Fantasy Islands

In the fantasy Gulf States, third world laborers build Xanadus for the world’s masters and their pet scribes (cf. flathead Thomas Friedman). Working as indentured servants, if not downright slaves, these East Asians are shipped in, have their passports confiscated, and housed in barracks away from the glitter, completely at the mercy of authoritarian states making their hellholes safe for finance capital. In the hotels, imported maids clean the excrement of highflying capital accumulators, consultant pols (Bill Clinton’s been pimping in the region), and other reps of the Global One Percent, from the rims of toilets. Meanwhile, prostitutes shipped in from the ruins of eastern Europe and Russia service other needs.

A long way from here? Not really. This model of the global service economy is alive and well on the resort island of Nantucket. Now thickly warted with what I call SUV-houses, grossly overscaled (and a real perversion of the island’s character), the place has become a case study of the workings of the global gastarbeiter system. A quarter century ago when I graduated from high school there, it was American college kids who used to do the lawn-mowing, bed-making, cleaning, and cooking; I washed dishes and cooked there myself there during college summers. More recently, there was a cohort of Irish kids; today, it’s workers from Brazil, the Caribbean, and Eastern Europe. Last week, there was an article in the local weekly (which I also used to work for) about three young Bulgarians who were suckered into paying serious coin to come to work as maids on the island. Only, once they got there, there were no jobs. Nor any place to live, either.

Dorm-like workers housing, pimping job brokers both here and abroad, dubious legal status and hence limited protections, profiteering landlords, pampered wealthy being clean up after; it all adds up to an old story, really.