Arab-On-Arab Racism - Instablogs
Arab-On-Arab Racism
Marco Villa , Connecticut: Aug 9 2009
Made Popular Aug 10 2009
Egypt :

Arab-On-Arab RacismOne thing that has always dismayed be whenever I travel to Tunisia is how little regard establishments such as restaurants, hotels, etc... have for Tunisian clients.

A waiter serving a table of Tunisians - unless they are rich - often will be less attentive and courtesy than when serving Westerns. The service is demonstrably worse for Tunisians across the table, no pun intended.

It is dismaying because it is one thing when service is neglected when dinning - Tunisians tend to not tip or tip very little unlike Westerns so you get the service you pay for - but service is often poor even when a tip is not in question.

Unquestioningly, tourists get better service. That is understandable given they spend more money and rich Tunisians do get equal service so it is more about class than race.

But Egypt may be a different and truly exhibit Arab-on-Arab racism, or Egyptian-on-Egyptian racism. Several years ago, a Tunisian cousin of mine was telling me how she visited the great museum of Egyptian history in Cairo and how the museum denies entrance to average Egyptians. I found it almost unbelievable. Alas, it is true:

Last week while I was on my way to work in the morning I noticed about 8 men standing at the security entrance that leads you to the main gate of the Cairo Museum. They were all wearing galabiyas and were obviously being denied entry into the museum by the police officers at the security gates. This is not the first time I have seen such an incident whereby Egyptians who are not considered ‘civilized’ enough are denied entry into the museum so as not to tarnish Egypt’s image infront of foreigners!

This is just sad. Tunisians may be neglectful against their own in restaurants but Tunisians - even poorly dressed ones - are never turned away from the country’s museums. We Arabs need to treat ourselves better.

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Turki Hannibal
Oct 25 2009
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Turki Hannibal
Oct 25 2009
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Turki Hannibal
Oct 25 2009
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1 Stars
Turki Hannibal
Tunis, Tunisia
The writer of this text is not Tunisian for sure but I am Tunisia and I live in Tunisia and as he said he just visited and I am not sure of that too because I see only lies in this text and I don’t know the reason because I am a Tunisian citizen and I see I can tell everybody clearly that the contrary is happening because the financial situation of the Tunisian citizen is better than the egyptian and everybody knows that and no difference for sure between services given to Tunisian and those to western in Tunisia and they are all good because the Tunisian never go to a place without having the necessary cash of money he needs to be always in good situation and there’s also a law that panish a restaurant or cafe that did not give good service in Tunisia whereas a similar law does not exist in egypt and to be honest sometimes a Tunisian get better services than the western because he knows where to go exactely and he is everyday client not like the western whereas my people in egypt even declare in thier local TV that they are foreigners in thier country and no good services at all compared even to the Tunisian tourists who visit egypt and my friend who visited egypt tell me something like that too and we have not to forget that Tunisia is the western arabic country and away just few miles from europe so the western is not a V.I.P for us whereas egypt is an eastern country and a western is like comming from an other world for them and it’s easy you can visit Tunisia and then visit egypt and compare ,the world is a little town today.
1 Stars
Marco Villa benaliwatch.blogspot..
Connecticut, United States
Turki,

Before I respond to your often incoherent rant, let me first state that I am Tunisian. I have spent ample time in the country, speak Arabic (including Tunisian colloquial Arabic), and am a Tunisian national. I write with authority on the nation.

First of all, what is your obsession with Egypt? Why are you so fixated with comparing Tunisia with Egypt? What’s the logic? Is Egypt some universal comparison board?

The treatment of Tunisians is just as I described, your boosting of Tunisian services notwithstanding.

Your post is filled with too many delusions and falsehoods to warrant my time refuting. You are clearly a vulgar nationalist with your comments on the supposed superiority and ”Western” nature of Tunis. Only an insecure and petty man would write that ”the Tunisian citizen is better than the egyptian [sic] and everybody knows that”.

No, everybody does not know that. I do not consider Tunisians better than anyone else. And such a comment only makes the point of my post for me: Arab-on-Arab racism.

How would you like it if a Frenchman spoke about Tunisians in just contemptible language?

And where is this law punishing restaurants for bad service? I guess every time I got bad service I had the right to sue? What a deal. This is just hilarious.

And, finally, Turki you represent the self-hating, inferiority complex that infects many Arabs as exhibited by the following: ”Tunisia is the western arabic country and away just few miles from europe so the western is not a V.I.P for us”

Why do you worship at the alter of the West? And Europe is ”V.I.P” for Tunisians given that most Tunisians have never been to the continent that is a little more than a few miles, by the way.

