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caniff
Joined: 03 Feb 2004
Location: All over the map
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 Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 8:14 pm Post subject: |
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41108081/ns/world_news-haiti_earthquake/
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PORT-AU-PRINCE � Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier made a surprise return from exile to his Caribbean homeland on Sunday, saying he wanted to help in the rebuilding of his earthquake-battered nation.
It was the first time that Duvalier, who is now 59 but was once the world's youngest head of state at 19, had returned to Haiti since he was forced out in 1986 by a popular uprising and U.S. pressure.
His unexpected return comes at a time when Haiti, still the poorest state in the Western Hemisphere, is facing political uncertainty following November 28 presidential and legislative elections whose preliminary results have triggered fraud allegations and violent street protests |
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Junior
Joined: 18 Nov 2005
Location: the eye
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| Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 5:08 am Post subject: Re: Haiti, Sudan, C�te d'Ivoire: Who Cares? |
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| mises wrote: |
| Haiti et al should be left alone and allowed to sort itself out. The population with dramatically thin to a level that their culture is able support. |
I think this is beoming the new methodology. "Let them find their own equilibrium" aka "Why Africa's excuses must end".
What happens then is that all the powerful/corrupt tyrants kill off a lot of their weak/defenceless population until you reach sustainable levels that are no longer dependent on foreign aid. |
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travel zen
Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Location: Good old Toronto, Canada
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| Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 4:23 pm Post subject: |
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Alot of this is just racism tied up with politics. "Biological problems, leave them alone, always be messed up"
You must know that India and Asia in general had the same problems in the last centuery as Africa.
You must realize that Africa is HUGE and has many countries and cultures, some of them work and are doing well (but you never hear about those for some reason).
WWII and as late as the war in Yugoslavia had tribalism and cultures clashing...just like what Africa has today.
People are people everywhere, but money is money and Africa has ALOT of resources, is poor and can be 'played with' by other powers.
That's whats happening now. |
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Sergio Stefanuto
Joined: 14 May 2009
Location: UK
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| Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 7:28 pm Post subject: |
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| tfunk wrote: |
| I think it's very Christian of you to think that charity shouldn't be associated with pleasure in order for it to be virtuous. |
I've no idea what the Christianity reference is in aid of.
I didn't argue that aid shouldn't be associated with pleasure in order to be virtuous. I merely said that it's impossible to divorce it from pleasure. As such, there is nothing noble or virtuous about foreign aid if it is nothing but a fruitless form of hedonism.
Giving money to a homeless person does more harm than good. Aid to Africa does more harm than good. But since charitable giving produces pleasant emotions for the giver, the negative consequences are ignored. Hence, charity is a game of self-interest. Everything is a game of self-interest - and rightly so. Unfortunately, some are disingenuous about their self-interested motivations, namely the proliferators of the altruism myth. There's plenty of evidence that the aid industry uses well-meaning altruism as a smokescreen for selfish parasitism. Try this
There's nothing wrong with giving to charity because it makes us feel good, unless it demonstrably produces poor results. The failures of aid to poor countries are a very high price to pay in order to indulge the hedonism of do-gooders.
Perfect example here:
Ninety-five percent of the debris from the Haitian earthquake one year ago hasn�t been moved. Billions of dollars later, with none other than Bill Clinton serving as the foreman for a massive international reconstruction effort, most of the country pretty much looks the way it did when dust and screams still filled the air. Except, of course, for all of the tent cities. More than a million people remain homeless.
One of Haiti�s problems is that it has a culture of poverty. Some cultures add value, some don�t. For instance, a low-skilled Mexican worker becomes 10 times more productive simply by crossing the border into the United States. It�s not that there aren�t entrepreneurs or hard workers in Haiti, but the system holds them down rather than unleashes them.
Most of the wealth of any society rests in what economists call �intangible capital��the laws, knowledge and customs that define a society. Social planners love to invoke the Marshall Plan, whereby America helped rebuild Europe after World War II, as proof that foreign aid can create prosperity. What is left out of the discussion is that while Europe�s bridges may have been smashed, its intangible capital remained relatively intact.
