Mob burns to death 11 elderly Kenyans accused of witchcraft
TruthSlave
Police in western Kenya tell the BBC that 11 elderly people —
between 80 and 96 years old — have been burned to death by a mob
that accused them of being witches.
Villagers told reporters they found an exercise book at a local
primary school that contained the minutes of a "witches' meeting"
that allegedly detailed who was going to be bewitched next.
The eight women and three men in the Kisii District were dragged
one by one from their houses and immolated, according to the BBC's
reporter. Their homes were then torched, and family members fled.
Reuters quotes a villager who said they burned inside their homes.
Reuters also varies on the ages of those killed.
Belief in, and fear of, witchcraft is common in the region, which
has a history of witch doctors and faith healers. Similar attacks
have occurred in the past.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2008/05/mob-burns-to-de.html
tooly
"TruthSlave" <T...@home.com> wrote in message news:g14lk7$ejo$1...@aioe.org...
Isn't Kenya where rich older British women go to get fucked?
Elvis sung
"And you said you was high class"
"But that was just a lie..."
"You never caught a rabbit, and you ain't no friend of mine..."
Chronos
time..
TruthSlave
> It's still early Middle Ages in Kenya. Poor folk is still messed up big
> time..
>
>
My initial thoughts too... but then i started to think around this report.
Where one sees 'Witches', one could see the elderly. It seems to me this
excuse to attack the isolated, or control the old, has always been at the
heart of this fear-filled label. For every accused there will be a dozen
suspects, a dozen waging tongues occupied by the new prominence of the
old label.
On the other hand, where the article mentions 'Bewitchment', i.e the mob's
justification, one could read a form of psychology. The same knowledge,
albeit in this primitive disguise, which must also lie at the roots of
our modern claims to applied psychology. The old with an acquired knowledge,
an advantage held in contempt by the latest generation, upon whom this
advantage is made a disadvantage.
Then there's the possible twist as alternative healers, are also ensnared
by the label. Alternative healers at a time when healers are needed and
science won't quite oblige the community with its answers.
The mob is certainly no answer, but neither is our dismissal of why the
mob acts in this way. Something else lies at the roots of their rage.
For all that, modernity has its own way with devils and witches, its own
ways to make capital our of our fears and our wouldbe rage. I think there's
room in the story to also see ourselves.
bigfl...@gmail.com
More importantly , to see yourself and how far you have come.
Groups do follow predictable patterns. As you rightly poit out, the
only difference between the respective cultures is the subtelty of the
'attacks'.
BOfL