These concerts are really effective, huh?
“So far, the concerts have raised about $3 million to benefit AIDS awareness.
“An estimated 5.4 million South Africans are infected with the AIDS virus, more than any other country in the world. About 900 people die of the disease each day.”
So: was South Africa a safer, healthier nation under apartheid?
Discuss.
SA was safer under the rule of apartheid and the white government. Not because of the racial segregation …. just because society was orderly and rule of law maintained.
Had the HIV epidemic got underway during this period the blacks would have been just as vulnerable.
Of course the argument and claims that it was a conspiracy of the whites would have been much louder.
As for the future of SA ….. bleak! Remember Tribalism?
Hand in hand with superstition the tribal culture is totally vulnerable to the influence of the leftists. Mugabe is just ahead of his time!
This is such specious didactics.
Tell me, who is promoting the wave of muslim immigrants to western Eurabia [aka Europe], is it liberal idiots [redundancy] or businesses?
Good topic!! God I hate the word “Aids.” Couldn’t they change the term to “The Great Equalizer.” or “The Sword of Gideon.” Nature takes care of all excesses. Upset are we?? So am I!!
Given that AIDS is a totally preventable disease, I would say that Africa’s greatest enemy is its lack of education and the low priority their governments put on wide public education.
“Tell me, who is promoting the wave of muslim immigrants to western Eurabia [aka Europe], is it liberal idiots [redundancy] or businesses?”
“refuse to enforce immigration laws that translate into more votes and constituents for the socialists”
Um… exactly how many illegal immigrants do you think vote in any given election????
Why don’t we just immigrate all the south africans to canada. Im sure exposure to our plentiful social programs and a welfare cheque would fix all of their cultural problems. Have you ever been to an african restaurant in toronto and seen how they eat? Puts alot of their problems into perspective
So: was Germany a safer, healthier, more economically sound and politically stable nation under Hitler than before Hitler?
Discuss.
__________________
And on a related subject: what word is the conservative equivalent of leftard?
Yes, South Africa was a safer, healthier nation under apartheid. I know, I’ve lived there, and have visited countless times over the decades.
And Zimbabwe was a much more prosperous nation under the previous regime. In fact when we left Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia), the Rhodesian dollar was worth more than the Canadian dollar.
Anyone care to guess what the Zim dollar is worth now?
But many people, especially liberals, tend to prefer to rewrite history than to accept these basic historical truths.
Thank you Kate for posing the question that no one ever wants to pose.
Anyone who thinks SA is going to right itself is naive.
The patterns occurring in SA are more or less identical to those that occurred in Zimbabwe, most of them not reported in the press.
The number of farmers being killed in SA is rapidly on the rise. You want a canary in the coal mine for predicting that an African country is going down the toilet, that’s a good gone.
Also Mbeki has refused to take a tough and clear stance on Mugabe. How can that be? If SA is supposed to be the shining example of democracy in Africa, how can its leader not take a strong stance against the thug to his north?
The ANC will win majorities for the next many many elections in SA, absolutely guaranteed. The party will become more corrupt and more power hungry than it already is.
The people waiting in the wings to replace Mbeki are little Mugabes yearning to become big Mugabes.
It’s only a matter of time…
Now of course what they teach your kids in school is quite different….but then liberals and other left-wing types never want people to know the truth.
South African and Zimbabwe have always been viewed by lefties and liberals through the simple lens of black versus white.
For anyone wishing to vote with their wallets, there is a mutual fund that holds stock in companies that specifically compete with South African companies on the grounds that they’ll do well when SA finally goes down the tubes. Probably as close to a sure thing as anything on the market.
Odd @ 1:55 – the word you’re looking for is “Conservative”.
Safer I not likely.
“in 2002, South Africa experienced 114.8 murders per 100,000 inhabitants, the world’s highest murder-rate and around five times higher than that of the second-highest country, Brazil. As of 1998, South Africa led the world, although by a smaller margin, in reported murders and robberies. A 2001 report by the Institute for Security Studies concluded that “South Africa has high but manageable levels of property crime but an extraordinary high level of violent crime.”
AIDS is lowest in African countries with a strong Christian and Muslim influence.
Those are the facts.
I don’t see that apartheid made any difference one way or the other in regards to AIDS; was Botha hiding in the closet in everyone’s hut or hovel, making sure that they used condoms?
“So: was South Africa a safer, healthier nation under apartheid?”
