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Considering that all of his time spent in the Western world Olu Oguibe represented someone that is commonly referred to as the other, it is then of no surprise that he starts his “Part III: Brave ‘New World’, with the story about a poor, indigenous boy he saw on a conference trip to Mexico in 1993. After all, other (especially one with trained eyes of so-called ‘postcolonial intellectual’) noticing other is hardly new or surprising. What I find problematic are these clichéd depictions of the poor, and overly sentimental portrayals of their living conditions and/or their plight.
While not liking the popular interpretation of the cause, that is not to say that I am not sympathetic and empathetic to this cause since most of my adult life I have myself been the embodiment of other. Based on my national identity and country of origin I was often considered different; whether ‘commie’ and/or ‘dirty foreigner’ in Western Europe, or ‘alien’ in the U.S. In terms of so-called ‘digital divide’ that exists between ‘advanced’ Western countries and those of so-called ‘third world’, I recognize that the divide is real and palpable. However, to think that spotlighting the issue and contributing to its improvement/solution from a Western standpoint is necessary or desired in the way it has been done, in my opinion, is either naïve, idealistic, or downright dangerous. Similarly, the so-called OLPC project is interesting, and in some ways probably beneficial to the intended targets, but it leaves me suspicious on several levels and depths (especially in relations to its sincerities) as to the eventual direction of it all.
For me, people like Negroponte and his associates (rich, white elite who in their advancing years are looking for lasting legacies as so-called ‘do good-ers’ through their faux altruistic acts), are just an extension of U.S. government foreign policy direction trajectory – a trajectory that has been in place for many years. This trajectory, and we can call it neo-colonial or neo-imperialist, is one that ultimately desires to create conditions (in those third world countries) that would be ultimately be beneficial to the U.S. interests (often times U.S. politicians refer to these types of goals as “advancing U.S. interests”) – whether those interests are political, economical, or cultural, or most often combination of all three.
The poor child say in Africa who gets this shiny, cool toy with ‘unlimited’ possibilities for personal fun, education and ‘empowerment’ will always remember that unknown white man from America who provided her with such opportunity where none maybe existed. Presumably, that same ‘educated/empowered’ child will wish to leave his surrounding eventually, whether by emigrating to that friendly first world country, or by becoming an ‘enlightened’ citizen of its own country. Doing so it is almost ensured that this adult will then become the active consumer not only of American/Western products, but even more so of American culture, and with that American lifestyle. By becoming the consumer of American culture and lifestyle she will actively, and often unwittingly, contribute to the erasure of her own culture, in the process adding to the emergence of monolithic worldwide uniculture that closely resembles and mimics whatever is that the American elites say that America needs.
"...we need to strengthen our ties to democratic allies and to challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values;
"we need to promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad;
"we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our *principles ."
http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm
So the idea, which proponents of these kinds of things usually take as their idealistic reasoning/argument, that the newly "empowered" third world will somehow take what is given ‘free’ to them by us (Americans) and create a destiny that is self-serving and self-fulfilling is preposterous given the characteristics of the nature of the master-servant type of relationship that in reality exist between these two worlds, but also the inherent characteristics of social architecture between humans that existed for thousands of years.
And with that,
I conclude my broadcasting for this quarter.
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