Just spent a weekend in Dubai. Not sure what I think of it.

[Recursion]

Still processing that.

It's an imaginary city. I mean, obviously it physically exists; but it was imagined and created within my lifetime.

It's kind of the embodiment of everything the social left and right hate about modernity. And it's ostentatiously that. It puts it in your face, constantly. It simply is an enlightened despotism. But it really is enlightened. And it really is a despotism. "Guest" (ha!) workers face immense legal liabilities, and human trafficking is a huge problem (though UAE has a much better handle on it than the rest of the Gulf does). They "experimented" with "democracy" 10 years ago, and allowed about 30% of citizens (and citizens are about 7% of UAE residents) to vote for an "advisory council".

That said, there was no "Arab Spring" in Dubai or Abu Dhabi or Ras Al Khaimah. The cynical response is that essentially no Arabs live in any of those places, and that's a fair point.

Dubai is an economy generated out of nothing. Yes, nothing. Dubai has almost no petroleum reserves; extraction is about 5% of GDP (traditional pearl diving is a larger portion of the economy; and the US has a larger per capita petroleum sector than the Emirate of Dubai).

Dubai is aggressively, and I mean aggressively, cosmopolitan. The only color people see is purple ("green"; the big currency notes in UAE are purple).

Like I said I'm still processing the trip and trying to form an opinion. There are poor people in the Emirates but they aren't for the most part in Dubai or Abu Dhabi; and all the Emirates make a point of hiding them pretty well. We did meet my sister-in-law's cousin who came here from the Philippines. She works in Ras al Khaimah ("the sticks", roughly) processing seafood as the fishing boats come in. She doesn't like being away from her family, but it's 10 times the money she would make back in Cebu.

It's a despotism; there's no way around that. Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum is an absolute ruler with absolute power. (Though he's only the VP of the entire UAE.) The only thought I have right now (and I'm working on this) is that they got the money first, and then turned to the West. They negotiated from a position of strength. The original Emirs took the trading and pearl money they were earning, before India embargoed them, and built an absolute shit-ton of infrastructure, schools, and hospitals. They came to the table with a population who had the first three Maslow levels met. In the 1970s, the Emirs were literally trying to bribe the UK to keep the British army there, because they didn't want their own MIC to spring up and start coups. But the Labor government would have none of it, so they were literally forced to accept independence.

It's enlightened; there's no way around that. The UAE's literacy rate (including female literacy) exceeds the US's, and their infant mortality rate puts us to shame -- obviously, like every significant country in the world other than the US they have a government-funded universal system (it varies by emirate, but there are legal minima each emirate must meet; public hospitals are available to all, and private insurance can cover more "fancy" treatment -- private rooms, etc.). Socially, racism is frowned upon to an extent that really surprised me. As long as he is rich, a guy from Kenya really is accepted into whatever venue he wants to walk in to.

And you see what I did there. "As long as he is rich." Dubai is the embodiment of the paradigm people hate from the third way: "shut up, trust us, produce & consume, and get rich". The Emirs dutifully studied economics and sociology and criminology and all the other things. That's what the Emirs want, and that's what the Emirs get: people keep working, people keep consuming, and the economy keeps growing. (Once again: petroleum is currently a lower percentage of Dubai's GDP than of the US's GDP; it's not simply petrodollars.) We were staying at a hotel directly across from the Dubai WTC. They have a "standing exposition" of consumer electronics, which I visited. You could have fit six Best Buys into there. (There was also a Round Table Pizza and a Shake Shack -- sorry; Maharashtra just banned beef for religious reasons so those were quite on my mind.)

