The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA • Hacker News Board

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#111

Post by snrip » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 9:42 PM UTC

jbooth wrote: post #6

snrip wrote: post #2

F*ck apartheid, but for all I know Mandela pretty much deserved to go to jail. Big disgrace if the CIA actively sponsored this regime, but the allegations in the article are just from one source not directly related to the affairs. All the "Who knows" and "My guess" doesn't make the case any stronger.

Thought experiment: Some other civilization (let's say the Arabs) comes to America and puts us in a system analogous to apartheid, where the groups are whites on bottom and arabs on top. In that hypothetical, would your opinions be different?

In that case my opinion would go from "fck apartheid" to "fck the system analogous to apartheid". I would support the Americans in their fight against Arabs (never thought I would live to say that!). I would still not condone hurting innocent people and feel that a punushment would be justified.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#112

Post by ismail » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 9:44 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #50

moolriaz wrote: post #40

Shocked by how misinformed people are about Mandela/Apartheid, or by the amount of trolling going on here. Thousands of white people have not died in SA thanks to Mandela. Mandela was not a 'terrorist'. Apartheid was BAD, and still affects the country significantly today. Here's some context for you. This all applied pre 1994/2: I am a non white South African. The only reason I got a good education was because with t…

If you want to learn more about what South Africa was like for people of different races before Apartheid, and the steps that lead to Apartheid, you should read the excellent book 'Cry the Beloved Country.' ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cry,_the_Beloved_Country , http://www.amazon.com/Cry-Beloved-Country-Alan-Paton/dp/0743... ) The history of South Africa is unique, and you will learn something. These events are str…

I have fond memories as a young child, cops escorting us of a beach because were were not supposed to be there.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#113

Post by pessimizer » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 9:50 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #40

Shocked by how misinformed people are about Mandela/Apartheid, or by the amount of trolling going on here. Thousands of white people have not died in SA thanks to Mandela. Mandela was not a 'terrorist'. Apartheid was BAD, and still affects the country significantly today. Here's some context for you. This all applied pre 1994/2: I am a non white South African. The only reason I got a good education was because with t…

Mandela was a terrorist. You're just having cognitive dissonance because you agree with him (as all right-thinking people should have.)

To the extent that "terrorist" has any meaning, it is when a less powerful actor attempts to advance an agenda through creating an unmanageable situation for a more powerful institution by causing an increased sense of risk within individuals who are part of the support structure of that institution, thereby making it too expensive for the institution to continue preventing that agenda from being advanced.

Where conventional war wins by killing enough people on the other side that they can't stop you from doing what you want, instead terrorism makes people so expensive (in lost government support from a targeted public, increased salaries and heightened security, and/or lost inflows of money from targeted clients and customers) that allowing the terrorist agenda to advance turns out to be cheaper for the institution being attacked than continuing to fight.

That's what the ANC did.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#114

Post by 001sky » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:04 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #105

001sky wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

he broke reasonable and justified laws The logic here escapes me. The purpose of the laws he broke was to support the unreasonable and unjust ones from being challenged. Right? The difference between something like apartheid (or the 3rd reich) and something like a dysfunctional democracy (which will have some bad laws) is the centrality of evil in the core of the system of idendity of the state. Clearly, in SA the ap…

This is at best anecdotal evidence for a mass exodus of the 'best and brightest' fleeing SA. The only time I have been mugged, attacked, or stalked was during my time as a student in the UK (have had all three happen). Ironically I suffered a serious racist attack in the UK, where someone tried to stab me because I wasn't the right colour. The only time I have serious feared for my life. I have never had any such pro…

No offense, but you seem quite ignorant of the "non-anecdotal" data. Almost to the point of unbeleivably so.

(1) Lack of Personal Security.

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

The private security industry in South Africa is the largest in the world,[2] with nearly 9,000 registered companies and 400,000 registered active private security guards, more than the South African police and army combined

(2) White flight, wealth, brain drain (1990's):

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

According to the 2001 UK Census, 140,201 South African born people were calling the UK, although most recent estimates put the population (including those of South African descent) at over half a million. Unlike South Africa itself...The 2001 census showed that 90% of South Africans in the UK are White

(3) Objective measures of Violent Crime:

UNODC murder rates most recent year

South Africa 31.8 / 15,940

UK 1.2 / 722

But to the broader point also for context:

Subregion Rate Count Region

Southern Africa 30.5 17,484 Africa

Central America 28.5 44,997 Americas

Eastern Africa 21.9 69,344 Africa

Middle Africa 20.8 25,330 Africa

South America 20 79,039 Americas

Northern Africa 5.9 12,276 Africa

Northern America 3.9 13,558 Americas

Western Europe 1 1,852 Europe

Australasia 1 268 Oceania

SA is basically an ~order of magnitude more violent that north america or western europe base on these data. Furthermore, the variation withing the African data from the sub-saharan regions to the north african ones is quite discernable.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#115

