New Culture Forum

The Left & Our Enemies Believe COLONISERS Must Be COLONISED! -- Marie Daouda

Apr 5, 2026
Marie Douda, a French-Moroccan Oxford academic and author, reflects on culture, history, and identity. She debates Western influence, critiques romanticized pre-colonial narratives, and explores the rise of victimhood culture. She defends museums, worries about cultural illiteracy, and suggests spiritual reflection and personal agency as antidotes.
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ANECDOTE

Immigrant Path That Shaped A Love For Western Culture

  • Marie Douda recounts moving from Morocco to France at 17 to study French literature and later settling in Oxford for an academic career.
  • She explains her Francophile upbringing, passion for 19th-century French literature, and surprise at Paris becoming more globalised and less culturally distinct.
INSIGHT

Colonial Contact Also Brought Measurable Social Progress

  • Douda argues that French presence in Morocco brought significant benefits including expanded education and women's rights despite colonial harms.
  • She contrasts Morocco with non-colonised Ethiopia to illustrate how colonial contact sometimes accelerated social progress for women and institutions.
INSIGHT

Progressive Narratives Can Be Neo-Orientalist

  • Douda labels modern left-wing praise of pre-colonial societies as a neo-Orientalist 'noble savage' fantasy that erases real historical complexities.
  • She details how this narrative infantilises minorities by severing them from their own histories and moral agency.
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