NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/world/africa/09nations.html?_r=1&ref=africa&oref=slogin

They're blocking a treaty to ban rape as a weapon of war. And they're apparently supporting Iran's quest to get nuclear weapons.

A clear indication that the government doesn't always have the best interests of its people in mind when it votes with its collective ass.

They aren't exactly in the most stable spot in the world. They don't really have the latitude to act with the same humanitarian concerns that we do.

But still...

South Africa's always had a shitty government, and probably always will.

South Africa's always had a shitty government, and probably always will.
Used to be better, though obviously had it's problems. There was something there though that made South Africa the greatest, most modern nation that Africa has ever seen.

Unfortunatly, it's now regressing back into an African shit-hole.

Used to be better, though obviously had it's problems. There was something there though that made South Africa the greatest, most modern nation that Africa has ever seen.

Unfortunatly, it's now regressing back into an African shit-hole.

South Africa could have remained great and modern, had the United Party won the 1948 election, and had apartheid never been implemented.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/world/africa/09nations.html?_r=1&ref=africa&oref=slogin

They're blocking a treaty to ban rape as a weapon of war. And they're apparently supporting Iran's quest to get nuclear weapons.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, over?


Although in a way, it's almost comforting to know that my country isn't the only one run by complete dumbasses.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, over?


Although in a way, it's almost comforting to know that my country isn't the only one run by complete dumbasses.

To be fair, at least Bush doesn't deny that HIV causes AIDS. Thabo Dumbfuck Mbeki says "poverty" causes AIDS. Not that people living in poverty are more likely to become infected, but that poverty itself causes the disease.

They should just put South Africa down as supporting it. Then when people start to question it, go;

"You know how it is! You're in a hot session of the Security Council, one thing leads to another... you kind of lose yourself to the moment. Besides, South Africa's mouth may have said 'No! No!' but their eyes said, 'Yes! Yes!'. "

:D

South Africa could have remained great and modern, had the United Party won the 1948 election, and had apartheid never been implemented.
Even with Apartheid, South Africa was still better than the rest of the African countries....sure Apartheid isn't exactly a good policy, but it's no worse than the rest of the shit that goes on in African countires, except in this one, economic progress and 1st world living standards were present...sure those may have only been for White people, but then again..in the rest of Africa nobody has economic progress and 1st world living standard...so it's kinda like that saying "In the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king."

Even with Apartheid, South Africa was still better than the rest of the African countries....sure Apartheid isn't exactly a good policy, but it's no worse than the rest of the shit that goes on in African countires, except in this one, economic progress and 1st world living standards were present...sure those may have only been for White people, but then again..in the rest of Africa nobody has economic progress and 1st world living standard...so it's kinda like that saying "In the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king."

South Africa would have been far wealthier had it made efforts to gradually integrate the country, lower the barriers between races, allowed blacks to excel academically (instead of deliberately giving them only the most rudimentary education possible), etc. Rather than spending shitloads of money enforcing thousands of insanely bureaucratic and oppressive segregation laws, South Africa could have taken a hands-off approach, encouraged (rather than proscribed) integration, and pursued a policy of allowing people to rise or fall on their own merits, rather than reducing non-whites to the lowest status possible.

South Africa understands the implications of this ruling if it ever were to be accepted as a resolution, foreign countries acting all high and mighty would set their foots back in Africa. You want to gain access to the Sudanese oil, just label the non-complying Sudanese government as a state sponsor of rape and you got Sudan's oil. You want to finally get rid of that annoying Zimbabwean leader called Robert Mugabe, label his government as a state sponsor of rape and in no time White farmers get to keep the lands they supposed to give up. Where were these so called "caring" nations when Rwanda was burning? Sudan's problems came to spotlight when oil was discovered in Sudan and China was going to get a huge share of that oil. South Africa is for Iran obtaining nuclear technology because it is every country's right to seek civilian nuclear technology. It is unacceptable for countries that have nuclear technology to wag their fingers at a country that is trying to obtain the same knowledge they have. You never hear non-Western countries screaming at Tehran to halt their nuclear programs because they know today it's Iran that's being grueled and tomorrow it could be them if they seek nuclear technology.

Where were these so called "caring" nations when Rwanda was burning?

Standing idly by and doing nothing in the case of the U.S., or actively aiding the Hutu Power government, in the case of France.

To be fair, at least Bush doesn't deny that HIV causes AIDS. Thabo Dumbfuck Mbeki says "poverty" causes AIDS. Not that people living in poverty are more likely to become infected, but that poverty itself causes the disease.

A lack of money causes you to be infected with a deadly disease? I suppose next it will be God is causing them to die because they must have sinned and are evil if they are poor. I'm sure the logic is perfect!

Oh, and something like 87% of prospective European immigrants after World War II intended to emigrate to South Africa, but the National Party prevented that. Think how much better the country would have been had they been allowed to come, and bring all their skills and expertise with them. Moreover, having just endured the hells of fascism, the vast majority of them would have voted against the National Party (a party which itself sympathized with the Nazis), and hastened the NP's departure into obscurity.

A lack of money causes you to be infected with a deadly disease? I suppose next it will be God is causing them to die because they must have sinned and are evil if they are poor. I'm sure the logic is perfect!

What can I say, the man is a complete moron.

Standing idly by and doing nothing in the case of the U.S., or actively aiding the Hutu Power government, in the case of France.

So what makes you think the usage of "state sponsor of rape" would accomplish when countries stood by during Rwanda's genocide?

So what makes you think the usage of "state sponsor of rape" would accomplish when countries stood by during Rwanda's genocide?

I don't know, but Rwanda was a tiny, impoverished, landlocked country with no resources or any strategic value whatsoever, which meant that, in the eyes of First World governments, it was expendable. Of course, had Rwanda been geologically wealthier, located in Europe, or populated by Westerners, the West would probably have cared a lot more. Cruel and deplorable, but that's the type of thinking that predominates in most governments.

South Africa would have been far wealthier had it made efforts to gradually integrate the country, lower the barriers between races, allowed blacks to excel academically (instead of deliberately giving them only the most rudimentary education possible), etc. Rather than spending shitloads of money enforcing thousands of insanely bureaucratic and oppressive segregation laws, South Africa could have taken a hands-off approach, encouraged (rather than proscribed) integration, and pursued a policy of allowing people to rise or fall on their own merits, rather than reducing non-whites to the lowest status possible.
They could have tried, but I don't think Black Africans were integratable into White African soceity..the culture, values and morals were just too different on many different levels.

What can I say, the man is a complete moron.

I suppose I shouldn't be pointing out the faults too much considering the utter idiots that are running some other nations...

They could have tried, but I don't think Black Africans were integratable into White African soceity..the culture, values and morals were just too different on many different levels.

If they couldn't or wouldn't integrate, that's their choice. But forcing people apart at gunpoint and reducing one group of people to near-serfdom is intolerable.

They could have tried, but I don't think Black Africans were integratable into White African soceity..the culture, values and morals were just too different on many different levels.Meh. Just another "multiculturalism can't work, so nyah" argument. Maybe the White Africans weren't integratable to Black African society? Or maybe they're all not trying hard enough?

"We want a resolution that is nonpoliticized and that looks at rape in a holistic manner in all its situations including rape by soldiers in detention centers and in situations of foreign occupation.”

It's easy to see why the USA doesn't like that position...

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/world/africa/09nations.html?_r=1&ref=africa&oref=slogin

They're blocking a treaty to ban rape as a weapon of war. And they're apparently supporting Iran's quest to get nuclear weapons.

This thread confirms that people are not bothered to actually read the sources cited in the OP. Unfortunately, it also leaves the impression that the OP didn't read more than the headline of the article, either.


Adjusted to actual content, your one-line summary should read something like "SA is trying to change a proposal for a treaty banning gov't-sponsored rape that is limited to only specific situations to a treaty banning all forms of gov't-sponsored or implicitly accepted acts of rape".

And I do wonder where from, and why, you pulled that Iran issue.

So going from sexual violence, general, to sexual violence, by government, is now "watering down"?

And a resolution that only bans government sexual violence is in the best interest of individuals?

They should just put South Africa down as supporting it. Then when people start to question it, go;

"You know how it is! You're in a hot session of the Security Council, one thing leads to another... you kind of lose yourself to the moment. Besides, South Africa's mouth may have said 'No! No!' but their eyes said, 'Yes! Yes!'. "

:D

:fluffle: Best suggestion yet. Except that SoWiBi is right xD

They could have tried, but I don't think Black Africans were integratable into White African soceity..the culture, values and morals were just too different on many different levels.

You're actually defending mother-rape-fucking APARTHEID??? And on the assertion that they "failed to integrate" even though South Africa was THEIR country?

Especially when the foreign minority were the WHITES. Thus showing you don't give a fuck about foreigners or about minorities, you want them down for being darker-skinned than you. Different. And ONLY that.

Meh. Just another "multiculturalism can't work, so nyah" argument. Maybe the White Africans weren't integratable to Black African society? Or maybe they're all not trying hard enough?

TAI would never even consider that possibility.

I don't know, but Rwanda was a tiny, impoverished, landlocked country with no resources or any strategic value whatsoever, which meant that, in the eyes of First World governments, it was expendable. Of course, had Rwanda been geologically wealthier, located in Europe, or populated by Westerners, the West would probably have cared a lot more. Cruel and deplorable, but that's the type of thinking that predominates in most governments.

But why should we? We don't have the money, time, or resources to rescue every imperilled people. And seeing the excessive amounts of flag-burning, rioting anti-westerns, it's clear that we wouldn't be appreciated at all. We're not the world's policemen, and we shouldn't have to be.

You're actually defending mother-rape-fucking APARTHEID??? And on the assertion that they "failed to integrate" even though South Africa was THEIR country?

Especially when the foreign minority were the WHITES. Thus showing you don't give a fuck about foreigners or about minorities, you want them down for being darker-skinned than you. Different. And ONLY that.

So much of what you said he said were actually words you put in his mouth.

But why should we? We don't have the money, time, or resources to rescue every imperilled people. And seeing the excessive amounts of flag-burning, rioting anti-westerns, it's clear that we wouldn't be appreciated at all. We're not the world's policemen, and we shouldn't have to be.When's the last time you saw a flag-burning on TV?

I think you mean surprise sex. And you can't get AIDS if you have a shower after sex, not that it really exists outside of the gay community.

[/Seth Efrican]

They should just put South Africa down as supporting it. Then when people start to question it, go;

"You know how it is! You're in a hot session of the Security Council, one thing leads to another... you kind of lose yourself to the moment. Besides, South Africa's mouth may have said 'No! No!' but their eyes said, 'Yes! Yes!'. "

:D
"Plus it was dressed like it wanted it!"

Even with Apartheid, South Africa was still better than the rest of the African countries....sure Apartheid isn't exactly a good policy, but it's no worse than the rest of the shit that goes on in African countires, except in this one, economic progress and 1st world living standards were present...sure those may have only been for White people, but then again..in the rest of Africa nobody has economic progress and 1st world living standard...so it's kinda like that saying "In the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king."

Bloody true.

In their defence, they have at least abandoned the ludicrous policy of racial quotas in their national sports teams, however, they remain upon what seems an inexorable decline into the anarchic crappiness endemic to Africa.

Meh. Just another "multiculturalism can't work, so nyah" argument. Maybe the White Africans weren't integratable to Black African society? Or maybe they're all not trying hard enough?

Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.

Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.

Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.
It's a perfectly excellent term for that, actually. A society is just a group of people with a unified culture (even if that culture is one of multiculturalism) who work together, for better or for worse.
Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.
That's probably because of the fact that most of the white South Africans have made no effort to help them integrate, other than saying that they need to have 1 black person and 1 coloured in every cricket / footie team etc., which was never going to solve anything.

Indeed, most of the South Africans I know left very, very quickly after the fall of apartheid to Great Britain, and most of them are pretty unpleasant people who basically left because they didn't feel like owning up to the fact that they supported Apartheid, either implicitly or explicitly.

Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.

Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.
So, you actively support countries completely integrating and adopting immigrant culture and society? Blimey, Chris, I never thought you had it in you.

Meh. Just another "multiculturalism can't work, so nyah" argument. Maybe the White Africans weren't integratable to Black African society? Or maybe they're all not trying hard enough?
White Africans are not integratable enough to Black African soceity because Black African soceity is about 1000 years behind White African soceity. Thank God White Africans are not integratable to that soceity.

If they couldn't or wouldn't integrate, that's their choice. But forcing people apart at gunpoint and reducing one group of people to near-serfdom is intolerable.
Meh, there's a saying. "T.I.A.", This Is Africa. Like I said...I'm not saying Apartheid is an excellent system, but rather I'm saying that South Africa was the best country out of all the shitholes of Africa....again, in the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king.
You're actually defending mother-rape-fucking APARTHEID??? And on the assertion that they "failed to integrate" even though South Africa was THEIR country?

Especially when the foreign minority were the WHITES. Thus showing you don't give a fuck about foreigners or about minorities, you want them down for being darker-skinned than you. Different. And ONLY that.
Oh relax, calm yourself. South Africa was who's country? A bunch of tongue-clicking bushmen in the north? Or the British and then Dutch who actually created the country, it's entire economy and all of it's infrastructure? There was no South Africa before the Europeans, only the geographical area called SouthERN Africa. White were the minority, but it was their country every way possible....I'll feel the same way when Europeans start becoming minorities in their own countries in the next half a century to century or so....
So much of what you said he said were actually words you put in his mouth.
Meh

Bloody true.

In their defence, they have at least abandoned the ludicrous policy of racial quotas in their national sports teams, however, they remain upon what seems an inexorable decline into the anarchic crappiness endemic to Africa.
I consider South Africa already lost. I suggest all remaining Afrikaaner to come to America or England...which most of them already do. I know quite a few of them here. (many of them are Jewish also)
Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.

Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.
Agreed...though I don't think Black South Africans were ever (speaking in general) integratable into the nation of South Africa...they were just too different, culturally, religiously, linguistically, morally....ect

Indeed, most of the South Africans I know left very, very quickly after the fall of apartheid to Great Britain, and most of them are pretty unpleasant people who basically left because they didn't feel like owning up to the fact that they supported Apartheid, either implicitly or explicitly.
Most South Africans I know also left ZA because they knew that under Black African leadership, they would become oppressed (which they have), the country would institute terrible economics (which it has), the leadership of the nation would be black nationalist (which it is/was) and that ZA, the country that they built, would fall to just another African shithole (which it is in the process of doing).

*snip*

I'm saying that South Africa was the best country out of all the shitholes of Africa
Not really, Rhodesia was.

When's the last time you saw a flag-burning on TV?

On BBC's website, when describing Iran. Several days to a week ago.

Unfortunately, I don't get TV :(

I consider South Africa already lost. I suggest all remaining Afrikaaner to come to America or England...which most of them already do. I know quite a few of them here. (many of them are Jewish also)
Actually, England could do with far less of them.
Most South Africans I know also left ZA because they knew that under Black African leadership, they would become oppressed (which they have)
Not really, no. They just don't have the sole position of power any more.
the country would institute terrible economics (which it has)
The country doesn't really have much worse economics than it did, it's more that almost everyone with money left circa 1996, which means that there's basically no capital to invest into the economy.
the leadership of the nation would be black nationalist (which it is/was)
It was. For a very short period of time, before they realised that this was making everyone who wasn't black leave. Sadly, the fact that they alienated loads of people has led to a lot of them not coming back.

On the other hand, if you were a part of an oppressed people, would you not be slightly tempted into doing the same were you given power pretty quickly?

Everyone makes mistakes.
and that ZA, the country that they built, would fall to just another African shithole (which it is in the process of doing).
That's mainly due to the fact that whites are still the ones holding all of the money in South Africa, and there aren't very many any more, and that HIV/AIDS is an incredibly large problem, due to the ridiculous policies of health ministers past and present.

So, you actively support countries completely integrating and adopting immigrant culture and society? Blimey, Chris, I never thought you had it in you.

No, I do not. I was simply noting that, in the fashion of kost "multicultural" societies, integration has not happened.

It's a perfectly excellent term for that, actually. A society is just a group of people with a unified culture (even if that culture is one of multiculturalism) who work together, for better or for worse.

That's probably because of the fact that most of the white South Africans have made no effort to help them integrate, other than saying that they need to have 1 black person and 1 coloured in every cricket / footie team etc., which was never going to solve anything.

Indeed, most of the South Africans I know left very, very quickly after the fall of apartheid to Great Britain, and most of them are pretty unpleasant people who basically left because they didn't feel like owning up to the fact that they supported Apartheid, either implicitly or explicitly.

What do you expect? I assume most of the South Africans you know would have grown up firmly surrounded by apartheid, and would thus have been inculcated, to an extent, into the support of it.

The issue of white Saffers helping integration is, for me, as irrelevant and illogical as asking me to do anything to help immigrants integrate in the UK. Rightly or wrongly, they were, and still are, the dominant economic and social power in South Africa; why should they do a damn thing?

Not really, Rhodesia was.

Don't a thing about it beyond the fact it is now called Zimbabwe.

Ugh, Yootopia, por que no te calles?

What do you expect? I assume most of the South Africans you know would have grown up firmly surrounded by apartheid, and would thus have been inculcated, to an extent, into the support of it.
Yes, quite.
The issue of white Saffers helping integration is, for me, as irrelevant and illogical as asking me to do anything to help immigrants integrate in the UK. Rightly or wrongly, they were, and still are, the dominant economic and social power in South Africa; why should they do a damn thing?
Because there are now roughly 3 of them left there, and unless they do, they won't be able to run any businesses because everyone'll be too poor to afford their goods?
Don't a thing about it beyond the fact it is now called Zimbabwe.
Fed basically the whole of Africa, as well as itself, and was basically the African version of India, in terms of worth having in our empire. Pretty much constant counter-insurgency going on by the Selous Scouts unit of the Rhodesian military, due to backlash from some (definitely a minority, most people were fairly resigned to working on farms run by the white colonials) of the black natives, but outside of this was pretty fairly run, and quality of life was oh so much better for everyone concerned than it is now under Mugabe.

Ugh, Yootopia, por que no te calles?
If you mean "why don't you reply?", my response is "porque mi networko wirelesso estaba completamente fuckado".

Actually, England could do with far less of them.
I don't see why. My best friend is of an Afrikaaner family and they're a great bunch. They're far more culturally compatible with existing society than some of the immigrant groups who have settled here in the past few decades (Guess who, huh huh). Let them all in.

Plus I love biltong.

A find it interesting that the US is pushing a treaty that it has retroactively violated multiple times within the past few years.

If you mean "why don't you reply?", my response is "porque mi networko wirelesso estaba completamente fuckado".

I wouldn't know what he meant, but what he said was quite the contrary, i.e. "Why don't you shut up".

And gotta love your impromptu Spanish ;P

White Africans are not integratable enough to Black African soceity because Black African soceity is about 1000 years behind White African soceity. Thank God White Africans are not integratable to that soceity.
I'll risk a Godwin, but I'm damned sure that's a thoroughly racist statement. You should be ashamed of yourself, sir.

I'll risk a Godwin, but I'm damned sure that's a thoroughly racist statement. You should be ashamed of yourself, sir.
He's not wrong though. If we're talking about South African society as it was originally, I'd say 1000 years is incredibly generous.

I BEFRIEND CHESTNUTS;13207355']He's not wrong though. If we're talking about South African society as it was originally, I'd say 1000 years is incredibly generous.Originally when?

I BEFRIEND CHESTNUTS;13207299']I don't see why. My best friend is of an Afrikaaner family and they're a great bunch. They're far more culturally compatible with existing society than some of the immigrant groups who have settled here in the past few decades (Guess who, huh huh). Let them all in.

Plus I love biltong.
Biltong is fine, if a bit meh, but their pretty vitriolic racism that still exists is a bit sad.

Originally when?
Round about the time of European colonisation, and up until relatively recently. I think that they've became much more advanced in the last 100 or so years but that's only down to European influence. (Though even now some of them still have beliefs such as raping babies is a great way to cure AIDs). One thingI can be fairly comfortable saying is that if it wasn't for European influence their society probably wouldn't have advanced one bit.

Biltong is fine, if a bit meh, but their pretty vitriolic racism that still exists is a bit sad.
Maybe, but I'll take some racist but otherwise law abiding, decent and hard working people over some of the scum this country's let in over the years (Radical islamist clerics, anyone? Foreign criminals that we can't deport because of the situation in their home countries?).

I BEFRIEND CHESTNUTS;13207375']Round about the time of European colonisation, and up until relatively recently. I think that they've became much more advanced in the last 100 or so years but that's only down to European influence. (Though even now some of them still have beliefs such as raping babies is a great way to cure AIDs). One thingI can be fairly comfortable saying is that if it wasn't for European influence their society probably wouldn't have advanced one bit.Ugh. Please stop with the whole "White Man's Burden" drivvel. European influence was positive in some instances and entirely negative in others, particularly the influence on society. Treating people like children that need to be guided is not going to result in any positive societal development, and that's pretty much what the European attitude was.

I BEFRIEND CHESTNUTS;13207375']Maybe, but I'll take some racist but otherwise law abiding, decent and hard working people over some of the scum this country's let in over the years
Aye, I wouldn't.
(Radical islamist clerics, anyone? Foreign criminals that we can't deport because of the situation in their home countries?).
Minority of Muslims and immigrants much?

I wouldn't know what he meant, but what he said was quite the contrary, i.e. "Why don't you shut up".

And gotta love your impromptu Spanish ;P
Oh, right, well in that case, I think "jódete" suffices.

So who else bothered to read the article?

Who else discovered that South Africa is actually pressing for stronger protections against rape???

Typical Bush Administration tactic: dig in your feet against usefully expanding a measure's scope, then blame the opposition for being obstructionist.

:headbang:

So who else bothered to read the article?
I don't have an NYT membership, any chance you could paste the whole thing here?

They should just put South Africa down as supporting it. Then when people start to question it, go;

"You know how it is! You're in a hot session of the Security Council, one thing leads to another... you kind of lose yourself to the moment. Besides, South Africa's mouth may have said 'No! No!' but their eyes said, 'Yes! Yes!'. "

:D

Quality.

I don't have an NYT membership, any chance you could paste the whole thing here?Sure.

The United States accused South Africa on Thursday of obstructing an American-drafted General Assembly resolution that would specifically condemn rape and sexual abuse used by governments and armed groups to achieve political and military objectives.

