Africa is...well... a complete disaster, as far as I can tell. Can we talk about the following -
Why is Africa such a mess?
Can Africa dig itself out of this poverty hole it seems to exist in?
Are countries that once enslaved Africans ( YES I KNOW AFRICA ENSLAVED ITS OWN PEOPLE! ) responsible for their current state of affairs?
Is Africa in a mindstate that prevents them from progressing and escaping its current living conditions?
Why does it seem that rebels are more powerful than governments in Africa?
And anything else, I want to learn and understand.
JayC
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Can Africa dig itself out of this poverty hole it seems to exist in?
Are countries that once enslaved Africans ( YES I KNOW AFRICA ENSLAVED ITS OWN PEOPLE! ) responsible for their current state of affairs?
Is Africa in a mindstate that prevents them from progressing and escaping its current living conditions?
You seem to suffer from the delusion that "Africa" is a person. It's not even a single nation. Do you want to talk about the Congo, Sudan, Morocco, or Swaziland?
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Vive, vale. Siquid novisti rectius istis,
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
Well, at least the top half of Africa is a desert, which probably plays a big role in it sucking to live there. And from what I understand, it sucks to live in a jungle too, which is the other half (cut away the trees and the topsoil blows away). I think it's just easier to live some places than others, and obviously, if it's easier to live somewhere, your life would be better.
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Possibly the last remaining member of the Banana Clan (+1)
Banana of the Month Feb '05 Cool stuff here.
I know Africa is a continent, but overall the place is the ****s - and we know which part I'm speaking of - the ****s - so let's talk about the countries that are the ****s.
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Because, much more than colonization, 400 years of the slave trade, and even more than that, the bizarre and decaying nature of the guns-for-slave trade where an influx of weapons that the Africans themselves had no control over defined African warfare destabilized and destroyed many African cultures. Africa, like any region of human politics, not incredibly stable to begin with, but it went from the natural progression of different states and empires to total anarchy. Then Colonization compounded these sins, and to top it off it was ended by complete and sudden withdrawal. Africa is uneducated and disenfranchised, with little background or experience in Democracy. While it is correct that Africa is not a single entity, and there are regions of relative stability, it's certainly the worst off of all continents in the World in terms of both economy and human rights.
Issues:
Lack of empowerment. By this I mean: There aren't enough guns. Third world warfare consists of thugs with guns attacking and slaughtering villagers without, and then the other side's thugs with guns doing the same to the other side's peasants. The soldiers don't kill each other. It's the civilians who suffer. This is because most people are unarmed and can't really resist. If every household in Africa had a gun, this problem would be very greatly solved, as attacking rural farmers would actually become dangerous and not something done for a lark.
Failing that, there's no outside intereference. The UN is a morally bankrupt and useless system that recognizes any group of thugs and bullies that opress, torture, and rape their neighbors as a legitimate, sovereign government. They function as a legislature with no real power or ability to enforce or interpret and apply laws, talking endlessly while doing nothing. We claimed, after WWII and the Holocaust, that we would never let genocide happen again, but it has happened repeatedly and not once has the UN stopped it.
People say that the US can't be the world's police, which is true both ideally and in simple pragmatics. We don't have the power or interest to police the world. But someone should. We need an actual world government organization, one with the power to protect basic human rights and based on principles of democracy, not a powerless body that rewards and applauds dictators and mass-murderers.
Africa depresses me. I'm happy no one ever succeeded in shipping all the Blacks back to Africa. *phew* I'm an American with African heritage but Africa's current state of affairs has cured me of any desire to visit.
Africa is like one of those 1000 piece jigasaw puzzles. You intend to put it together carefully but in the end you either give up or try to make a piece fit where it doesn't belong. There's so much corruption and tribal warfare in Africa. Couple that with the rampant disease and uneducated populace and its a recipe for disaster. From what I've heard from the African immigrants I've met many Africans want to modernize Africa but they simply don't know how. So many come to the US for education and/or jobs to help improve life for those they left behind. The West needs to stop sending money and weapons to Africa and start sending more doctors and teachers. African governments need help keeping their governments stable, especially if its a new or post civil war government. Another problem is that the West just doesn't understand Africa. The peoples of Africa are loyal to their tribe/family before anyone else. Honoring old feuds and rivalries is simply a way of life. Could you fight an enemy all your life and then call him brother as a citizen of the same country? Alot of Africans can't and its not really their fault. Its the way they've lived for thousands of years and no amount of colonialization is going to erase that.
Africa requires infrastructure for truly efficient transportation of aid, but infrastructure is not sexy enough for major fundraising, making it slow going.
Beyond that any major comes with the additional price tag of ensuring that aid actually gets to the people, making the truly impoverished areas of Africa right now something of a black hole for money.
But wouldn't it be desirable? For example, if we assume that philanthropic policy toward Africa could be a good investment, business-wise, wouldn't such be a good idea in the long-run?