On women's rights: I don't know. The actual Arab population is small (again, less than 10% of residents are citizens), but I did see Arab women at the mall; some wore hijab, some niqab, some club outfits. There's also a kind of interesting device called the "Emirati burqa"; it's not a "burqa" in the Afghan sense, but a metal strip that hangs down in front of the woman's nose and mouth, like an ancient Greek battle helmet. It's apparently very traditional, like the Sicilian Catholic woman's veil, and like that veil rare to see in women under the age of 60 (I think the younger woman I saw wearing one was getting married; it was incredibly fancy and solid gold). Most of the women I saw were from the Philippines, and dressed exactly like the women I know from the Philippines (which is to say, like the women I know from Topeka: jeans and t-shirts). My wife never covered her hair the entire time and that was never a thing, even when we went into the Old Town to buy some saffron.

On that: we got 10 grams of fresh saffron for what worked out to be about $5 US. If you're in Dubai, it's Hajji Yusuf's Dry Goods, right by the Ras metro stop. Worth stopping in. I can't legally recommend you get the Iranian caviar, because that would be illegal, but if you feel like spending $10 US for what would be $300 of caviar back home...

Anyways. The UAE have a lot of problems, particularly with labor rights. But they're doing *something* right. There's a reason Bangladeshi and Filipino workers are lining up to work there and not the other way around. It is, like I said, the absolute embodiment of the corporatist spirit that rules too much of the world now, but we have to address the fact that it actually is delivering what it promises: shut up, avoid politics, do your work, and you'll get rich (by your standards of "rich&quot .

Like I said, I need to think more about this; I'm still not a fan of the UAE (labor needs more of a voice), but actually seeing it in action has made me think that we need a better argument than we have right now. *shrug*. Also, pictures coming in the later post. The Burj Khalifa is frigging amazing.

[villager]

1. Thoughtful piece. But how is it sustainable *environmentally*?

I've long wondered about the tenuousness of these desert "oasis" cities....

[druidity33]

3. yeah, um, water?

A cosmopolitan center in the middle of a desert has always seemed unsustainable to me.

I know their desalination plants do not work as well as they say they do...

[Recursion]

7. The desalination has come a long way in the past 10 years

They are actually exporting potable water at this point to Oman and Qatar.

[druidity33]

13. at what cost?

I know you're still forming opinions, so i would respectfully submit that you not take everything you learned while there as the god's honest truth. Why do we not see this technology in other desert areas? Who has done studies on how it affects the bioregion? How many extra resources do they use to extract their water? Sometimes we can be fooled by facades. Curious as to whether this trip was gratis?

[former9thward]

22. Phoenix has no water problem.

I pay less for water here than Chicago, Portland and Birmingham which are other cities I have lived for periods of time.

[villager]

33. Paying less is not indicative of "no water problem" in desert cities.

Usually, it's a sign of water profligacy.

In any case, before the water runs out, Phoenix will have a "power grid" problem in trying to keep city-dwellers at habitable temperatures in the face of rising desert heat...

[former9thward]

34. Water is not going to run out.

To build in AZ you have to show a 100 year water supply for the project. Desert heat is not rising. What is rising is the urban heat island effect which is created by all the concrete and asphalt which soaks in the day heat and releases it at night.

[villager]

37. You are free to imagine Phoenix-area development remaining unfettered for 100 years

Nature, however, will (soon) have other ideas.

[former9thward]

40. Yes doomsayers have been saying that for at least a 100 years.

Soon, soon, soon... The vast underground water systems are not going anywhere.

[villager]

41. "2007 climate study predicted permanent drought in Southwest"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10409710


You can bring it up with all those pesky scientists.

[former9thward]

55. Scientists in AZ say its BS.

But keep on with the 100 year old doomsayers. Maybe you will be right some eon.

[villager]

62. How about a link, instead of your usual dismissive GOP talking points?

Thanks.

[Kingofalldems]

64. Excellent response.

[former9thward]

69. Anything you don't like you call

"dismissive GOP talking points". Those attempts to shut down discussion may work with newbies but not with me. I will give you a link to the hard right Phoenix New Times



http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2014/07/no_arizona_will_not_be_out_of_water_in_six_years_no_matter_what_the_smithsonian_says.php

[villager]

70. "Planned development in Benson Sparks Water Worries"

This is more recent than your year-old link:

http://kjzz.org/content/123059/planned-development-benson-sparks-water-worries

But you folks just go ahead and keep building like there's no tomorrow!

