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Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

theguardian.com

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Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#51

Post by lelanthran »

mekkkkkk wrote: post #32
lelanthran wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not one mention of the disgusting xenophobia demonstrated by the majority of city residents. Not. One. > ... > The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. Hilarious :-)

I don't think this geopolitical perspective constitutes xenophobia. Do you really?

> I don't think this geopolitical perspective constitutes xenophobia. Do you really?

Well, yeah, practically textbook:

Popular definition from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/xenophobia ("Fear and hatred of strangers or foreigners").

In more detail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenophobia - " It is an expression of perceived conflict between an ingroup and an outgroup and may manifest in suspicion by the one of the other's activities, a desire to eliminate their presence, and fear of losing national, ethnic, or racial identity."

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#52

Post by Schattenbaer »

zohch wrote: post #10
smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

> The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. South Africa has taken all the rope it had and hung itself with it. Sure the west stole enough from South Africa, but South Africans stole more from other South Africans than the west ever stole from South Africa, and they continue to steal from other South Africans, and will continue doing so. South Africa's biggest roadblock to prosperity is not the west, it is…

I'm struggling to parse the point you're making, paraphrasing: "Systemic issues in SA causes more money to be lost than sending money to Uber Eats... thus the parent's point of not supporting Uber Eats is moot"?

I think you can choose to not support a company that isn't playing by South African labour rules and rather support a local alternative even if the government is corrupt. And that doing a little bit is better than doing nothing, even if it's not a complete fix.

Apologies if I misunderstood, though - I do agree with you that there are bigger issues at play too in the country. But I do think it doesn't mean we shouldn't also fix the smaller issues if they are in reach. Low-hanging fruit and all that.

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#53

Post by zohch »

Schattenbaer wrote: post #52
zohch wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. South Africa has taken all the rope it had and hung itself with it. Sure the west stole enough from South Africa, but South Africans stole more from other South Africans than the west ever stole from South Africa, and they continue to steal from other South Africans, and will continue doing so. South Africa's biggest roadblock to prosperity is not the west, it is…

I'm struggling to parse the point you're making, paraphrasing: "Systemic issues in SA causes more money to be lost than sending money to Uber Eats... thus the parent's point of not supporting Uber Eats is moot"? I think you can choose to not support a company that isn't playing by South African labour rules and rather support a local alternative even if the government is corrupt. And that doing a little bit is better…

> "Systemic issues in SA causes more money to be lost than sending money to Uber Eats... thus the parent's point of not supporting Uber Eats is moot"?

Fair enough, the point about not supporting Uber Eats is great. I boycott Amazon for example for similar reasons. I'm just a bit tired of hearing how awful the west is while any problems that the west creates for South Africa is negligible compared to the problems that South Africans create for themselves.

But yeah sure, fuck Uber eats, where I live (in the west) we don't even have Uber never-mind Uber eats. But again we have legislation that prevent them from operating here, put in place by politicians, who were voted for by the populace, same as in South Africa. So you know, the root cause remains the root cause.

South Africans en masse can claim they don't want Uber eats to operate there, but of course they would never stop voting en masse for shitty politicians either that keep screwing them over and that allow Uber eats to operate there.

But I guess if you are the kind of person who thinks lynching a Pakistanis and Nigerians will fix something, then probably it also seems like a good idea to boycott Uber eats while voting for politicians who allow Uber eats to operate.

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#54

Post by yunohn »

lelanthran wrote: post #50
yunohn wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Certainly, but it was not the West that, for the most part, enslaved and then sold the African slaves. Surely the righteous West could’ve freed those slaves and not fought to keep them for centuries? If you read the wiki link further, you’ll see that they paid Africans to find slaves, because they couldn’t survive on their own - amidst warring tribes and diseases. They would transport slaves as cargo, resell them t…

> Surely the righteous West could’ve freed those slaves and not fought to keep them for centuries? Where did I claim that the West was not at fault? (The rest of your argument relies on this sort of strawman so there's no need to respond to it).

There is no strawman?

Your whole post relies on blaming SA for what happened to them, using their fellow SAfricans who exploited them (alongside the West) as a fall-guy. That’s a very unfair characterisation of colonialism and its modern effects, like I claimed in my post.