Help has come in the form of a bit of basic algebra. I feel that it'll shed some light on your problem here.
Basically:
S + T = W
...S in this case stands for 'spam' and the T stands for 'light trolling'. And the W? That stands for 'Warning'. I love math. -- {mikeyG}
Irresponsible decolonization created immature states that were quickly swept into authoritarianism and corruption. As Stax said, building up the infrastructure would go a long way towards starting to solve Africa's problems.
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By kingcobweb and Goblinboy.
Official Elitist of [thread=40859][RBS][/thread]
Quote from kingcobweb »
I don't understand the purpose of gimmick accounts.
But wouldn't it be desirable? For example, if we assume that philanthropic policy toward Africa could be a good investment, business-wise, wouldn't such be a good idea in the long-run?
Yes, of course it would. But people are lazy and don't want to make the sacrifices necessary to acchieve this. At some point you have to be willing to use force where diplomacy won't work to stop murder, corruption, genocide, rape, and opression. But people don't want to do it. Look at Darfur and Rwanda. Look at how pissed people are about Iraq's lack of progress, when we haven't even been there a fourth as long as we were in the South during the Reconstruction. To paraphrase Hotel Rwanda, people look at these things, say, "Oh my God, that's horrible", and then just want to be able to go on eating their dinner.
I heard an interesting solution for at least one of Africa's problems.
Basically, the idea is that the WTO should pronounce legitimacy on new governments. If a government is not legitimate, they are not allowed to sell the natural resources of that nation (Diamonds and oil being the best examples). This removes a huge incentive for these bloody coups. There is a cycle of rebels trying to overthrow the government, both sides borrowing heavily in order to arm themselves, and if the rebels win then they plan on using the natural resources to pay off their debts and then live the high life. At least until another rebel group gets the same idea. If they know that they will not be able to sell their resources, then they have no economic incentive to rebel.
Help has come in the form of a bit of basic algebra. I feel that it'll shed some light on your problem here.
Basically:
S + T = W
...S in this case stands for 'spam' and the T stands for 'light trolling'. And the W? That stands for 'Warning'. I love math. -- {mikeyG}
The issue there is that they can just go to the black market and sell their goods to other illicit governments. This is the UN's approach, and it's one of the reasons that the UN is a flawed and failed model.
What we actually need is a world police. People say that America can't be the world's police, and I agree, but someone should do the job. There needs to be an executive, a law enforcement arm to a world government, and if you take away the people's power, take away their resources, take away their rights to trials and their lives, this force can come in and punish you for it. Right now we have nothing like that, nothing to stop groups of bloodthirsty murderers and tyrants from getting some guns and startup capital and starting their own bloody genocides and regimes. And rather than focus on this, most of the educated, free world is whining about Bush overstepping his bounds because of the US trying to overthrow one of these regimes and try to put up a real democracy in it's place.
The issue there is that they can just go to the black market and sell their goods to other illicit governments. This is the UN's approach, and it's one of the reasons that the UN is a flawed and failed model.
What we actually need is a world police. People say that America can't be the world's police, and I agree, but someone should do the job. There needs to be an executive, a law enforcement arm to a world government, and if you take away the people's power, take away their resources, take away their rights to trials and their lives, this force can come in and punish you for it. Right now we have nothing like that, nothing to stop groups of bloodthirsty murderers and tyrants from getting some guns and startup capital and starting their own bloody genocides and regimes. And rather than focus on this, most of the educated, free world is whining about Bush overstepping his bounds because of the US trying to overthrow one of these regimes and try to put up a real democracy in it's place.
The problem behind this is that you just got through saying the UN, the only legitimate body of international law, is a failed model. If there is no truly international law there is nothing such a world police would have the right to enforce. Unless, *gasp*, you're just suggesting superpowers like the US just enforce whatever they want like they currently do but call it policing. Because that makes us more like the world police from the world of Batman or maybe Sin City
Yes, of course it would. But people are lazy and don't want to make the sacrifices necessary to acchieve this. At some point you have to be willing to use force where diplomacy won't work to stop murder, corruption, genocide, rape, and opression. But people don't want to do it. Look at Darfur and Rwanda. Look at how pissed people are about Iraq's lack of progress, when we haven't even been there a fourth as long as we were in the South during the Reconstruction. To paraphrase Hotel Rwanda, people look at these things, say, "Oh my God, that's horrible", and then just want to be able to go on eating their dinner.
Yah, thats because Iraq was botched from the start, and while its certainly not totally our fault we are there so long, things could be in a much better shape of things than they are now. If we actually cared about whats happening in Dharfur or Rwanda then we could intervene, and we could succeed learning from were we failed in Iraq. People just don't know or care.
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Quote from Cochese »
Do threads in this forum ever not get hijacked by the magical invisible hand of the market guys?
and I also believe that militair intervention will never bring the solution for world peace. Maybe you can a local problem sometimes, if you not fail. But the problems will come back.