Perhaps a better question might be, would South Africa (or all of Africa for that matter) be a healthier nation without the Catholic Church (or any church for that matter)
digitaljournal.com/article/233734/South_African_Bishop_Condoms_tainted_with_AIDS
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3176982.stm
“If you’re not “aware” of AIDS by now, is it safe to say you’re pretty much retarded?”
How aware of AIDS were women living under Taliban rule in Afghanistan? It’s hard to stay on top of health concerns when you can be stoned to death for leaving the house without a male relative tagging along, y’know.
(Maybe that counts as “cultural retardation”.)
TJ, re your 2:03 comment: Kate is away; K. Shaidle is the author of the post.
Um… exactly how many illegal immigrants do you think vote in any given election????
No one knows. What we do know is a leftist dreg running for political office in San Diego was caught on tape at a latino gathering encouraging illegals to vote and violate our laws. I do concede that illegals probably do not vote in large numbers but in close elections a few hundred could be the difference. Also keep in mind, the number of illegals in America is roughly the total population of Canada. If 10% of the illegals are violating our voting laws [there are somewhere between 20-30 million illegals in the US] that’s 2-3 million people, more than enough to swing a vote. Also the democrats are doing their best to see to it that illegals can vote by giving them drivers licenses, which is all the ID needed to vote; usually no ID is required so the donks can continue to cheat. You’ll notice the only ones opposed to showing ID when voting are the leftist miscreants.
You were blaming the economic exploitation of illegal immigrants on Liberals. If you are going to adopt an authoritative posture, try being correct.
That’s a non sequitur. Try answering the question.
You were blaming the economic exploitation of illegal immigrants on Liberals. If you are going to adopt an authoritative posture, try being correct.
While you attempt to figure out who’s promoting the massive Muslim influx into Eurabia let me answer your non sequitur. When companies hire illegals below min wage laws by definition they’re exploiting them, no one disputes this. The business lobby is merely a faction of the Republican/Democrat Party. It is the democrats who’ve adopted a policy of open borders and shameless pandering to illegals. You have a political party in America that has as one of its platforms the direct exploitation of third worlders; notice the same disregard for our immigration laws isn’t extended to non-latinos.
Sorry, my thanks to Kathy Shaidle for the post and for posing the question.
TJ: What about my question. Don’t I get your same gratitude? In the case of 1930s Germany, “many people, especially liberals, tend to prefer to rewrite history than to accept some basic historical truths” there as well. Won’t you thank me too for posing the question that no one ever wants to pose?
I’ll repeat it:
———————–
So: was Germany a safer, healthier, more economically sound and politically stable nation under Hitler than before Hitler?
Discuss.
———————–
Surely, my question was just as valuable and daring and intelligent as Kathy’s. Surely, my question is just as free of racism as Kathy’s.
AIDS is a moral question, one of personal responsibility.
The state can try to promote condom programs, but it’s biggest cost is treating the unfortunate results of a pursuit of momentary pleasure and saddling everybody else who had nothing to do with the pleasure with picking up the cost of the pain.
Hardly fair considering most of the spread is a voluntary act and that nobody else in society forced the person to perform the act which resulted in the infection.
What compassion is shown toward the taxpayer by the person who performed these immoral acts?
…i feel a concert coming on…
Canadian women support immigration from Africa because Caandian women tend to be fat and the African man is attracted to fat white women. The sows love the attention.
That explains why so many Africans, despite having AIDS infection rates up to SIXTY times higher than Canadians (source: CBC), are allowed into this country. Because fat chicks like the attention they get from foreign AIDS carriers.
To “Odd…”, I won’t take such silly bait.
Come up with something better.
I have lived in Africa, and I know a bit about what has gone on there from first hand experience.
This discussion isn’t about Germany. It’s about the mess that is Africa today.
Several posters have pointed out that South Africa is going to the dogs. I’ll add that the ANC government has also enacted racist laws and is overseeing a decline in productivity. There’s an argument to be made that the high crime rate is encouraged as a way to get whites to leave. Farmland is being bought up by the government at prices they dictate and handed over to blacks, mostly then going to waste. A European outfit that monitors these things has declared the killing of white farmers to meet the definition of genocide; interesting when the governemnt is buying them out.
Meanwhile the west is still congratulating itself (Brian Mulroney) on supplying the pressure to get rid of the Apartheid government.
I’m not blaming Mulroney. Apartheid was in itself a self-defeating system, morals aside. Mandela seemed so jolly nice, but the fact is a bunch of Russian trained commies took over. Read the party publications and you’ll see M’Beki refers to his political opposition as, “the enemy.” The ANC is planning on staying.
