The Myth of White South African Genocide

The Myth of White Genocide

An Unfinished Civil War Inspires a Global Delusion

By James Pogue

Harper’s

March 2019

Numbers from the article:

56million people in South Africa

·      8% are white, own 72% of the rural land

o   2.7million are Afrikaners (of Dutch descent)

·      81% are black, own 4% of rural land

o   5million squatters

·      14million live in extreme poverty

o   13,310 are white living in squatter camps

·      2017: 20,000 killed, 62 were white

Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) – Black dominated political party championing land redistribution

• 25 of 400 National Assembly Seats
• Leader Says: Have more black children as a political weapon.

 ANC-Led Government Averse to Nationalizing Land

• ANC Charter: “The Land Shall Be Shared Among Those Who Work It!”
• 1994, Whites Would Not Sell Land at Fair Market Prices
•  Zimbabwe and Mozambique Land Redistribution Models Unacceptable
•  Government of South Africa Prefers Individual Ownership, Direct State Ownership, Trusts, Communal Land Custodianship. But, doesn’t know how to get there without international outcry or shedding white blood. The latter of which would take the matter away from being about reaching economic reconciliation and equality and force the Western dominated world media to portray it as white genocide. A most unenviable position for GOSA.

Principles, Key Factors:

Democracy

Rule of Law

Reconciliation

25% of Population Live in Extreme Poverty

 Harper's

Harper's

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Just looking at the numbers above and comparing them to the principles below them, I don’t see how South African society can remain as it is indefinitely.

There can be no real or sustainable democracy, rule of law or reconciliation until matters of the unequal distribution of wealth, including land ownership, are resolved. Something must give.

Moral Politics in America

The excerpt at the end of this post is from philosopher Massimo Pigliucci. It helps me understand the fundamental moral divide between Republicans and Democrats. They value and pursue different things.

I post this, in part, in response to friends and acquaintances who discourage my tendency to make moral judgments about the two US political parties as they currently exist.

I accept that not all Republicans are selfish, heartless, money-grubbing materialists. And yes, limousine liberals abound among Democrats. Here I’m addressing the overarching principles and worldviews of the two parties as they currently are. I’m setting aside the cronyism of both parties and the dead-end collapse inherent in unrestrained consumer capitalism, for now.

Emphasizing the free, ‘legal’ accumulation of money, economic policies that favor relatively unfettered consumer capitalism, and a preference for a small, weak federal government characterizes the GOP.

Democrats emphasize using governmental means to achieve greater, more equitable wealth distribution in society and more widespread individual and societal wellbeing.

Deepfakes, Truth, and the American Way

Deepfake Videos Are Getting Real, and That’s a Problem

Hilke Shellmann

The Wall Street Journal

October 15, 2018

Seeing isn’t believing anymore. Deep-learning computer applications can now generate fake video and audio recordings that look strikingly real.

In a recent video published by researchers to show how the technology works, an actor sits in front of a camera moving his face. The computer then generates the same expressions in real time on an existing video of Barack Obama. When the actor shakes his head, the former president shakes his head as well. When he speaks, Mr. Obama speaks as well.

“This is a big deal,” Hany Farid, computer science professor at Dartmouth College, told The Wall Street Journal. “You can literally put into a person’s mouth anything you want.”

Prof. Christian Theobalt, part of a team working on the technology at the Max-Planck-Institute for Informatics in Germany, said he is motivated by the creative possibilities that it holds for the future.

He said researchers have developed forensic methods to detect fakes.

But Prof. Farid says researchers who push computer-generated technology need to think about the consequences these computer-generated fakes could have for society. He believes forensic experts are being outpaced by the development of fakes and that there is no method yet that can detect them all.

“How are we going to believe anything anymore that we see? And so to me that’s a real threat to our democracy,” Mr. Farid said.

In the video above, WSJ’s Jason Bellini explores this world of realistic video fakes. He gets deepfaked himself, and thanks to a deep-learning application, he can now dance like Bruno Mars. He also learns of the dark side of this technology, through one victim whose life has been deeply affected by deepfakes, and why others believe they could even lead to war.

Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ex83dhTn0IU

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I am grateful to a friend for drawing my attention to the above report and video. It’s not the tech that should concern us. It’s the owners of the tech and the moral and ethical truth they control with it that we should be very concerned about.

Deepfakes are to truth what makeup is to beauty. Both are tools of deceit and manipulation.