Cutting someone open rarely helps someone get better by itself. That doesn't mean it's not an essential step to surgery. You can't rely on pretty words and high ideals to stop people slaughtering each other. Even if you could, it's not enough- even after the killing stops, people deserve justice. You can't give a free ride to those who've already killed their neighbors.
I also assume you mean relative world peace. Total world peace is about an impossibility.
The problem behind this is that you just got through saying the UN, the only legitimate body of international law, is a failed model. If there is no truly international law there is nothing such a world police would have the right to enforce. Unless, *gasp*, you're just suggesting superpowers like the US just enforce whatever they want like they currently do but call it policing. Because that makes us more like the world police from the world of Batman or maybe Sin City
Or, unless I'm suggesting that we abandon the failed model, and build a new world government based upon the principles of liberty that we hold dear- that no member nation may deprive it's citizens of the vote, of jury by trial, of right to freely practice religion, of right to property, of right to arms, that this new organization recognizes a nation as sovereign only in so far as it represents the rights of all of it's citizens, whether Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Black or White or Man or Woman or Gay or Straight.
yes, that would be the solution, give evrybody a gun an make them kill eachother. Man, I hope you know that Africa has also a high number of criminality. If you give evrybody a gun, this will make it all worse.
Maybe start with spending money to give them medicines, and a decent infrastructure. And give them the chances to grow on their own, at this moment, a lot of farmers have to give all their products to big corporations.
the problem with one country being world police: abuse.
Which country wants to do this without advantages? and with a neutral position?
It's impossible.
Yes, I know there's a high level of crime in Africa. I also know that more guns would solve this problem to a large extent. Let me explain it to you;
Most gun-wielding thugs in Africa are not suicidal or insane. They go around killing people to take their possessions, sell them for more guns, get a bigger gang going. They do this because it's profitable because there's a very small chance of them getting shot. The problem is, right now, that guns are concentrated in the hands of a few. These people are holding the cards; they're stacking the deck. The average person cannot survive and cannot get a gun unless they join one of these vicious gangs and kill others. And they can't get wealth unless they do this, either. It's a system that rewards evil and punishes good. Human nature means more people are turning to evil just to try and survive. Violence doesn't dissappear if you remove the guns- history has been bloody enough before gunpowder- and you can't do that anyway. All you can try and do is level the playing field. You want to stop trying to draw parallels to Europe in your mind. Africa is not Europe. There's no stable infrastructure, nor a recent history of one. There isn't a communal past; there's been a flux in mass movements, immigrations, and pushes caused by wars that were fueled by the guns-for-slave trade that started the lopsided distribution of arms and the one-sided slaughters in the first place. Africa is like America; violent, volatile, dynamic. The second amendment is absolutely essential to America as it is to Africa because of that first one primarily. When everyone's trying to get ahead, the best way of making sure they don't do it over your corpse and raped wife is the threat of having their face blasted off.
Now, yes, just chucking guns in there isn't a solve-all. But it enables other solutions. Right now no aid can get through with regularity because the thugs with guns will confiscate it, sell it off, and use it to buy more guns instead of helping their neighbors. They don't give a flying **** about their neighbors. If they do, even for a minute, a more capitalistic gang is going to kill them or a more enterprising leader will chop the head off of the one that stopped to do this.
There are, again, obviously areas in Africa that are much more stable than the scenario I describe, where there's some actual police force and firearm distribution isn't as necessary, but for a solution to the whole of the Africa problem, more guns are necessary for any near-term asnwer.
Yah, thats because Iraq was botched from the start, and while its certainly not totally our fault we are there so long, things could be in a much better shape of things than they are now. If we actually cared about whats happening in Dharfur or Rwanda then we could intervene, and we could succeed learning from were we failed in Iraq. People just don't know or care.
The US has spent over a trillion dollars in Iraq. The entire world ****s on us because, after three years free from a long and bloody history of brutal dictatorship and sectarian violence, Iraq hasn't transitioned into a seamless and peaceful Democracy.
These sort of problems take time to sort out. It's not enough just to try and quell the killing, you have to actually convince people that there's a better way. And people don't have the patience. I think we should interfere in Darfur, but I would also expect that afterwards the international community, especially nations like China which performs experimental surgery on it's rural poor, or Iran that hangs boys for suspected homosexuality, or Jordan which gives a pass when fathers kill their virgin daughters for talking to a man, or Libya that imprisons foreign doctors and sentences them to death for trying to help AIDs victims, and Russia that decapitates civilians and puts their heads on pikes as warnings, and nations like France and Germany and Belgium that would rather be on a high horse about the US than actually stop to adress real human rights abuses like these, I expect these to come down and condemn the US for brutality and tyranny in trying to stop people from being slaughtered. This is how the stage is set. Anyone who actually acts makes themselves vulnerable- the international community would rather deliberate, wait until everyone's dead already, then bemoan their lack of action in retrospect and put on a show of remorse. "How ****ing terrible", and then they can go back to eating dinner.