While the resolution does not mention any countries by name, the Bush administration has cited accusations that rape was being employed by soldiers and militia members as a tactic for intimidation and warfare, notably in Sudan and Myanmar.

“The South African position is shocking,” said Kristen Silverberg, the assistant secretary of state for international organization affairs, given “South Africa’s long struggle against oppression.” She noted that the South African government took a strong domestic position against sexual violence.

Speaking in a telephone interview from Washington, Ms. Silverberg said that the South Africans were demanding watered-down language that would make the resolution one about sexual violence in general rather than one about sexual violence sponsored by governments. “We think there is a real difference between governments that fail to prevent rape and governments that actively promote it, and we do not want the resolution to blur that difference,” she said.

The resolution, which currently has 61 co-sponsors, would also call on the secretary general to report back to the General Assembly on evidence of government-sanctioned rape. Ms. Silverberg described this as a needed backup mechanism that did not exist in any of the many international conventions and resolutions on sexual abuse.

“We want the secretary general with all the power behind his office to shine a spotlight on this specific form of abuse,” she said.

Asked about Ms. Silverberg’s expression of shock at South Africa’s position, Baso Sangqu, the country’s deputy ambassador, said, “I am shocked about that statement because we have been working very closely within the African group to find agreement on this resolution.”

He said, “We are objecting to the resolution because it is politicized and singles out clear categories of rape. We want a resolution that is nonpoliticized and that looks at rape in a holistic manner in all its situations including rape by soldiers in detention centers and in situations of foreign occupation.”

American officials said that South Africa initially tried to portray its position as one that enjoyed the support of the 43-nation African group at the United Nations. When American diplomats made inquiries in individual capitals, however, they said, they found this not to be true, and three African countries, Burundi, Congo and Liberia, have signed on as co-sponsors.

Since beginning its two-year term as a member of the Security Council in January, South Africa has continually been criticized at home and by longtime supporters abroad for withholding the same sorts of international human rights condemnations at the United Nations that helped end apartheid.

In the cases of Myanmar and Zimbabwe, two notorious rights violators, South Africa moved to tone down or prevent harsh actions by the Council. And it has resisted proposals for strict measures by the Council put forward by Britain, France and the United States to curb Iran’s nuclear program, even though South Africa is the only country ever to have renounced its nuclear program of its own accord.

The United States had hoped for a vote on Friday, but Ms. Silverberg said that was now in doubt because of the persistent South African demands for changes.

“We would like to have a vote as soon as we have a resolution that reflects the interests of the victims rather than the interests of the government,” she said.

I don't have an NYT membership, any chance you could paste the whole thing here?That's weird. I don't have NYT membership either, and I could read it fine earlier, only not anymore. Did the article change?

Sure.
Oh, right. So actually, they want to ban guerilla movements from using it, as well as other non-governmental forces such as mercenaries.

Yeah, that's actually the exact opposite, as you pointed out.

Thanks for posting that. Most helpful.

Actually, England could do with far less of them.



I quite like all the Afrikaaners I've met actually.

Why are we allowed to welcome any number of Poles, Lithuanians and Bongo Bongoese, but not those who are more culturally compatible, and who tend to have a better grasp of English?

That's weird. I don't have NYT membership either, and I could read it fine earlier, only not anymore. Did the article change?

I think you get one for free or something.

In the 'huh' category-
Speaking in a telephone interview from Washington, Ms. Silverberg said that the South Africans were demanding watered-down language that would make the resolution one about sexual violence in general rather than one about sexual violence sponsored by governments. “We think there is a real difference between governments that fail to prevent rape and governments that actively promote it, and we do not want the resolution to blur that difference,” she said.

The resolution, which currently has 61 co-sponsors, would also call on the secretary general to report back to the General Assembly on evidence of government-sanctioned rape. Ms. Silverberg described this as a needed backup mechanism that did not exist in any of the many international conventions and resolutions on sexual abuse.

“We want the secretary general with all the power behind his office to shine a spotlight on this specific form of abuse,” she said.

Asked about Ms. Silverberg’s expression of shock at South Africa’s position, Baso Sangqu, the country’s deputy ambassador, said, “I am shocked about that statement because we have been working very closely within the African group to find agreement on this resolution.”

He said, “We are objecting to the resolution because it is politicized and singles out clear categories of rape. We want a resolution that is nonpoliticized and that looks at rape in a holistic manner in all its situations including rape by soldiers in detention centers and in situations of foreign occupation.”
They want it broader, it seems.

I quite like all the Afrikaaners I've met actually.
Quelle surprise.
Why are we allowed to welcome any number of Poles and Lithuanians
Because they're EU members, so we have to.
and Bongo Bongoese
Because Bongo Bongolia has a civil war going on, and international treaties that we created mean that we have to take their citizens as refugees.
but not those who are more culturally compatible, and who tend to have a better grasp of English?
Because they're not fleeing from anything other than their conscience.

You know, you have to love this: “We think there is a real difference between governments that fail to prevent rape and governments that actively promote it, and we do not want the resolution to blur that difference,” she said.So, in other words... "Look, we're willing to agree that we shouldn't actually order our troops to rape women... but come on! Do you really expect us to do anything about it when they do??"

Quelle surprise.

Because they're EU members, so we have to.

Because Bongo Bongolia has a civil war going on, and international treaties that we created mean that we have to take their citizens as refugees.

Because they're not fleeding from anything other than their conscience.

You know my opinions upon both the EU, and, for that matter, treaties obliging us to accept refugees; waste of time, money, and effort.

The average Afrikaan migrant is not only hard working, but is more culturally compatible with the majority of the UK than the charity cases and EU goons we are obliged to pretend to care about.

You know, you have to love this: So, in other words... "Look, we're willing to agree that we shouldn't actually order our troops to rape women... but come on! Do you really expect us to do anything about it when they do??"
No, it's not that at all.

It's "let's punish any organisation, be it state or NGO, that uses rape as a weapon of war".
You know my opinions upon both the EU, and, for that matter, treaties obliging us to accept refugees; waste of time, money, and effort.

The average Afrikaan migrant is not only hard working, but is more culturally compatible with the majority of the UK than the charity cases and EU goons we are obliged to pretend to care about.
International law doesn't care about your opinion, nor, in all probability, will it ever care.

So who else bothered to read the article?

Who else discovered that South Africa is actually pressing for stronger protections against rape???

Typical Bush Administration tactic: dig in your feet against usefully expanding a measure's scope, then blame the opposition for being obstructionist.

:headbang:

I've been saying that! Thanks for making more people aware of it; a single post often tends to be drowned out by the crowd.

I've been saying that! Thanks for making more people aware of it; a single post often tends to be drowned out by the crowd.Nah, it's just that not everyone reads the whole thread, so the valid point (if not already present in the OP) needs to be repeated every few pages.

It's "let's punish any organisation, be it state or NGO, that uses rape as a weapon of war".Define "uses."

Define "uses."
http://nexus404.com/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/sex-toy-for-dogs.jpg

This, etc., but with people involved. Incidentally, "sex" on Google Images leads to a whole load of weird and generally non-wonderful things coming up.

International law doesn't care about your opinion, nor, in all probability, will it ever care.

It really doesn't care about your opinion either. But since no one really stops a nation from breaking international law unless it's in their own interests, opinion is the only thing that matters. The opinion of who has the most clout.

http://nexus404.com/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/sex-toy-for-dogs.jpg

This, etc.,See, that would be my understanding. But I also understand that the United States favors a definition in which this wouldn't count unless it were the consequence of official orders.

In other words, for the United States and its allies it allows a simple out: "Oh, our soldiers have been raping your citizens? Well, but... we didn't mean it."

Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.

Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.

It's the attitude that Africans are "savages" and destroying their cultural values through colonialism that has caused most of the mess in Africa

Destroying the myth that African nations are by nature in poverty 49 Zimbabwes (stone cities) including the Great Zimbabwe site were pillaged by treasure hunters and melted down many artefacts and destroyed many structures

http://s120.photobucket.com/albums/o180/Markellion/th_gravy.jpg

It's the attitude that Africans are "savages" and destroying their cultural values through colonialism that has caused most of the mess in Africa

As opposed to the rampant killing, slavery and general raping and pillaging that was characteristic of pre-colonialism?

As opposed to the rampant killing, slavery and general raping and pillaging that was characteristic of pre-colonialism?

You see that all of the world, much more so in Europe than in Africa before colonialism.

Africa was much more Civilized before the Europeans interfered with established African insitutions.

I know many Afircan Americans trying to return to African values and I support that

See, that would be my understanding. But I also understand that the United States favors a definition in which this wouldn't count unless it were the consequence of official orders.

In other words, for the United States and its allies it allows a simple out: "Oh, our soldiers have been raping your citizens? Well, but... we didn't mean it."
Yes, that's exactly what SA wants to avoid happening.

International law doesn't care about your opinion, nor, in all probability, will it ever care.

erm.... great. Do you intend to hide between the argument "well, it's law!" for the whole discussion? I couldn't care less what international law does, or does not, stipulate for anything; I'd rather discuss whether something is meritorious and right than whether it is actually legal. The two states rarely coincide fully.

It's the attitude that Africans are "savages" and destroying their cultural values through colonialism that has caused most of the mess in Africa

Destroying the myth that African nations are by nature in poverty 49 Zimbabwes (stone cities) including the Great Zimbabwe site were pillaged by treasure hunters and melted down many artefacts and destroyed many structures

http://s120.photobucket.com/albums/o180/Markellion/th_gravy.jpg


These cities were built, and thriving, when? You see, time was when Mesopotamia was the centre of civilisation, but it doesn't seem to be too rosy at the moment does it?

These cities were built, and thriving, when? You see, time was when Mesopotamia was the centre of civilisation, but it doesn't seem to be too rosy at the moment does it?

That was my point, the destruction of African Civilization through colonialism

That was my point, the destruction of African Civilization through colonialism

Provide me with a credible source for your assertion, or I'll maintain that it was in fact aliens who killed Kennedy with their dastardly "super killy death ray".

[edit]

Provide me with a credible source for your assertion, or I'll maintain that it was in fact aliens who killed Kennedy with their dastardly "super killy death ray".

huh?

[edit]

Just so you know I'm not saying Africans themselves arn't at fault too

This is from the BBC program "the story of Africa" It talks about the fall of the Kongo kingdom

http://youtube.com/watch?v=5eYMh37BEMk&watch_response

I'm also not saying slavery didn't predate European contact

This is from the movie Shaka Zulu:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=lwLYW8s4jEc

http://exploringafrica.matrix.msu.edu/images/africa_kingdoms.jpg

Provide me with a credible source for your assertion, or I'll maintain that it was in fact aliens who killed Kennedy with their dastardly "super killy death ray".Prove that colonialism was overly beneficial first.

This is some where in south Africa I don't know where though

The traditional homes of a Bantu ethnic group called Ndebele:

http://wysinger.homestead.com/0303.jpg

http://wysinger.homestead.com/house2.jpg

colors

Meh. Just another "multiculturalism can't work, so nyah" argument. Maybe the White Africans weren't integratable to Black African society? Or maybe they're all not trying hard enough?

Ding-ding-ding!

Tell him what he's won, Charlie!

But why should we? We don't have the money, time, or resources to rescue every imperilled people. And seeing the excessive amounts of flag-burning, rioting anti-westerns, it's clear that we wouldn't be appreciated at all. We're not the world's policemen, and we shouldn't have to be.

