Pilot wrote:Africa and the Mid East are prime examples of humans failing at life.
If you are referring to the mistakes the West have made in both these regions, you are correct.
If you are just being racist, ignorant and stupid, you are wrong.
Sure, we say colonization and slavery was wrong today, but was it wrong back then? No. Was environmental pollution always an issue? Was ethnic cleansing or un-provoked invasion always frowned upon by humanity?
There are many, many things today that we hold drastically different views than our ancestors have done before us. What was right and accepted back then is usually all comdemned today. Blaming colonization of the African and Mid East continents by the Occident isn't a justifiable reason to why they're worlds apart from us in terms of technology, education and standard of living. There is no one to blame but them. There are many countries today subjected to colonization and worse that are now respectable partners of the normal world community. Faced with similar situations, some countries pulled through, and some didn't purely through their own idiocy. They are represented by the Middle East and Africa. They are so far behind the rest of the world, it will never be possible for any of them to catch up. Its simply impossible for the Western world to provide for our own people and provide for the less fortunate.
Iraq was a mistake. Any military venture into Africa and the Middle east is a mistake. Period. The biggest problem now is not the war, but how to end it responsibly and effectively.[/quote][/quote]
Wow, you really did just say that.
Also, you need a history lesson too my friend. You claim we cannot blame the current state of affairs in much of the developing world on colonization, but you are 100% wrong. That is the most arrogant, ignorant thing I have ever read. Plus, it shows you have no grasp WHATSOEVER of history. BTW, colonization and imperialism didn't begin at the end of the 19th Century, but much earlier. Arabs were trading slaves in Africa prior to europeans. After seven centuries of being brutalized by the Arab slave traders, Europeans took great advantage of the existing system of blacks capturing blacks to feed the huge demand of large plantations in the Americas.So Swahili or black traders trekked throughout Africa, capturing blacks or buying prisoners from other native tribes to sell as slaves on the coast. But, the bulk of colonization DID occur during the 19th century.
The 19th century in Europe was a time of industrialization. Factories in Europe required raw materials to be manufactured into marketable products. As a result, Europeans sought both a source of raw materials, as well as, a market for manufactured goods in Africa. This economic motivation played a large role in the colonization of Africa.
Politics in Europe also led to the colonization of Africa. Nationalism-a strong of identification with and pride in one's nation-resulted in competition between European nations. This competition often resulted in wars between nations. Competition over colonial expansion in Africa was another way that national competition between European nations was demonstrated in the late 19th century. One of the causes of the Scramble for Africa, (1885-1910) which resulted in the colonization of all of Africa in just twenty-five years, was the competition between European nations. No major nation wanted to be without colonies. The competition was particularly strong between Britain, France, and Germany, the strongest European nation-states in the late 19th century.
In addition, ideologies of racial hierarchy were prevalent in Europe in the 19th century. Many Europeans viewed themselves as the most advanced civilization in the world, and some saw it as their mission to "enlighten" and "civilize" people in the rest of the world. This feeling of racial superiority and "responsibility" was captured in a poem written in 1899, The White Man's Burden by the British poet Rudyard Kipling. Many inaccurate and racialized stereotypes of African peoples, which existed at the time, were used to justify colonialism in Africa.
The colonization of Africa coincided with the expansion of Christian missionary activity in Africa. You will remember from the last module that parts of Africa, such as Ethiopia and Egypt, were home to Christians right from the beginning of Christianity as a region. However, Christianity was introduced to the rest of Africa only in the modern era. Christian missionary activity began in earnest in the 19th century during the same period of time that European countries were becoming more engaged in Africa. Historians do not all agree on what the relationship was between Christian missionary activity and colonialism. However, evidence suggests that while many missionaries opposed the harsher aspects of colonialism, they were supportive the colonization of African countries. Missionaries who supported colonialism believed that European control would provide a political environment that would facilitate missionary activity in Africa. This support for colonialism played an important role in legitimizing the colonial endeavor among the citizens of the colonizing powers in Europe.
European nations were able to make certain areas of Africa into their colonies in two main ways. Some African leaders were willing to sign treaties with Europeans for various reasons. In some cases, they saw it to their benefit to gain European allies. In other cases, there was not a clear understanding of what the treaties were about or what the consequences of them would be.