After Zimbabwe, the west should have learned not to force the dismantling of working systems. Push for a certain amount of change certainly but do NOT hand over power to random claimants. Black South Africans are starting to say they had it better under Apartheid – and they did NOT have it very good under that system.
Gosh Andrew, that is harsh indeed.
First hand white experience or first hand black experience? That’s the point. From a white perspective, no question it is worse now, just like from a white Christian perspective, no question it was better under Hitler. Just too bad if you are black or Jewish, respectively, eh?
set you free, of course [sarc on] you know that the unfortunates who choose to engage in dangerous sexual behaviours become VICTIMS as soon as the worst consequences of their unwise choices become evident.
Victim status then relieves these “victims” of any responsibility towards the rest of us, who are left to underwrite the huge expenses, in all kinds of ways, which are a direct result of their choice to be irresponsible.
Logically, the often self-chosen decision of these “victims” to be irresponsible should mean that the rest of us, who have to pay for their choice, are victims. Right?
Not on your life, because “the rest of us” are not considered to be a minority and, haven’t you noticed, only “minorities”–the more “exotic” and outside the norm, the better–are protected by the Charter and deserve “rights” for their “outside the envelope” behaviour.
It’s enough to make a sane, ordinary, responsible Canadian weep.
So: was Germany a safer,
6,000,000 dead
healthier,
yes if you were not one of the 6,000,000
more economically sound
no wheelbarrels needed to buy food
and politically stable nation
all other parties taken out and shot just like stalin would do.
Odd What Some Conservatives Think
Not compared to lefties, that ability to hold 2 totally contradictory views because they make you feel emotionally actualized is amazing.
So: was Germany a safer, healthier, more economically sound and politically stable nation under Hitler than before Hitler?
The short answer is no.
Given that my grandfather was putting down mutinous sailors in 1919 Kiel, not likely. The Weimar Republic with its pitched street battles and political murders was hardly the example of a stable society.
1929 brought hyper-inflation with currency having the same worth as toilet paper. I can still recall my grandmother telling stories of buying a loaf of bread which cost some $4 billion Reichsmarks. Similar to modern day Zimbabwe.
If Adolf didn’t come along, some other radicals surely would have. One need only think of the Communist government of Munich which lasted a few weeks, replete with a minister straight out of the asylum! For further reading check out the Spartacist League.
I believe the Weimar republic is a case study of how a democracy goes completely off the rails. Given that German GDP back then was ~75 million compared to 120 Billion in reparations payments for WWI; I’d say you had the ideal conditions for radicalism.
But then comparing Weimar Germany with modern day SA is probably the wrong yardstick.
The AIDs pandemic is a phenomena of disease tied to specific behaviours.
Rather the disastrous political conditions of Weimar and the Adolf follow on, were a direct consequence of the decision to best the colonial powers of the day on the field of battle.
As the Kaiser remarked to his generals of the day, upon signing the mobilisation order:
“You will regret this, gentlemen.”
Yes, just an ocean of tears and rivers of blood.
I don’t think Mandela had any idea of the depth of the problem that was rearing its head back in the 1990s. They were too busy trying to put the sword into apartheid.
The ANC more or less used similar methods to the old Spartacist League of Germany. If you didn’t support their aims, whether white or black, you would be targeted back in the 80s and early 90s.
Once the ANC got power, they spent most of their time consolidating that power. AIDs with its silent creep was not even on the agenda.
greenmamba has eloquently written all that needs to be said on this topic. My hat off to you.
“Gosh Andrew, that is harsh indeed.”
Harsh, severe, but never untrue or unjust. That is the way of the true conservative.
My understanding is that the African nations that preach abstinence and faithfulness to one’s spouse are having the most success at curbing the spread of HIV/AIDS. It is the ones that think unbridled sexual behaviour is fine as long as you use a condom (provided by the West) that are continuing to suffer the most.
The message of abstinence was shouted down at a recent AIDS Conference in Toronto. This gives the appearance that the AIDS awareness movement is more about the preservation of sexual licentiousness at all costs than saving lives.
Here’s a good trick to check if you are talking to a liberal at your next cocktail party.
Ask them if they think Mugabe is a racist. If they turn and run away because they don’t want to answer the question then you know you have definitely found a liberal.
Apollyon,
Revisionist History?
