South Africa - Going Down The Pan?

[Officer Dibble]

"Keep them fighting against each other so they can get that oil!"

"They", C.J.? Who's 'they'? Aren?t you part of the great American petro chemical consuming economy then? Does your truck run on steam or something? Are you standing on the sidelines of American society, contemptuous and aloof from the everyday concerns and desires of your countrymen? Don't you consider yourself one of them? The way you talk I fully expect you to one day announce that you had enough of those pesky Americans and you're moving to Baghdad, Tehran or Caracas, where you will be free to chill out with multitudes of like minded anti-American folk.




Officer Dibble

[Sam Slater]

Like I said though c.j. Do you think that only Africans have ever been enslaved? All tribes of people have, at one time or another, been enslaved, raped, murdered and pillaged.

The guys on this thread, that solely blame the Africans for their plight are just ignorant, but the ones who just blame 'the whites', or 'the west' is just as ignorant in my opinion.

We're all to blame, Western, or African. The West needs to encourage, and help more, and the Africans need to make proper use of the help given.

It takes two to Tango, as they say.

[Officer Dibble]

"And all this is before one starts to consider what Africa would have been like without colonial exploitation."

Well I have considered this and quickly came to the conclusion that it would today be a continent of dark skinned people who lived in mud huts and, for a living, threw spears at the herds of majestic wilder beasts as they roamed across the dusty savannah - that was of course when they weren't busy dodging prides of lethargic lions or rampaging rhinos.




Officer Dibble

[Flat_Eric]

c.j.jaxxon wrote:

>>>


... The major flaws in that hackneyed old argument (which is trotted out constantly on Internet forums like this) being that:

a) The West doesn't actually **need** there to be local infighting to obtain natural resources.

b) Local infighting can actually make it **harder** (and more costly) to obtain natural resources.

- Eric

[beutelwolf]

c.j.jaxxon wrote:

> We all believe in personal responsability but if you're saying
> Africa can't get it together because they're not smart enough
> or whatever, take a look at the plight of blacks all over the
> globe and you'll see the same or almost the same kinds of
> problems.

That argument makes it sound as if it was an intrinsically black problem, i.e. somehow attached to blacks as a race. I don't buy that, for the simple reason of the large genetic diversity of blacks within Africa. Africa's problems are (in my opinion) most and foremost cultural.

> Can we as blacks rise above it? Yes! But when you put
> in covert racism it makes it harder to navigate and if you
> don't realize what's going on it's usually to late.

Well, in Africa that particular argument does not really apply these days, notwithstanding some local issues such as Sudan or Rwanda.

I have issues with blaming racism for the continuing problems of blacks. Racism can be plain hatred, it can be prejudicial, or it can be a form of generalisation, depending on the degree of experience holders of racist convictions have. The simplest way (only way?) of overcoming racism is to overcome racist expectations. That's what more or less happened with e.g. East-Asian immigrants to the US when the railways were build in the 19th century. A more recent example was in the UK, when Poland joined the EU: the tabloid newspapers made the people expect an avalange of work-shy scroungers, and that prejudice pretty quickly went down the drain. This can also go the other way when old prejudices are 'confirmed' - that happened when Germany had a sudden influx of Roma immigrants after the end of the cold war.

There is a hen-and-egg problem with racism: racial prejudice keeps people down, and if they stay down it reenforces the prejudice. In the UK I would say that these prejudices are fairly volatile, i.e. most people are open to be convinced otherwise.

An example of that is the lack of black managers in professional football in the UK. Considering the number of black professional players the scarcity of black managers in the football league is quite striking. Is this due to prejudice? Largely, yes - although 30 years ago there were very few black players and they take a while to go through the system. What it would take to change that discrepancy is simply the odd black manager who is given a chance making a success of his job.

[mrmcfister]

How many people visiting this forum would prefer to live somewhere like Belgium than Chad.Why? The answer is that its a far more pleasant part of the world.I am talking about this year .I can not dispute that Europeans have done some bad shit but at least we seem to have learned from it.I genuinely see no hope for Africa.Call me selfish but I can not make any difference.I think the place is too much of a hole for any efforts from the so called developed nations to make any long term changes either.They make an impact at the margins but the continent is too large and too problematic.

My priority is my family.I'll be dead one day and Africa is doomed for generations.Sad but true.If there is a god he fucked up..btw in Africa hundreds of thousands of people die miserable deaths from malaria caused by one of his so called creations....

I do care but Africa is the sick note of the world.

[one eyed jack]

Officer Dibble wrote:

Well I have considered this and quickly came to the conclusion that it would today be a continent of dark skinned people who lived in mud huts and, for a living, threw spears at the herds of majestic wilder beasts as they roamed across the dusty savannah - that was of course when they weren't busy dodging prides of lethargic lions or rampaging rhinos.

Hey whats wrong with that? Africa was probably a lot better for it with all that natural living. Just because i grew up with running water and creature comforts such as tv , entertainment and digital porn doesnt mean had I been brought up in a less cilivised environs that my life would have been any worse off.

Try dragging me off to that life style now and I'd be kicking and screaming and in misery within a few days. I imagine it is the same for them. I mean shanti towns are just a modern version of the mud hut village but a poor version of what a civilised home is supposed to be.

Like the old saying goes: You can take a person out of the ghetto but you cant take the ghetto out of the person seems t ring true in this case.

[Deuce Bigolo]

Living in harmony as part of their enviroment

Something us superior civilised whites could learn from