The future of South Africa in your opinion [serious]

[MrFun]

On a scale of 1 to 10, how good did it make you feel to post that MrFun? Considering how often you seem to be posting such garbage I'm guessing it must be at least an 8.

I'll get back to you on this.

[Dinner]

Crapsack, like all its neighbours. Except with nukes. If the US extracts the nukes when tribal politics start getting out of hand, then simply a crapsack.

All nuclear weapons material was handed over to the US for disposal during the last days of the white minority government. It seems F.W. DeClerk didn't like the idea of blacks with nuclear weapons.

[C0ckney]

jacob zuma is taking his role as father of the nation very seriously, some woman (not one of his half dozen or so wives) giving birth to his 20th (!) child.

south africa is going to face very serious problems in the coming years. they have a problem with the educated (white) middle class wanting to leave. they have a massive AIDS epidemic (in the region of 20% of the population and there are over 1 million 'AIDS orphans'), which the years of confusion, muddled policy, and flat out denial from the leaders has worsened. they have a massive underclass of people with no education and no work, who live in shantytowns with little sanitation and where violence is endemic.

the ANC seems to have, like many liberation movements once liberation is achieved, run out of ideas for moving the country forward and solving its problems. the rise of a credible opposition in the last election is a good sign though i think.

[aneeshm]

All nuclear weapons material was handed over to the US for disposal during the last days of the white minority government. It seems F.W. DeClerk didn't like the idea of blacks with nuclear weapons.

With good reason, it now seems; imagine the current mess with nuclear weapons.

[aneeshm]

Less provocatively, it is a known trend that in any country where the franchise is abruptly extended to a population not invested in democratic institutions, and which in fact resents the creators of those institutions, the result is a royal (democratic?) mess. Couple this with the fact that the "black" (or, in other countries, underclass) parties who inevitably come to power as the result of such a transition never have experience with governance, and are generally corrupt, comprised of the lumpen-proletariat or representative of their wishes, and rely on in-group patronage at the expense of the longevity of national institutions to survive, and adding nuclear weapons to the mix gives you a recipe for nuclear devastation.

Knowing this, getting rid of SA's nuclear weapons was a very foresighted thing to do.

[KrazyHorse]

Cali: "Thank God I'm an anglo-saxon"
Hera: "Thank God I'm white"
Annie: "Thank God I'm not Dalit"

[KrazyHorse]

The poly server strikes again!

[Dinner]

BTW my prediction for South Africa is that they continue to see white flight of the middle class and upper class due to insane racial laws biased against white people. Sure, part of this is uneducated Africaans who were guaranteed life time government employment at middle class wages simply because they are white (and so they're now hurting because this set a side is now gone) but much more is that middle and upper class educated English speaking white are leaving the country in record numbers causing a brain drain of the nation's most valuable (economically speaking) people. To make matters worse eastern European whites who moved to South Africa after 1991 are now leaving largely because even though they never personally benefited from white minority rule, how could they since they didn't live in the country then, they're now being attacked by punishing laws requiring all businesses to sell majority stacks to blacks at discount rates or to hire blacks preferentially to whites even if the blacks are less qualified. All of this adds up to an environment which is hostile to white, even whites who didn't live in South Africa during Apartheid, so they're picking up their marbles and going some where else. Worse the black majority even attacks Asians (be they East Asians or South Asians) as being privelaged compared to blacks so it is not just whites but Asians who also are leaving. Those are the two best educated and most entrepreneurial people in South Africa. You can't continue such racially based politics without alienating people of other races and worse these polices are attacking innocent people and chasing them out of the country simply because of their race. You won't make a successful country by eliminating the best, the brightest, the most educated, and the people with the most money. It's simply impossible.

You're going to end up with only the people who cannot leave (be they black, white, or Asian) and with a falling economy. We've seen this over and over again in the history of post colonial Africa so it seems some people never do learn.

[Pekka]

I think the problem is quite common vicious circle we've seen over and over again.

1) Ruling class/group/etc rapes the people and their money's worth and acts like pigs with imaginary cigars hanging from their mouths, laughing heart-attack laugh, because they are accustomed to being close to it anyway with their lifestyles.
2) The "common people" first submit, but then wake up after they get an inspiring person/group/party to see what's going on.
3) The "common people" have new found hope. They actually believe they can take over and it is justified. This is particularly dangerous, as it makes violence acceptable, and "our side is justified to" do anything.
4) Charismatic or accepted leader or group then excites the people who had been previously done wrong.
5) They take power.
6) And now.... they don't know what the hell to do with it.
7) Corruption, except it's not controlled and institutionalized like before, now it's chaotic.
8) If you want something, you better have money or know someone. The ones in power now favor their own friends and relatives, who in turn include psychopaths, murderers and other nice people, who are given carte blanche to live their fantasies.

and so forth.

[bc1871]

South Africa will end up as bad, if not worse than Rhodesia currently is.

[Caligastia]

I'll get back to you on this.

Please don't.

[MrFun]

Cali: "Thank God I'm an anglo-saxon"
Hera: "Thank God I'm white"
Annie: "Thank God I'm not Dalit"

KH and the TRUTH

[Heraclitus]

I dissagre, I'm an atheist most of the time. And when I'm not I'm not egoistical enough to say "thank God".

[rah]

woooooosh

[MrFun]

I dissagre, I'm an atheist most of the time. And when I'm not I'm not egoistical enough to say "than God".

We know you better than you know yourself.