Post by moolriaz » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:18 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #113

moolriaz wrote: post #40

Shocked by how misinformed people are about Mandela/Apartheid, or by the amount of trolling going on here. Thousands of white people have not died in SA thanks to Mandela. Mandela was not a 'terrorist'. Apartheid was BAD, and still affects the country significantly today. Here's some context for you. This all applied pre 1994/2: I am a non white South African. The only reason I got a good education was because with t…

Mandela was a terrorist. You're just having cognitive dissonance because you agree with him (as all right-thinking people should have.) To the extent that "terrorist" has any meaning, it is when a less powerful actor attempts to advance an agenda through creating an unmanageable situation for a more powerful institution by causing an increased sense of risk within individuals who are part of the support structure of…

That's a bit condescending. Terrorism doesn't have an accepted definition, and that definitely isn't my definition of terrorism, nor many others. Perhaps people living in America are more inclined to your definition.

I believe that terrorism is defined by the desire to cause mass fear in the general populace by intentionally targeting innocent people, to send across some political message in whichever guise. 9/11 was a terrorist attack.

The Spear of the Nation targeted infrastructure of the Apartheid regime, and the policies of equality upheld by the ANC and Nelson Mandela were widely supported by both white and non-white people in South Africa. I do not think these actions were aimed at provoking mass fear or lobbying an ideal not commonly accepted in South Africa.

This period is often referred to as a revolution, and successful revolutionaries are not historically known as 'terrorists'. In the Anglo-Boer war a similar tactic was employed by the Boers to great effect, but I have never heard of anyone referring to their actions during this war as acts of terrorism. They fought against an act of war initiated by the British, the same way that the ANC fought against acts of violence by the ruling regime, except the ANC were severely under resourced.

Again, the spear of the nation may have done this. This doesn't make Nelson Mandela a terrorist. If he armed a bomb, killed someone, held someone hostage for international attention, I would be far more inclined to accept your definition, as with others.

Given that even the Iron Lady apologised for calling Mandela a terrorist, I'd say the commonly accepted belief is that he is and was not a terrorist.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#116

Post by dragonwriter » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:21 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #115

pessimizer wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mandela was a terrorist. You're just having cognitive dissonance because you agree with him (as all right-thinking people should have.) To the extent that "terrorist" has any meaning, it is when a less powerful actor attempts to advance an agenda through creating an unmanageable situation for a more powerful institution by causing an increased sense of risk within individuals who are part of the support structure of…

That's a bit condescending. Terrorism doesn't have an accepted definition, and that definitely isn't my definition of terrorism, nor many others. Perhaps people living in America are more inclined to your definition. I believe that terrorism is defined by the desire to cause mass fear in the general populace by intentionally targeting innocent people, to send across some political message in whichever guise. 9/11 was…

> This period is often referred to as a revolution, and successful revolutionaries are not historically known as 'terrorists'.

Well, except that the term "Terror" as a political act and "Terrorists" for those who practiced it -- well, except in French, not English -- was coined to refer to a particular set of successful (to that point) revolutionaries and their actions (and embraced by them.)

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#117

Post by thiagoharry » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:23 PM UTC

noarchy wrote: post #55

tcdent wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to elaborate on "all of the bad things"? If there's anything to take away from this discussion on Mandela, it's that there are a lot of misunderstandings about what actually happened, especially if you are primarily informed by American media.

"all of the bad things" seem to continue: Cuba remains the only country in Latin America that represses virtually all forms of political dissent. The government of Raúl Castro continues to enforce political conformity using short-term detentions, beatings, public acts of repudiation, travel restrictions, and forced exile. Although the Cuban government released dozens of political prisoners on the condition that they…

As a third world inhabitant who really saw all the "wonders" of capitalism here, I really don't consider Cuba a bad place to live. Travel restriction? We also have this here because only rich people have money to travel. "Move freely"? We have this only to people who can afford this. Beatings, detentions? We also have these things for people who lives in slums. I already talked with cuban people and people who really traveled to Cuba and the place really isn't the hell described by the american media.

The cuban government pursuit dissidents? How difficult is to identify legitimate dissidents from spies and people financed by enemy nations in a country so attacked by hostile powers? A country that suffers from sabotage, embargo and terrorism with a little help from the CIA (like the apartheid).