You can hardly say the same thing about Haiti, which has seen its storehouse of intangible capital devalued for generations. Many ambitious Haitians of means leave the country. Worse, those who stay home are thwarted when they try to break through the cycle of dependency created by indisputably well-meaning aid agencies
http://www.aei.org/article/103004
Welfarism, whether at home or abroad, is a sacred cow that needs a bullet through its brain. |
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darkjedidave
Joined: 19 Aug 2009
Location: Shanghai/Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 8:41 pm Post subject: |
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| Call me selfless, but the same goes for the Pakistan floods. Weren't these the same people who were dancing in the streets and celebrating on 9/11? Now in their dire need, they want the West's help? Whatever... |
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Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
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| Posted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:39 pm Post subject: |
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| darkjedidave wrote: |
| Call me selfless, but the same goes for the Pakistan floods. Weren't these the same people who were dancing in the streets and celebrating on 9/11? Now in their dire need, they want the West's help? Whatever... |
Ignorant. To think a majority of Pakistani's felt that way is wrong, and furthermore ignores the many reasons they would have to feel animosity towards the west anyways. To not help them would further their feelings of hatred towards the west and give an even greater chance that militants will gain more control. Considering where Pakistan is, the general lawlessness of Pakistan, and who currently lives and trains there aiding them is in as much our interest as it is theres. The posters on this boards understanding of how international relations work is laughable at best. |
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CHUD
Joined: 31 Dec 2010
Location: KR
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agentX
Joined: 12 Oct 2007
Location: Jeolla province
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| Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 6:39 pm Post subject: |
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It seems to me that the West needs to change the way aid is issued and distributed.
Sending stuff like clothes is useful in the aftermath of a disaster, but once the disaster is over, more concrete and longer term aid should be deployed (factory building components, etc) so they can take care of their own needs.
Of course, sending all the aid and money you want won't help a region if major rebel groups keep killing everybody using arms from illicit arms merchants so greedy industrialists can keep mineral prices down. So security has to come first and foremost. |
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Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
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| Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 11:15 pm Post subject: |
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| I wonder if all of the posters here would have been against the Marshall Plan. Aid is so baaaddd!! |
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Enrico Palazzo
Mod Team
Joined: 11 Mar 2008
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 6:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
Korea has been colonized repeatedly throughout history (and, as Kuros points out, has been given aid), and is none the less doing fairly well by modern standards.
Saying the problem in Africa is aid is like saying the problem in Africa is the result of colonialism. I think to really understand Africa, we need to stop talking about us and start focusing on them. Africa was a tribal hell hole before colonialism. Africa, despite being dolled up with Western political ideas and foreign technology, is still a tribal hell hole. The African people are culturally -- and perhaps even to some extent biologically -- inclined towards a mode of life different than our own. Changing their culture to make it compatible with the modern world isn't something we can do for them. They'll have to do it themselves over time, and the meanwhile is going to be painful. That's life, unfortunately.
I suppose mark me down as an "I don't care," because although I do care, I think the real problems aren't ones we as non-members of their societies can solve. |
Racism is a violation of the TOS. To suggest that Africans are racially inferior because of an IQ test or current or recent past state is rather offensive. When the Arabs were civilized, many parts of Europe were backward. Now, it's the reverse. Most Africans were tribal. They were forced into states where the tribes often despise one another. You cannot compare Japan and Korea where the people are homogenous to Africa. Also, the news in the US ignores stable countries like Ghana.
Refrain from using biology and DNA to dehumanize others. We've seen a problem with racism. We will have to increase temp and perma bans.