Or, unless I'm suggesting that we abandon the failed model, and build a new world government based upon the principles of liberty that we hold dear- that no member nation may deprive it's citizens of the vote, of jury by trial, of right to freely practice religion, of right to property, of right to arms, that this new organization recognizes a nation as sovereign only in so far as it represents the rights of all of it's citizens, whether Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Black or White or Man or Woman or Gay or Straight.
You just imposed American society on 6-approaching-7 billion people on the Earth without request. Because, obviously, by this new world order of supposedly international law that's so obviously just a mirror of American law where we are the policemen I'd assume we'd consider anyone who didn't sign on an enemy?
The US cannot join a body of international law, then say "piss off" to it when it doesn't like it's decision, then expect to be popular in international circles. When you are facing trial and you jump bond, you probably won't get bond again. When you are facing an international community and ignore them, you likely won't get their ear easily again because you've ignored them already.
You just imposed American society on 6-approaching-7 billion people on the Earth without request. Because, obviously, by this new world order of supposedly international law that's so obviously just a mirror of American law where we are the policemen I'd assume we'd consider anyone who didn't sign on an enemy?
The US cannot join a body of international law, then say "piss off" to it when it doesn't like it's decision, then expect to be popular in international circles. When you are facing trial and you jump bond, you probably won't get bond again. When you are facing an international community and ignore them, you likely won't get their ear easily again because you've ignored them already.
News flash: Freedom and justice aren't American concepts. They're basic principles that all human beings desire. If a few *******s with the money and the guns who are holding an entire nation of human beings in bondage only want those ideals for themselves instead of their neighbors? Too ****ing bad.
International law? What international law? Do you pay attention to the world? Do you see what's going on inside of governments that are given respect and word in the UN, a body that is powerless to enforce any of it's high-minded decrees? Have you paid any attention to history? Where has the UN ever enforced international law? Where has the UN stopped the abuse of human rights? Why should we give a flying **** about the opinions of the handful of elites that control and opress the masses of people, that abuse and starve and rape and torture their "citizens" and take their resources for themselves? Why do you think we should listen to the criminals who tell us that their people dont want freedom, don't want justice, that they're happy being treated this way? I'm not suggesting we ignore the opinions of sovereign governments; I'm suggesting we form an organization where we only listen to the opinions of sovereign governments, instead of allowing murderers, thieves, brutal dictators and rapists to form international policy. If you invite criminals onto the city council, don't be surprised when crime rises.
The US has spent over a trillion dollars in Iraq. The entire world ****s on us because, after three years free from a long and bloody history of brutal dictatorship and sectarian violence, Iraq hasn't transitioned into a seamless and peaceful Democracy.
These sort of problems take time to sort out. It's not enough just to try and quell the killing, you have to actually convince people that there's a better way. And people don't have the patience. I think we should interfere in Darfur, but I would also expect that afterwards the international community, especially nations like China which performs experimental surgery on it's rural poor, or Iran that hangs boys for suspected homosexuality, or Jordan which gives a pass when fathers kill their virgin daughters for talking to a man, or Libya that imprisons foreign doctors and sentences them to death for trying to help AIDs victims, and Russia that decapitates civilians and puts their heads on pikes as warnings, and nations like France and Germany and Belgium that would rather be on a high horse about the US than actually stop to adress real human rights abuses like these, I expect these to come down and condemn the US for brutality and tyranny in trying to stop people from being slaughtered. This is how the stage is set. Anyone who actually acts makes themselves vulnerable- the international community would rather deliberate, wait until everyone's dead already, then bemoan their lack of action in retrospect and put on a show of remorse. "How ****ing terrible", and then they can go back to eating dinner.
Four, going on five years later and things should have gotten at least marginally better, not worse. Free of sectarian violence? Yah, we got rid of the brutal dictatorship which was keeping the sectarian violence at bay, and then, obviously, we ended up with sectarian violence. Do you really expect people to be patient when they are staring down four years of blood, violence, and death?
Off course people are going to ***** when you screw something up; if these sort of affairs weren't totally botched up so often, maybe their would be some more support for these actions.
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Quote from Cochese »
Do threads in this forum ever not get hijacked by the magical invisible hand of the market guys?
Four, going on five years later and things should have gotten at least marginally better, not worse. Free of sectarian violence? Yah, we got rid of the brutal dictatorship which was keeping the sectarian violence at bay, and then, obviously, we ended up with sectarian violence. Do you really expect people to be patient when they are staring down four years of blood, violence, and death?
Off course people are going to ***** when you screw something up; if these sort of affairs weren't totally botched up so often, maybe their would be some more support for these actions.