Secondly, military force was used in some cases when there was a large amount of resistance to colonial rule.All of this treaty making and territory claiming by European nations caused a competitive rush for territory in Africa. This period is sometimes referred to as the "Scramble for Africa." As a result, Chancellor Otto von Bismarck of Germany initiated a conference in 1884 for European nations to regulate the rush for territory. The conference served several main purposes. First, European nations were interested in being assured access to various important trade routes, particularly along the ***** and Congo river basins. Secondly, there was a concern to suppress the internal slave trade that was still going on in some parts of Africa. Thirdly,
a ban was put on importing firearms into Africa, which resulted in Europeans having a monopoly on guns in Africa. And finally, occupation of territories in Africa was discussed. The result of this conference was a treaty called the Treaty of Berlin. By 1900,
almost 90% of Africa was under European control.It is important to notice how borders have shifted as a result of colonialism. The borders of African countries today were imposed from the outside by European nations. Often the people who drew these borders
paid no attention to ethnolinguistic groups or existing political organization at the time of colonialization.
Sometimes they grouped together people who had never been united under the same government before. Sometimes they divided existing systems of government at the time of colonial conquest. Also, note that the borders of African colonies in 1914 were still different than what they would become in the latter part of the 20th century.
Now, smartass, keep in mind that this same type of border-drawing, imperialist/colonialist mentality took place in the Middle East. So, if you're retarded enough to sit there and tell me that colonization did NOTHING to lead to what has happened in Africa and the Mid East today, you are a failure at being an intelligent human being, you're racist and you should GTFO. You have no place discussing things which you know nothing about. Jesus christ i mean, the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 was a DIRECT result of European colonization by Belgium FFS you moron. Case in point....
From 1894 until the end of World War I, Rwanda, along with Burundi and present-day
Tanzania, was part of German East Africa. Belgium claimed it thereafter, becoming the
administering authority from 1924 to 1962. During their colonial tenure, the Germans and Belgians ruled Rwanda indirectly through Tutsi monarchs and their chiefs. The colonialists developed the socalled Hamitic hypothesis or myth, which held that the Tutsi and everything humanly superior in Central Africa came from ancient Egypt or Abyssinia. The Europeans regarded Hutu and Twa (about 3% of the population) as inferior to Tutsi. Sixty years of such prejudicial fabrications inflated Tutsi egos inordinately and crushed Hutu feelings, which coalesced into an aggressively resentful inferiority complex.
During 1933-34, the Belgians conducted a census and introduced an identity card system that indicated the Tutsi, Hutu, or Twa “ethnicity” of each person. The identity card ethnicity” of future generations was determined patrilineally; all persons were designated as having the “ethnicity” of their fathers, regardless of the “ethnicity” of their mothers. This practice, which was carried on until its abolition by the 1994 post-genocide government, had the unfortunate consequence of firmly attaching a sub-national identity to all Rwandans and thereby rigidly dividing them into categories, which, for many people, carried a negative history of dominance-subordination, superiorityinferiority, and exploitation-suffering. In their “Hutu Manifesto” of 1957, Hutu leaders referred to the identity card categories as “races,” thereby evincing how inflexible these labels had become in their minds. In fact, Hutu and Tutsi spoke the same language and practiced similar religions. They also intermarried.
In November 1959, the pro-Hutu PARMEHUTU party led a revolt that resulted in bloody
ethnic clashes and the toppling of King Kigri V. By 1963, these and other Hutu attacks had resulted in thousands of Tutsi deaths and the flight of about 130,000 Tutsi to the neighboring countries of Burundi, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) and Uganda. The land and cattle that the fleeing pastoral Tutsi left behind were quickly claimed by land-hungry, horticultural Hutu. As a result of the national election held under UN supervision in 1961, Gregoire Kayibanda (an author of the “Hutu Manifesto”) became Rwanda’s president-designate. Rwanda was declared independent on 1 July 1962.
Supported by the Tutsi-dominated government in Burundi, Rwandan Tutsi refugees there began launching unsuccessful attacks into Rwanda. These invasions were usually followed by brutal Hutu reprisals against local Tutsi. The Hutu government used a failed 1963 invasion as the pretext to launch a massive wave of repression between December 1963 and January 1964, in which an estimated 10,000 Tutsi were slaughtered. All surviving Tutsi politicians still living in Rwanda were executed.