I'm sure those GOP developers love it!

[former9thward]

73. Phoenix is run by Democrats

and they do love it. Have a good day!

[villager]

79. And so is California, but somehow, that's not reversing the effects of climate change

And it is true California, sadly, was lagging behind other Western states with groundwater limits, due to its long-standing capture by corporate agricultural interests.

So, while I applaud any wiser groundwater depletion restrictions in your state, I don't see Arizona being, exactly, "off the hook," in the years to come, as heat increases, along with the demands for cooling, and everyone in the West relying on the same power grid to keep things manageable.

In fact, given how many Arizonans I know who flee to San Diego during summertime, I'm wondering just how many more years the balancing act -- at current population numbers -- can last.

Which, really, is one of the unspoken questions about the OP, and where my part in the conversation came in.

[former9thward]

81. Look I agree with you

and I am not putting my head in the sand, pun intended, about this issue. I myself take a long vacation every summer to Chicago and Portland. There is no doubt if the drought continues there will be severe problems all around. If I had a magic wand I would stop all growth in AZ and CA. But I don't and our economy is built on constant growth.

[villager]

83. Well there you go. We actually agree & can break bread! And if sticky *Chicago*

...is cooler in the summer, then you know there are "thermostat" issues in Arizona!

No question California's water use was captured long ago by ag interests, which is now coming back to haunt/bite the state in increasingly spectacular fashion (and not the good kind of "spectacle!&quot

And the economy -- like the ideology of cancer cells -- has been built on the notion of "constant growth" on a clearly finite planet.

But either we will stop it, and reorganize, or it will be "stopped" for us, in rather unpretty fashion.

And yes, the effects of climate change won't be halted at Blythe, either. We're all in for a bumpy ride, whether we hit the exact same bumps at the same time, or not...

[nationalize the fed]

44. There are between 15-20,000 desalination plants in operation

around the world, according to Wikipedia

Existing Desalination facilities and facilities under construction around the world

Estimates vary widely between 15,000–20,000 desalination plants producing more than 20,000 m3/day.

Israel

Israel Desalination Enterprises' Sorek Desalination Plant in Palmachim provides up to 26,000 m³ of potable water per hour (2.300 m³ p.a.). At full capacity, it is the largest desalination plant of its kind in the world. Once unthinkable, given Israel's history of drought and lack of available fresh water resource, with desalination, Israel can now actually produce a surplus of fresh water.

The Hadera seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) desalination plant in Israel is the largest of its kind in the world. The project was developed as a build–operate–transfer by a consortium of two Israeli companies: Shikun and Binui, and IDE Technologies.

By 2014, Israel's desalination programs provided roughly 35% of Israel's drinking water and it is expected to supply 40% by 2015 and 70% by 2050.

Saudi Arabia

The Saline Water Conversion Corporation of Saudi Arabia provides 50% of the municipal water in the Kingdom, operates a number of desalination plants, and has contracted $1.892 billion to a Japanese-South Korean consortium to build a new facility capable of producing a billion liters per day, opening at the end of 2013. They currently operate 32 plants in the Kingdom; one example at Shoaiba cost $1.06 billion and produces 450 million liters per day...

More countries that desalinate water:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desalination#Existing_facilities_and_facilities_under_construction

A desalination plant in CA is under construction

New research will lower the cost, and Australia has a few desalination plants that run off of renewable energy (see link above)

New Energy Efficient Graphene Desalination Membrane For The 99%
http://cleantechnica.com/2015/04/03/methane-rescue-new-energy-efficient-graphene-desalination-membrane-99/

[KamaAina]

75. Actually, California already has one in operation

in the small city of Sand City near Monterey.

http://www.sandcity.org/News_and_Events/Sand_City_Water_Supply_Project.aspx

[tk2kewl]

4. If you build this you are about as far from environmental sustainability as you can get

[Recursion]

6. Yeah, the Palm is stupid. I'll be the first to say that.

The argument (to the extent there is one) is that all the money the Palm generates is why they can have an 80% solar-powered metro system that's cheaper than New York's and free basic health care for guest workers. But most of the people I met also find the Palm an embarrassment, along with the whole strip it anchors on the coast.