I agree, Julianus II, I was just explaining the government's perspective.

Society? That really is too rich a term for what, at the time of colonial occupation, consisted of shamans and men in loincloths and fruity headgear.

Despite the lifiting of apartheid, there has been sod all attempt upon the part of black South Africans to integrate into wider society.

Yet another person who doesn't know Jack Shit about the continent.

Most South Africans I know also left ZA because they knew that under Black African leadership, they would become oppressed (which they have), the country would institute terrible economics (which it has), the leadership of the nation would be black nationalist (which it is/was) and that ZA, the country that they built, would fall to just another African shithole (which it is in the process of doing).

lol, and apartheid's economic policies weren't terrible?

The reality was that the government played a major role in almost every facet of the economy, including production, consumption, and regulation. In fact, Soviet economists in the late 1980s noted that the state-owned portion of South Africa's industrial sector was greater than that in any country outside the communist bloc. The South African government owned and managed almost 40 percent of all wealth-producing assets, including iron and steel works, weapons manufacturing facilities, and energy-producing resources. Government-owned corporations and parastatals were also vital to the services sector. Marketing boards and tariff regulations intervened to influence consumer prices. Finally, a wide variety of laws governed economic activities at all levels based on race.

source (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+za0079))

As opposed to the rampant killing, slavery and general raping and pillaging that was characteristic of colonialism?

Fixed.

Africa pre-colonialism was no paradise, but it was much better than the "civilization" that was imposed on them.

Prove that colonialism was overly beneficial first.

All I require is for him to substantiate an assertion with evidence; his assertion is rather simpler than that that states that colonialism, when viewed with sufficient circumspection, was of benefit.

However, I could direct you to "Empire" by Dr. Niall Ferguson if you do want further information, and are not, as I suspect, following the great NSG trend of being fascetious.

Yet another person who doesn't know Jack Shit about the continent.

So, presumably, if my appreciation of grammar is correct, and thus "doesn't know Jack Shit" is indeed a double negative, I know an awful lot about Africa?

Many thanks for the compliment.:)

Fixed.

Africa pre-colonialism was no paradise, but it was much better than the "civilization" that was imposed on them.

Really? So how do you explain away prosperous states, both in a colonial and post-colonial era, such as Zimbabwe?

I always felt rapine, razzias and general disorder tended to be counter-productive where prosperity was concerned.

All I require is for him to substantiate an assertion with evidence; his assertion is rather simpler than that that states that colonialism, when viewed with sufficient circumspection, was of benefit.Which, of course, in turn doesn't absolve you from providing support for your claim, particularly since his is a response to yours.

However, I could direct you to "Empire" by Dr. Niall Ferguson if you do want further information, and are not, as I suspect, following the great NSG trend of being fascetious.Being poor, I will probably not buy the book, so wikepedia will need to suffice for a first impression.

I don't think he's a good historian, based on the wiki article. Some of the conclusions he's come to concerning Germany in WWI (particularly the origin of National Socialism and rightfully deserved blame for the war's cause).

Furthermore, the criticism of his work (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niall_Ferguson#Criticisms) seems pretty convincing:
His calculations consistently underestimate or ignore the massive crimes of Empire, and grossly overstate the benefits.
Ferguson's 'history' is a fairytale for our times which puts the white man and his burden back at the centre of heroic action.
"White Man's Burden" is a major cause for plenty of misery on the African continent; it's little more than benign racism.

Really? So how do you explain away prosperous states, both in a colonial and post-colonial era, such as Zimbabwe?

Prosperity for whom? Not for the natives, that's for sure. And the fact that so many post-independence African countries do so poorly is because the colonialists did next to nothing to prepare their colonies for independence. It's equivalent to giving a medical degree to someone who has never studied medicine, having him perform a brain surgery, and then being shocked and awed when he botches it.

I always felt rapine, razzias and general disorder tended to be counter-productive where prosperity was concerned.

For the most part, there was little "general disorder" before colonialism, and there would probably have been far less after colonialism had de-colonization not been bungled so badly.

"White Man's Burden" is a major cause for plenty of misery on the African continent; it's little more than benign racism.

Hell, in most cases, calling it "benign" would be a stretch.

Really? So how do you explain away prosperous states, both in a colonial and post-colonial era, such as Zimbabwe?

I always felt rapine, razzias and general disorder tended to be counter-productive where prosperity was concerned.It's funny how the most successful states were the ones intended as white-ruled homes as opposed to sources of raw materials and markets for finished products...

Hell, in most cases, calling it "benign" would be a stretch.Well, no. Malignant racism would be going around and beating the crap out of anyone that looks different than you. Benign racism is the general opinion that the savages must be civilised because they're like children.

Well, no. Malignant racism would be going around and beating the crap out of anyone that looks different than you. Benign racism is the general opinion that the savages must be civilised because they're like children.

They made no efforts to make them "civilized" in the European sense. Instead, they gave them the most rudimentary education possible and erected a multitude of barriers to prevent them from advancing, effectively reducing them to serfs in all but name, and using them as a source of cheap labor, like draft animals.

However, I could direct you to "Empire" by Dr. Niall Ferguson if you do want further information, and are not, as I suspect, following the great NSG trend of being fascetious.Ferguson is a blatant apologist for imperialism, and a pretty shitty writer on top of it.

Do you really want to be taking your history from a man who thinks that anyone who is NOT a racist "may ... be atypical in their sexual predilections." :rolleyes:

They made no efforts to make them "civilized" in the European sense. Instead, they gave them the most rudimentary education possible and erected a multitude of barriers to prevent them from advancing, effectively reducing them to serfs in all but name, and using them as a source of cheap labor, like draft animals.Queen Victoria and Rudyard Kipling's poem "White Man's Burden" are good examples of how seemingly good intentions are actually racist delusions; not for cruel purposes, but with horrible consequences never the less.

Queen Victoria and Rudyard Kipling's poem "White Man's Burden" are good examples of how seemingly good intentions are actually racist delusions; not for cruel purposes, but with horrible consequences never the less.

True. Then there are people like Leopold II...

Ferguson is a blatant apologist for imperialism, and a pretty shitty writer on top of it.

Do you really want to be taking your history from a man who thinks that anyone who is NOT a racist "may ... be atypical in their sexual predilections." :rolleyes:

Writing style is subjective, and frankly I quite like it. Given I'm probably more classically read than yourself, I'll follow my sensibilities, and those of the Times, over your own.

Regarding "sexual predilictions", I really don't think that is of any consequence. Frankly, I dislike Milton deeply as a personality, but adore his writing.

It's funny how the most successful states were the ones intended as white-ruled homes as opposed to sources of raw materials and markets for finished products...

Because clearly colonial governers had the same grasp of economics, and spineless, risible morality as the average left wing modern pseudo-intellectual.

All I require is for him to substantiate an assertion with evidence; his assertion is rather simpler than that that states that colonialism, when viewed with sufficient circumspection, was of benefit.

However, I could direct you to "Empire" by Dr. Niall Ferguson if you do want further information, and are not, as I suspect, following the great NSG trend of being fascetious.

This is from Howard Zinn's "A people's history of the united States". It's on west Africa not south Africa though

Was their culture inferior -- and so subject to easy destruction? Inferior in military capability, yes --vulnerable to whites with guns and ships. But in no other way -- except that cultures that are different are often taken as inferior, especially when such a judgment is practical and profitable. Even militarily, while the Westerners could secure forts on the African coast, they were unable to subdue the interior and had to come to terms with its chiefs.


The African civilization was as advanced in its own way as that of Europe. In certain ways, it was more admirable; but it also included cruelties, hierarchical privilege, and the readiness to sacrifice human lives for religion or profit. It was a civilization of 100 million people, using iron implements and skilled in farming. It had large urban centers and remarkable achievements in weaving, ceramics, sculpture.


European travelers in the sixteenth century were impressed with the African kingdoms of Timbuktu and Mali, already stable and organized at a time when European states were just beginning to develop into the modern nation. In 1563, Ramusio, secretary to the rulers in Venice, wrote to the Italian merchants: "Let them go and do business with the King of Timbuktu and Mali and there is no doubt that they will be well-received there with their ships and their goods and treated well, and granted the favours that they ask..."


A Dutch report, around 1602, on the West African kingdom of Benin, said: "The Towne seemeth to be very great, when you enter it. You go into a great broad street, not paved, which seemeth to be seven or eight times broader than the Warmoes Street in Amsterdam. ...The Houses in this Towne stand in good order, one close and even with the other, as the Houses in Holland stand."


The inhabitants of the Guinea Coast were described by one traveler around 1680 as "very civil and good-natured people, easy to be dealt with, condescending to what Europeans require of them in a civil way, and very ready to return double the presents we make them."


Africa had a kind of feudalism, like Europe based on agriculture, and with hierarchies of lords and vassals. But African feudalism did not come, as did Europe's, out of the slave societies of Greece and Rome, which had destroyed ancient tribal life. In Africa, tribal life was still powerful, and some of its better features -- a communal spirit, more kindness in law and punishment -- still existed. And because the lords did not have the weapons that European lords had, they could not command obedience as easily.


In his book The African Slave Trade, Basil Davidson contrasts law in the Congo in the early sixteenth century with law in Portugal and England. In those European countries, where the idea of private property was becoming powerful, theft was punished brutally. In England, even as late as 1740, a child could be hanged for stealing a rag of cotton. But in the Congo, communal life persisted, the idea of private property was a strange one, and thefts were punished with fines or various degrees of servitude. A Congolese leader, told of the Portuguese legal codes, asked a Portuguese once, teasingly: "What is the penalty in Portugal for anyone who puts his feet on the ground?"


Slavery existed in the African states, and it was sometimes used by Europeans to justify their own slave trade. But, as Davidson points out, the "slaves" of Africa were more like the serfs of Europe -- in other words, like most of the population of Europe. It was a harsh servitude, but but they had rights which slaves brought to America did not have, and they were "altogether different from the human cattle of the slave ships and the American plantations." In the Ashanti Kingdom of West Africa, one observer noted that "a slave might marry; own property; himself own a slave; swear an oath; be a competent witness and ultimately become heir to his master... An Ashanti slave, nine cases out of ten, possibly became an adopted member of the family, and in time his descendants so merged and intermarried with the owner's kinsmen that only a few would know their origin."


One slave trader, John Newton (who later became an antislavery leader), wrote about the people of what is now Sierra Leone:


The state of slavery, among these wild barbarous people, as we esteem them, is much milder than in our colonies. For as, on the one hand, they have no land in high cultivation, like our West India plantations, and therefore no call for that excessive, unintermitted labour, which exhausts our slaves: so, on the other hand, no man is permitted to draw blood even from a slave.


African slavery is hardly to be praised. But it was far different from plantation or mining slavery in the Americas, which was lifelong, morally crippling, destructive of family ties, without hope of any future. African slavery lacked two elements that made American slavery the most cruel form of slavery in history: the frenzy for limitless profit that comes from capitalistic agriculture; the reduction of the slave to less than human status by the use of racial hatred, with that relentless clarity based on color, where white was master, black was slave.