In July 1973, Major Juvénal Habyarimana, a northern Hutu, overthrew Kayibanda, a southerner, and declared himself president of the Second Republic. Over the next few years, his security forces would eliminate former president Kayibanda and many of his high-ranking supporters as part of a plan to eradicate serious Hutu opposition. Habyarimana’s kin and regional supporters filled high level positions in the government and security forces. Close relatives of the president and his wife dominated the army, gendarmerie and, especially, the Presidential Guard. Habyarimana’s Rwanda became a single-party dictatorship. He relegated the Tutsi to the private sector. Regulations prohibited army members from marrying Tutsi. Habyarimana also maintained the “ethnic” identity card and “ethnic” quota systems of the previous regime. By the
mid-1980s, the number of Rwandan refugees in neighboring countries had surpassed one-half million. Thousands more were living in Europe and North America. Habyarimana adamantly refused to allow their return, insisting that Rwanda was already too crowded and had too little land, jobs, and food for them. However, the surrounding countries were also poor and had insufficient resources to accommodate both their own citizens and large refugee populations.
Rwandan Tutsi refugees in Uganda, together with some Rwandan Hutu refugees, formed the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) and committed themselves to return to Rwanda. During 1990-93, RPF troops conducted a number of assaults into Rwanda from Uganda in unsuccessful attempts to seize power. The fighting caused the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people.
Habyarimana retaliated by heightening internal repression against the Tutsi. From 1990 to 1992, Hutu ultra-nationalists killed an estimated 2,000 Tutsi. Owing to European pressure, especially from France, the Rwandan government allowed political parties and press freedom in the early 1990s. The result was more pro-Hutu, anti-Tutsi extremism. The December 1990 issue of a “Hutu Power” newspaper vilified the Tutsi as the common enemy. Despite strong opposition from the growing Hutu Power movement, Habyarimana’s government signed a series of agreements (the Arusha Accords) with the RPF that called for a power-sharing government with the Tutsi, return of Tutsi refugees to Rwanda, and integration of Tutsi into the armed forces. The RPF was to constitute 40% of the integrated military forces and 50% of its officer corps. For Habyarimana, the Accords amounted to a suicide note. Hutu Power leaders cried treason. If the Accords were implemented, many Hutu elitists in the government and the military would lose their privileged positions. A significant number of northern Hutu related to or allied with the powerful lineage of Habyarimana’s wife were among those who would be adversely
affected. Within days of the signing, Radio Milles Collines, a new, private station, began broadcasting anti-Accord and anti-Tutsi diatribes from Kigali.
On April 6, 1994, as Habyarimana’s presidential plane neared the Kigali Airport on his return from Dar-es-Salam, it was struck by a missile and plunged to earth, killing the president and all aboard. Although the identity of his assassins is not publicly known, many foreign observers believe Habyarimana was killed by Hutu extremists in his own military.
Within the hour following the crash, and prior to its official announcement over the radio,
members of the Interahamwe (Hutu militiamen) had begun to set up road-blocks in Kigali. During April 6th and 7th, the young men checked the identity cards of passers-by, searching for Tutsi, members of opposition parties, and human rights activists. Anyone belonging to these groups was set upon with machetes and iron bars. Radio Milles Collines blamed the RPF and a contingent of UN soldiers for Habyarimana’s death and urged revenge against the Tutsi. The Presidential Guard began killing Tutsi civilians in Ramera, a section of Kigali near the airport. Extremists in the president’s entourage had made up lists of Hutu political opponents, mostly democrats, for the first wave of murders.
The extremists exhorted the Interahamwe and ordinary Hutu to kill Tutsi and “eat their cows.” The later phrase had both symbolic and practical significance. Symbolic, because historically Tutsi supremacy had been built on cattle ownership. Practical, because it also meant looting Tutsi homes, farms, offices, businesses, churches, and so on. Theft was one of the principal weapons used to bribe people into betraying and killing their neighbors.
RPF troops from the north began fighting their way south in early April in an attempt to stop the slaughter. By July 18, the RPF had reached the Zairian border. Having defeated the Hutu militias that opposed them, the RPF unilaterally declared a cease-fire. Within a period of only three months over 750,000 Tutsi and between 10,000 to 30,000 Hutu, or 11 per cent of the total population, had been killed. About two million people were uprooted within Rwanda, while the same number of Hutu fled from Rwanda into Tanzania, Burundi, and Zaire.
The RPF and moderate Hutu political parties formed a new government on July 18, 1994, but the country was in chaos. The government pledged to implement the Arusha Accords. The government publicly committed itself to building a multiparty democracy and to discontinuing the ethnic classification system utilized by the previous regime.
If you refuse to read this post cuz it's too long, it proves you are an idiot. I study this stuff for a living, so don't talk to me about what you "know" because you're wrong and it's the epic fail to end all epic fails.
