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Old 03-04-2009, 08:26 PM
 
Location: Rockport Texas from El Paso
2,602 posts, read 8,496,195 times
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Zimbabwe set a record for decline in GDP - down 50% since the recent govt took over -that was in 2007 its much worse now - white farmers have been killed and Cholera sweeps the country.

Rwanda -massacres and genocide

Sudan - the same and mass starvation

The entire continent huge AIDs epidemic.

Nigeria Ghana an epidemic of email spammers (ok lol but they are a pain in the ass)

Now someone could point to Nazi Germany in WW2 or how Bush had the nation with the best resources and killed the economy and started the illegal war in Iraq but on the whole isn't the rest of the world more civilized with less mass killing, disease and economic failure than Africa?

 
Old 03-04-2009, 09:16 PM
 
4,282 posts, read 15,715,109 times
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And your point would be?
 
Old 03-04-2009, 09:42 PM
 
Location: Rockport Texas from El Paso
2,602 posts, read 8,496,195 times
Reputation: 1606
Well its a difficult subject- any mention that Africans can't govern themselves smacks of racism. On the other had its pretty clear they've been a disaster at self-government- all the way from Amin to the current time. Mandela may have been an exception.

Point? Well I want to see other's opinions if my perception is correct or faulty.
 
Old 03-04-2009, 09:56 PM
 
Location: Iowa
3,316 posts, read 4,104,036 times
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Don't forget about the DRC (congo) where they poke a stick up your wifes uterus and make you watch it. After the rape and disfigurement that leaves your wife barren, you leave your wife and home in shame. Then three months later you join the other side do the same thing to someone else. Makes me ahamed to be human knowing what we are still capable of.

Which country used to eleminate rivals and political opponents by throwing a tire over their head and lighting them on fire, I forgot. They had a special name for it too.
 
Old 03-05-2009, 08:12 AM
 
456 posts, read 1,392,951 times
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I find this post ridiculously racist. If you would read and understand the history of Africa and European colonization and encroachment, then and only then could you possibly begin to understand why there is so much trouble in Africa. No one culture or race has a monopoly on good or bad leadership. Wake up, please.
 
Old 03-05-2009, 08:23 AM
 
983 posts, read 3,589,592 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ocean2026 View Post
The entire continent huge AIDs epidemic.
Not true. Only the southern part of the continent.
 
Old 03-05-2009, 09:24 AM
 
Location: Wichita,Kansas
2,732 posts, read 6,750,110 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Indi9 View Post
I find this post ridiculously racist. If you would read and understand the history of Africa and European colonization and encroachment, then and only then could you possibly begin to understand why there is so much trouble in Africa. No one culture or race has a monopoly on good or bad leadership. Wake up, please.
I was waiting for this post....
 
Old 03-05-2009, 11:00 AM
 
Location: Rockport Texas from El Paso
2,602 posts, read 8,496,195 times
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I was waiting for this response too and having campaigned and voted for Obama in a racially mixed household it doesn't exactly alarm me.

So now that you've gotten that off your chest - examine the facts. Compare African nations to Asian, Latin American and European nations.

Is there more genocide?
Are there more corrupt dictators - there have been some in Asia and Latin America bu to this degree? Latin America has many poor countries as well.
Is AIDs as widespread?
Famine through misuse of resources?


Past history is just that - the past. Blacks in America who say they want reparations for past civil war injustices can go to hell- my ancestors had nothing to do with it.

This is 2009 and Africa seems to have regressed not progressed.

This is not meant to be about race America has a Black President who will move us forward and is 1000 times brighter than his predecessor. It just so happens that most Africans are Black.
 
Old 03-05-2009, 11:19 AM
 
3,210 posts, read 4,596,070 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Indi9 View Post
I find this post ridiculously racist. If you would read and understand the history of Africa and European colonization and encroachment, then and only then could you possibly begin to understand why there is so much trouble in Africa. No one culture or race has a monopoly on good or bad leadership. Wake up, please.
This argument lacks total merit. Yes, it is true Africa had her resources stolen by European colonizers and it did disrupt the continent's natural social ecology.

However, let's be real here: Most all of the world was at some point under European control, and despite that, very few apporach the depravity of Africa. Now, to be fair, there are many parts of Africa that are making very good strides towards betterment. Somailia, Ethiopia, and Liberia all escaped European rule and all three had some of the worst carange of all....