Oh, I agree that people should be pissed that Bush screwed up. The surge should've taken place years ago. We should've committed total necessary resources to get Iraq stable and provide some basic necessities like water, electricity and medicine to the people there. I can understand wanting to hold people accountable for screwing up. I can't understand and I can't forgive wanting to make the problem worse by pulling out. This is a test of the ideals people claim. People walk away every day feeling good about themselves and talking about if they were there, if they were there, if they were in charge- they'd have stopped the Holocaust, stopped Cambodia, stopped Rwanda, they're the good people, they don't believe in killing innocents, don't support killing innocents, they would stand up, they wouldn't be waving a Nazi flag at the rally. They wouldn't pull out of these countries and let dictators take over. They wouldn't stand by and let Sierre Leone or Darfur or the Congo happen, they want the murder and the brutality and the viciousness to stop, except when they actuall talk about Iraq, all you hear is, "It's not our problem. They don't want freedom. Let them kill each other."
International law? What international law? Do you pay attention to the world? Do you see what's going on inside of governments that are given respect and word in the UN, a body that is powerless to enforce any of it's high-minded decrees? Have you paid any attention to history? Where has the UN ever enforced international law?
When inspectors were sent into Iraq, most recently. Who, by the way, were right, and would've stopped a $400+ billion war with tens of thousands of casualties.
And the UN isn't the only body of international law. How about NATO, who stopped a genocide of 1.5 million without a single allied combat death?
Where has the UN stopped the abuse of human rights? Why should we give a flying **** about the opinions of the handful of elites that control and opress the masses of people, that abuse and starve and rape and torture their "citizens" and take their resources for themselves?
Do you understand how the UN actually works? Because you're coming off as one of the crazy guys who stands in the park yelling and handing out pamphlets on the evils of globalization. The UN doesn't say "Well, 99.9% of our member nations want to do X, but Turkmenistan over there says no so screw it."
Oh, and the ICC, the ICTY, ICTR, Sierra Leone court, and Nuremburg, to name a few "small" times where the UN enforced some human rights law.
So far all I have seen on this is that we should throw money or troops at the problem and we have tried both over the last 50 years with little to no success. My belief is that it is just to big a problem right now, as the population bottoms’ out from famine and AIDS we stand a better chance of rebuilding them from the ground up. Then first trying to stem the tide and then bring them up to our level.
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Scott Adams... Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs. This is the principle behind lotteries, dating, and religion
If a government is not legitimate, they are not allowed to sell the natural resources of that nation (Diamonds and oil being the best examples).
One of the main problems is that the mines that are extracting the diamonds, and other precious metals, from Africa are still largely owned by corporations in Europe and the US. The local governments and warlords get kick-backs from these corporations for 'protection', and everyone is happy. The day that warlords attempt to seize these resources from the corporations is the day that you will see UN intervention in Africa.
When inspectors were sent into Iraq, most recently. Who, by the way, were right, and would've stopped a $400+ billion war with tens of thousands of casualties.
On the grounds of whether or not Sadaam had weapons of mass destruction? Maybe. More importantly, why didn't we do this ten years earlier when evidence of his genocidal tendencies came to light? Why wasn't that grounds for a UN response to actually solve the issue?" Would, in light of Sadaam's practices, it have been a good thing to have stopped that war from a humanitarian viewpoint?
And the UN isn't the only body of international law. How about NATO, who stopped a genocide of 1.5 million without a single allied combat death?
What, you mean an organization with actual military power and only including members that actually practice the exact same requirements I said ought to be necessary for membership in a real world government is more effective at stopping Genocide than the UN? Get out of here. I suppose it would be absolutely crazy to extend membership in this form of organization to any free, democratized government.
Do you understand how the UN actually works? Because you're coming off as one of the crazy guys who stands in the park yelling and handing out pamphlets on the evils of globalization. The UN doesn't say "Well, 99.9% of our member nations want to do X, but Turkmenistan over there says no so screw it."
I don't know what 89 over 192 equals in your book, but in mine it's not .01%
Oh, and the ICC, the ICTY, ICTR, Sierra Leone court, and Nuremburg, to name a few "small" times where the UN enforced some human rights law.
The irony in your doing nothing but listing incidents where, failing to actually step in in time to prevent mass genocide, the international community afterwards issued or practices issuing condemning statements once the despots and dictators in charge of said genocides have already been deposed is overwhelming.
A little less trade embargoes and talking about the problem until it solves itself, and a little more shutting the **** up, going in there and killing anyone who's carrying around a gun and a machete and killing unarmed villagers. A little less spending hundreds of hours censuring Israel for defending it's borders while giving China a pass on performing experimental, "practice" surgeries on it's rural poor. And a little less creating peace by granting amnesty to those who've been practicing the rape and torture and killings. Maybe instead of making high-minded decrees and sending peacekeeping forces into wartorn countries, actually enabling them to act upon those ideals. Y'know, if UN peace-keeping forces aren't too busy raping 8 year old girls and all.
Why is Africa such a mess?
Can Africa dig itself out of this poverty hole it seems to exist in?
Are countries that once enslaved Africans ( YES I KNOW AFRICA ENSLAVED ITS OWN PEOPLE! ) responsible for their current state of affairs?
Is Africa in a mindstate that prevents them from progressing and escaping its current living conditions?
