More Fun With Africa!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7353929.stm

We have so much to learn from Mother Africa.

The British don't have to steal the country. They could purchase it outright for less than a pound

Fuck it. I don't want to even save those people from themselves at this point. It's more fun watching that place self destruct.

It's like a reality show, but with more comedy.

When did you ever?

Prior to 1980. Since then it's been high comedy watching Africa swirl around the bowl.

Mugabe is a fuckwit. Why should the people - who've already proved they oppose him - be punished for the fact that he's a fuckwit with arms/soldiers?

They supported him when he stole from the farmers that made Rhodesia the bread basket of Africa and now they have to pay the price for that support by starving to death.

I was thinking the other day: "What's keeping an enterprising band from invading and taking over?"

Seriously. We could promise people acres in exchange for military service. These people are starving, if we gave them a fair and responsible government (as opposed to genocide or apartheid as some would suggest), who could argue?

Fuck that. Then we'd have to be responsible for the Africans and in 20 years they'd do the same thing all over again. "Majority rule" for people incapable of ruling led to this, not apartheid.

Tell us what the country was like before apartheid, Teacher.

In Rhodesia? Blacks had civil rights, including voting and limited self rule in the enclaves set up for them, analagous to Indian reservations. And blacks that wanted to live outside of the enclaves certainly could and could own property. And until the communists started supplying black rebels and the western media began rattling the white guilt saber, and coupled with a growing black urbanization, there wasn't any real unrest.

Blacks as a whole simply didn't hold any political capital because they couldn't exercise power. The proof of that can be seen in every country in Subsharan Africa, even in the one success story of Kenya.

That's "more fun with Mugabe" really.

One thing I don't get - the guy's 84. Why the fuck would he bother? Just retire, scumbag.

I mean *before* apartheid. As in before the Europeans came, before it was "The Country Named for Cecil Rhodes." If black people are as completely incapable of governing themselves without white people to help them as you seem to be implying, you'd think they'd have gone extinct long before the whites arrived, wouldn't you?

It was like it is today, but without guns.

So I'll put you in the "does not want an African estate" column.

Not really, no.

How was pre-Colonial Africa demonstratably different than post-Colonial Africa, with the exception of technological advancements introduced by the west? Has tribalism been replaced by a real concept of the nation-state? Has genocide by one tribe against another been halted? I trust slavery has been eradicated completely from Africa. Is rule of law firmly established? Has healthcare based on superstition been replaced by science?

For one thing, one might argue that it was the introduction/imposition of the European nation-state system that caused so many problems. Not just in Africa, but elsewhere as well.

Generally, it was a series of nation-tribes who weren't starving.

Except when they were starving you mean. Or was famine also unknown before the Europeans showed up?

Power. He has it and doesn't want to give it up.

Kind of like other folks like Lenin, Stalin, Castro, and that bloke in South America. Oh, you know the one I'm talking about henry.

Eh, no, not really. The problem with third-world states was that they were organized around resources and conveniences to European powers, not around real nations. That, and the social Darwinist theories prevalent at the time which ended up pouring gasoline on the simmering tribal feuds and vendettas.

The idea of a nation-state is sound and perfectly maintainable, if it's a true nation-state. Most third world states around the world have no overly dominant ethnic body.

Famine would've been more of nature's fault than the callous ignorance it is now.

I don't agree. While I concur that there were totally unnatural units created to satisfy imperialist conquest, nation states cause wars IMO, and we're lucky that to some extent the world is moving away from them as an absolutist concept.

No we're not. The only international confederation with any real power/legitimacy is the European Union, which is causing the rest of the world to counteract their influence.

And don't be dense. Man causes war, regardless of the political organizations he creates for himself.

There are all sorts of institutions and organisations with real power, despite what people would like to believe in some cases - the UN, World Bank, IMF, G8, WTO, NAFTA... And multinational corporations are probably the largest example.
The effects of these aren't exclusively positive of course, but they erode the 18th century nation-state ideal.

Man doesn't cause war for no reasons. Men within certain political organisations are more apt at creating the tensions that lead to it than men within others.

No they don't, their members are nation-states. The only example that isn't useless are multinational corporations, but their assets can be nationalized at flick of a pen.

Links, please?

Their members may be nation states, but they are bound by the rules and can be punished for breaking them, meaning that power is more distributed internationally.
Similarly for corporations - just because states retain theoretical power doesn't mean it's easy to exercise.

I'm not saying states aren't still dominant - they are - there just not as much so as 100 or 200 years ago.

No, certain political organizations lend themselves to a greater use of resources which lends itself to more ability to effectively wage war. It's easier to draft an army from unemployed youths in a city than it is to build one from hunter/gathers or tenet farmers.

Man's still the same evil creature. It's his free time that lets him give into desires.