I didn't go into the Palm (though I rode the train to its entrance; just checking out the transit). I went to the absurdly huge mall, the old city, and my sister-in-law's cousin's place out in Ras al Khaimah.

[Recursion]

5. They lead the world in desalination

And they at least claim all the desalination energy requirements come from their solar farms. That's something I need to look in to.

[Warpy]

27. It's not sustainable, at all.

Sewage is dumped into the ocean because things like treatment plants had never occurred to them. If the glitzy towers were actually full of people, there wouldn't be enough water for them to drink, let alone bathe in. Most of the glitz is snapped up by people with more money than brains as "investment properties" that they're absolutely sure they can sell for a profit down the line because of the glitz and proximity to oil fields. Most stay empty.

There was a great article in Harper's some years ago. The author there envisioned the dunes taking it over after it had been abandoned because it was unsustainable, no one living above the fourth floor because the elevators hadn't worked for years.

Being a guest worker there is taking a big chance. Construction workers have about the worst of it with domestic servants next. However, if one survives a few years of working there, s/he can take the money home and open a food stall or other small business with the proceeds, the best way for a poor person in the developing world to get a cash stake to do so.

[shraby]

2. This is interesting. Looking forward for the pictures.

[octoberlib]

8. What about income inequality and upward mobility?

I've read most of those workers aren't getting paid very much.

[Recursion]

10. It's a great question.

And it's hard to get numbers on. The "guest" workers are earning much, much more than they could earn in the countries they come from, which is why people are lining up for those visas. I don't know whether the inequality there is greater than, say, in the US. But it's huge.

The people who work at the mall can shop at the mall (the prices and wages there were basically indistinguishable from the US). My sister-in-law's cousin can shop at the mall once a month or so (she earns what translates to about $10 / hour, which I guess is roughly the US minimum wage). But processing seafood is skilled labor and she speaks English; people doing less skilled labor who don't speak English earn less. UAE has no de jure minimum wage* but the de facto wage floor is about $4 US per hour (caveat 1: there is also apparently currency manipulation where people are paid in their "home" currency at deprecated rates. caveat 2: there are trafficked persons doing slave labor, just like in the US).

I flew to Dubai from Mumbai, which is in an explicitly Socialist state, and my immediate take is that the inequality is worse here in India.

* The UAE has bilateral agreements with India and IIRC Vietnam that guarantee a minimum wage to nationals of those countries, but that guaranteed legal minimum wage is below the practical wage floor so it's kind of pointless.

[Bluenorthwest]

9. Dubai has regularly jailed and then deported people for same sex behavior ranging from verbal to

sexual. Americans, Europeans, Indians, as well as their own citizens who get even longer jail terms, up to 10 years. Foreigners usually get one to three years in jail then the boot. They close down any clubs, bust any parties, arrest everyone present.
If you add that to the labor issues, I think a case could be made that the word 'enlightened' is a bit out of place.

[Recursion]

11. Yup. Huge problem.

LGBTQ rights are damn-near non-existent.

[Helen Borg]

17. Not just same sex, I think...

[JCMach1]

35. At the same time there is a very vibrant underground (or not so underground) queer community...

Gulf Arab Culture is a don't ask, don't tell sexual culture... They honestly don't care as long as everything happens out of sight.

[Bluenorthwest]

66. First, that is wildly untruthful, they raid private events, clubs and jail people for minor acts of

affection or even for saying they have a same sex lover. A culture that 'does not care' does not jail people for up to 10 years for the thing they don't care about. Dubai does. Dubai also enforces these laws on tourists and other visitors.
So you are way, way off base. Additionally, the OP is claiming they are an enlightened society. I wonder if you or the OP would consider a society 'enlightened' if it jailed your sort for 10 years for existing? I don't think so. In fact I know you would not.