Why does it seem that rebels are more powerful than governments in Africa?
And anything else, I want to learn and understand.
JayC
Spread the word.
You seem to suffer from the delusion that "Africa" is a person. It's not even a single nation. Do you want to talk about the Congo, Sudan, Morocco, or Swaziland?
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
Possibly the last remaining member of the Banana Clan (+1)
Banana of the Month Feb '05
Cool stuff here.
Spread the word.
Issues:
Lack of empowerment. By this I mean: There aren't enough guns. Third world warfare consists of thugs with guns attacking and slaughtering villagers without, and then the other side's thugs with guns doing the same to the other side's peasants. The soldiers don't kill each other. It's the civilians who suffer. This is because most people are unarmed and can't really resist. If every household in Africa had a gun, this problem would be very greatly solved, as attacking rural farmers would actually become dangerous and not something done for a lark.
Failing that, there's no outside intereference. The UN is a morally bankrupt and useless system that recognizes any group of thugs and bullies that opress, torture, and rape their neighbors as a legitimate, sovereign government. They function as a legislature with no real power or ability to enforce or interpret and apply laws, talking endlessly while doing nothing. We claimed, after WWII and the Holocaust, that we would never let genocide happen again, but it has happened repeatedly and not once has the UN stopped it.
People say that the US can't be the world's police, which is true both ideally and in simple pragmatics. We don't have the power or interest to police the world. But someone should. We need an actual world government organization, one with the power to protect basic human rights and based on principles of democracy, not a powerless body that rewards and applauds dictators and mass-murderers.
Africa is like one of those 1000 piece jigasaw puzzles. You intend to put it together carefully but in the end you either give up or try to make a piece fit where it doesn't belong. There's so much corruption and tribal warfare in Africa. Couple that with the rampant disease and uneducated populace and its a recipe for disaster. From what I've heard from the African immigrants I've met many Africans want to modernize Africa but they simply don't know how. So many come to the US for education and/or jobs to help improve life for those they left behind. The West needs to stop sending money and weapons to Africa and start sending more doctors and teachers. African governments need help keeping their governments stable, especially if its a new or post civil war government. Another problem is that the West just doesn't understand Africa. The peoples of Africa are loyal to their tribe/family before anyone else. Honoring old feuds and rivalries is simply a way of life. Could you fight an enemy all your life and then call him brother as a citizen of the same country? Alot of Africans can't and its not really their fault. Its the way they've lived for thousands of years and no amount of colonialization is going to erase that.
Beyond that any major comes with the additional price tag of ensuring that aid actually gets to the people, making the truly impoverished areas of Africa right now something of a black hole for money.
Help has come in the form of a bit of basic algebra. I feel that it'll shed some light on your problem here.
Basically:
S + T = W
...S in this case stands for 'spam' and the T stands for 'light trolling'. And the W? That stands for 'Warning'. I love math. -- {mikeyG}
By kingcobweb and Goblinboy.
Official Elitist of [thread=40859][RBS][/thread]
Yes, of course it would. But people are lazy and don't want to make the sacrifices necessary to acchieve this. At some point you have to be willing to use force where diplomacy won't work to stop murder, corruption, genocide, rape, and opression. But people don't want to do it. Look at Darfur and Rwanda. Look at how pissed people are about Iraq's lack of progress, when we haven't even been there a fourth as long as we were in the South during the Reconstruction. To paraphrase Hotel Rwanda, people look at these things, say, "Oh my God, that's horrible", and then just want to be able to go on eating their dinner.
Basically, the idea is that the WTO should pronounce legitimacy on new governments. If a government is not legitimate, they are not allowed to sell the natural resources of that nation (Diamonds and oil being the best examples). This removes a huge incentive for these bloody coups. There is a cycle of rebels trying to overthrow the government, both sides borrowing heavily in order to arm themselves, and if the rebels win then they plan on using the natural resources to pay off their debts and then live the high life. At least until another rebel group gets the same idea. If they know that they will not be able to sell their resources, then they have no economic incentive to rebel.
Help has come in the form of a bit of basic algebra. I feel that it'll shed some light on your problem here.
Basically:
S + T = W
...S in this case stands for 'spam' and the T stands for 'light trolling'. And the W? That stands for 'Warning'. I love math. -- {mikeyG}
Just because it is right now doesn't mean that's all it can be.
What we actually need is a world police. People say that America can't be the world's police, and I agree, but someone should do the job. There needs to be an executive, a law enforcement arm to a world government, and if you take away the people's power, take away their resources, take away their rights to trials and their lives, this force can come in and punish you for it. Right now we have nothing like that, nothing to stop groups of bloodthirsty murderers and tyrants from getting some guns and startup capital and starting their own bloody genocides and regimes. And rather than focus on this, most of the educated, free world is whining about Bush overstepping his bounds because of the US trying to overthrow one of these regimes and try to put up a real democracy in it's place.
