@bamonouri.bsky.social
When the moral alibi expires, power stands exposed. And that - not decline - is what makes this moment so unsettling.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
When the moral alibi expires, power stands exposed. And that - not decline - is what makes this moment so unsettling.
The world hasn’t become what the West claimed it could make it. It has become proof that the claim itself was never necessary.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
The world hasn’t become what the West claimed it could make it. It has become proof that the claim itself was never necessary.
This doesn’t mean power politics or repression have disappeared. It means the moral language that once justified intervention no longer persuades.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
This doesn’t mean power politics or repression have disappeared. It means the moral language that once justified intervention no longer persuades.
What links these cases isn’t ideology - but outcomes. Safety, efficiency, cultural confidence, and global relevance are no longer Western monopolies.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
What links these cases isn’t ideology - but outcomes. Safety, efficiency, cultural confidence, and global relevance are no longer Western monopolies.
Across East Asia, #Japan, #Singapore, and #China demonstrate safety, prosperity, and innovation without conforming to Western liberal orthodoxies long treated as universal.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Across East Asia, #Japan, #Singapore, and #China demonstrate safety, prosperity, and innovation without conforming to Western liberal orthodoxies long treated as universal.
Even more uncomfortable for Orientalist thinking: political innovation in places still framed only through violence. In northeast Syria, #Kurdish women’s co-leadership structures and autonomous councils challenge assumptions about governance capacity.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Even more uncomfortable for Orientalist thinking: political innovation in places still framed only through violence. In northeast Syria, #Kurdish women’s co-leadership structures and autonomous councils challenge assumptions about governance capacity.
Governance without Western tutelage is also visible. Oman’s stability. Jordan’s resilience despite hosting vast refugee populations. These outcomes contradict decades of predictions of inevitable collapse.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Governance without Western tutelage is also visible. Oman’s stability. Jordan’s resilience despite hosting vast refugee populations. These outcomes contradict decades of predictions of inevitable collapse.
Representation is changing too. Western cinema once monopolised how the Middle East and Asia were seen. That monopoly is eroding. From #Squidgame to Spirited Away to Gulf-based shows, everyday life replaces permanent crisis imagery.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Representation is changing too. Western cinema once monopolised how the Middle East and Asia were seen. That monopoly is eroding. From #Squidgame to Spirited Away to Gulf-based shows, everyday life replaces permanent crisis imagery.
When figures like #Ronaldo, #Benzema and #RioFerdinand
relocate to the Gulf, it quietly undermines the idea that modernity and security naturally flow from #West to #East.
relocate to the Gulf, it quietly undermines the idea that modernity and security naturally flow from #West to #East.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
When figures like #Ronaldo, #Benzema and #RioFerdinand
relocate to the Gulf, it quietly undermines the idea that modernity and security naturally flow from #West to #East.
relocate to the Gulf, it quietly undermines the idea that modernity and security naturally flow from #West to #East.
The #UAE, ranked the world’s safest country in 2025, and cities like #Dubai and #AbuDhabi challenge clichés of oil wealth without governance. #SaudiArabia’s cultural and sporting centrality further signals a shift in global gravity.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
The #UAE, ranked the world’s safest country in 2025, and cities like #Dubai and #AbuDhabi challenge clichés of oil wealth without governance. #SaudiArabia’s cultural and sporting centrality further signals a shift in global gravity.
Today, reality is undoing the script. #Qatar’s 2022 World Cup was predicted to collapse into chaos. Instead, it functioned. #Transport worked. Safety held. Normality - not spectacle - proved deeply unsettling for old assumptions.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Today, reality is undoing the script. #Qatar’s 2022 World Cup was predicted to collapse into chaos. Instead, it functioned. #Transport worked. Safety held. Normality - not spectacle - proved deeply unsettling for old assumptions.
Of course - history never supported this story. The Middle East - especially #Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) was the cradle of organised civilisation: #writing, #law, #urbanplanning, #taxation, #astronomy, #medicine. These weren’t signs of primitivism, but complex social order.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Of course - history never supported this story. The Middle East - especially #Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) was the cradle of organised civilisation: #writing, #law, #urbanplanning, #taxation, #astronomy, #medicine. These weren’t signs of primitivism, but complex social order.
From #colonial mandates to #Iraq and #Afghanistan, the same claim resurfaced: these societies couldn’t govern themselves, so Western force was necessary and benevolent. The results? Long-term instability, not order.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
From #colonial mandates to #Iraq and #Afghanistan, the same claim resurfaced: these societies couldn’t govern themselves, so Western force was necessary and benevolent. The results? Long-term instability, not order.
Orientalism was never just cultural bias. As Edward Said showed, it functioned as political infrastructure. It turned domination into responsibility, violence into order-making, and made international law selectively applied.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Orientalism was never just cultural bias. As Edward Said showed, it functioned as political infrastructure. It turned domination into responsibility, violence into order-making, and made international law selectively applied.
For over a century, #Orientalism gave #Western power a moral alibi: the East was #backward, #irrational, and therefore needed intervention. #Empire was framed as progress. #War as rescue. That story is collapsing.
December 22, 2025 at 1:58 PM
For over a century, #Orientalism gave #Western power a moral alibi: the East was #backward, #irrational, and therefore needed intervention. #Empire was framed as progress. #War as rescue. That story is collapsing.