[JCMach1]

74. I lived and worked there for 12 years... so yeah, I would know

doesn't make the law themselves any better, but the UAE (especially Dubai) has only rarely prosecuted anyone for gay activities. You should also note that basically anyone caught doing the hetero dirty deed is also treated in the same manner if they are not married.

They catch plenty of those people.

Also not right, but it is a consistently bad thing.

One of the reasons I left was a continued tightening of the political noose. I got tired of biting my tongue for one thing.

It is a dictatorship... FULL STOP. That shouldn't be forgotten however benign.

What I AM telling you is that whatever the laws are, there is a bright and vibrant underground gay community... one of the largest in the Arab world.

[Bluenorthwest]

77. In the last few years there have been numerous arrests of tourists and nationals, sorry.

It's not rar Because there have been lots of stories in the international press. Belgians, Americans, Canadians, Indians, all arrested for gay stuffs. I am not untraveled, an underground community is another word for an oppressed community. I am fully aware that lots of Muslim men have sex with other men.
Talking about the legal status in a country is in no way a claim that there are no gay people or that the people in general are horrible. A dictatorship is never, ever benign, you left because of it, yet here you are trying to tell me it's not really that bad.

The people who I am concerned for in this instance are the LGBT stuck there. I have no need to speak kindly about their oppressors, there is nothing in it for me, they have nothing in Dubai that I need.

[NV Whino]

12. Sounds a lot like Hussein's Bagdad before we bombed the hell out of the country.

Hmmm.

[Zorra]

14. Fuck Dubai. Agony of Pakistani women enslaved by Dubai sex trade

Agony of Pakistani women enslaved by Dubai sex trade
snip---
But campaigners and officials say hundreds of young Pakistani women are also trafficked every year to supply the thriving sex trade in the brothels and nightclubs of Dubai. Zunera and her sister Shaista were two of them.

More than a year after she escaped, Zunera's pain is still etched into her stumbling, hesitant voice -- and also into her body, which bears the marks of countless beatings.

Vivid, angry scars run the length of her legs from ankle to hip, reminders of a botched operation after she was shot three times by the gang who trafficked her.

Zunera and Shaista managed to escape their tormentors in 2013 but still live in hiding in a two-room house in a slum, fearing revenge attacks. AFP is withholding their full names and precise whereabouts for their safety.

http://news.yahoo.com/agony-pakistani-women-enslaved-dubai-sex-trade-054926784.html;_ylt=A0LEV0wjc8NT.CMAPWtXNyoA

[JCMach1]

36. No doubt by criminal Pakistanis... trafficking is a pretty serious issue here in America too...

[Recursion]

53. Most trafficked persons in the UAE are construction workers

mainly from Pakistan and Bangladesh. Most trafficked persons in the US are agricultural workers, mainly from Latin America and the Caribbean.

As with all sex work sectors (even the legal ones), the UAE has a problem with sex trafficking. But it's simply not remotely close to the numbers involved in labor trafficking.

[SoapBox]

15. Very interesting.

[Helen Borg]

16. Is it true that if you show affection in public

You end up in jail? This and the many other ways you can end up in jail there ensure that I will never visit.

[Recursion]

54. I'm not sure. I know that they jail people for debt

It's a way they trap people into their jobs: if you have an income, they don't jail you for debt, but if you quit the job you're liable to be arrested on exit. OTOH they have a long enough line for work visas that their first response to almost any problem is to just expel the person.

[zentrum]

18. Both Dubai and Abu Dhabi were...

....built on foreign/immigrant slave labor. They are Disney Lands for the very, super, beyond Midas rich. They are complete Oligarchies. The 1% would do this everywhere if they could get away with it. Ostentation and waste define their aesthetics.

What's ghastly also, is that New York University, a so called liberal institution of higher learning, is using this slave-type labor to build it's new campus in Abu Dhabi. The Guggenheim is there too, built on the same kind of suffering and theft from the labor force.

