EU Immigration Crisis Megathread

[Queequeg]

Well we have mentioned this here already, and especiall for me is the most frustrating part about this crisis: at this stage it is almost guaranteed that it is going to push the EU into an era of desintegration and far-right rule of darkness.

I don't know.  There would be worse things than moving past Europe that has spent the better part of the last 50 years in paralytic, self-aggrandizing guilt. 

[Zanza]

Other parades similarly questioned Germany's asylum politics. In Saxony, a mock up train was labeled "Balkan Express", with people dressed as locusts on/around it.

Some others: 


"Refugee Wave"


Small fish: "Welcome Culture", big fish "New Years in Cologne"


Kurden are Kurds

[Admiral Yi]

Self-aggrandizing guilt?

[Queequeg]

Self-aggrandizing guilt?

"All of this is happening because European powers were colonial rulers of the Levant for 30 years."

[Valmy]

Self-aggrandizing guilt?

"All of this is happening because European powers were colonial rulers of the Levant for 30 years."

Yet the one place they did not colonize is the source of all (well ok a great deal of) the problems.

[Admiral Yi]

"All of this is happening because European powers were colonial rulers of the Levant for 30 years."

And that aggrandizes themselves how exactly?

[The Brain]

"All of this is happening because European powers were colonial rulers of the Levant for 30 years."

And that aggrandizes themselves how exactly?

Everything that happens happens because of the actions of Europeans.

[Queequeg]

"All of this is happening because European powers were colonial rulers of the Levant for 30 years."

And that aggrandizes themselves how exactly?

Everything that happens happens because of the actions of Europeans.

Exactly.

Anticolonialism and Postcolonialism has ironically made the history of all of not-Europe a response to Europe.

[LaCroix]

queeq, what do you think is the cause if you think western powers weren't hugely influential in what's going down in the middle east? you never posted in that thread ages back where I literally said something like, "hey, it'd be nice if queeq was around to talk about ancient islam conquest of egypt"

if your argument stems from some weird projection based off bad mormon upbringing (or somethingsomething bactria), I'm gonna be disappointed

[Tamas]

queeq, what do you think is the cause if you think western powers weren't hugely influential in what's going down in the middle east? you never posted in that thread ages back where I literally said something like, "hey, it'd be nice if queeq was around to talk about ancient islam conquest of egypt"

if your argument stems from some weird projection based off bad mormon upbringing (or somethingsomething bactria), I'm gonna be disappointed

There have been plenty of fuckups by firs world powers in the Middle East, but blaming everything on them creates a narrative where the ME had functional and peaceful societies until the Europeans came about. Which isn't true, unless you count 500 years of ruthless Ottoman oppression a functional and peaceful society.

[Queequeg]

queeq, what do you think is the cause if you think western powers weren't hugely influential in what's going down in the middle east? you never posted in that thread ages back where I literally said something like, "hey, it'd be nice if queeq was around to talk about ancient islam conquest of egypt"

if your argument stems from some weird projection based off bad mormon upbringing (or somethingsomething bactria), I'm gonna be disappointed

Honestly, the Ottomans.  I'd mellowed in my anti-Ottoman Byzanteen prejudices when I was in College/doing my Masters but being in the Balkans has, well, confirmed everything.  A journey from north to south Serbia-from the old Austrian frontier to Rashka and Kosovo-is a journey from Europe to, well, ethnic hatred, tribal thinking and chronic underdevelopment.  It's not some kind of mistake that we've now spent more than a century fighting wars stemming from the utter failure of the Ottoman Empire. Gavrilo Princip, Mlada Bosna, ISIS, Al Qaeda-same parents. 

The Ottomans legacy here is astonishing.  You go through regions that were supposedly favored-Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo-and they just didn't build shit.  The sole legacy of the Empire was the creation of ethnic hierarchies premised on hatred, oppression and continued poverty.  No literacy.  Minimal trade networks.  Minimal investment.  You go to the great recruiting grounds of the greatest Ottoman soldiers and statesmen and the only impressive buildings are pre-Ottoman.  They make the Austrians look like goddamned Cyrus the Great.  It's incredible.  The Porte didn't give a shit if central Hungary was almost unpopulated.  They didn't care if a million Serbs fled Kosovo for the Austrian frontier.  They didn't care if Albania was ludicrously poor as long as Albanian tribes could be counted on to repress the occasional Serb or Greek rebellion.  That was the logic of the entire Empire.  The Western colonialists just imitated that for a few decades.

[Valmy]

Well the primary role of the provinces for a couple centuries there was to be farmed by corrupt Pashas.

[Queequeg]

Well the primary role of the provinces for a couple centuries there was to be farmed by corrupt Pashas.

That does not go against my "the Ottomans were terrible" hypothesis.

Actually part of the point.  They would bleed the Balkans to build horrible, tacky palaces along the Bosporus.

[Valmy]

Well the primary role of the provinces for a couple centuries there was to be farmed by corrupt Pashas.

That does not go against my "the Ottomans were terrible" hypothesis.

Actually part of the point.  They would bleed the Balkans to build horrible, tacky palaces along the Bosporus.

No it does not. But the Ottoman Empire was a self-perpetuating bureaucratic state whose strength primary resided with its almost implacable inertia. In order for it to function as designed it needed a strong and vigorous Sultan (or failing that a strong Vizier with imperial support), without that nobody would (or rather could) actually attempt to do anything productive beyond just feather their nest. But great leadership from the top was not a hallmark of the Ottoman Empire from about 1600 onwards.

[Queequeg]

Honestly, the Ottomans were a shitshow for everyone even on their good days.