Please don’t throw out claims like that without backing them up. The fact of the matter is South Africa had a revolution against the same Europeans as North America. You happened to have lived in a era when you saw the changes happen in Southern Africa (SA, Zim, Namibia) and you happened to have only heard the stories of how great the American revolutionaries were. They are one in the same especially for people like me (24 yrs old) who did not experience the end of apartheid, the end of the French Monarchy, the end of Britain in the 13 colonies, or the end of Nazi Germany.
You have to understand that the great reverence I have for Thomas Jefferson, I quote him as often as possible, is analogous to the reverence I have for Mandela. As conservatives, libertarians and Mill-style liberals, we shouldn’t be debating on which regime was safer, we should be debating how to make the world FREER TO SELF DETERMINE. Blacks, Indians (from India), and Coloureds were not allowed voting until the fall of apartheid, something anyone who dares call themselves conservative should oppose.
Jefferson (and Washington) Freed American from British tyranny, Mandela freed South Africa from Boer and British tyranny. You’re revising history yourself if you think there wasn’t turbulence after the American revolution, the United Empire Loyalists fled it, just like TJ (and most people I work for, and my Ex) fled SA.
Oh ya, the turbulence is actually ongoing, both in America and South Africa. It’s just that South Africa has had the right of self governance for 10 years, while America is damn near 232.
So, when it comes to Nazi Germany, I don’t care if the average person was safer. I care about whether people were allowed to freely follow the path of their choice, while not obstructing the paths of others. To be born free, to live free and to die free are the goals of any free society.
Oh look, the trolls are out. Funny how they just fling poo without reading what people have written.
Hey Mr. Odd! (apt name, that) If you look back to my comment at 11:43 AM today. Its pretty much word for word what you said, in spite of the non-sequiter Nazi reference. Scary, eh?
The world is much brighter if you pull your head out of your ass and look around y’know. Smells better too.
Jon, based on your post I must have misunderstood your comment I quoted. My apologies.
I care about whether people were allowed to freely follow the path of their choice, while not obstructing the paths of others. To be born free, to live free and to die free are the goals of any free society.
Well said.
AIDS does not just belong to homosexuals; it exists in the lives of victims of rape – women, child, and man; it exists in the lives of victims of men and women who go outside a relationship and sexual-orientation – bisexuals, contract AIDS, and then give it to their partners; it exists in the lives of victims of adultery; it exists in the lives of victims who receive tainted blood transfusions; it exists in the lives of victims born with AIDS; it exists in the lives of victims who have sexual relations with people who knowingly have AIDS, but do not abstain; it exists in the lives of victims who use and/or share tainted needles; it exists in the lives of victims who fall into the category of ‘none of the above’; and the list goes on and on.
Certainly AIDS could end tomorrow if people refrained from sexual relations until marriage and then did not go outside the marriage, but mankind lives in the gutter, and unfortunately, many people, including you and me, do not have the ability to refrain from becoming a victim.
“Shame on the Joannes who allow AIDS to continue.”
by enough
Shame on you ‘enough’ for being ignorant. You need to wake up and realize you live in a world where your chances of contracting AIDS are not slim to none because you use protection; anyone can fall victim to AIDS – be careful, God has a way of teaching us lessons – thankfully God is merciful.
Joanne
“To the present time, 75 to 85 percent of AIDS cases reported are related to homosexual activity, promiscuous heterosexual sex and IV drug abuse. AIDS stubbornly refuses to spread into the population in general, even 20 years after its discovery, despite dire warnings to the contrary.
These diseases are acquired directly through the sexual behavior homosexual activists are asking Americans to legally endorse and protect. Yet, as professor Jerome Lejeune of Descartes University, Paris, says of AIDS: “Only God can truly pardon the one who violates His laws; man pardons at times; Nature never pardons at all: She is not a person.” The brutal consequences of attempting to break the natural law are not bigoted or hateful, nor are those, like Dr. Laura, Cal Thomas or Gary Morella, who try to point out the dangers and simple truths.
We are seeing the natural consequences of violating nature’s laws now. ”
From http://www.marysremnant.org/Friends/DBK/BKHomAids.html
greenmamba – great analysis of the SA situation.
Mandela is another example of the west’s naivete in the saints that they annoint.
Face it, we left the healthy and the innocent down when way back at the beginning against good medical practice we refused to treat HIV as we should have and did with TB or syphilis. The medical community and politicians caved to the pc culture.
HIV is now a life style choice with no shame in contracting it and hardly any consequences in passing it along. The planet’s navel gazing sheeple seem satisfied with this and will be until a new strain appears that is totally drug resistant and as virlulent as hell.