It's really disturbing.

[alcina]

19. "The dark side of Dubai"

The article is a few years old, but from what I hear, still pretty accurate.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/johann-hari/the-dark-side-of-dubai-1664368.html

Coincidentally -- or not -- the first section is titled "An Adult Disneyland."

[zentrum]

20. I'll take a look.

It was a coincidence, but the analogy seems inevitable.

[former9thward]

23. What is this "slave labor" BS?

Immigrant workers there earn far more than in their home countries. I was in Dubai in 2002 and these "slaves" were fighting to get there and stay there.

[zentrum]

25. Knew someone like you would crawl

…out from the woodwork.

Just because these people are starving at home doesn't mean unsupervised exploitation by some of our major institutions isn't slave labor.

Just google it. Here's one to get you started:
http://rt.com/news/246901-migrant-workers-uae-slave/

And:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/19/nyregion/workers-at-nyus-abu-dhabi-site-face-harsh-conditions.html?_r=0

Look up what's happening to Professor Andrew Ross at NYU who tried to uncover the story.

Oh, I get it! Beating captive laborers and stuffing them in rooms, to work many hours every day is BS! Of course—if they have to choose between starvation at home and slave conditions in Abu Dhabi, blame the story! You have a lovely personality.

[former9thward]

26. I thought rt.com made up stories weren't allowed on DU.

I guess the rules change depending on the topic. And I don't need any links because I have been there twice. And I had my eyes open. You can find exploitative situations in ANY country including the U.S.

[zentrum]

29. That was the first one

…I hit.

Google it yourself for many other references before you defend these despicable labor conditions. Or maybe you'll stand by them even when you get more informed.

In any event I'm done with you.

[Chathamization]

32. Yep, a pretty messed up place. I guess it's not hard to make their stats look good when they exclude

most of their residents from the stats. Before people start fawning over their wealth they need to take a look at their horrible human rights record.

[zentrum]

43. That's it. n/t

[Recursion]

52. About 7% of their residents are citizens. Kind of like ancient Rome

They treat the foreign workers (especially south asians) as disposable. They can avoid some of the "obvious" repressive tactics because all they have to do in most cases is expel anybody who rocks the boat. (They have done this to citizens, too, though that's much more rare.)

[Liberal_in_LA]

21. Great summary of your visit. thanks for this. I will never visit Dubai

So great to read a first hand view

[tammywammy]

24. I have a friend that lived in Dubai for years.

She moved there after graduating college. She came to the US for graduate school, but always made sure to go back often enough to retain her ability to move back there later. She loved it there.

Dubai is on my list of places to visit.

[pinboy3niner]

28. I'm sorry, but I can't resist asking...

...who controls their cabanas?

[Savannahmann]

30. Having never been there, I can't speak to the people.

But numerous television programs have highlighted the astonishing engineering feats going on. Even the Palm Island's are mind boggling in their complexity. The Engineering involved in so many of those projects is cutting edge, and occasionally the bleeding edge of Structural Engineering, Materials Engineering, and Design.

The work done on the Hong Kong Airport was astonishing, as is many other feats of human ingenuity. In Dubai, they made an indoor ski resort. http://www.theplaymania.com/skidubai/welcome

Now, part of me says this and many other projects are wasteful consumption. But another part is amazed at the accomplishment of projects that are so difficult as to be nearly impossible.

From skyscrapers to manufacturing islands, the rich and shameless are really going to town in Dubai. I know about the slave wages they pay to their foreign workers. I know about the horrific record on so many social issues. But from the pure engineering point of view, I admit to being impressed. I would not want to live there, I couldn't stand the stifling political environment that I've read about. However, I'd like to see some of those engineering accomplishments. I suppose it's much like my amazement with the Great Wall of China, or the Pyramids, or perhaps the five most impressive Monasteries on top of mountains. http://www.amusingplanet.com/2012/09/5-most-inaccessible-monasteries-in-world.html

I'm always impressed by Human Achievement in building the impossible. That's probably why I continue to read and watch programs about the long dead Apollo program. The idea that we took three humans, and flung them a quarter of a million miles away to another celestial body is almost unbelievable.

