In 2017, I wrote this article about the ongoing slave trade in Libya. If you look at Libya’s neighbors, where do you think the buyers of African bodies come? Obviously from Libya itself but can we speculate that some Gulf neighbors also drop by to buy people.
Some questions and answers
Q1: If black people are being sold in the Gulf region, what kind of working conditions can we expect in that region?
Simple answer: You can expect slave-like working conditions.
Complex answer: You cannot expect or demand fair treatment from a person who is conditioned to dehumanize black people for generations. To them, you are a commodity.
Q2: what kind of dehumanization can you expect in the Gulf region?
Simple answer: You will be expected to labor like a donkey without complaint, rest or illness. Additionally, the expectation is for you to avail yourself for sex and sexual acts that Arabs reserve for those less than themselves. Quite simply, you become the free experimental vessel for their fantasies and cruelties.
Complex answer:
Whatever you undertake in the Gulf region, even buying a cup of coffee will be an experience that minimizes you just a little more that you were minimized at work. Taking the rain or bus, going out dancing, dating, visiting the supermarket and all other daily activities that shouldn’t be humiliating or minimizing will minimize and humiliate you just a little bit.
Q3: Are some jobs safer that others?
Simple answer: Domestic work naturally places you at your employers’ mercy which exposes you to the personalities, cruelties, dysfunctions etc of that household. It is easy to be isolated inside a house where nobody has access except the members of the family employing you.
Complex answer: What does safety mean for you?
- Is living in dormitories, being picked and dropped with a bus, eating in a dining hall like boarding high school safe enough for you?
- What happens if you don’t like dormitory conditions and want to live alone inside the countries society? Are you still safe?
- Say you become exhausted and want to go to your home country for a vacation? Is that open to you? Do you still feel safe?
- Your employer doesn’t like you as a person – the way you open you mouth, how you breathe, your ass popping in the back – or they don’t like how you do your job. They want to fire you on a whim, what safety nets do you have? Do you still feel safe?
Q4: Are there ways you can avoid being dehumanized and victimized in the Gulf?
Answer: I will be investigating this and creating a new post soon.
Q5: Are some countries in the Gulf safer that others?
Answer: I don’t know. Do you know if some countries in the gulf are safer than others? Let’s have this conversation
Growth Catalysts 