Doomsday Cult Mass "Suicide"
August Pamplona
Brian D. Smith
Of course when to the West lies the Democratic Republic of the Congo,
where armies of six African states have been involved in a messy civil war
and to the South is Rwanda, where 800,000 people were slaughtered in that
1994 genocide...well, one can see where it may have indeed looked like the
end of the world to many of these people.
Lets see...I live in the state of Tennessee; when is the last time the
counties of Kentucky were involved in a bloody civil war and more than
800,000 were slaughtered in Alabama? I wonder what a lot of the people
around
here would be thinking about life under such circumstances? When you put
it in these terms...bringing it rather close to home it's not too difficult
to realize that there's could not have been an existence with many prospects
for the future.
----Brian of Murfreesboro
Sceptik1
This is politically incorrect to the extreme, but I think that
African-Americans should thank their lucky stars their ancestors were
brought
here. Virtually any American has a better standard of living and a safer
existence than blacks living in their ancestral homelands currently. While
some of our inner cities exhibit appalling violence, it pales in
comparison
to the horrors that have been occurring in Africa over the last few
decades.
Remember Idi Amin? Rwanda? Somalia? While I detest racism in any form, it
often draws attention away from other horrors being committed by persons
of
the same race. One reason it does is that racism is easy to see: White vs
Black; Asian vs. White, etc. But a child murdered by a person of the same
race is just as dead as if she were killed by a member of another. The
majority of killings in Rwanda were commited with machetes, not AK-47s.
Tribal warfare still reigns in the Dark Continent.
Steve
August Pamplona
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-...@efn.org [mailto:owner-...@efn.org]On Behalf Of
> Scep...@aol.com
> Sent: Sunday, 19 March, 2000 12:43
> To: ske...@efn.org
> Subject: Re: Doomsday Cult Mass "Suicide"
>
>
> This is politically incorrect to the extreme, but I think that
> African-Americans should thank their lucky stars their ancestors
> were brought
> here. Virtually any American has a better standard of living and a safer
> existence than blacks living in their ancestral homelands
> currently. While
> some of our inner cities exhibit appalling violence, it pales in
> comparison
> to the horrors that have been occurring in Africa over the last
> few decades.
Yes, in a sense one can agree. Yet, it is difficult to say
something like
that without sounding racist. For one thing there's the guilt by
association, one is most likely to hear such a statement from racists
thus,
upon hearing such a statement, the speaker is automatically assumed to be
racist. Note that one doesn't hear as often things like Irish-Americans
should thank their lucky stars their ancestors had a horrible famine that
killed a million Irish; or, Israel is such a nifty country, Jews should
thank their lucky stars that half a dozen million of them were slaughtered
in Nazi death camps in WWII (though, if Israel does really well in the
future maybe we'll hear such statements more often --particularly as the
holocaust starts seeming more and more remote). You could probably make
the
same sort of statement about nearly any thirld world country refugee group
found in the U.S. on the basis (if nothing else) of standard of living.
Yet,
I've only ever heard such a statement made about blacks.
In the end, the worst part about this sort of statement is that it
always
ends up sounding like blacks (or whatever group) should just shut up about
whatever grievances they feel they have because things would be much worse
if they were in Africa (I'm sure you are not trying to say that but that
is
what will come through in the ears of many).
Also, I tend to regard these sorts of statements as meaningful as
saying:
aren't you lucky that your dad wore the right kind of underwear that
ensured
that a certain sperm cell and not another would win the race and create
you
(or if you are into anti abortion rethoric: aren't you glad your mother
didn't abort you?). It's really not making any useful point besides
pointing
out that things are really bad in Africa and less bad in the U.S.A. --word
differently if you're one of those glass is half full guys.
> Remember Idi Amin? Rwanda? Somalia? While I detest racism in any form,
it
> often draws attention away from other horrors being committed by
> persons of
> the same race. One reason it does is that racism is easy to see: White
vs
> Black; Asian vs. White, etc. But a child murdered by a person of the
same
> race is just as dead as if she were killed by a member of another. The
In the U.S. I believe black on black (and white on white) violence
is more
common than violence across racial lines (though I'm stating this from
memory and couldn't give you any citations to back it up). Dead is dead.
> majority of killings in Rwanda were commited with machetes, not AK-47s.
> Tribal warfare still reigns in the Dark Continent.
>
> Steve
>
August Pamplona
Sceptik1
My point exactly. But my Irish ancestors DID flee Ireland to avoid
starving
to death; as did millions of others. Bad luck for an individual can still
be
good for their descendants. I do not deny that being sold into slavery was
a
horror I can scarcely comprehend; but their decendants are better off for
it,
as am I for my Irish ancestors misfortune. I do not think Israel and the
deathcamps is a good analogy, though. Jews are not necessarily better off
in
Israel than they are in, say, New York. I am not trying to put a good spin
on
slavery, because there really isn't one. Slavery, the ownership of another
human being as property, is without a doubt one of the vilest practices in
all of human history. But if their descendants are better off here than
there, that was certainly not something planned by their slavemasters. And
remember, the bulk of the killing in Africa these days is done by
tyrannical
governments.
Steve
Sceptik1
That is in fact what I said. I in no way implied that the slaves
themselves were better off; only their descendants. What I meant, and perhaps poorly
expressed, was that African-Americans are better off than their relatives
who still live in Africa. The horrors currently occurring in Africa are almost
entirely the fault of corrupt governments. That is not meant to belittle
the horror of slavery, nor the generations who had to suffer here under Jim
Crow laws. A little less knee-jerking, please.
Nick Merrit
Scep...@aol.com wrote:
> This is politically incorrect to the extreme, but I think that
> African-Americans should thank their lucky stars their ancestors were
brought
> here. Virtually any American has a better standard of living and a safer
> existence than blacks living in their ancestral homelands currently.
What a patronising statement. If you had said something along the lines of
'Many African-Americans might thank their lucky stars they live in America
and not Africa
There are some British (although thankfully fewer every year as that
generation dies out) who believe we were never properly thanked for
invading and butchering various natives, since they are all far better off
for it now. Perhaps you would like to thank me now for the potato famine,
personally and with interest...
If it is wrong to blame a modern people for the crimes of their ancestors,
it is also wrong to expect any sort of gratitude from descendents of the
victims, who got lucky.
Nick
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