I could say a lot more, but you bore me and your post is just so vapid, delusional, false, petty and just plain stupid that it isn’t worth it.
(Global Perspectives)
1 Stars
Turki Hannibal
Tunis, Tunisia
There’s no western people who can pay well in Tunisia due to the world economic crisis and to the high level to Tunisian dinars and to the tourists who come to Tunisia from eastern european countries today like poland and and russia and those people have no good income and Tunisian dinars is high compared to the local money of those 2 countries for exemple so only Tunisian people pay for the restaurants and so on and if we say that only rich people in Tunisia pay so all those shops will be closed because the number of rich people compared to the rest of citizen is little and so those shop have only one solution give good services to Tunisian to gain more client but the egyptian pound is so weak and tourist from the 2 countries I took as exemple thier local money is high copared to egyptian pound and have better income to egyptian so egyptian people can pay for nothing and only rich egyptian people and tourist pay and just search in the internet the world bank say that in 2008 from 95 countries and population live under poverty rank Tunisia was classified 86 whereas egypt 63 and russia ranked 70 and poland 71 that prove that still the financial situation for the Tunisian better than the egyptian till now and all economic percentages of international davos congress and the world bank say that and a comparison between the two countries proove that and so if we say like the writer of the text that people of the country who pay better have better services so Tunisian must have better services then the egyptian.
1 Stars
Turki Hannibal
Tunis, Tunisia
Marco Villa,
I doubt again if you are Tunisian and I can beleive nothing from what you say or if you are Tunisian so you were a failful person in Tunisia and you want to find any reason now against your country to feel satisfied and cover your fault because you said”I visited Tunisia” so may be you were only a visitor and you said ”Tunisian may be neglected” and you did not say ”Tunisian” but you said in your post ”we arabs need to treat ourselves better” so may be you are egyptian because you said ”we arabs” and not Tunisian because you said in general ”Tunisian” and you just use ”we” when you said arabs then I advice you to start treat your self better and stop lying before you treat the others because if arabs today are in bad situation so because of you and many others like you who ”eat the fruits and then insult them” as the Tunisian proverb said and if that has a meaning in english and I want to tell you that you first compared egypt to Tunisia and I answered your comparison and I did not say Tunnisian are better than egyptian but I said ”the financial situation of the Tunisian citizen is better than the egyptian ” and I gave arguments from the world bank declaration is everybody has to know that and only ignorant people and it seems you are between them because you dont know it have no information about that and dont talk about french because they dont have the truth and france is a country where racism is well spread by declaration of the europeen union itself and I know my society better than them but I respect their points of view if they do not touch the dignity of our nation but if you feel minority toward the french so cure yourself because this is your problem not ours.You said too ”I got bad service” we can not judge the services in Tunisia basing on your exemple because it seems through your answer you are aggressive and may that was your behavior with those who gave you services in Tunisia and who dont respect himself so nobody will respect him wherever he goes and I said ”Tunisia is the western arab country and away few miles from europe”and I dont take that from my mind but it’s geography and I dont know why this truth disturbed you so revise where Tunisia is situated and revise geaography and I said ”the western is not a VIP for us”so I am not worshiping western and we have no copmplex from them so dont change what I said and post only lies which prove that all your post is a big lie and I advise you to revise the Tunisian law too because there’s a real rule that punish that punish those who open a busness and give bad services to people by total responsibility so the law exist and if you dont want to go and declare that you got a bad services to the organization of consommer defend so it’s because you dont have a civilization and law culture and you miss information how to defend yourself and not because of law but failful persons trow all the time thier mistakes and responsibility on the others and you said in your answer ”the treatment of Tunisians is just as I described” which shows that you dont accept other point of view and democracy and you just insult who does not share your ideas like saying to me ”you are vulgar” and ”stupid” which shows you have aggressivity in your personality and dangerous to the other point of view and you are not able to open a civilized discussion like that unless you insult everybody that give an other view point.
Finally I see that the way you think is so syupid and naive and you just fill this page in internet by false things and big lies and you have ignorant and not educated thoughts with no civilization or culture and I advice you to learn law and geography and history and culture of Tunisia to be better educated and erase your ignorance but sure you will feel to little and weak toward what you will learn and I am only a Tunisian student who study in England and I have my own point of view based on international arguments not based on lies and your aggressive behavior so dont Talk in name of Tunisian because you are shame for us and learn how respect other point of view than open a civilized discussion like or nobody will visit this site again.
1 Stars
Turki Hannibal
Tunis, Tunisia
Marco Villa,
You dont accept other points of view and you insult people who have different thoughts even if they have true arguments like mine so that shows that you are a racist who want to cure racism BIZARRE...
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