4 ms·

Do you think those people (and their families!) would have been better off if they stayed in Kerala? I’ve lived in the UAE too, and actually had conversations

by rosndo 5y ago

Do you think those people (and their families!) would have been better off if they stayed in Kerala? I’ve lived in the UAE too, and actually had conversations with many of these people. Many of them missed home, but it was all worth it for the relatively massive amounts of money they were earning. I think comments like yours are often ignorant of just how rough lives these people would have back home.

rglullis 5y ago
If things were so clearly good, they wouldn't have their passports confiscated.
- rosndo 5y ago
  If your employer confiscates your passport in the UAE, you just have to call 80060 and you’ll have the police bringing it back to you real soon. It is illegal for employers to do that, and enforcement is swift. All low-skill immigrant workers have to watch an hour long video explaining this (and all their other rights) in order to get their visa. —— Edit: Sorry, I can’t reply to you below darkteflon. I’ve seen the worker camps, but I’ve also extensively toured India and it’s neighboring countries. UAE and Qatar only look bad when compared with the West, but in reality they’re doing more to help these people than the Western countries which would never even grant them visas. > This is not a Rule of Law jurisdiction Sure, I agree. I have a plenty of bad things to say about these countries, but I think that their treatment of migrant workers is a particularly weak criticism. I’ll accept the criticism as valid the day Western countries start offering visas to similar categories of migrant workers.
  - baybal2 5y ago
  - darkteflon 5y ago
    Come on man. If you’ve lived there, you’ve seen the work camps and the conditions those guys live in, and you’ve seen accounts of their de facto imprisonment. This is not a Rule of Law jurisdiction.
  - silicon2401 5y ago
    > If your employer confiscates your passport in the UAE, you just have to call 80060 and you’ll have the police bringing it back to you real soon I find this argument either naive or dishonest. Any average adult knows there's a big difference between how things are supposed to work in theory and how they actually go.
    - rosndo 5y ago
      Can you provide some evidence that it doesn’t actually work like this? My UAE based lawyer is certainly convinced that MOHRE enforcement is very strict.
    - me_me_me 5y ago
      All you have to do is spin anticlockwise twice, clap 5 times, say magic word and poof bad people with stop being bad. Everyone knows that in X country. At this stage you cant say if they are naive or a troll.
darkteflon 5y ago
Nice straw man argument. Do you think it might be possible to invite migrants workers in _and_ treat them like humans?
- heavenlyblue 5y ago
  Playing the devil’s advocate your argument is even more strawman: purely because you can always make up an imaginary world where everybody is happy and unicorns are pooping candy.
  - darkteflon 5y ago
    Sick burn bro. Might want to spend a couple minutes on Wikipedia next time though.
  - me_me_me 5y ago
    > purely because you can always make up an imaginary world where everybody is happy and unicorns are pooping candy. That doesn't hold up, he argues that they should be treated like other citizens of the country they emigrated to (treated like a human). And not to be extra privileged based on some utopia. Just because a North Korean escapes life work camp sentence , it doesn't give South Korea right to put them in a South Korean work camp.
    - rosndo 5y ago
      Hmm. Western countries will not take these kinds of immigrants at all. Qatar will take these immigrants, offer them significantly better pay and quality of life than what they had at home. Qatar is bad? Perhaps the heavy restrictions Western countries place on immigration are even worse?
      - me_me_me 5y ago
        > Western countries will not take these kinds of immigrants at all. That's outright not true, they will not take ALL of the immigrants. Thats how you create strawman justifying un-institutionalized slavery. Secondly, letting all immigrants come and treating them like objects/slaves is immoral. Also it would negatively impact the local economy, cheapening production overhead for businesses that will exploit slaves driving bottom-line for everyone else.
csee 5y ago
> Do you think those people (and their families!) would have been better off if they stayed in Kerala? Probably not, but the consequence of that shouldn't be to excuse unnecessarily dangerous or abusive working conditions. I think it is morally good to pay people just a few dollars an hour if the alternative to that is that they have nothing. The people who advocate for trade barriers to stop such things are only harming the poor people that they are pretending to care for. But these workers should at least get a safe and respectful work environment. There is too much bullying and abuse that these people face in their work environments which serves no business purpose. It's a big problem in East Asia and the Middle East especially.

