So what is justified to redress apartheid?
That’s really the only question. A system designed to keep a minority in ‘country club’ style at both the economic and political expense of most other people, who are easily identified by color leaves us all shaking our head. It’s so un-american ,1 million Americans became casualties to ensure this kind of system ended here.
A system like that sooner or later, ESPECIALLY when backed by an entity such as the Dutch Reformed Church (of South Africa) will eventually self justify any and every brutality.
So if you want to overthrow that, what is justified?
Well, if I am in the majority and watching my own children’s hopes and dreams atrophy .. ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING.
And so, it was with Mr. Mandela. Sometimes we are defined by our enemies for history. Thus all his reported approvals and actions of ‘terrorism’ are washed away in the crimes of the SA regime and his 27 years in prison.
When victorious however he made a choice that will be his legacy. There could have been a frenzy of years of righteous retributions and reckonings, but he chose other and it is THAT which marks him.
Of course in his execrable friendship with Qaddafi and Castro who are/were BRUTAL, BRUTAL dictators every bit as disgusting AND MORE as DF Malan, and what he launched, Mandela shows he also could not get around in his personal choices what helped power his revolution.
He was associated with some evil creatures, but defeated an evil regime and prevented a civil war which considering how armed the people were, would have been astonishing.,
Not bad.
But no MLK. Nor a Washington.
And there we have it. Shaped by the crimes against him and his people, he rose above those when it counted, but remained in that shape.
Not bad.
15 comments:
Yeah, pretty much.
Nico and I had a very long conversation on just this subject on another post a few days ago. I'm pretty much on the ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING side.
I think, Epa, this is one of those subjects that divides us "neoCons" from traditional Conservatives.
LOL
Is it still possible to be a neoCon?
By the way, on the topic of the new Babe of the Week, I love babes who wear bikinis in inappropriate places and seemingly without any reason.
That's what my personal home life is like.
No, you may not come over.
I'm not sure about him avoiding a civil war. He did anything but. The South Africa of today sure seems like in a state of civil war. Targeted killings of whites, of blacks who don't fall in line, etc.
Also, I wasn't aware that a million Americans died during the civil rights movement? :/ Why the F does no one talk about that? I was under the impression it was more or less peaceful?
Nicoenarg
Nico, I believe Epa, like me, equates Apartheid with the evil of the American South during the slave times.
1 million people = Civil War.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/03/science/civil-war-toll-up-by-20-percent-in-new-estimate.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Ah I see. Thanks.
Nicoenarg
Yes, civil war 1861-65
620,000 MILITARY deaths, and almost as many other casualties. About 4 times the toll in WW2.
2% of the entire population.
Or about 7 million today MILITARY DEAD.
Amazing.
And that's why I have little patience for people who say we owe ...
All of us here at IBA agree that apartheid was evil in the extreme -- and had to be overturned.
However, if we say, "Anything goes to overthrow evil," would we all agree that anything goes to overthrow all evil if the word evil is defined so as to include a cause of which we disapprove?
Much of Islamic hate toward the West is driven by hatred of "the evil West."
And what about Hitler? The treaty terms of the WW1 armistice were "evil." So anything that Hitler did was a-okay because he was combating "evil"?
I think that we have to be very wary of slipping into moral relevancy.
I find the ongoing canonization of Nelson Mandela quite disturbing. And something tells me that it is agenda driven.
That's what makes this a tough call, AoW. You are right, of course.
That's why I tried to say it in personal terms. If I saw this system killing the life inside my kids, I'm all in, and the devil take the hindmost because I'm in the right, and let others sort out LATER, after I change things, if I was a good man or bad.
On balance, for this man, at this time, I give him a pass. MLK would have been killed outright in SA (Steve Biko anyone?). But GW would not have gone the way of terrorist attacks (I hope).
A reluctant, 'well, apartheid is gone thanks to you, but geez... and you didn't unleash vengeance nationwide, so it's a pass.'
Epa,
Yes, a tough call.
I don't give Mandela a pass -- even though the situation could have been much, much worse.
I want more balance, I guess. Maybe because I've read so much Shakespeare?
I'm with AOW on this one.
Washington faced an enemy way tougher and way more ruthless than the South African apartheid state. That there was a man of principle. He didn't just kill anyone and anything that moved to get what he wanted.
People say, yeah but the blacks had no one. Thats a freaking lie since the Soviets and the Chinese were busy arming and training Mandela's goons in neighboring countries.
Of course Pasto and I went back and forth on these issues in the 36 comment long thread before so I don't intend to keep arguing about it. But like AOW I don't give this guy a pass.
And not only that, with all the f*cked up principles (or the lack thereof) and the murder of anyone, even amongst the anti apartheid blacks, who didn't support the ANC's murderous and torturous BS, what is it that the man achieved?
CHAOS!
Open season against whites for generations.
Rape and murder with no consequences.
What is it that he foresaw? In his book he talks about seeing the self serving tyrant of Ethiopia Haile Selassie I and how black soldiers were so respectful of him and his words were "we all foresaw a future like this for South Africa."
What was his vision? In another place he says, "I saw South Africa, a country for Africans..." And he distinguishes between "Africans", whites, indians and coloreds in his book all the time.
Why is his supremacism better than white supremacism?
Why is rape, pillage, murder and theft based on race that started under him and continues to this day better than segregationist practices of white supremacists?
I see no difference between Mandela and the apartheid leaders. Both were assholes and destroyed lives of ordinary south africans for whatever the hell their goals were.
What we see in South Africa is the legacy of Mandela. Murder capital of the world, a country with no future, a country whose white population is the target of murders and possible genocide but no one gives a shit. Rape capital of the world. A country where the minister of security of the country says "If you don't like the crime, leave South Africa..." That is what he achieved. So in other words, f*ck Mandela!
Nicoenarg
Nico,
There was a 36 comment long thread?
I missed it!
For four days, I've been busier than a one-legged man in as ass-kicking contest -- and sick with a head cold, too. It's more than the Christmas season that's keeping me busy: a very busy day Saturday, then Monday and Tuesday we had back-to-back storms (one an ice storm, the other a snowstorm).
Why is his supremacism better than white supremacism?
It isn't, IMO.
I'm sick of this "race thing."
Past wrongs cannot be righted.
Remember the Hatfields and the McCoys?
There was a family feud in my own family -- person after person killed by another person in the family and for two generations. Nothing was accomplished -- except for more division within the family.
The important thing about dealing with past wrongs is to right them as much as is reasonably possible (complete righting of past wrongs is never possible), then move on and don't commit present wrongs.
Hope you're feeling better now AOW.
Here's the link to the thread i was talking about:
http://ibloga.blogspot.com.ar/2013/12/from-political-islam-most-persecuted.html
Nicoenarg
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