From my perspective I can relate Mandela's struggle with Fidel and Che's struggle. A lot of african countries can thanks Cuba for their independence. 300 000 cuban soldiers were sent by Castro to fight for the independence of african countries and 10 000 died there. To ilustrate what I'm saying, this is a speech by Nelson Mandela spoken in 1991:

http://lanic.utexas.edu/project/castro/db/1991/19910726-1.ht...

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#118

Post by pessimizer » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:43 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #115

pessimizer wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mandela was a terrorist. You're just having cognitive dissonance because you agree with him (as all right-thinking people should have.) To the extent that "terrorist" has any meaning, it is when a less powerful actor attempts to advance an agenda through creating an unmanageable situation for a more powerful institution by causing an increased sense of risk within individuals who are part of the support structure of…

That's a bit condescending. Terrorism doesn't have an accepted definition, and that definitely isn't my definition of terrorism, nor many others. Perhaps people living in America are more inclined to your definition. I believe that terrorism is defined by the desire to cause mass fear in the general populace by intentionally targeting innocent people, to send across some political message in whichever guise. 9/11 was…

>Terrorism doesn't have an accepted definition,

Then it's going to be very difficult to make an argument that Mandela was not a terrorist.

>In the Anglo-Boer war a similar tactic was employed by the Boers to great effect, but I have never heard of anyone referring to their actions during this war as acts of terrorism.

The first hit I get for "Boer terrorism" is: http://www.angloboerwar.com/books/78-stevens-the-complete-hi...

( https://duckduckgo.com/?t=lm&q=Boer+terrorism )

Edit:

Sorry about going on about this, but I think that saying people are not terrorists because we agree with them is closely related to saying that people are terrorists because we don't agree with them. If "terrorism" has a meaning, the question of whether Mandela was a terrorist should be answered based on that meaning. If what we really mean to say is that we think Mandela was a great man who improved the lives of millions, we can just say that instead of arguing or insulting each other over semantics.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#119

Post by TrainedMonkey » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:45 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #113

moolriaz wrote: post #40

Shocked by how misinformed people are about Mandela/Apartheid, or by the amount of trolling going on here. Thousands of white people have not died in SA thanks to Mandela. Mandela was not a 'terrorist'. Apartheid was BAD, and still affects the country significantly today. Here's some context for you. This all applied pre 1994/2: I am a non white South African. The only reason I got a good education was because with t…

Mandela was a terrorist. You're just having cognitive dissonance because you agree with him (as all right-thinking people should have.) To the extent that "terrorist" has any meaning, it is when a less powerful actor attempts to advance an agenda through creating an unmanageable situation for a more powerful institution by causing an increased sense of risk within individuals who are part of the support structure of…

You are confusing things. Mandela was not a terrorist because he won, proper term is freedom fighter. History is always written by victorious.

Re: The Day Mandela Was Arrested, With A Little Help From the CIA

#120

Post by JPKab » Fri, Dec 06, 2013, 10:49 PM UTC

moolriaz wrote: post #105

001sky wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

he broke reasonable and justified laws The logic here escapes me. The purpose of the laws he broke was to support the unreasonable and unjust ones from being challenged. Right? The difference between something like apartheid (or the 3rd reich) and something like a dysfunctional democracy (which will have some bad laws) is the centrality of evil in the core of the system of idendity of the state. Clearly, in SA the ap…

This is at best anecdotal evidence for a mass exodus of the 'best and brightest' fleeing SA. The only time I have been mugged, attacked, or stalked was during my time as a student in the UK (have had all three happen). Ironically I suffered a serious racist attack in the UK, where someone tried to stab me because I wasn't the right colour. The only time I have serious feared for my life. I have never had any such pro…

Not that I disagree with much of what you say, (Mandela was no terrorist) but your first paragraph starts out by pointing out someone citing anecdotal evidence, and then ends with you citing your own anecdotal evidence of racial violence in the UK vs. SA. As if your experience walking around in London vs. whatever part of SA (as you know a huge country) you live in is solid data.

I have white friends from college who were from South Africa, and returned there (Cape Town). They are glad Apartheid is gone, but are unhappy that they have had to watch senior politicians in the ANC sing "Kill the Boers" at rallies in 2013. They also complain of the effects of the BEE. As with other affirmative action programs, it has the effect of fueling racism and resentment while simultaneously (on the positive side) correcting past inequities. Also tying in with other affirmative action weaknesses, it disproportionately benefits the most advantaged members of the favored group(s) while leaving behind the least advantaged from both the favored group and being punishingly unfair to the poor members of the non-favored group. (an Afrikaner boy from a poor home will hurt a company's BEE scorecard, while a black boy whose father is a lawyer will help it)