Further, similarly to the way you dismissed the West for purchasing slaves, you skipped over Shell getting away with bribing the poorer previously colonised country.

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#55

Post by lelanthran »

yunohn wrote: post #54
lelanthran wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Surely the righteous West could’ve freed those slaves and not fought to keep them for centuries? Where did I claim that the West was not at fault? (The rest of your argument relies on this sort of strawman so there's no need to respond to it).

There is no strawman? Your whole post relies on blaming SA for what happened to them, using their fellow SAfricans who exploited them (alongside the West) as a fall-guy. That’s a very unfair characterisation of colonialism and its modern effects, like I claimed in my post. Further, similarly to the way you dismissed the West for purchasing slaves, you skipped over Shell getting away with bribing the poorer previously…

> Your whole post relies on blaming SA for what happened to them, using their fellow SAfricans who exploited them (alongside the West) as a fall-guy. That’s a very unfair characterisation of colonialism and its modern effects, like I claimed in my post.

No, I did not claim that, I am saying that the voters in South Africa are voting in policies based on color and racial lines, not based on their self-interest.

> Further, similarly to the way you dismissed the West for purchasing slaves,

I did not dismiss the West for purchasing slaves (I said that they should not have), I merely pointed out that native Africans were enslaving their neighbours (and worse) well before they started selling their slaves to the West.

> you skipped over Shell getting away with bribing the poorer previously colonised country.

I did not;

1) No accusation was made that Shell was bribing anyone,

and

2) I pointed out very clearly that mining rights are usually SOLD to the highest bidder by the state. If the state does not then use that money for its citizens, you can hardly blame the source of the money. Since the state is legitimately elected by the voters, the voters have only themselves to blame when their leaders (whom have been in charge for the last 30 years almost) take all the money.

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#56

Post by dang »

zohch wrote: post #10
smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

> The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. South Africa has taken all the rope it had and hung itself with it. Sure the west stole enough from South Africa, but South Africans stole more from other South Africans than the west ever stole from South Africa, and they continue to steal from other South Africans, and will continue doing so. South Africa's biggest roadblock to prosperity is not the west, it is…

Please don't take HN threads further into hellish flamewar. The GP started it but at least that comment was partly on topic. You should have ignored the provocation at the end and either replied to the interesting, curious bits, or—if you didn't find any bits interesting or curious—not replied at all.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#57

Post by dang »

zohch wrote: post #10
smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

> The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. South Africa has taken all the rope it had and hung itself with it. Sure the west stole enough from South Africa, but South Africans stole more from other South Africans than the west ever stole from South Africa, and they continue to steal from other South Africans, and will continue doing so. South Africa's biggest roadblock to prosperity is not the west, it is…

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29550522.

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#58

Post by dang »

sgt wrote: post #16
smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

> The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. That's a feeble victim mentality that you should consider re-evaluating. Not uncommon on the African continent and elsewhere (blaming colonialism etc), but it's obviously not as simple as that, and you know it.

Please don't take HN threads further into nationalistic flamewar. Last thing we want or need here.

The site guidelines explicitly ask you to avoid responding to flamebait with worse.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#59

Post by dang »

lelanthran wrote: post #14
smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

> Not one mention of the disgusting xenophobia demonstrated by the majority of city residents. Not. One. > ... > The western world has stolen enough wealth from us. Hilarious :-)

Please don't take HN threads further into nationalistic flamewar. Last thing we want or need here.

The site guidelines explicitly ask you to avoid responding to flamebait with worse.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Ghost riders: the invisible lives of Johannesburg food couriers

#60

Post by dang »

smokey_circles wrote: post #8

I've lived in Joburg all my life. Joburg, especially the inner city, is one of the most dangerous places in the world. Couriers are at risk? We all are. I don't know anyone who doesn't have a story of being held up at gunpoint somewhere around joburg, even the wealthy northern suburbs. Happened to me 4 times, twice in one week. Try convincing an armed mugger some other tit stole your phone already. Fun times. I also…

Please keep flamewar provocation out of your comments here. Your post contained some interesting stuff and also some hellish flamebait, and naturally the hellish flamebait dominated the thread.

That is entirely predictable internet dynamics, which is why the site guidelines explicitly ask everyone to avoid it here. Please don't do it again.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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