by rosndo 5y ago

rglullis 5y ago

If things were so clearly good, they wouldn't have their passports confiscated.

rosndo 5y ago
If your employer confiscates your passport in the UAE, you just have to call 80060 and you’ll have the police bringing it back to you real soon. It is illegal for employers to do that, and enforcement is swift. All low-skill immigrant workers have to watch an hour long video explaining this (and all their other rights) in order to get their visa. —— Edit: Sorry, I can’t reply to you below darkteflon. I’ve seen the worker camps, but I’ve also extensively toured India and it’s neighboring countries. UAE and Qatar only look bad when compared with the West, but in reality they’re doing more to help these people than the Western countries which would never even grant them visas. > This is not a Rule of Law jurisdiction Sure, I agree. I have a plenty of bad things to say about these countries, but I think that their treatment of migrant workers is a particularly weak criticism. I’ll accept the criticism as valid the day Western countries start offering visas to similar categories of migrant workers.
- baybal2 5y ago
- darkteflon 5y ago
  Come on man. If you’ve lived there, you’ve seen the work camps and the conditions those guys live in, and you’ve seen accounts of their de facto imprisonment. This is not a Rule of Law jurisdiction.
- silicon2401 5y ago
  > If your employer confiscates your passport in the UAE, you just have to call 80060 and you’ll have the police bringing it back to you real soon I find this argument either naive or dishonest. Any average adult knows there's a big difference between how things are supposed to work in theory and how they actually go.
  - rosndo 5y ago
    Can you provide some evidence that it doesn’t actually work like this? My UAE based lawyer is certainly convinced that MOHRE enforcement is very strict.
  - me_me_me 5y ago
    All you have to do is spin anticlockwise twice, clap 5 times, say magic word and poof bad people with stop being bad. Everyone knows that in X country. At this stage you cant say if they are naive or a troll.

darkteflon 5y ago

Nice straw man argument. Do you think it might be possible to invite migrants workers in _and_ treat them like humans?

heavenlyblue 5y ago
Playing the devil’s advocate your argument is even more strawman: purely because you can always make up an imaginary world where everybody is happy and unicorns are pooping candy.
- darkteflon 5y ago
  Sick burn bro. Might want to spend a couple minutes on Wikipedia next time though.
- me_me_me 5y ago
  > purely because you can always make up an imaginary world where everybody is happy and unicorns are pooping candy. That doesn't hold up, he argues that they should be treated like other citizens of the country they emigrated to (treated like a human). And not to be extra privileged based on some utopia. Just because a North Korean escapes life work camp sentence , it doesn't give South Korea right to put them in a South Korean work camp.
  - rosndo 5y ago
    Hmm. Western countries will not take these kinds of immigrants at all. Qatar will take these immigrants, offer them significantly better pay and quality of life than what they had at home. Qatar is bad? Perhaps the heavy restrictions Western countries place on immigration are even worse?
    - me_me_me 5y ago
      > Western countries will not take these kinds of immigrants at all. That's outright not true, they will not take ALL of the immigrants. Thats how you create strawman justifying un-institutionalized slavery. Secondly, letting all immigrants come and treating them like objects/slaves is immoral. Also it would negatively impact the local economy, cheapening production overhead for businesses that will exploit slaves driving bottom-line for everyone else.

csee 5y ago

> Do you think those people (and their families!) would have been better off if they stayed in Kerala? Probably not, but the consequence of that shouldn't be to excuse unnecessarily dangerous or abusive working conditions. I think it is morally good to pay people just a few dollars an hour if the alternative to that is that they have nothing. The people who advocate for trade barriers to stop such things are only harming the poor people that they are pretending to care for. But these workers should at least get a safe and respectful work environment. There is too much bullying and abuse that these people face in their work environments which serves no business purpose. It's a big problem in East Asia and the Middle East especially.