The problem behind this is that you just got through saying the UN, the only legitimate body of international law, is a failed model. If there is no truly international law there is nothing such a world police would have the right to enforce. Unless, *gasp*, you're just suggesting superpowers like the US just enforce whatever they want like they currently do but call it policing. Because that makes us more like the world police from the world of Batman or maybe Sin City
Yah, thats because Iraq was botched from the start, and while its certainly not totally our fault we are there so long, things could be in a much better shape of things than they are now. If we actually cared about whats happening in Dharfur or Rwanda then we could intervene, and we could succeed learning from were we failed in Iraq. People just don't know or care.
Cutting someone open rarely helps someone get better by itself. That doesn't mean it's not an essential step to surgery. You can't rely on pretty words and high ideals to stop people slaughtering each other. Even if you could, it's not enough- even after the killing stops, people deserve justice. You can't give a free ride to those who've already killed their neighbors.
I also assume you mean relative world peace. Total world peace is about an impossibility.
Or, unless I'm suggesting that we abandon the failed model, and build a new world government based upon the principles of liberty that we hold dear- that no member nation may deprive it's citizens of the vote, of jury by trial, of right to freely practice religion, of right to property, of right to arms, that this new organization recognizes a nation as sovereign only in so far as it represents the rights of all of it's citizens, whether Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Black or White or Man or Woman or Gay or Straight.
Yes, I know there's a high level of crime in Africa. I also know that more guns would solve this problem to a large extent. Let me explain it to you;
Most gun-wielding thugs in Africa are not suicidal or insane. They go around killing people to take their possessions, sell them for more guns, get a bigger gang going. They do this because it's profitable because there's a very small chance of them getting shot. The problem is, right now, that guns are concentrated in the hands of a few. These people are holding the cards; they're stacking the deck. The average person cannot survive and cannot get a gun unless they join one of these vicious gangs and kill others. And they can't get wealth unless they do this, either. It's a system that rewards evil and punishes good. Human nature means more people are turning to evil just to try and survive. Violence doesn't dissappear if you remove the guns- history has been bloody enough before gunpowder- and you can't do that anyway. All you can try and do is level the playing field. You want to stop trying to draw parallels to Europe in your mind. Africa is not Europe. There's no stable infrastructure, nor a recent history of one. There isn't a communal past; there's been a flux in mass movements, immigrations, and pushes caused by wars that were fueled by the guns-for-slave trade that started the lopsided distribution of arms and the one-sided slaughters in the first place. Africa is like America; violent, volatile, dynamic. The second amendment is absolutely essential to America as it is to Africa because of that first one primarily. When everyone's trying to get ahead, the best way of making sure they don't do it over your corpse and raped wife is the threat of having their face blasted off.
Now, yes, just chucking guns in there isn't a solve-all. But it enables other solutions. Right now no aid can get through with regularity because the thugs with guns will confiscate it, sell it off, and use it to buy more guns instead of helping their neighbors. They don't give a flying **** about their neighbors. If they do, even for a minute, a more capitalistic gang is going to kill them or a more enterprising leader will chop the head off of the one that stopped to do this.
There are, again, obviously areas in Africa that are much more stable than the scenario I describe, where there's some actual police force and firearm distribution isn't as necessary, but for a solution to the whole of the Africa problem, more guns are necessary for any near-term asnwer.
The US has spent over a trillion dollars in Iraq. The entire world ****s on us because, after three years free from a long and bloody history of brutal dictatorship and sectarian violence, Iraq hasn't transitioned into a seamless and peaceful Democracy.
These sort of problems take time to sort out. It's not enough just to try and quell the killing, you have to actually convince people that there's a better way. And people don't have the patience. I think we should interfere in Darfur, but I would also expect that afterwards the international community, especially nations like China which performs experimental surgery on it's rural poor, or Iran that hangs boys for suspected homosexuality, or Jordan which gives a pass when fathers kill their virgin daughters for talking to a man, or Libya that imprisons foreign doctors and sentences them to death for trying to help AIDs victims, and Russia that decapitates civilians and puts their heads on pikes as warnings, and nations like France and Germany and Belgium that would rather be on a high horse about the US than actually stop to adress real human rights abuses like these, I expect these to come down and condemn the US for brutality and tyranny in trying to stop people from being slaughtered. This is how the stage is set. Anyone who actually acts makes themselves vulnerable- the international community would rather deliberate, wait until everyone's dead already, then bemoan their lack of action in retrospect and put on a show of remorse. "How ****ing terrible", and then they can go back to eating dinner.
You just imposed American society on 6-approaching-7 billion people on the Earth without request. Because, obviously, by this new world order of supposedly international law that's so obviously just a mirror of American law where we are the policemen I'd assume we'd consider anyone who didn't sign on an enemy?
The US cannot join a body of international law, then say "piss off" to it when it doesn't like it's decision, then expect to be popular in international circles. When you are facing trial and you jump bond, you probably won't get bond again. When you are facing an international community and ignore them, you likely won't get their ear easily again because you've ignored them already.