It’s the same crowd that is tolerant of Islam’s terrorists, can’t quite call them the homicidal Koran based maniacs that they are, for fear of shaming Muslims who damn well ought of be ashamed. It will take the next Big One from Islam to gob smack the passive into reality.
“I care about whether people were allowed to freely follow the path of their choice, while not obstructing the paths of others. To be born free, to live free and to die free are the goals of any free society.” by Jon
There you have it – people being allowed to freely follow the path of their choice; unfortunately, the choices of so many do obstruct the paths of others, and herein, the problems lie.
When non-violent people, regardless of color, live in a society in a state of fear, they may be born free and die free, but they certainly are not living free.
Everyone knew that the end of apartheid would mean the end of the rule of the white man in South Africa because of the sheer number of blacks who would be voting for black candidates, regardless, of their platforms. Now no man lives free in South Africa; talk about biting off one’s nose to spite their face.
Appolyon,
Sometimes I can be a bit obtuse. I think it’s a shame that SA is going communist rather than free market. I guess Mugabe’s stupidity hasn’t scared Mbeki enough. Or maybe SA poor is too poor to realise that the man offering equality for everyone is really looking for power for himself.
Discuss?
OK…
You, madam, are a shitdisturber, without the redeeming qualities of a gardener or a gong farmer. You use a straw man question as a “whipping boy”, not to redeem, but to demean. As expressed, this question does nothing but tarnish the reputations of some who would be better off keeping their mouth shut. It does nothing to better the situation in South Africa.
You want to be your brother’s keeper, Kathy? Then suggest how to do so more in keeping with your claimed religion. Vade retro me, Satana.
I agree with alan @ 6:18. It may be harsh but if aids was treated like TB (i.e. travel restrictions, manditory treatments, etc) maybe it might not be such an epidemic.
For the cradle of human civilization, Africa seems to have regressed in development. For my entire lifetime there have been untold quantities of money, technology and food sent to Africa and yet they are still in the stone age. Are those nasty European colonists are to blame? Well just look at what used to be a pretty developed country called Rhodesia and tell me how the (black) Africans have done with it.
The solution? Damned if I know but you can’t blame it on whitey or Mr Bush.
“An estimated 24.5 million adults and children
were living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa at the end of 2005.
During that year, an estimated 2 million people died from AIDS. The epidemic has left behind some 12 million orphaned African children.”
http://www.avert.org/subaadults.htm
alan, I do agree, and the wages of sin are death. I just feel it is foolhardy for people to think that because they refrain from immoral and/or unprotected sexual relations that AIDS will not knock on their door.
According to the United States Justice Department, a woman in America is raped every two minutes, and personally I believe it would be even higher because women tend not to report rapes because of shame and for some inexplicable reason they blame themselves. Every single one of those women are terrified that their perpetrator may have been HIV positive, and that they may in turn, through no fault of their own, contracted HIV.
Yes, you and I believe AIDS is preventable, but us and people of life-mind do not live in a vacuum. Condoms are not the answer; morality is the answer.
I’ve always found it incredible that the same country which used to jail people for spitting on the sidewalk (tuberculosis used to be pretty much 100% fatal) refused to even take the most obvious public health measure of closing gay bath houses in San Francisco in the 1970’s and 1980’s, which lead inevitably to the endemic AIDS infestation we currently “enjoy”.
Our own idiot country will hospitalize you involuntarily if you get diagnosed with TB to this day. There are a number of diseases that this is the public health action for. You get isolation, in the hospital, no choice, under armed guard if required.
AIDS, which until quite recently was invariably fatal, is not one of them. Rest assured this was a political decision, not a public health one.
My only explanation for this is that the “progressive” elements in our political establishment decided it was too much trouble to do the right thing, given that it was only a bunch of homos at stake. More votes to be had defending noble gay activists against the horrible repressive Conservatives [boo, hiss!] trying to treat HIV as a fatal disease and not some kind of lifestyle choice.
Net result, HIV in straight high school students in Toronto. Awesome leadership there progressives. Way to go!
“anyone can fall victim to AIDS….many people, including you and me, do not have the ability to refrain from becoming a victim.
“…. not true at all, Joanne, unless you are an infant born to an AIDS mother where choice and behavior aren’t at issue. AIDS is a 100% behavioral disease among adults. It’s not like you’ll get it as unsuspecting person like with TB on an airplane. You have recreational sex or you don’t, you have unprotected sex or you don’t, you share dirty needles or you don’t, every individual has a choice.
I don’t warm eat food with mayonnaise that has been sitting out in the sun, do you? Germ theory isn’t that complicated even for the illiterate.