[JCMach1]

38. You summed up many of the contradictions pretty well. I lived and worked there for over 12 years

met and saw everyone and everything from personally knowing the ruling family of Abu Dhabi to the lowest workers in hotels and construction.

And yes, Dubai does have the best shopping in the world... sorry NYC, London, Paris, et al.

[X_Digger]

39. A couple of years ago I turned down a job there.

A friend of mine was importing saltwater fish from the Red Sea via Dubai, and exporting Hawaiian fish *to* Dubai (grass is always greener kind of thing.)

He needed a guy on the ground that knew the business and had dealt with USF&WS and US Customs.

I spent about 9 days in Dubai doing getting the hard sell, but in the end, it seemed too.. plastic-y for lack of a better word.

[kwassa]

42. How would you compare the govermental/economic system to Singapore?

it would be an interesting comparison in despotic corporatism that is successful in creating a high standard of living and literacy.

[U4ikLefty]

45. Come back here as a sex-worker then I will have more respect for your "weekend" in Dubai story.

Good tourist.

[Recursion]

49. Good thing we don't have sex slavery in the US, right? (nt)

[U4ikLefty]

50. Good thing we treat sex slavery the same way in the U.S. as Dubai...you really fucking believe that?

That is some sick shit. I hope you don't have daughters.

[Recursion]

51. OK, well, if you want to direct that anger at human traffickers, that would be awesome

As headline-grabbing as sexual exploitation is, in both the UAE and the US the much larger problem is labor trafficking (do you eat oranges, by any chance?).

The governments of both countries make noises about stopping trafficking but don't seem to make a ton of headway.

[Zorra]

72. Intent, and the percentage of sex slaves per capita, is the issue here.

Dubai freely and openly caters to men from all over the world who want to use and/or abuse women, and many don't care or don't know if the women they are using and/or abusing are slaves or not.

Why Dubai's Islamic austerity is a sham – sex is for sale in every bar

This was not Amsterdam's red-light district or the Reeperbahn in Hamburg or a bar on Shanghai's Bund. This was in the city centre of Dubai, the Gulf emirate where western women get a month in prison for a peck on the cheek; the Islamic city on Muhammad's peninsula where the muezzin's call rings out five times a day drawing believers to prayer; where public consumption of alcohol prompts immediate arrest; where adultery is an imprisonable offence; and where mall shoppers are advised against "overt displays of affection", such as kissing.

Ayman Najafi and Charlotte Adams, the couple recently banged up in Al Awir desert prison for a brief public snog, must have been very unlucky indeed, because in reality Dubai is a heaving maelstrom of sexual activity that would make the hair stand up on even the most worldly westerner's head. It is known by some residents as "Sodom-sur-Mer".

Beach life, cafe society, glamorous lifestyles, fast cars and deep tans are all things associated with "romance" in the fog-chilled minds of Europeans and North Americans. And there is a fair amount of legitimate "romance" in Dubai. Western girls fall for handsome, flash Lebanese men; male visitors go for the dusky charms of women from virtually anywhere. Office and beach affairs are common.

But most of the "romance" in Dubai is paid-for sex, accepted by expatriates as the norm, and to which a blind eye is turned – at the very least – by the authorities. The bar where "Jenny" approached me was top-of-the-range, where expensively dressed and coiffured girls can demand top dollar from wealthy businessmen or tourists.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/may/16/dubai-sex-tourism-prostitution

Three quarters of Dubai's population is male. You can be damn sure that every prostitute in Dubai's oppressive Islamic patriarchal monarchy is owned, or tightly controlled by a man or group of men, even the male prostitutes.

On edit: I forgot to mention the children forced into prostitution to service the pedophiles who come to Dubai for diverse and easy pickins.

Fuck Dubai.

[Recursion]

85. You know that's also true about Houston, TX, right?

It's a world center for sex trafficking. And don't even get me started on the number of trafficked persons picking oranges in Florida and California.