Batshittery - An Anthropological Commentary

The Cult That Made Your Grandmother’s Fine Silverware

a video on

Today I Found Out - Feed Your Brain

  

A friend asked what I as an ethnographer, a student of Humankind, make of the cult reported on in the above video. My answer: “Batshittery americana domesticus, anthropologically speaking.”

This genus, species and subspecies belongs to the taxonomic family of religious cults and other beliefs and practices that have failed to find a place in mainstream American life. Such cults and their beliefs are not in a dustbin with similar nonsense the likes of which are never to be seen again. This one and its sundry mutant variants await us in a holding pattern in the Ethnosphere. Awaiting what? Awaiting their chance to rejoin us and hopefully get into the mainstream of American thinking. That is, as a new and improved human-made supernatural myth to propel us further toward our place in Abrahamic heaven.

But, shockingly (well, not too shockingly), such bizarre approaches, in all spheres of human life, have become more highly feasible options for Americans in recent years. That is, as we careen toward full national batshittery under the pastoral presidential leadership of God’s current anointed one, Junior Jesus Golden Hair.

African Philosophy

Thank you to those who attended Owl & Ibis on February 12th where a presentation and slideshow, "African Philosophy", was given by Immy Rose Lassiter and yours truly.

A PDF of the slideshow is here. All photos of African life by JEL.

We covered a lot of topics yet had plenty of time for questions and discussion.

~ Overview of Africa's Geography, Demography and Major Foreign Influences

~ What, Whose African Philosophy?

~ "Culture Philosophy" & Ethnophilosophy

~ African Culture and Personality

~ "Traditional" African Cultural Characteristics

~ Revitalizing, Reverting to "Traditional" African Ways

~ Case Study: The Bamasaaba of Eastern Uganda

~ Take Home Handout: Excerpts from the book, Circumcision and Coffee in Uganda by yours truly.

Sincere thanks to the attendees for their interest and their great questions and comments!

}:> ~:) 

United The World Stands, Divided It Falls – Choosing Capitalism Or Socialism

Virtue can only flourish among equals.

Mary Wollstonecraft

1759-1797

Davos is a Microcosm of the World – And the Outlook is Grim

Fareed Zakaria

January 24, 2019

Washington Post

“This, then, is the post-American world. Not one marked by Chinese dominance or Asian arrogance. Not an outright anti-American one, but one in which many yearn for a greater U.S. presence. One in which countries are freelancing, narrowly pursuing their own interests, and hoping that the framework of international order remains reasonably stable. But with no one actively shoring up the international system, the great question remains: In a world without leaders, will that system over time weaken and eventually crumble?”

This is the Gloom and Doom Fareed. Below is an essay a week later where he comes on as Mr. Sunshine and Hope. In both essays he ignores the fatally flawed, thousand pound gorilla in the room – consumer crony capitalism.

Now, let’s consider the above, his first essay.

Regrettably, the US is not withdrawing from world leadership because it believes the system is flawed and it is looking for a more sustainable, equitable way forward. We, our current leaders, are withdrawing because they (wrongly) believe their nationalist power, wealth and world hegemony can be increased and more assured by going it alone.

Trump, his GOP members generally but not all of them, claim and reassure their patrons and voter base with this ill-founded notion: “It’s a social Darwinist* world out there! No more operating as one nation among equals. We shall take the lead, dominate through economics and military threat and force, and let all others fare as best they can in our wake. The only globalism** we adhere to is one where the U.S. economically dominates but allows political spheres of influence among its adversary nations. Globalization for us is a very flat pyramid of the world’s nations with the U.S. at the apex. So help us God!"

This national versus international approach is an analogous, individual-skewed take on the individual-group dynamic, the most fundamental aspect of being human. We recently looked at this dynamic in depth at Owl & Ibis – A Confluence of Minds, through my presentation of The Evolution of Western Individualism, Part I and Part II. The analogy being made here is between the individual-group dynamic and a nationalism-globalism dynamic now favoring nationalism.

From a consideration of prehistory, history and current events O&I concluded that a political and economic approach skewed in either direction - one favoring sustained, hardline, libertarian, individual freedom or one that favors fascism, slavery, group dominance - is not better for human wellbeing and flourishing than a sustained balance between the two. That, since the origins of agriculture and urbanization the balance has shifted back and forth between favoring collectivism then favoring individualism. O&I believes there is a deep need among most of Humankind, something fundamental to our cultural nature, to ensure that one approach does not dominate the other indefinitely.

Here's another aspect of that same human nature, something contradictory: