M!TCH3LL retweeted
By the way, I hope some of you are beginning to understand the logic behind your favourite GOs turning their churches into institutions that their spouses and children can eventually inherit in the event of their demise.
While you Christians remain fixated on the religious layer of these enterprises, treating their leaders as principled custodians of some divine mandate, you fail to appreciate that these are fundamentally human institutions, driven by very human desires, interests and ambitions.
Nobody builds an empire of this scale with the intention of handing it over to a church committee or some trusted associate.
These pastors are building dynasties, and succession within the family is arguably the most reliable way to preserve their control, wealth and legacy beyond their lifetimes.
From their perspective, it is a perfectly rational model of continuity. You may disagree with the morality of it, but pretending these are purely spiritual enterprises with no underlying interests in power, ownership and inheritance is incredibly naive.
These massive megastructures are essentially betting on sustained, exponential growth in Nigeria’s Christian population and, by extension, the number of churchgoers over the next 10–20 years. Given the country’s demographics, it is not an entirely unreasonable bet. But we’ll see how it plays out.
One thing I am fairly certain about, though, is that once these facilities become operational, the financial pressure on congregants is going to intensify. If you think the level of financial extraction in churches is excessive now, just wait until the bills for operating and maintaining these complexes start coming due.
I’m particularly unconvinced about the long-term sustainability of these projects. Raising the capital to construct them is one challenge; maintaining them, alongside the considerable portfolio of properties and other assets many of these churches already own, is an entirely different proposition. These are capital-intensive facilities with enormous recurring costs, from utilities and staffing to repairs, security and general upkeep.
Even established sports franchises in considerably wealthier economies struggle with the economics of maintaining stadium-scale infrastructure, despite operating in markets with much stronger purchasing power, commercial sponsorships, broadcasting revenues and, in many cases, hundreds of dollars in ticket revenue per spectator.
Anyway, good luck to everyone involved.
M!TCH3LL retweeted
These massive megastructures are essentially betting on sustained, exponential growth in Nigeria’s Christian population and, by extension, the number of churchgoers over the next 10–20 years. Given the country’s demographics, it is not an entirely unreasonable bet. But we’ll see how it plays out.
One thing I am fairly certain about, though, is that once these facilities become operational, the financial pressure on congregants is going to intensify. If you think the level of financial extraction in churches is excessive now, just wait until the bills for operating and maintaining these complexes start coming due.
I’m particularly unconvinced about the long-term sustainability of these projects. Raising the capital to construct them is one challenge; maintaining them, alongside the considerable portfolio of properties and other assets many of these churches already own, is an entirely different proposition. These are capital-intensive facilities with enormous recurring costs, from utilities and staffing to repairs, security and general upkeep.
Even established sports franchises in considerably wealthier economies struggle with the economics of maintaining stadium-scale infrastructure, despite operating in markets with much stronger purchasing power, commercial sponsorships, broadcasting revenues and, in many cases, hundreds of dollars in ticket revenue per spectator.
Anyway, good luck to everyone involved.
M!TCH3LL retweeted
Maslow's hierarchy of needs teaches us that people must have their basic physiological needs met before they can meaningfully concern themselves with higher level needs.
How do you explain the importance of wildlife conservation to the average Nigerian who is hungry, struggling to survive and has little or no understanding of conservation?
Foreign Man Pays Men Attempting to Sell Sea Turtle Along Road Near Eko Hotel, Lagos, and Returns It to the Sea
"Today, I witnessed something that genuinely broke my heart but also restored a little of my faith in humanity.
While leaving Eko Hotel, Lagos State, I saw some men trying to sell a sea turtle in the middle of the road as though it were an ordinary item of trade.
A foreign man stopped and tried everything possible to stop them. He shouted, pleaded and appealed to the people around him, including the uniformed police officers present, to understand that what they were doing was wrong.
Sadly, it seemed his voice was the only one speaking up for a creature that couldn't speak for itself.
However, he refused to give up. He eventually paid the men for the turtle, not to own it but to give it another chance at life.
With the assistance of a police van, the turtle was taken back to the sea and released into its natural habitat."
— A lady shares what she witnessed near Eko Hotel in Lagos State.
M!TCH3LL retweeted
Intersectional imperialism is so wonderful! Brown people can bomb other brown people. Women can rule the bomb squad! Gay, black straight or trans, the bombs are the same. But hey at least there’s diversity in the warmongering bomber.
M!TCH3LL retweeted
This is why I'm amused by some takes that the military should not be central to a revolution.
If a critical mass of the rifles do not buy the ideology you might as well become a content creator instead of risking your life for nothing
M!TCH3LL retweeted
Every American election is sold to the world as a historic struggle between two competing visions. Yet whether Washington turns red or blue, the machinery of American imperial power remains largely intact.
The faces change, the speeches change, but the sanctions, military interventions, economic coercion and pursuit of global dominance continue.
The Global South must understand that its liberation will never come from the ballot boxes of an empire. It will come from dismantling the structures of dependency that allow that empire to dictate the destiny of other nations.
M!TCH3LL retweeted
Conceiving the idea to even cheat in bar finals is insane to me. Some people get insane risk appetite 😂
