menu with the letters "KP". If you click on it you can choose English instead.
Oh boy I thought I would cool it with the controversial LGBT stuff on this site but my country was pulled into the Western culture war this time (making my blood boil as per usual). [The British band The 1975 decided to do a stunt](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/22/malaysia-festival-halted-matty-healy-1975-criticises-anti-lgbtq-laws) where 2 male band members kissed on stage. Which was proceeded by a rant and behaviours that was very liberal, only could be done by someone who grew up in a hyper-capitalist and alienated society in which individualism festers like a plague. Needless to say, but this sort of "activism" doesn't work. That's obvious enough. Then the liberals that consume too much American media (or lives in America) comes out of the woodwork bashing the government for over-exaggerating, and/or praising this pathetic attempt at lecturing the barbarians for their bad values. Liberals really showcase remarkable cynicism and hatred of the masses. The sheer chauvinism in which you come into another country as a guest to perform and then lambast government policy in which you yourself are not affected by and in which you agreed to beforehand, while at the same time breaking many social norms - well that takes the cake. Thank you for giving right-wingers ammo to further politicize and police "LGBT" communities in this country - making it worse for everyone here by enflaming the already vicious identity politics prevalent here (referring to the local identity politics - not commenting on the American one). Good job, colonizer. I see that the Brits still think that anyone cares about what they have to say. The coverage by the [Rolling Stone](https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/the-1975-malaysia-festival-matty-healy-slams-anti-lgbtq-laws-1234793551/) and [The Independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/the-1975-malaysia-matty-healy-denise-welch-b2379860.html) is as chauvinistic as ever. I'd prefer it if you just called us primatives directly instead of this whole fake concern for human rights. Atleast [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/rock-band-1975s-set-stopped-malaysia-after-onstage-kiss-2023-07-22/) had the decency to mention that: > Friday's incident sparked uproar on Malaysian social media, including among some members of the LGBT community, who accused Healy of "performative activism" and said his action could expose the community to more stigma and discrimination. but in typical fashion doesn't mention that such behaviours, even if advocating for something the majority of the people agree, is not acceptable. It's a *concert*, not a political debate. Narcissistic behaviour and dysfunctional interpersonal skills (as determined by our culture and society at large) isn't something that should be promoted. Furthermore, this isn't even mentioning colonial history and ongoing imperialism. Liberals needs to be sent into re-education camps for decades to deworm their minds from their terminal brain disease. Alhamdullilah that most people here don't have it and recognised the chauvinism for what it is. ([All non-english and many English replies on this tweet for example](https://twitter.com/PopCrave/status/1682434753520361474?s=20).)
I know pirating is always an option, and I used to play EU4 completely pirated. But I got some credit remaining on Steam and they’re on sale right now, so lads, which should I go for? Background info being I only played EU4 before, and enjoyed the nation-building side more rather than the military strategy. Although I was able to do some WCs back in the day and I do like micromanaging and extending a 20hr campaign into a 100hr one.
I was debating whether to insert this within LGBT+ or Islamic Leftism but I do think ultimately it might fit here better because it covers the specific experience of French indigènes, which makes it more relevant here. I feel like in these sort of online Islamic “progressive” spaces, there’s no genuine discussions happening. These spaces are often almost defensive in nature - like the existence of this community is just to prove to disapproving whites that Islam isn’t this, or isn’t that. This is a result of being in a Western dominated space in general. Gender and sexual minorities is a very important phenomenon that must require a response, yet it is almost ignored or never spoken about because this muslim-homophobia dichotomy is so engrained that people are (rightfully) scared to even talk about it, especially across the White left. I’d of course invite everyone to treat this article critically, and contribute if you have any qualms against their conclusions, although I will admit my opinions have slowly drifted closer to the article as the years went by.
learningfromchina.net
This is a good followup to the previously shared article over here by the same writer on “[Peak China](https://mronline.org/2023/05/23/peak-china-a-new-low-in-western-attempts-to-persuade-china-to-commit-suicide/)”. The article gives a much more historical view on the role of US imperialism, in dominating other previously (and still somewhat) productive centres of the capitalist world economy - Germany and Japan, and hindering growth in other parts of Asia as well.