News flash: Freedom and justice aren't American concepts. They're basic principles that all human beings desire. If a few *******s with the money and the guns who are holding an entire nation of human beings in bondage only want those ideals for themselves instead of their neighbors? Too ****ing bad.
International law? What international law? Do you pay attention to the world? Do you see what's going on inside of governments that are given respect and word in the UN, a body that is powerless to enforce any of it's high-minded decrees? Have you paid any attention to history? Where has the UN ever enforced international law? Where has the UN stopped the abuse of human rights? Why should we give a flying **** about the opinions of the handful of elites that control and opress the masses of people, that abuse and starve and rape and torture their "citizens" and take their resources for themselves? Why do you think we should listen to the criminals who tell us that their people dont want freedom, don't want justice, that they're happy being treated this way? I'm not suggesting we ignore the opinions of sovereign governments; I'm suggesting we form an organization where we only listen to the opinions of sovereign governments, instead of allowing murderers, thieves, brutal dictators and rapists to form international policy. If you invite criminals onto the city council, don't be surprised when crime rises.
Four, going on five years later and things should have gotten at least marginally better, not worse. Free of sectarian violence? Yah, we got rid of the brutal dictatorship which was keeping the sectarian violence at bay, and then, obviously, we ended up with sectarian violence. Do you really expect people to be patient when they are staring down four years of blood, violence, and death?
Off course people are going to ***** when you screw something up; if these sort of affairs weren't totally botched up so often, maybe their would be some more support for these actions.
Oh, I agree that people should be pissed that Bush screwed up. The surge should've taken place years ago. We should've committed total necessary resources to get Iraq stable and provide some basic necessities like water, electricity and medicine to the people there. I can understand wanting to hold people accountable for screwing up. I can't understand and I can't forgive wanting to make the problem worse by pulling out. This is a test of the ideals people claim. People walk away every day feeling good about themselves and talking about if they were there, if they were there, if they were in charge- they'd have stopped the Holocaust, stopped Cambodia, stopped Rwanda, they're the good people, they don't believe in killing innocents, don't support killing innocents, they would stand up, they wouldn't be waving a Nazi flag at the rally. They wouldn't pull out of these countries and let dictators take over. They wouldn't stand by and let Sierre Leone or Darfur or the Congo happen, they want the murder and the brutality and the viciousness to stop, except when they actuall talk about Iraq, all you hear is, "It's not our problem. They don't want freedom. Let them kill each other."
When inspectors were sent into Iraq, most recently. Who, by the way, were right, and would've stopped a $400+ billion war with tens of thousands of casualties.
And the UN isn't the only body of international law. How about NATO, who stopped a genocide of 1.5 million without a single allied combat death?
Do you understand how the UN actually works? Because you're coming off as one of the crazy guys who stands in the park yelling and handing out pamphlets on the evils of globalization. The UN doesn't say "Well, 99.9% of our member nations want to do X, but Turkmenistan over there says no so screw it."
Oh, and the ICC, the ICTY, ICTR, Sierra Leone court, and Nuremburg, to name a few "small" times where the UN enforced some human rights law.
One of the main problems is that the mines that are extracting the diamonds, and other precious metals, from Africa are still largely owned by corporations in Europe and the US. The local governments and warlords get kick-backs from these corporations for 'protection', and everyone is happy. The day that warlords attempt to seize these resources from the corporations is the day that you will see UN intervention in Africa.
On the grounds of whether or not Sadaam had weapons of mass destruction? Maybe. More importantly, why didn't we do this ten years earlier when evidence of his genocidal tendencies came to light? Why wasn't that grounds for a UN response to actually solve the issue?" Would, in light of Sadaam's practices, it have been a good thing to have stopped that war from a humanitarian viewpoint?
What, you mean an organization with actual military power and only including members that actually practice the exact same requirements I said ought to be necessary for membership in a real world government is more effective at stopping Genocide than the UN? Get out of here. I suppose it would be absolutely crazy to extend membership in this form of organization to any free, democratized government.
I don't know what 89 over 192 equals in your book, but in mine it's not .01%
The irony in your doing nothing but listing incidents where, failing to actually step in in time to prevent mass genocide, the international community afterwards issued or practices issuing condemning statements once the despots and dictators in charge of said genocides have already been deposed is overwhelming.
A little less trade embargoes and talking about the problem until it solves itself, and a little more shutting the **** up, going in there and killing anyone who's carrying around a gun and a machete and killing unarmed villagers. A little less spending hundreds of hours censuring Israel for defending it's borders while giving China a pass on performing experimental, "practice" surgeries on it's rural poor. And a little less creating peace by granting amnesty to those who've been practicing the rape and torture and killings. Maybe instead of making high-minded decrees and sending peacekeeping forces into wartorn countries, actually enabling them to act upon those ideals. Y'know, if UN peace-keeping forces aren't too busy raping 8 year old girls and all.