I'll get working on it within the next week. If anyone gets involved this type of stuff, we will either warn them, temp ban, or perma ban depending on the severity. Do not touch on biology and human beings in this way. Make your arguments without that. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 7:52 pm Post subject: |
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| Enrico Palazzo wrote: |
| Racism is a violation of the TOS. To suggest that Africans are racially inferior because of an IQ test or current or recent past state is rather offensive. |
I don't believe I used the term "racially inferior" -- or any variant thereof -- a single time in that post (or in fact, in my entire posting tenure here).
| Enrico Palazzo wrote: |
| Refrain from using biology and DNA to dehumanize others. |
Nothing I've ever written here states or even suggests that anyone is less than human. Suggesting the possibility of genuine biological differences between individuals of different ethnicity is not dehumanizing, especially when it's done purely in passing and in a data-driven fashion. Difference does not automatically entail disparity.
I understand you no doubt get a number of complaints about my posts on these topics, and I could probably guess exactly from whom they came. I'm asking that you reconsider the validity of those complaints in light of the actual content of my posts.
Nothing I've said here is racist. |
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Leon
Joined: 31 May 2010
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 8:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| Enrico Palazzo wrote: |
| Racism is a violation of the TOS. To suggest that Africans are racially inferior because of an IQ test or current or recent past state is rather offensive. |
I don't believe I used the term "racially inferior" -- or any variant thereof -- a single time in that post (or in fact, in my entire posting tenure here).
| Enrico Palazzo wrote: |
| Refrain from using biology and DNA to dehumanize others. |
Nothing I've ever written here states or even suggests that anyone is less than human. Suggesting the possibility of genuine biological differences between individuals of different ethnicity is not dehumanizing, especially when it's done purely in passing and in a data-driven fashion. Difference does not automatically entail disparity.
I understand you no doubt get a number of complaints about my posts on these topics, and I could probably guess exactly from whom they came. I'm asking that you reconsider the validity of those complaints in light of the actual content of my posts.
Nothing I've said here is racist. |
| Fox wrote: |
| Africa was a tribal hell hole before colonialism. Africa, despite being dolled up with Western political ideas and foreign technology, is still a tribal hell hole. The African people are culturally -- and perhaps even to some extent biologically -- inclined towards a mode of life different than our own. |
Reread this, and try to imagine it as if you weren't the one that wrote it. Try to imagine someone said something like this about the Jews. Coupled with you preoccupation with the blacks. I'm not accusing you of being racist, but it is very understandable that someone would think that there were racist undertones. Not to mention your basic premise is misguided in regards to Africa. The artifical creation and impostion of the modern nation state by the Europeans is the worst thing that could have ever happened to Africa. |
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HijackedTw1light
Joined: 24 May 2010
Location: Daegu
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 8:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Sergio Stefanuto wrote: |
| ]Welfarism, whether at home or abroad, is a sacred cow that needs a bullet through its brain. |
It's true that giving someone charity or welfare in a way that makes them dependent can be harmful.
But the aim of true giving is its own cessation. In other words, the aim is to make the recipient self-sufficient. "Teach a man to fish," and so forth. It happens every day on a personal level, if not a societal level. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 8:50 pm Post subject: |
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| You know what Enrico, forget it. I was all ready considering putting a stop to my time killing on this site due to a worsening dearth of genuinely interesting posters, and being threatened with a ban for racism over an 8 month old post by people who obviously don't understand what racism actually is has convinced me it's probably a good idea. If that weren't enough, Leon's banal, unrigorous, pseudointellectual attempt at a defense of the politically-correct status quo is surely the final nail in the coffin. |
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UknowsI
Joined: 16 Apr 2009
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| Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 9:50 pm Post subject: |
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| Enrico Palazzo wrote: |
| Do not touch on biology and human beings in this way. Make your arguments without that. |
I admit that the earth has many properties similar to a sphere, but I would of course never imply that it's not flat.
If it's an offence in this forum to mention that some races may have different characteristics (for example sun tolerance, immune system, height, ability to excel at running, and other characteristics which are more difficult to measure) then that's within the rights of the forum moderators, but it will somewhat limit the discussion based on political correctness. I would like to support Fox', but I also understand that it's easier for the forum to avoid the topic completely. |
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