View of Benin city in 1891 before the British conquest. H. Ling Roth, Great Benin, Barnes and Noble reprint. 1968.
http://wysinger.homestead.com/benin.jpg

Spanish map of west Africa showing Mansa Musa 14th century
http://s120.photobucket.com/albums/o180/Markellion/th_speech12.jpg

In Africa men's skin are black, their hair is crisp and curled; And somewhere there, unkown to public view, A mighty city lies called Timbuktu
-William Thackeray

This thread confirms that people are not bothered to actually read the sources cited in the OP. Unfortunately, it also leaves the impression that the OP didn't read more than the headline of the article, either.


Adjusted to actual content, your one-line summary should read something like "SA is trying to change a proposal for a treaty banning gov't-sponsored rape that is limited to only specific situations to a treaty banning all forms of gov't-sponsored or implicitly accepted acts of rape".

And I do wonder where from, and why, you pulled that Iran issue.
Quite.

Because clearly colonial governers had the same grasp of economics, and spineless, risible morality as the average left wing modern pseudo-intellectual.As opposed to the grasp of these of the average right wing modern revisionist?

This is from Howard Zinn's "A people's history of the united States". It's on west Africa not south Africa though



http://wysinger.homestead.com/benin.jpg

Zinn is hardly a credible source. I recommend George B.N. Ayittey's Africa in Chaos, which examines the predicament of Africa and is not afraid to point fingers and name names. It is equally critical of colonialism as well as post-colonial asshats.

Zinn is hardly a credible source.Why?

Why?

I take it you've never read his work.

This is from the Ending Stereotypes website

Fall of Africa
After people hear of Africa's true past the question, "what happened?" usually follows. Why did the kingdoms of the once great continent fall? The answer could be written into a thousand-page book. An oversimplified answer can be broken into two categories--slavery and guns.

The terror, demoralization, political instability, and wealth disparity that Africa experienced during the slave trade destroyed many societies in West Africa.

The guns had perhaps a greater effect. Guns, invented by Arabs and massed produced by Europeans, allowed North African kingdoms to inflict enough harm on Songhay and other West African kingdoms to lead to their destruction.

Guns also gave the Portuguese an effortless conquest of East African trading cities and the West coast of India, consequently destroying the prosperous trade between those two regions and Central Africa. With the prosperous trade suddenly destroyed--therefore an economic livelihood suddenly destroyed--wars broke out among the desperate people. Soon kings, chiefs, and princes in central Africa were making deals with the Portuguese to remain in or to gain power. The structure of African governments and their economies were destroyed.

Top

West Africa:
Songhay, in a sense, was the continuation of the intellectual, economic, and military powerhouse that was Mali, which was a continuation of the great, powerful, and organized kingdom of Ghana. The destruction of Songhay was therefore the death of over 1000 yrs of West African evolution of enhanced prosperity, technology, wealth, and power. Several factors led to the great kingdom's decline. In the 1580's droughts and epidemics caused food shortages within the region. Prior to the droughts the Portuguese were giving trade advantages to some of Songhay's tenuous vassal states in order to fragment the kingdom, which would lead to greater trading competition, and therefore lower prices for Europeans. Songhay's central government lost a lot of tax revenue and military power when their vassal states seceded. Some of these new independent states made several of the primary trade routes too dangerous to travel. The combination of food shortages and the decline in revenue intensified rivalries, which resulted in a civil war. The civil war ended when Ishak II defeated Balama al-Sadduk--who resided in Timbuktu--in the 1580's; this left little time, though, to reunite the country before the Moroccan army, now wielding muskets, stormed into Songhay. Previously the West African nations of Ghana, Mali and Songhay had enjoyed military superiority over the North African nations, but they soon fell victim to the new dimension of warfare that had just begun to shape our world…guns.1 In 1585 the Moroccan sultan, Mulay Ahmed el-Mansure, took the vital Taghaza salt deposits from Songhay. Then in 1591, under the Spanish renegade Judar, the Moroccan army overwhelmed Songhay, seizing Timbuktu and Gao.2 One chronicle of the time cried, "From that moment everything changed. Danger took the place of security, poverty of wealth. Peace gave way to distress, disasters, and violence."3

Finally, in 1618, after 25 years of fighting and 23,000 Moroccan deaths, the Sultan Mulay Zidan abandoned the Songhay campaign for good.4 Basil Davidson wrote that the Moroccan invasion, "cost Songhay its place in history…It demolished the unity and administrative organization of the state, and while it left Timbuktu and Gao and Jenne as considerable cities, it robbed this civilization of its vitality, for it temporarily ruined the trans-Saharan trade as well as much of the internal trade of the Sudan."5

External warfare continued with the Dendi in the south, who had recognized Songhay's newfound vulnerability and wished to capitalize on it. Soon the Songhay nation was completely vanquished. Wars continued, and in 1884 the French began their attacks on the Niger. They conquered Timbuktu in 1894, Gao in 1898, and the much-desired Tuareg salt mines in 1900.6

Top

Slavery and West Africa
Songhay wasn't the only great state in West Africa. West Africa was home to the powerful and advanced kingdoms of Benin, Kongo, and Borno, to name a few. The death of these kingdoms can be directly attributed to the slave trade.

When Portugal first arrived in West Africa the slave trade was an afterthought. Only a few criminals and prisoners of war were traded here and there. It was nothing more than had been done for hundreds of years in the region. With the breakdown of the Lord/serf system many Europeans needed cheap labor fast. White people were too difficult to maintain as slaves because they could easily run away to the newly developed coastal cities and become lost among a sea of white people; that is one of the reasons the feudal system broke down in the first place. The landowners needed people who were easily distinguishable and Black African's were their answer. At first the Africans gladly rid themselves of their POW's and criminals. A few powerful men and government officials gained a monopoly over the slave trade and their wealth and power grew. When the pool of available slaves dried they needed other means to hold onto their wealth and power. Greedy African slave merchants and government officials weren't about to let go of their wealth making machine and consequently hired men to raid weaker villages to obtain more slaves. Davidson wrote, "The chiefs and some of the tribes of the coasts were easily corrupted into wholesale slave trading is obvious enough; the step from domestic slavery, which they had always practiced, to the sale of slaves was all too easily made…the hunt for a few slaves changing into the hunt for many; and, with that, the gradual ruin of every sentiment of decency and restraint."7 Between 1486-1641 one million three hundred eighty-nine thousand slaves were taken from the coast of Angola alone. This is about 9,000 a year from an area not too densely populated.8

Soon the Americans faced the same problems the Europeans had. They needed cheap labor but didn't have any usable people: Indians knew the land too well and could easily escape and mix with other Indian people. They also couldn't raid the Indian villages for slaves because the Indians had organized clans, federations, and confederations that could strike back.9 Furthermore, the Indians were too vulnerable to diseases. At first white slaves from Europe were used, who went through the same brutal middle passage blacks later would. In the 17th and 18th centuries thousands of Europeans, because of either false promises made by slave traders, kidnappings, or merely in desperation to leave their harsh life in Europe, become commodities for merchants, traders, ship captains and finally their masters in the Americas. On the voyage to America the famous historian Howard Zinn wrote, "the servants were packed into ships with the same fanatic concern for profits that marked the slave ships."11 It was recorded that one ship in 1741 had 46 out of 106 white passengers die on its way to Boston--six of them were eaten. On another ship thirty-two children died from starvation, disease or being thrown into the ocean.12 A German, Gottlieb Mittelberher, described the horrific experience in 1750:
"During the journey the ship is full of pitiful sign of distress-smells, fumes, horrors, vomiting, various kings of sea sickness, fever, dysentery, headaches, heat, constipation, boils, scurvy, cancer, mouth-rot, and similar afflictions, all of them caused by the age and the high salted state of the food, especially of the meat, as well as by the very bad and filthy water…Add to all that shortage of food, hunger, thirst, frost, heat, dampness, fear, misery, vexation, and lamentation as well as other troubles…On board our ship, on a day on which we had a great storm, a woman about to give birth and unable to deliver under the circumstances, was pushed through one of the portholes into the sea…"13

When Europeans arrived in America they were auctioned off like black slaves. "Beatings and whippings were common," Zinn wrote. "Servant women were raped."14

Luckily for Europe the white servants were not part of the wanted society. They were the underclass, which the European nations desperately wanted to get rid of. That is why crimes like stealing a loaf of bread were enough to ship a starving child to Australia. In America the vast majority of people had no idea about the cruelties of the middle passage and indentured servitude. Soon, because of the growing white population in America, whites could no longer be used as servants because they could easily escape and mix into society. The solution was more black slaves. Americans soon forgot about using white slaves and justified the use of black slaves by the Bible. Excluding the slave traders who were aware of the great civilizations in Africa whites felt that they were lifting up a less civilized and savage Pagan people. They actually believed they were doing good. They used the erroneous, "Curse of Cannan," as justification; this justification was a distortion of the Old Testament.

Whites were able to contrast themselves with the savage blacks: we are the people who always strive to be civilized, they believed, whereas the blacks were brutish savages; that mindset gave whites an extreme psychological advantage over the African societies. The psychological cushioning allowed whites to separate themselves from the reality of the situation. The whites had justification on moral grounds, while the only justification for Africans were profit.

As the slave trade grew African civilizations fell. Slavery fused mercantilism and the monarchy: either monarchs or government officials selling slaves, or slave merchants acquiring too much power--sometimes more than the king. The former traditional monarchy that had developed out of hundreds of years of careful pragmatism was destroyed. The result was the rule of immoral merchants looking to enrich themselves at the expense of the people.15 It devastated Africa's economy. "One of the slave trade's most destructive effects," wrote Iliffe of Cambridge University, "was to retard African commodity production."16 During the Atlantic slave trade, "Western Africa traded with the Atlantic world for over 300 years without experiencing any significant economic development."17 Rarely did large African textile or metal industries find new international markets. It became slavery and more slavery.18 As Europe's industry grew they were able to produce commodities at cheaper prices than the Africans. Consequently, cheap European cloth and metal nearly destroyed West Africa's textile and metal-smelting industries.19 This could have, of course, been avoided if Africa's industry and technology wouldn't have been retarded by the slave trade, and if the former governments of Africa's pre-Atlantic-slavery days would have remained.

"By 1600," Davidson sadly wrote, "the great days of the western Sudan were over."20

Top

East Coast
The Swahili East Coast of Africa, just like the West Coast of India, was clearly destroyed by Portuguese intervention. When the rough and war conditioned Portuguese, with their guns and cannons, came upon the, "soft and civilized," merchant cities, they took advantage of the easy prey. Davidson wrote, "The first care of the Portuguese had been to sack and subdue the wealthier of the coastal cities, and thanks to their guns, this had proved relatively easy….for here was once again the old familiar tale of nomad strength and settled weakness."21

One European of the time gave a horrifying account of what the Portuguese did to the defenseless people; "Cruelties were not confined to the baser sort, but were deliberately adopted as a line of terrorizing policy by Vasco da Gama, Almeida, and Albuquerque, to take no mean examples. Da Gama, tortured helpless fishermen; Almeida tore out the eyes of Nair who had come in with a promise of his life, because he suspected a design on his life; Albuquerque cut off the noses of women and the hands of men."22

The ruler of Mombasa wrote a letter explaining that his city was left with, "no living thing in it, neither man nor woman, young nor old, nor child however little. All who had failed to escape had been killed and burned." Barbosa recorded that the city of Brava, "was destroyed by the Portuguese, who slew many of its peoples and carried them into captivity, and took great spoil of gold and silver and goods."23

In 1502 da Gama threatened to burn the prosperous and advanced trading city of Kilwa if its ruler did not acknowledge the king of Portugal as his overlord and pay him yearly tribute--Ravosio did the same to the cities of Zanzibar and Brava. The annual payment imposed upon the black trading city was too much; consequently Kilwa suffered greatly. In 1505, because Kilwa could not afford the Portuguese's illogical demands, Dom Francesco de Ameida, who would later become the viceroy of India, attacked, burned and destroyed the city. He did the same to Mombasa; Saldanha did the same to Cerbera; Soares destroyed Zeila; and D'Acunha destroyed Brava.24 In 1512 the Portuguese finally realized the tribute forced upon the Kilwa people had destroyed the economy, and thus abandoned the city.

