Alt-Right Lessons from The United Arab Emirates

    So I was reading an economist article about Dubai's attempts at establishing world-class opera houses. The read itself was only marginally interesting, but the thing that popped out to me was the following sentence:

And in the case of Dubai, the opera house may further accelerate the emirate’s shift from commercial centre to expat hub: foreigners already make up 80% of the population.

    I had no idea that Dubai was that globalized (actually the situation is even worse, as 97% of the city is foreign-born), though I have met an Indian guy from Dubai. I decided to look into Dubai and the United Arab Emirates a little further on Wikipedia.

    The United Arab Emirates are an old set of trade centers in the Middle East. The formation of this nation only came after Britain relinquished control of the territory in 1968.  Cities like Dubai were not nearly so heavily populated until the immigration boom; Dubai only had a population of about 40,000 in 1960. Around this time is when Indians and Pakistanis began to move into Dubai. The population jumped to 58,971 by 1968, and was measured at 2,250,000 in 2014.
    The immigrants are a mix of Indians (51%), Pakistanis (16%), Bangladeshis (9%), and Filipinos (3%).  There are over 100,000 British expatriates in Dubai, making up about 5% of the total population. English is the second language of Dubai, and Hindi is also an official language.
    Despite what many people believe, Dubai does not get its wealth from oil. A great deal of the wealth is from the immigrants themselves, the wealthy classes of India, Africa, and other parts of Asia who sought to escape from the poverty and financial risk of their home countries. Oil only accounts for 5% of GDP, the bulk of GDP is high finance, tourism, service, trade, and real estate. Oil was only found in Dubai in the 1960's, well after it was an important trade hub. Dubai is around the world's 20th most expensive city, and is known for its being among the world's most luxurious cities. It has a skyline that can compete with that of any city in the world.
    The culture of the city has taken a noticeable hit. According to Wikipedia:

Due to the touristic approach of many Dubaites in the entrepreneurial sector and the high standard of living, Dubai's culture has gradually evolved towards one of luxury, opulence and lavishness with a high regard for leisure-related extravagance. Annual entertainment events such as the Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF) and Dubai Summer Surprises (DSS) attract over 4 million visitors from across the region and generate revenues in excess of $2.7 billion.

    A major reason for the opulence of UAE is actually George W. Bush. After 9/11, the Patriot Act created a vast number of money-laundering regulations to punish banks that were complicit in funding terrorism. The UAE financial system was, of course, complicit in terrorism, and investing in the USA became risky and difficult. So the Arabs began investing at home, in real estate.

    While this is true, the government does enforce Muslim culture, earning the scolding of the secular world. Women are not allowed to dress indecently in public, and calls to prayer happen five times a day. They have a firewall, except in specially protected regions in which people can search the internet freely, with the exception of Israeli internet sites.
     There are massive efforts to create social and cultural activity among the people, such as the creation of the opera house from the economist article. As a golf fan, I know of the two major events in UAE, both of which draw many of the world's best players with massive purses. They are odd to watch on television, because essentially none of the residents of UAE come out to watch golf. These people do not care about golf.
     The rest of UAE follows a similar story. Only 13% of residents of UAE are nationals, and Indians are a massive plurality.


     From what I can tell, the place is basically run by monarchs of each emirate, called emirs. The emir of Abu Dhabi is the "president," and the emir of Dubai is the "prime minister." The monarchies are hereditary.

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     So what happened to these regions? How did they let themselves become global cities? It is an important question. But let us back up and talk about how many alt-right misconceptions are challenged by the existence of the globalist UAE.

    Firstly, many on the alt-right would claim that monarchy is better suited to protect the native peoples' majority than democracy. It just feels  to people as if a monarch would want to protect his people out of pride and loyalty, or something like that. But since UAE is clearly bucking this trend (if the trend even exists), we need to examine and specify the conservatory effect of monarchy.
    It would be a good idea to control for wealth, as the one thing that separates nearly all monarchies from UAE would be monetary success.

    The second misconception of the alt-right is that Dubai will go in the shitter when the oil dries up. It will take a major hit, as the financial sector manages the wealth of the Gulf region, which is dependent on oil. But the economy is certainly complex enough to survive the drying of oil. It is clear that Dubai will fall not economically, but demographically, if it falls at all. The male-female ratio is terrible in Dubai. In 2009, there were over three times as many males as females. So if Dubai is working the system in such a way that the foreigners are not actually families, but temporary businessmen, the elite might maintain permanent control over the foreign strivers who just want to treat the country as a playground and a shopping mall.

    Back to the main question: How did UAE become so globalized? It must be the case that the monarchs sold the people out to foreigners. I do wonder if the people are upset about this, or if there is little feeling of ethnic history and identity among them in the first place.

    I believe that the monarchs sold the people out to foreigners for wealth. The particular kind of immigration in UAE is of rich people are entering this region for freedom and luxury. Even despite that, a small population is not going to be able to generate the opulence that these monarchs enjoy today. Real estate investments, in particular, are greatly helped by a massive influx of foreign people. And there has been an influx; the population has increased from 1,204,000 to 2,250,000 since 2005. Considering that Dubai is among the world's most expensive cities, I'd say that these real estate investments did pretty well.

    There are three lessons that the alt-right should take away from the story of UAE. Firstly, if my suspicions are right regarding the drive for money is, in a vacuum, enough to cause to the replacement of a people group. It makes you understand the verse "the love of money is the root of all [kinds] of evil" in a new light. Secondly, we have found that monarchy might not be as conservative as larpers think. Furthermore, if it is true that the immigration was motivated by the desire of the Arab elite class to enrich themselves, then one must wonder as to how much of America's immigration disaster is really attributable to the financial elite.
    Thirdly, we see the soullessness of the "global city" apparent in UAE. This soullessness will be America's future. UAE apes western sport and opera, things which their own residents do not care about. Nobody attends these golf tournaments in Dubai or Abu Dhabi, no matter how many players of Rory McIlroy's caliber compete. The entire point of the public spending on cultural activities is to look as classy, artistic, vibrant, and innovative as the west (and maybe to raise property values...). The reality is that none of this globalized cultural activity is real or meaningful. Diverse America is likewise heading towards an artificial culture. America apes negro culture because we are increasingly taught that this is cool, and we "observe" foreigners' holidays to look inclusive and tolerant- in colleges now, students pretend to celebrate Holi by flinging paint at one another. In fact, negro music is now almost entirely dominate the music scene, if you haven't noticed, and Holi is by far a more widely celebrated springtime holiday than Easter among college students. Our culture is becoming fake, as elaborated so annoyingly by the hipster subculture. I believe this is a result of moving from an ethic culture (which non-whites will not agree to) to a shockingly negro-centric culture of diversity that the hopelessly divided population can agree upon.