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Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

economist.com

321–330 of 415 posts

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#321

It's odd how many people pay attention to a few big crises -- Ukraine, Gaza, etc -- when there are many other crises which are, by most measures, more important. For instance, current major crises are ongoing in (per Wikipedia) the DRC, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Yemen, Sudan (of course), the Sahel, Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, and South Sudan -- but most of those are rarel…

the bulbbelt boiling over into permawar is scary.

also a major component in sudan is arab racism against black africans and arab hate for jews. As soon as its muslim on muslim violence its okay.

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#322

I donate to UNICEF on a monthly basis. These sorts of things are terrible, but I’d like to think donating helps a little. https://www.unicef.org/

I also donate regularly. It is a great organization. Also other great charities in this space is Médecins Sans Frontières and World Food Program and of course the Red Cross.

MSF for sure. Less certain about the Red Cross, feels like a lot of admin for the impact (low dollars-to-impact).

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#323

It's odd how many people pay attention to a few big crises -- Ukraine, Gaza, etc -- when there are many other crises which are, by most measures, more important. For instance, current major crises are ongoing in (per Wikipedia) the DRC, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Yemen, Sudan (of course), the Sahel, Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, and South Sudan -- but most of those are rarel…

> why would Gaza get more attention than, say, Yemen, Afghanistan, or Syria? All are somewhat Middle Eastern, after all, so it would be hard for racism to be as much of a factor, if at all.

The Palestinian crisis has always gotten more attention in the US because of Israel's close political relationship with the US and Jews having a strong cultural influence in the US especially since WW2. It's similar to the reason why almost no one in the US knows about the Nazi's oppression and genocide of the Roma.

Also, tragically, the US has never cared about how many people die in Africa. We're so used to hearing about "hundreds of thousands dying of X" in Africa that we're completely desensitized to it, whereas one American hostage dying will be major headlines for weeks.

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#324

It's odd how many people pay attention to a few big crises -- Ukraine, Gaza, etc -- when there are many other crises which are, by most measures, more important. For instance, current major crises are ongoing in (per Wikipedia) the DRC, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Yemen, Sudan (of course), the Sahel, Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, and South Sudan -- but most of those are rarel…

Ukraine gets attention because it's happening in Europe, next to NATO countries, with nuclear weapons lurking in the shadows, and it happened as a result of filthy policy decisions by four of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council in the 1990s and now. Nothing remotely related to 'racism'.

And turn this around: how much attention is Somalia, or Sudan, getting on the African continent? Do events in either of those two countries make it to national headlines?

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#325

Still cannot get the images of the Ethiopian famine out of my head - truly horrific stuff. I’ll let people smarter and more powerful than me debate what could/should be done - I’d personally hazard a guess nothing short of military intervention can stop something like this but that has its whole slew of unintended side effects. It seems like there are enough resources in the world to prevent things like this, at leas…

Ethiopian famine was linked with previous massive deforestation projects. No trees = no water and no water = no food. War was a logical consequence of that. After several decades they finally grasp the idea, and are trying to bring the trees again with the "green legacy" project.

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#326
post #22

I am very sad to watch this situation. I spent 3 weeks driving my 4x4 through Sudan in early 2019 [1], just a month before they finally got rid of Al-Bashir, and it was incredible. The people of Sudan were some of the kindest and friendliest I have ever encountered on the planet. When I asked for directions to buy bread and it turned out to be complicated, the following morning locals brought a bag of fresh-baked bre…

I don't think I've heard of a single group that was not described as the 'kindest and friendliest'.

I was very happy to see Ethiopia in my review mirror.

I’ve driven through 55 countries in the undeveloped and developing world. Many were friendly or kinda neutral. Sudan is a very clear standout.

Sudanese were way more friendly than Australians, Canadians, Brits

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#327
post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the old prememant ownership thing has gone out of fashion, maybe we could have something like a 20 year lease where the Brits go in again and bring law and order? This kind of thing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Egyptian_Sudan

Meh. We had the great Bengal famine under British rule. And none of it was due to lack of this and that. Amrtya Sen "Nobel" in economics was related to this.

Several famines.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_major_famines_in_I....

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess the problem is nobody wants to "own" countries anymore. Probably for good reason, colonization caused a lot of evil. However if you want to make a country do what you want, you can't just blow it up and then expect them to listen to you. Controlling people requires actually controlling them, and that is icky.

Debt bondage is much cleaner.

Yeah. The PRC has this process down. None of the long term side effects of colonialism, but the benefits of immediate access to resources.

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#329

It's odd how many people pay attention to a few big crises -- Ukraine, Gaza, etc -- when there are many other crises which are, by most measures, more important. For instance, current major crises are ongoing in (per Wikipedia) the DRC, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Yemen, Sudan (of course), the Sahel, Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, and South Sudan -- but most of those are rarel…

> why would Gaza get more attention than, say, Yemen, Afghanistan, or Syria? All are somewhat Middle Eastern, after all, so it would be hard for racism to be as much of a factor, if at all. The Palestinian crisis has always gotten more attention in the US because of Israel's close political relationship with the US and Jews having a strong cultural influence in the US especially since WW2. It's similar to the reason…

I guess that in part because only a small minority of the Ethiopia citizens own phones.

Re: Anarchy in Sudan has spawned the world’s worst famine in 40 years

#330

It's odd how many people pay attention to a few big crises -- Ukraine, Gaza, etc -- when there are many other crises which are, by most measures, more important. For instance, current major crises are ongoing in (per Wikipedia) the DRC, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Yemen, Sudan (of course), the Sahel, Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Haiti, and South Sudan -- but most of those are rarel…

Ukraine gets attention because it's happening in Europe, next to NATO countries, with nuclear weapons lurking in the shadows, and it happened as a result of filthy policy decisions by four of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council in the 1990s and now. Nothing remotely related to 'racism'. And turn this around: how much attention is Somalia, or Sudan, getting on the African continent? Do events in eith…

Partly because it's happening in Europe and the nuclear context, yes.

But not simply because of that. It gets attention because the nature of the aggression is extremely clear, and highly unusual (in its brazenness and openness); and due to the clear and present threat to the (at least approximately) rule-based world order that human beings have been trying to keep in place since 1945. And it "happened" because the regime currently installed in the aggressor country chose to take the action that it did (and falsely calculated that the invasion would be a brilliant success, and face very little effective resistance).

Not because of anything that went down in the 1990s.

Nothing remotely related to 'racism'.

On the contrary -- this decision was intimately tied to Putin's racist conception of Ukrainians as a people (and his supremacist views of his own people, or what he believes to be "his" people anyway). This is eminently clear from his own statements and numerous other indications.

If you wish to explore this topic further, then I invite you to consider the writings of e.g. Terrell Jermaine Starr:

https://www.oprahdaily.com/entertainment/a40137153/terrell-j...

However you choose to ignore these indications and the openly available history of the region, and build your narratives accordingly -- that's up to you.

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