Perhaps the most devastating result of Portuguese intervention was that it destroyed the rich Indian, Eastern African, and Central African trade. After conquering the coastal cities of India and Africa the Portuguese attempted to continue the African-Indian trade, but failed miserably, according to Davidson, "by their ignorance and greed." They then made an even greater blunder. "The mistake…had been to try and seize not only the maritime monopoly but also the overland monopoly. The African coastal cities had learned better than to try to dominate their inland neighbors…. Their (the Portuguese) captains and commercial agents would do the same in India with the same destructive consequences."25

Davidson gave the following of Africa and India's experience:
"They sacked and conquered the coastal cities and cut the trading links which had long bound the east coast--and its inland customers and suppliers--with the Persian Gulf and India and the Far East. They pushed into the interior and used their firearms on this side or on that of dynastic wars and rivalries, so as to weaken the whole and deliver the power of government into their ultimate control. Being too weak to hold this power, they left chaos in their wake."26

Examples of the Portuguese giving smaller chiefs aid to usurp kings so that the Portuguese could gain trading advantages are common. In 1667 Manuel Barreto wrote, "While I was there Antonio Ruiz was at the head of this unjust rebellion, and of other great disorders in that conquest."27

A 1607 document recorded by Antionio Bocarro, written by an African king to the King of Portugal, describes the sad and common fate of the kings and chiefs of Africa:
"I, the emperor Monomotapa think fit and am pleased to give to His Majesty (King of Portugal) all the mines of gold, copper, iron, lead, and pewter which may be in my empire, so long as the king of Portugal, to whom I give the said mines, shall maintain me in my position, that I may have power to order and dispose therein in the same manner as my predecessors…and shall give me forces which to go and take possession of my court and destroy a rebellious robber named Matuzuanha, who has pillaged some of the lands in which there is gold, and prevents merchants trading with their goods."28

In 1629 that same chief wrote that his kingdom had to, "within a year expel all the Moors from his kingdom (who were the Portuguese rivals in trade) and those who shall be found there afterwards shall be killed by the Portuguese."29

The new wars in the interior and the Portuguese's cupidity and bad trading policies, "damned the flow of gold," as well as all other forms of trade.

Barreto gave a couple examples why the gold trade halted:
"The Kaffirs would not dig for it through fear of the Portuguese. It is true that the chiefs do not wish gold to be dug in their lands, because upon the report of gold being found the Portuguese buy the land from the king as has frequently happened, and they, the chiefs, being great lords…are despoiled of their lands, and become poor capreros, which signifies laborers….the bad conduct of the Portuguese, from whose violence the Kaffirs flee from our lands to others."30

His second example tells of the gold mining region of Morando.
"For in Morando, if they should respond to our demand for it, there comes immediately some powerful man, or in his default some mocoque with his people and slaves, and commits such thefts and violence against the poor diggers that they think it better to hide the gold than to extract any more as a further incentive to our greed and their own misfortune."31

The new reality caused African merchants to smuggle goods in and out of the country. Many Africans, the Sofala for instance, began to illegally weave their own cloth because they could no longer buy it from India, unless they went through the Portuguese. Soon it all became too much. The wealth the Portuguese once dreamed of turned into poverty and chaos.

In 1719 the Portuguese king wrote this letter to his viceroy in India:
This once, "vast empire" of central Africa "is in such decay at the present day that no one has dominion over it, because everyone has power there; and although there is a ruling prince, a descendant of the ancient line of Monomotapa, this right and pre-eminence that he hath avail him little, because Changamire and an infinite number of other petty rulers nearly always put these kings to death as soon as they take up the sceptre."32

The Portuguese couldn't take anymore. Having ruined the royal order, stability, and economy of Coastal, Central, and Southern Africa, along with the west coast of India--subsequently destroying the long established and successful network of trade between these regions--the Portuguese, as many of their letters show, could not restore it, so left.

Davidson wrote, "Having destroyed this great system of exchange and found its restoration beyond their powers, they went off desperately in search of gold; and when gold eluded them they looked for silver; and when silver failed they went for anything they could get, and were finally content with slaves…. The domestic slavery of Africa slides easily and grimly into a wholesale traffic in human flesh for sale and export."



http://endingstereotypesforamerica.org/fall_of_africa.html

Writing style is subjective, and frankly I quite like it.When it comes to polemic, the judgment garners broad inter-subjective agreement if not objective evaluation. Ferguson's writing is laden with heavy-handed irony and childish name-calling.

It's no wonder neo-conservatives love him. He's the historian's Ann Coulter. :rolleyes:

Given I'm probably more classically read than yourself,And whatever would make you think that?

I'll follow my sensibilities, and those of the Times, over your own.For such a perceptive judge of writing, I'm surprised you don't know "your own" is an incorrect construction here: it should be "yours."

Regarding "sexual predilictions", I really don't think that is of any consequence.Neither do I; but Ferguson does, and that tells me a great deal about his quality as an intellectual. He actually throws this around like a grade-school insult.

As opposed to the grasp of these of the average right wing modern revisionist?

"The most brilliant British historian of his generation"

Having read, to my embressment, the wiki article you cited, I could only note that Johaan Hari attracted criticism for his criticism of Ferguson, whilst the Indian chap was not only Indian, and thus unlikely to be objective regarding colonialism, but also a teacher of "post-colonial studies". Stupid bloody subject, if it merits the term, but also as likely to support Ferguson as Brian Barwick would Alex Ferguson.

Zinn is hardly a credible source. I recommend George B.N. Ayittey's Africa in Chaos, which examines the predicament of Africa and is not afraid to point fingers and name names. It is equally critical of colonialism as well as post-colonial asshats.

Ok thanks for the advice

Basically total disregard to Africans as human beings and the slave trade has done allot to destabilize the continent, and many Africans themselves are guilty as well as Arabs and Europeans

Ok thanks for the advice

Better yet, Ayittey is himself from Africa (Ghana), and is very knowledgeable about African history in general, and pre-colonial history in particular.

“If one adds together the illegal immigrants, the jobless, and the convicts, there is surely ample raw material for a larger American army.”

Given THAT I'm probably more classically read than yourself

So let's discuss the classics, Chris! Come on, now! Discuss the classics of the English and American authors with me, a Brazilian! Show me what you CLAIM to have read! What is it you want to discuss? Poe? Shakespeare? Milton, Paradise Lost? What about Chaucer? Or even something more modern! Huxley, George Orwell! Go ahead!

Prove to me that you read anything other than the revisionist, racist tripe you keep posting on these forums, already. Mind you, I KNOW I read those authors more than you ever did, and I also read Portuguese and Brazilian classics - Fernando Pessoa, Machado de Assis, Mário de Andrade, Olavo Bilac - which you will obviously dismiss as inferior because they are "darker" than yourself.

Come on, boy, tell me all about these classics you claim to have read. Because until you prove to me and to this forum you read anything, you are but a brat posting racist tripe on an internet forum to mentally masturbate about a perceived superiority that does not exist! Even IF you somehow prove to me that you have read them, it's pretty obvious you learned NOTHING from them.

This is a good website, it also talks about south Africa if you click on the link

the quote is on Queen Nzinga of Angolla, she was badass


Portugal held onto the island of Pincipe (a little to the northwest of São Tomé) and a spot of land (roughly 200 by 200 kilometers) called Portuguese Guinea. In 1623, the Portuguese signed a peace treaty with Ndongo - east of Luanda and populated primarily by Mbundu. In 1624, a warrior queen, Nzinga, succeeded to the throne in Ndongo. She objected to Portuguese violations of the treaty. She welcomed slaves that had runaway from the Portuguese colony. She called on Africans under Portuguese rule to rebel and she acquired African soldiers who had been trained by the Portuguese. The Portuguese drove her from Ndongo and replaced her with a puppet ruler. Nzinga and her army fled north and conquered the kingdom of Matamba, from which she continued to war against the Portuguese. Nzinga formed an alliance with the Dutch, and at her request the Dutch sent her a militia of soldiers, the officer commanding the militia describing her as valiant, cunning and a "prudent virago" in command of both her slaves and her soldiers.

Queen Nzinga envisioned command of a great empire. Thousands of slave soldiers deserted to her. She attempted to bring various kings and heads of families to her fight against the Portuguese. In 1645 and 1646 she suffered military setbacks at the hands of the Portuguese, and she wondered whether the god of the Portuguese was stronger than her own god, Tem-Bon-Dumba. She had heard the Jesuits say that the Christian god was just and an enemy of all who suffered. She could not resolve this and the fact that the Portuguese were invading her country, but she decided to worship of the god of the Portuguese to test its power.

Queen Nzinga's alliance with the Dutch came to nothing as the Portuguese drove the Dutch from Luanda in 1648. The Dutch had lost their hold on Brazil and places on the Atlantic coast of Africa as well as their colonies in North America and their ability to trade on the Atlantic.

Queen Nzinga was facing the superior weaponry of the Portuguese. By the time she was at least seventy-five years old she had lost many of her faithful assistants. Some of those close to her had grown tired of fighting the Portuguese. Nzinga signed a treaty giving the Portuguese alone access to Matamba's markets - the Portuguese concerned about competition from the Dutch, English and French.

http://www.fsmitha.com/h3/h28af3.html

So let's discuss the classics, Chris! Come on, now! Discuss the classics of the English and American authors with me, a Brazilian! Show me what you CLAIM to have read! What is it you want to discuss? Poe? Shakespeare? Milton, Paradise Lost? What about Chaucer? Or even something more modern! Huxley, George Orwell! Go ahead!

Prove to me that you read anything other than the revisionist, racist tripe you keep posting on these forums, already. Mind you, I KNOW I read those authors more than you ever did, and I also read Portuguese and Brazilian classics - Fernando Pessoa, Machado de Assis, Mário de Andrade, Olavo Bilac - which you will obviously dismiss as inferior because they are "darker" than yourself.

Come on, boy, tell me all about these classics you claim to have read. Because until you prove to me and to this forum you read anything, you are but a brat posting racist tripe on an internet forum to mentally masturbate about a perceived superiority that does not exist! Even IF you somehow prove to me that you have read them, it's pretty obvious you learned NOTHING from them.

I'm up for Keats if you're interested. I'm sure you'd enjoy a discussion about the symbolism in the albatross in "The ancynt marinere". Shakepeare suits me as well, although Iim sure Virgil, Cassiodorus or Homer would suffice equally well. Hell, I could discuss Gibbon with you if you fancy discussing the origins of history as an academic discipline, or "L'etranger" if French lierature is your thing. Burke is a personal favourite as well; although I daresay that would qualify as right wing, and hence naughty.

“If one adds together the illegal immigrants, the jobless, and the convicts, there is surely ample raw material for a larger American army.”