I was reading *Socialism's Ignored Success: Iranian Islamic Socialism* by Ramin Mazaheri, and they mentioned something that has become a common sight here too: Islamic finance. Iran is leading in Islamic financing, with Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the UAE and Qatar filling the rest of the Top 5 according to this [report](https://icd-ps.org/uploads/files/ICD%20Refinitiv%20ifdi-report-20221669878247_1582.pdf). For those who don't know, it's basically finance but with Islamic principles as accorded to the Quran and various *Madhhab*s (schools of jurisprudence). Some of it's principles are (quoting [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_banking_and_finance#Principles)), among others: > 1. Paying or charging interest. "All forms of interest are riba and hence prohibited". Islamic rules on transactions (known as Fiqh al-Muamalat) have been created to prevent use of interest. > 2. Investing in businesses involved in activities that are forbidden (haraam). These include things such as selling alcohol or pork, or producing media such as gossip columns or pornography. > 3. Charging extra for late payment. This applies to murâbaḥah or other fixed payment financing transactions, although some authors believe late fees may be charged if they are donated to charity,or if the buyer has "deliberately refused" to make a payment. Has any comrades read much on this? How viable do you think is such a financial system, especially now, with renewed *interest* in de-dollarisation? (see what I did there?) Can it fully live up to it's socialistic principles in a world capitalist system?
About the multiracial, working class [hartal](https://lemmygrad.ml/comment/354470) I mentioned before that took place prior to the supposed communist emergency in what was then Malaya.
Set in a feudalistic fictional world, the song espouses a liberal (to use the term a bit anachronistically) feminist form of class collaborationism. Although both expresses ill-feelings toward the heteronormative patriarchy that they live in, the film tries to make a false equivalence between both of their lives just because of their gender. Erika exhibits false consciousness believing that a princess has the same experiences as her, an indentured servant whose forced to work due to her parent’s debts. This is clearly shown in the first few lines of the song, where Erika had to manually toil away in hard day’s work to even feed herself and yet brushes it off as being ‘used to it’, while Anneliese (the princess) just ‘has to ring a bell’ to have an omelette delivered to her bed. Erika, being kept ignorant by the ruling class, exclaims that they have the same lives. To use Frier’s analysis, it can be seen that Anneliese, although still part of the aristocracy, is denied humanity (agency) not only through her gender but also due to her class as shown by the song’s chorus ‘We carry through to do what we need to do’. Showcasing how everyone is oppressed to some extent in class society.
The word must be something non-political that is in everyday use or in common speech. For example, in my mother language there's the word *muak*, which describes the feeling you get after eating the same dish repeatedly, leading to you being sick of it and not wanting to eat that dish anymore. Tired (ie. tired of eating the same x dish/food) may be the closest word/phrase in the English language that captures the meaning, but not exactly.
Westerners crying that China helped subsidized their shitty liberal democracies since the 2000s and subsequently probably saved them from an even worse crisis than they are facing now. From [Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2022/06/29/negative-views-of-china-tied-to-critical-views-of-its-policies-on-human-rights/). Quoted from [South China Morning Post](https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3186192/why-do-singapore-and-malaysia-have-more-favourable-view-china-us?module=perpetual_scroll_0&pgtype=article&campaign=3186192) (paywalled): > Chong Ja Ian, an associate professor of political science at the National University of Singapore, said populations in Singapore and Malaysia were more “primed towards pliancy to authority” and tended to place more emphasis on economic performance. I really do hate this rhetoric that somehow Malaysia/Singapore values authoritarianism (whatever that means). Liberal politics will never understand how even if the 2 countries are functionally 1 party states and may not be the most socially liberal places in the world, the parties carried and boosted economic performance, making both nations the top 3 in GDP per capita in southeast asia. Personally, they would never get how economic performance has allowed my family to literally escape from poverty and peasant level subsistance farming to clean, modern houses and high-school/university education. Of course they wouldn't understand. Muh liberal values and hooman rights. The West would rather see us fighting for scraps and being unstable and war torn like the Middle East. Fuck them.
blogs.worldbank.org
Went and dug a little deeper and it seems that for high-income nations, this trend of more women than men graduating in universities (as well as outperforming in school) has been going on for multiple decades now. Apart of me wants to think its just right-wing hysteria because this was brought to my attention by some random podcast clip using this example as somehow proof that patriarchy doesn't exist lol. Some articles I read did mention how other factors (particularly class and race) was a higher determinant of school/university success. And I particularly do not like biological explanations anyways (too essentialist to my taste, but I can't say for sure). I forgot which article in particular but it did argue it's because men used to be able find jobs in more traditional blue-collar industries, leading to this present day discrepancy. What do you all think?