Shehzad M Arifeen

The banality of evil and the Messiah of a new dawn

For three days we were a state without a government.

2m ago

The cheapening of life and the struggle for the state

Either we finally build a people’s republic or we condemn ourselves to repeat this “legacy of blood”.

2m ago

The shifting political field and the price of permanent war

Is it not easier to defeat your enemies in parliament than to be permanently on the warpath against some shapeshifting enemy?

3m ago

There is no ‘development’ without a living wage

If we can feed the RMG industry with blood, sweat, and taxes year after year, surely we should be able to decide the bare minimum that it pays its workers?

11m ago

Making Bangladeshi workers safe for capitalism

If fast fashion must dominate the “national interest,” then at the very least we must compel the state apparatuses to play a truly mediating role on behalf of “the nation.

1y ago

The burning man, and our national addiction to violence

Barely a month had passed since one of us wrote about rape, scopophilia and collective rage, and barely a day since we began an intergenerational dialogue on gender, rage and violence, full of hope at the emergence of passionate and resourceful young allies, when the world dutifully punched back.

4y ago

Covid-19: The ineptitude of power

Plagues, pandemics, floods and blights, we were once taught, are vehicles of retribution, weeding out those who have not prepared for divine wrath—the greedy, reckless, and arrogant.

4y ago

A Sense of Smallness

There are few things more difficult in life than a full awareness of the conditions of one’s possibility. To come to terms with how little of my world is my own creation, and just how much of it is the accumulated labour of dead generations and living masses far removed from my consciousness, is to grapple with a sense of smallness and insignificance.

5y ago
August 13, 2024
August 13, 2024

The banality of evil and the Messiah of a new dawn

For three days we were a state without a government.

August 6, 2024
August 6, 2024

The cheapening of life and the struggle for the state

Either we finally build a people’s republic or we condemn ourselves to repeat this “legacy of blood”.

July 26, 2024
July 26, 2024

The shifting political field and the price of permanent war

Is it not easier to defeat your enemies in parliament than to be permanently on the warpath against some shapeshifting enemy?

November 18, 2023
November 18, 2023

There is no ‘development’ without a living wage

If we can feed the RMG industry with blood, sweat, and taxes year after year, surely we should be able to decide the bare minimum that it pays its workers?

May 1, 2023
May 1, 2023

Making Bangladeshi workers safe for capitalism

If fast fashion must dominate the “national interest,” then at the very least we must compel the state apparatuses to play a truly mediating role on behalf of “the nation.

November 1, 2020
November 1, 2020

The burning man, and our national addiction to violence

Barely a month had passed since one of us wrote about rape, scopophilia and collective rage, and barely a day since we began an intergenerational dialogue on gender, rage and violence, full of hope at the emergence of passionate and resourceful young allies, when the world dutifully punched back.

April 4, 2020
April 4, 2020

Covid-19: The ineptitude of power

Plagues, pandemics, floods and blights, we were once taught, are vehicles of retribution, weeding out those who have not prepared for divine wrath—the greedy, reckless, and arrogant.

May 3, 2019
May 3, 2019

A Sense of Smallness

There are few things more difficult in life than a full awareness of the conditions of one’s possibility. To come to terms with how little of my world is my own creation, and just how much of it is the accumulated labour of dead generations and living masses far removed from my consciousness, is to grapple with a sense of smallness and insignificance.

July 20, 2018
July 20, 2018

THE SECOND TIME AS FARCE

What security has the working man that it may not be his turn [to starve] tomorrow? Who assures him employment, who vouches for it that, if for any reason or no reason his lord and master discharges him tomorrow, he can struggle along with those dependent upon him, until he may find someone else 'to give him bread'?