And the problem with this is?

All I require is for him to substantiate an assertion with evidence; his assertion is rather simpler than that that states that colonialism, when viewed with sufficient circumspection, was of benefit.

However, I could direct you to "Empire" by Dr. Niall Ferguson if you do want further information, and are not, as I suspect, following the great NSG trend of being fascetious.

I already gave evidence before you made that post

[edit]
Just so you know I'm not saying Africans themselves arn't at fault too

This is from the BBC program "the story of Africa" It talks about the fall of the Kongo kingdom

http://youtube.com/watch?v=5eYMh37BEMk&watch_response

I'm also not saying slavery didn't predate European contact

This is from the movie Shaka Zulu:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=lwLYW8s4jEc

http://exploringafrica.matrix.msu.edu/images/africa_kingdoms.jpg

I'm up for Keats if you're interested. I'm sure you'd enjoy a discussion about the symbolism in the albatross in "The ancynt marinere". Shakepeare suits me as well, although Iim sure Virgil, Cassiodorus or Homer would suffice equally well. Hell, I could discuss Gibbon with you if you fancy discussing the origins of history as an academic discipline, or "L'etranger" if French lierature is your thing. Burke is a personal favourite as well; although I daresay that would qualify as right wing, and hence naughty.

John Keats? Very well, pick a poem.

Also, do discuss what Iago, an European man, in Othello, did in the play to the title character and to Desdemona. Tell me about Oceania's use of nationalism to keep that state of affairs in 1984. What about the Savage from Brave New World, the only character that could realize the truth about that state of affairs? Is that not telling of what a "foreign" view can perceive from outside that isolated world?

And that, Chris, is why I point out that even if you DID read those books, you gained nothing from them. Because you persist in the notion of superiority of "Europeans", because you persist in nationalism, because you persist in your dislike of multiculturalism, a word that has a meaning that's lost on you.

The year 1441 proved to be ominous for Africa. That year, Antam Gonçalves, a young Portuguese mariner, led the first slave raid that would culminate in the period of mass enslavement – one of the ugliest chapters in world history. But what was Africa like just before that period? What was going on there?

In 1441 West Africa was dominated by the Mali Empire. Its imperial reach included the regions we today call Mali, Mauretania, Guinea and Senegambia. Although the empire had become decadent and undisciplined, losing its fourteenth century position as the richest state in the world – it was still impressive. Of its 400 cities and large towns, three were particularly important – Timbuktu, Djenné and Gao.

Timbuktu had spacious houses, built of clay bricks, wood and plaster. It had three famous temples whose minarets dominated the Timbuktu skyline. The great Malian king, Mansa Musa, built the Djinguerebere Mosque in the fourteenth century. It was an eerie nine-aisle building looking somewhat like a fortress. There was the Sankore University Mosque in which 25,000 students studied. The third key temple was the Oratory of Sidi Yayia.

Timbuktu had over 150 Koran schools in which 20,000 children were instructed. The total city population was 115,000 people – over five times larger than fourteenth century London (population 20,000). One early visitor to the city saw “numerous judges, PhD’s, and clerics, all receiving good salaries from the king.” The same eye-witness observed that “More profit is made from the book trade than any other line of business.” It is estimated that 700,000 manuscripts, many of them dating back to this period or even earlier, are still held by Timbuktu families and institutions.

Djenné was an eleven-gated city encircled by a rampart. Its buildings were attractive with villas of two storeys, usually with toilets and indoor drainage systems. The Grand Mosque was outstanding. It was a huge monument then over two hundred years old. It was a castle-like building with obeliskoid pillars built into its walls. Like Timbuktu, Djenne also possessed a university. At its medical college eye-cataract surgery was taught.

Gao was also a great city within the Mali Empire. One early geographer described it as a “populous, unwalled, commercial and industrial town, in which were to be found the produce of all arts and trades”. More recently, archaeologists from Cambridge University carried out important excavations in Gao. Some of their finds were once on display at the British Museum. Particularly intriguing was an exhibit entitled: “Fragments of alabaster window surrounds and a piece of pink window glass, Gao 10th - 14th century.”

Outside of the Mali Empire and near the West African coast was the civilisation of the Yoruba, ruling from the city of Ife. This civilisation has been praised by many scholars. One author wrote that: “It is impossible to describe here all the riches of the civilization of Ife”. Another was even more flattering: “Modern ethnologists” says a German scholar, “have found the art of the Yorubas so astonishingly high in quality that they did not [at first] ascribe it to a Negro race.” The same writer continues: “The Yoruba empire consisted of city states similar to those of ancient Greece . . . [S]ome of these states had a hundred and fifty to two hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants. Art objects of the highest quality were found in their ruins – glazed urns, tiles with pictures of animals and gods on them, bronze implements, gigantic granite figures. The Yorubas introduced the cultivation of yams, the preparation of cheese and the breeding of horses into West Africa. They had outstanding artists in metal, gold-casters, cotton-weavers, wood-carvers and potters. Their professions formed themselves into guilds with their own laws, their children were brought up in educational camps, their public affairs were directed by a courtly aristocracy and an exuberantly expanding bureaucracy.”

Further inland towards the Central Africa of 1441 lay the Empire of Kanem-Borno and also the Sudanese civilisation of Alwa. Sir Richmond Palmer, an Englishman, wrote learnedly on the Kanem-Borno Empire. After much research, he declared that: “[T]he degree of civilisation achieved by its early [rulers] would appear to compare favourably with that of European monarchs of that day.” Especially when it is understood that “the Christian West had remained ignorant, rude, and barbarous”.

Soba was the capital of the Sudanese civilisation of Alwa. Of this city, one medieval visitor described “fine buildings and large monasteries, churches rich with gold and gardens: there is also a great suburb where many Muslims live.” Its Throne Hall was a two storey clay brick building. Archaeologists working at this lost city have recovered fragments of ceramic grilles for windows. The window glass panes were also found close by.

The East Coast, from Somalia to Mozambique, has ruins of well over 50 towns and cities. They flourished from the ninth to the sixteenth centuries. One of these cities was Kilwa, a former seaport on the coast of Tanzania. In the fourteenth century, Kilwa was a very fine place. One medieval visitor described it as “one of the most beautiful and well constructed cities in the world”:

“Today” says a modern authority, “only a shabby village stands there. Yet beyond the village can still be found the walls and towers of ruined palaces and large houses and mosques . . . A great palace has been dug out of the bushes that covered it for hundreds of years. It is a strange and beautiful ruin on a cliff over the Indian Ocean. Many other ruins stand nearby.”

In 1961 British archaeologists excavated this “strange and beautiful ruin” - the royal palace of Kilwa. It was a marvellous building with over a hundred rooms, including a reception hall, galleries, courtyards, terraces and a swimming pool. The rooms were elaborately decorated and had vaulted roofs. The second floor of the building was imaginatively roofed with barrels, domes and conical designs, all made of concrete. At night, oil lanterns, numbering thousands, illuminated this wonderful monument.

Gedi, near the coast of Kenya, is another ghost town. Its ruins, dating from the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, include the city walls, the palace, private houses, the Great Mosque, seven smaller mosques, and three pillar tombs. The walls are 9 feet high and had at least three gates. Approaching the mosque was a washing pool for the believers to perform ablutions. It had a purifier made of limestone for recycling water. The houses had a court, leading to the main room, and behind that was the private quarter. Also there, were smaller adjoining rooms, such as the bathroom, the toilet, bedroom, kitchen and storeroom. The royal palace had a layout similar to a large cluster of these houses, but with the addition of a reception hall. The palace contains evidence of piped water controlled by taps, bathrooms and indoor toilets.

In conclusion, then, mass enslavement, beginning in 1441 was not a crime committed against an Africa of untutored savages. The Africans = Savage theory was invented much much later . . .

http://www.forumcityusa.com/viewtopic.php?t=147&mforum=africa

These are examples of statues of such a quality Europeans didn't believe black people could have made them
http://s120.photobucket.com/albums/o180/Markellion/th_speech2.jpg
http://s120.photobucket.com/albums/o180/Markellion/th_a.jpg

John Keats? Very well, pick a poem.

Also, do discuss what Iago, an European man, in Othello, did in the play to the title character and to Desdemona. Tell me about Oceania's use of nationalism to keep that state of affairs in 1984. What about the Savage from Brave New World, the only character that could realize the truth about that state of affairs? Is that not telling of what a "foreign" view can perceive from outside that isolated world?

And that, Chris, is why I point out that even if you DID read those books, you gained nothing from them. Because you persist in the notion of superiority of "Europeans", because you persist in nationalism, because you persist in your dislike of multiculturalism, a word that has a meaning that's lost on you.

Multiculturalism may well, to the likes of yourself, who embrace anything that allows you to be "contemporary" in that odiously new Labour sort of way, an excellent notion. In truth, it is a vain, naive, idealistic notion that a host culture, that was perfectly content to exist without multiculturalism, can be eroded and abused because it dared to arise from a dominant state.

Where Keats is concerned, why not discuss whether or not one ought the poor chap is successful in creating the impression of hope in "Ode to Autumn"?

And the problem with this is?If a nation cannot support its armies with its own willing citizens, that tells us a great deal about the strength of the nation--and its ability to maintain an Empire, as Ferguson admits. But if you're so classically read, don't take it from Ferguson: try Machiavelli.

Perhaps more importantly, this reveals Ferguson's fundamental contradiction: revising history to justify American Empire by referring to the liberal blessings of British Empire, he nevertheless advocates blatant violations of the "civilized values" he claims to support. Case in point: conscripting the homeless.

I think The Blessed Chris is a brilliant example of idiocy triumphing over education.

I think The Blessed Chris is a brilliant example of idiocy triumphing over education.

And you are? So sorry, but your opinion is of no consequnce to me. What is is the fact I am amongst the top 2% of students in the UK for last year, and was considered bloody gifted but arrogant at the best state school in England.:)

If a nation cannot support its armies with its own willing citizens, that tells us a great deal about the strength of the nation--and its ability to maintain an Empire, as Ferguson admits. But if you're so classically read, don't take it from Ferguson: try Machiavelli.

Perhaps more importantly, this reveals Ferguson's fundamental contradiction: revising history to justify American Empire by referring to the liberal blessings of British Empire, he nevertheless advocates blatant violations of the "civilized values" he claims to support. Case in point: conscripting the homeless.

Few nations, in a modern paradigm, can sustain a sizable army from willing recruits; the reason being that being part of the rank and file, in a society in which oppurtunities abound, has little lustre. The British army, even as early as 1800, consisted primarily of conscripts and those pressganged into service; nonetheless, Britain retained an empire for a further century and a half.

I note you do not refer to conscripting the convicted or illegal immigrants when discussing "civilised values". Why is this?

In any case, I think you, like many, hold a naive notion of "civilised values".

And you are? So sorry, but your opinion is of no consequnce to me. What is is the fact I am amongst the top 2% of students in the UK for last year, and was considered bloody gifted but arrogant at the best state school in England.:)Wait, you're this arrogant about the 98th percentile... of high school students?!

My entire life was "98th percentile"... until I dropped out to go to college... which I finished in two years... before being recruited to grad school... and going on to work with some of the top intellectuals in political science, philosophy, and psychoanalysis... ultimately to pen a dissertation that many commentators have declared will send decades-long ripples through the whole of social science?