Most all of the Africans I have met personally are extremely friendly and hard-working. The issue is they simply don't have the oppertunity to be the best they can be back home, so they come here, which I completely sypathize with. I think the problem is a few things:

-During the cold war, both the US and the USSR armed proxy groups throughout the third world. This flow of weaponry made natural tribal arugments that much more deadly.

-The resources of Africa are often controlled by the government/military instead of by property owners. This creates sort of a "Death Trade" where minerals are sold to China, India, The West, who then give African dictators the cash to buy weapons to oppress their people. Left poor and starving, there simply is no way for the people to fight back.(this right here is an excellent argument against socialism, btw)

-The handouts mentality fostered by the UN/NGOs has sort of resulted in a "Psychological Colonialism" where white nations are still seen as being responsible for African's well being...

-Anicent attitudes towards society in general. The rule of law is non-existant. Why produce anything when it's going to be stolen/taken? Private property is the backbone of prosperity. This is exasperated by the warped sense of "Social Justice" garbage spewed by Black Liberation theologians...

In short, it's a complex and deep issue, which isn't going to be solved by the "Blame Whitey" scapegoat used by the intellectually lazy. Many Africans who do try to better themselves end up emigrating, which both leaves behind a increasingly barren continent back home, as well as leaves the emigrae in his host country feeling alienated and exiled from his natual home, a big factor driving raical tensions in the US and Europe....
 
Old 03-05-2009, 12:43 PM
 
Location: Aloverton
6,560 posts, read 14,406,362 times
Reputation: 10164
This whole topic is rife with evasions, slogans and overgeneralizations. It usually is.

In the first place, not all of Africa is unable to rule itself. Morocco seems to do just fine. Ethiopia seemed to do very well until Italy started invading them with automatic weapons. Is Botswana a hellhole? Not that I'm aware. We may not have liked the way the Afrikaner minority ruled the Republic of South Africa in its day, but it was most certainly able to rule, as was the government of Rhodesia.

In the second place, if you mean 'black African' when you say 'African', then at least have the guts to say that. Your post might get deleted from the board on grounds of racism, but at least you won't be weaseling. A white guy from Pretoria named Pieter van der Merwe is an African, as is an Indian gal named Sunita Gupta from Entebbe, as is a part-Portuguese fellow from Luanda named Joao da Silva. Dare to say what you really mean.

In the third, it's fashionable to attribute all of modern Africa's problems to colonialism. If colonialism were the problem, then the end of colonialism should begin the solution. Did it? No? If so, why not? Is that because the simple, childlike tribal minds were damaged by colonialism so that, with colonialism gone, they now lacked the wisdom to see a better way? If that is what you are saying, come out and say it, and dare to blame all of modern Africa's problems on colonialism. Because you cannot have it both ways. Today Africans govern themselves. If some Africans do a bad job of it, they have had ample time and opportunity to choose a better way. Either you say they lack the sense to do that (and in so doing, are essentially saying Africans are dumber than other people), or you admit a more defensible premise: that, like anyone else, once the colonial power vacuum appeared, those in a position to create benefit for themselves at everyone else's expense took over, and don't care to let go.

In the fourth, what reason is there to believe things would be any different in sub-Saharan Africa had there never been a European colony there? Suppose, for the sake of interest, that medieval Europeans and Arabs had suddenly gained this vast enlightenment and sense of racial equality: never kidnapped a free African into slavery, never attempted to govern an inch of SSA. They would still have stopped to trade, of course; a scenario without that is too silly to explore, but let's say outsiders chose not to rule or enslave. Africa would still have exchanged ideas with other continents, of course; would the horrid rubber trade of the Congo not have occurred once European traders landed and offered to buy it? Would any future endangered species have survived to become endangered? Even African commentators have bemoaned the culturally-based familial nepotism that makes it so difficult for an African to improve his or her position in the world without being besieged by a horde of lazy, freeloading cousins, all of whom now expect comfy sinecures and preferential treatment. That's not just Africa, either; it's just more pronounced there.

You can make a case that a lot of Africa's ills are quite cultural, which does not necessarily mean racial. But when you take a position on the topic, all of you, have the valor to say what you mean.
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