[LittleBlue]

46. Most of those "slaves" would face the same abuse/exploitation in their home countries

Great piece, OP. I just wanted to mention the issue of slave labor in the UAE.

It makes me shake my head when activists lay in to the UAE without examining where these laborers come from. They never follow up the Dubai slave labor stories with the horrific child labor abuse in Bangladesh, for instance. In my mind, the greater outrage, and the root problem, is that these workers have to leave their own country to find reasonable work.

[Man from Pickens]

47. Built by blood money and slave labor

Dubai is the epitome of valuing material wealth over humanity. It deserves to be despised by all.

[Aerows]

48. You are male

You can enjoy every single facet of the city, you could move there and they would respect you and hey, maybe that is what you want.

They will cater to every single ounce of you.

Indulge.

You will be crushing 100 people beneath your feet.

[daredtowork]

56. I remember reading you go to prison for debt in Dubai

So the next question is, what happens if you become unemployed? Is there a social safety net or arrangements to protect you from getting into desperate debt in the first place? While saffron is cheap, doesn't it cost $11 for a head of lettuce?

[Recursion]

57. If a guest worker becomes unemployed he or she loses their visa and is usually expelled

That's their go-to solution for about 99% of things the government doesn't like: send the person making noise back to their home country. The debt for prison thing apparently can and does happen (it's particularly used as a threat against trafficked laborers in debt slavery), but the government in most cases would much rather just send the person away.

[Bonobo]

58. A city built on the blood and bones of slaves. nt

[Recursion]

59. Yup. But then I like New Orleans, which is too (nt)

[Bonobo]

60. Yeah, but Dubai STILL is doing it. nt

[Recursion]

61. So is New Orleans. So is most of American agriculture.

Do you eat oranges?

The amount of debt bondage and TIP that happens in the US today is staggering. I'm pretty sure UAE is worse on a per capita if not raw basis, but then again they're a haven of workers' rights compared to Saudi and Qatar. That's kind of the basis of the ambivalence in my post: they're awful, but they're doing things in a much better way than their neighbors.

[Bluenorthwest]

68. Would you call slave trade era New Orleans an 'enlightened' society? You did Dubai.

nt

[Recursion]

71. You're missing the point: look at the TIP stats in New Orleans *today*

Like, right this minute.

[Bluenorthwest]

76. Whatever, it's you that is missing the point. Privliege will do that to a person, so smug.

Some people loved to visit South Africa during Apartheid. They'd say it was cosmopolitan and the beaches fantastic, good casinos and impeccable service.

If nothing else, you should be able to understand why LGBT people might not be all that fond of countries that put us in prison. Calling them enlightened while they abuse others is just pretty low.

[Recursion]

84. Smug? I'm not the one pretending the US has fixed our human trafficking problem

If nothing else, you should be able to understand why LGBT people might not be all that fond of countries that put us in prison. Calling them enlightened while they abuse others is just pretty low.

Whatever. They're next door to Qatar and Saudi, where they decapitate LGBT people. And the US had (and enforced) anti-gay criminal codes until 10 years ago. You can pretend the problem is with me making that comparison, if you prefer.

[melman]

82. Yep

[KamaAina]

63. Some of the many Indians who live in Dubai have a saying

"Dubai is the best city in India."

[KamaAina]

65. Maharashtra just banned beef for religious reasons? Holy cow!

Those BJP types play hardball! Pork isn't even banned in Israel, for heaven's sake!

[closeupready]

67. Vacation or business related trip?

[hatrack]

78. Interesting piece - A harsher Singapore w/o the charm or cooling ocean breezes

Right down there at the bottom of my "must-visit" list with Vegas, Epcot and Beijing.

[dissentient]

80. That would be one of the last places I would ever visit

Yea, I really want to go to a place full of rich people where they build monstrosities as tribute to their disgusting wealth and where shopping is the prime attraction, and where a backwards religion is the law of the land.