Of course, what's more important is the fact that I grew up, "got a life" as we say... and learned that you never win an argument by waving your dick all over the forum. No matter how jealous you think everyone will be. :rolleyes:

Now, did you have anything useful to say, or do you want to try a pissing contest, too?

And you are? So sorry, but your opinion is of no consequnce to me. What is is the fact I am amongst the top 2% of students in the UK for last year, and was considered bloody gifted but arrogant at the best state school in England.:)

Well done. What does that matter if when put into practice you still come up with all of this crap like "if Britain ever gets a black prime minister I'll emigrate"? How is education going to help you if your grasp on reality is so flimsy?

Dalya Alberge reports on how details of crushing defeat by another Nile superpower were kept hidden

Ancient Egyptians "airbrushed" out of history one of their most humiliating defeats in battle, academics believe.

In what the British Museum described as the discovery of a lifetime, a 3,500-year-old inscription shows that the Sudanese kingdom of Kush came close to destroying its northern neighbour.

The revelation is contained in 22 lines of sophisticated hieroglyphics deciphered by Egyptologists from the British Museum and Egypt after their discovery in February in a richly decorated tomb at ElKab, near Thebes, in Upper Egypt.

Vivian Davies, Keeper of the museum's Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan, said: "In many ways this is the discovery of a lifetime, one that changes the textbooks.

We're absolutely staggered by it."

The inscription details previously unknown important battles unprecedented "since the time of the god" -the beginning of time. Experts now believe that the humiliation of defeat was one that the Ancient Egyptians preferred to omit from their historical accounts.

Contemporary Egyptian descriptions had led historians to assume that the kingdom of Kush was a weak and barbaric neighbouring state for hundreds of years, although it boasted a complex society with vast resources of gold dominating the principal trade routes into the heart of Africa. It did eventually conquer Egypt, in the 8th century BC.

Mr Davies, who headed the joint British Museum and Egyptian archaeological team, said: "Now it is clear that Kush was a superpower which had the capacity to invade Egypt. It was a huge invasion, one that stirred up the entire region, a momentous event that is previously undocumented.

"They swept over the mountains, over the Nile, without limit. This is the first time we've got evidence. Far from Egypt being the supreme power of the Nile Valley, clearly Kush was at that time.

"Had they stayed to occupy Egypt, the Kushites might have eliminated it. That's how close Egypt came to extinction. But the Egyptians were resilient enough to survive, and shortly afterwards inaugurated the great imperial age known as the New Kingdom. The Kushites weren't interested in occupation. They went raiding for precious objects, a symbol of domination. They did a lot of damage."

The inscription was found between two internal chambers in a rock-cut tomb that was covered in soot and dirt. It appeared gradually as the grime was removed.

Mr Davies said: "I thought it would be a religious text, but it turned out to be historical. Gradually, a real narrative emerged, a brand new text inscribed in red paint, reading from right to left."

The tomb belonged to Sobeknakht, a Governor of El Kab, an important provincial capital during the latter part of the 17th Dynasty (about 1575-1550BC).

The inscription describes a ferocious invasion of Egypt by armies from Kush and its allies from the south, including the land of Punt, on the southern coast of the Red Sea. It says that vast territories were affected and describes Sobeknakht's heroic role in organising a counter-attack.

The text takes the form of an address to the living by Sobeknakht: "Listen you, who are alive upon earth...Kush came...aroused along his length, he having stirred up the tribes of Wawat...the land of Punt and the Medjaw..." It describes the decisive role played by "the might of the great one, Nekhbet", the vulture-goddess of El Kab, as "strong of heart against the Nubians, who were burnt through fire", while the "chief of the nomads fell through the blast of her flame".

The discovery explains why Egyptian treasures, including statues, stelae and an elegant alabaster vessel found in the royal tomb at Kerma, were buried in Kushite tombs: they were war trophies.

Mr Davies said: "That has never been properly explained before. Now it makes sense. It's the key that unlocks the information. Now we know they were looted trophies, symbols of these kings' power over the Egyptians. Each of the four main kings of Kush brought back looted treasures."

The alabaster vessel is contemporary with the latter part of the 17th Dynasty. It bears a funerary text "for the spirit of the Governor, Hereditary Prince of Nekheb, Sobek-nakht". Now it is clear that it was looted from Sobeknakht's tomb, or an associated workshop, by the Kushite forces and taken back to Kerma, where it was buried in the precincts of the tomb of the Kushite king who had led or inspired the invasion.

The El Kab tomb was looted long ago, probably in antiquity. There is more to investigate at the enormous site and the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt is now making such work a priority.

http://www.hnn.us/comments/15975.html

Actually that was thousands of years before European colonialism but it breaks apart the idea of Africa never being Civilized

Multiculturalism may well, to the likes of yourself, who embrace anything that allows you to be "contemporary" in that odiously new Labour sort of way, an excellent notion. In truth, it is a vain, naive, idealistic notion that a host culture, that was perfectly content to exist without multiculturalism, can be eroded and abused because it dared to arise from a dominant state.

Where Keats is concerned, why not discuss whether or not one ought the poor chap is successful in creating the impression of hope in "Ode to Autumn"?

1- Yet you failed to learn from any of the classics you claim to have read about the dangers of racism, nationalism and intolerance. Or about the necessity - yes, the necessity - of a culture to have other cultures besides itself as a reference.

2- I'll not consider the "one ought" so the sentence you wrote makes sense.

He creates an impression of hope, yes, but in the third stanza he tones it down to point out winter as a part of the natural order. As such, he doesn't debase the notion of hope created in the first two stanzas, he just points out it ends. Considering he had tuberculosis at the time, it included making peace with his own death.

Your considerations?

Well done. What does that matter if when put into practice you still come up with all of this crap like "if Britain ever gets a black prime minister I'll emigrate"? How is education going to help you if your grasp on reality is so flimsy?

Because I can't ever see when I'm going to need to mire myself in the mediocrity you embrace as equality and progress. I know what I'm doing with my life, where I intend to go, and it does not involve anything average or mediocre.

Few nations, in a modern paradigm, can sustain a sizable army from willing recruits;What is "sizable"?

If you are suggesting that no modern country could so maintain a military capable of sustaining global empire, you'll get no argument from me. But then, I'm not the one hoping for a global empire.

the reason being that being part of the rank and file, in a society in which oppurtunities abound, has little lustre.That may be. But did the United States face a shortage immediately after 9/11? No, because people believed they had a duty to serve.

Any country that cannot stir up the devoted loyalty of its own population does not deserve to be an empire. (Which, I should not need to remind you, cannot be inverted to imply that a country that can stir up loyalty does deserve to be an empire.)

I note you do not refer to conscripting the convicted or illegal immigrants when discussing "civilised values". Why is this?Mostly, it's the fact that I assume (wrongly, it seems) that my audience is intelligent enough to identify my usage as metonymy standing in for the whole set. In other words: I do include them, I just didn't type them out.

In any case, I think you, like many, hold a naive notion of "civilised values".Well, that's nice. Would you care to explain, or does condescending obliqueness do it for you? You good?

Because I can't ever see when I'm going to need to mire myself in the mediocrity you embrace as equality and progress. I know what I'm doing with my life, where I intend to go, and it does not involve anything average or mediocre.

I don't think a lack of prejudice creates mediocrity. I'd say it's more logical to suspose that the exclusion of talent would create mediocrity.

Where do you intend to go? Did you know that your political beliefs - if you had the courage to make them public knowledge - exclude you from many positions of excellence?

I think The Blessed Chris is a brilliant example of idiocy triumphing over education.

The part I added on to my signatue was because of him

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/world/africa/09nations.html?_r=1&ref=africa&oref=slogin

They're blocking a treaty to ban rape as a weapon of war. And they're apparently supporting Iran's quest to get nuclear weapons.
Fail.
Please read the IAEA report on this.

If the most dangerous country in the world, the one that is king in invading other countries then Iran can have nukes as well.

Besides, USA doesn’t have any moral authority anymore since it invaded Iraq.

I take it you've never read his work.
Excerpts mainly. Nothing as comprehensive as a book, but what I did read didn't seem all that inaccurate.

Because I can't ever see when I'm going to need to mire myself in the mediocrity you embrace as equality and progress. I know what I'm doing with my life, where I intend to go, and it does not involve anything average or mediocre.

If you want excellence then you should support more African immigrants coming to your country :D

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_immigrants

http://paa2005.princeton.edu/download.aspx?submissionId=50390

http://mumford1.dyndns.org/cen2000/BlackWhite/BlackDiversityReport/black-diversity01.htm
"Do African immigrants make the smartest Americans? The question may sound outlandish, but if you were judging by statistics alone, you could find plenty of evidence to back it up.

In a side-by-side comparison of 2000 census data by sociologist John R. Logan at the Mumford Center, State University of New York at Albany, black immigrants from Africa average the highest educational attainment of any population group in the country, including whites and Asians."
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/03/black_immigrants_an_invisible.html
African Immigrants (This was a compilation of bluecafe22's a friends research, all credit goes to him):

In an analysis of Census Bureau data by the Journal of Blacks in higher education (and several other sources using similar data), African immigrants to the United States were found more likely to be college educated than any other immigrant group. African immigrants to the U.S. are also more highly educated than any other native-born ethnic group including white Americans (Logan & Deane, 2003; Dixon, 2006; Journal of Blacks in higher education,
1999-2000; Onwudiwe, 2006; Otiso and Smith, 2005; The Economist, 1996:
Shobo). Some 48.9 percent of all African immigrants hold a college diploma. This is slightly more than the percentage of Asian immigrants to the U.S., nearly double the rate of native-born white Americans, and nearly four times
the rate of native-born African Americans (The Journal of Blacks in Higher
Education, No. 26 (Winter, 1999-2000), pp. 60-61).

In 1997, 19.4 percent of all adult African immigrants in the United States
held a graduate degree, compared to 8.1 percent of adult whites and 3.8 percent of adult blacks in the United States, respectively (The Journal of
Blacks in Higher Education, No. 26 (Winter, 1999-2000), pp. 60-61).
This information suggests that America has an equally large achievement gap
between whites and African/Asian immigrants as they do between white and black Americans.

The Canadian sociological literature on immigrants also paints a similar
picture, however, less stark. All visible-minority immigrant groups whether
from the Caribbean or India do better academically than their native born (non-visible) cohorts, on average. Both foreign-born and Canadian-born blacks have graduation rates that exceed those of other Canadians. Similar
patters of educational over-achievements are reached with years of schooling
and with data from the 1994 Statistics Canada survey. (Guppy and
Davies,
1998; Boyd, 2002).

In the UK, 1988, the Commission for Racial Equality conducted an
investigation on the admissions practices of St. George's, and other medical
colleges, who set aside a certain number of places for minority students. This informal quota system reflected the percentage of minorities in the
general population. However, minority students with Chinese, Indian, or black African heritage had higher academic qualifications for university
admission than did whites (Blacks in Britain from the West Indies had far
lower academic credentials than did whites). In fact, blacks with African
origins over the age of 30 had the highest educational qualifications of any ethnic group in the British Isles. Thus, the evidence pointed to the fact
that minority quotas for University admissions were actually working against
students from these ethnic groups who were on average more qualified for higher education than their white peers (Cross, 1994).

West Africa has a strong acedmic tradition

Some list of scholars from the golden age of Africa if anyone is interested
http://timbuktufoundation.org/scholars.html