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Smudgie Buggler posted:It must be seriously comforting, being able to wrap yourself in this kind of intellectual security blanket. Rather than than unwarranted smugness. Religion is the ostensible cause but really Boko Haram are just bandits high on their own farts.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:14
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icantfindaname posted:you are correct, colonialism is somehow not responsible for drawing up a country containing roughly equal numbers of muslim hausa and christian yoruba, with distinct cultures and languages They fought before they all got lumped into countries as well. So it's civil wars instead or regular ones. And even had the Europeans never shown up, it still would have been a shitshow the second they discovered they had valuable resources and began fighting over control of them, just like today. e: Yeah, colonialism in Africa was bad, but it is not the only cause of problems there. ReidRansom fucked around with this message at 23:18 on Jan 9, 2015 |
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Jan 9, 2015 23:15
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Popular Thug Drink posted:Rather than than unwarranted smugness. Question, I don't mean this in a smartass kind of way, does ideology have any effect on peoples actions? This is not me saying 'Rawr, all Islam is evil', but honestly what I know about Salafist ideology makes it sound pretty unpleasant a lot of the time.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:16
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ReidRansom posted:They fought before they all got lumped into countries as well. So it's civil wars instead or regular ones. And even had the Europeans never shown up, it still would have been a shitshow the second they discovered they had valuable resources and began fighting over control of them, just like today. And you can blame Shaka Zulu for making wars in Africa much deadlier. Before he came in and revolutionised warfare, Africa conflicts were a lot less bloody. If the whites hadn't come in (and yes the whites had an awful influence, we all know that), it's not like Africans would have lived in eternal peace with one another - they're human after all.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:20
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Eh if colonialism never happened in Africa things would at the very least certainly be different. If they'd be more or less bloody is hard to say, but Europe wasn't exactly very peaceful at the time either. Hell, no place on earth really was.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:22
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Yeah but the structure and legacy of colonial governments made it significantly more difficult to fix things. When there's no infrastructure in a society you can create infrastructure the right way, but when the infrastructure already exists but is dysfunctional or actively malevolent, you have to tear it down before you can start rebuilding
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Jan 9, 2015 23:23
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khwarezm posted:Question, I don't mean this in a smartass kind of way, does ideology have any effect on peoples actions? This is not me saying 'Rawr, all Islam is evil', but honestly what I know about Salafist ideology makes it sound pretty unpleasant a lot of the time. Sure, but you also have to consider the inverse - that some people's personalities may cause them to be more attracted to extremist ideology. Take a look at American 3%ers who have to invent a reason to parade around in camo with guns and feel like a resistance group. If the American hinterland suddenly had the same minimal level of government-imposed order as the Nigerian frontier does I'm sure you'd see a rise in organized violence, massacres, and banditry like you did on the American frontier ~120 years ago.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:24
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Popular Thug Drink posted:Sure, but you also have to consider the inverse - that some people's personalities may cause them to be more attracted to extremist ideology. then what makes islamic extremism so disproportinately attractive to psychos?
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Jan 9, 2015 23:30
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The Nigerian military is embarrasingly corrupt (and also notoriously brutal in their own right) like much of the country's government, so counting on them to beat highly motivated guerillas is a pretty bad bet. Scratch that.... they probably could beat Boko Haram by breaking out their old strategy from the Biafran war. But I doubt anyone wants to see that.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:33
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icantfindaname posted:Yeah but the structure and legacy of colonial governments made it significantly more difficult to fix things. When there's no infrastructure in a society you can create infrastructure the right way, but when the infrastructure already exists but is dysfunctional or actively malevolent, you have to tear it down before you can start rebuilding Could you explain how infrastructure can be actively malevolent in the wake of the Europeans leaving? The only thing I can think of that it could be is that it was mostly built for exports and to support a rich overclass?
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Jan 9, 2015 23:35
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A big flaming stink posted:then what makes islamic extremism so disproportinately attractive to psychos? "what is it about subsaharan african languages that make them so attractive to aids-riddled third world militia members???????????" perhaps the native culture (islam) of socially dysfunctional, economically stagnant and war torn regions (the middle east) will be widely associated with disgruntled psychos, who are created by the social dysfunction, economic stagnation and wars? nah Broken Cog posted:Could you explain how infrastructure can be actively malevolent in the wake of the Europeans leaving? The only thing I can think of it would be that maybe it would be mostly built for exports and to support a rich overclass? Colonial governments often used divide and conquer strategies among the unrelated native populations they threw together into colonial borders, and legally enshrined certain groups with rights and privileges. Beyond that administration was usually conducted solely in the language of whatever European country we're talking about because natives don't need to be involved with it, and that continues today. Look at a map of official languages in africa, it's almost entirely European ones. Physical infrastructure and industry was built to suit the needs of the colonizing country, and not the needs of an independent country. Turns out if your country's industry is 95% rubber plantations and the price of rubber is low, you're hosed because you can't eat rubber, etc icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Jan 9, 2015 |
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Jan 9, 2015 23:36
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A big flaming stink posted:then what makes islamic extremism so disproportinately attractive to psychos? places where islamic extremism is the locally popular extremism are places where it tends to be easy to commit mass violence. like you'd think saudi arabia would be a hotbed of islamic extremism but saudi arabia is wealthy and has a strong government so they find and eliminate terror cells before they happen in America's case, our extremist ideology tends to be individualist and leads to less organized violence, such as an estimated 1-1.5k murder suicides per year, the majority rooted in female rejection of a male - but we choose not to see that as terrorism Broken Cog posted:Could you explain how infrastructure can be actively malevolent in the wake of the Europeans leaving? The only thing I can think of that it could be is that it was mostly built for exports and to support a rich overclass? divide and conquer - if we, the new colonial governors of Colortown, place the small Red minority in power above the Blue majority, their ancient enemy, the Reds are more likely to fall in line and stick with us out of fear of Blue reprisals. even after we leave the Reds, who inherit the government, may use their position to continue to exploit the Blues this happened a hell of a lot during imperialism. for example in Vietnam, the French actively courted Catholic Vietnamese to government over the Buddhist majority. in the short time South Vietnam was a thing the government continued to give preferential treatment and favors to Catholics, which rightly pissed off the Buddhists. boner confessor fucked around with this message at 23:42 on Jan 9, 2015 |
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Jan 9, 2015 23:36
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One thing to keep in mind is that Nigeria is a petrostate and it's goverment, already hobbled by staggering levels of corruption, is probably struggling to cope with reduced revenues due to huge drop in prices. Also, the upcoming elections are probably going to have a huge chunk of the country unable to vote and huge levels of violence. Nigeria struggled from election violence before Boko Haram was a gleam in anyone's eye.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:39
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It's also worth mentioning that the US is currently refusing to sell heavy weaponry to Nigeria to combat Boko Haram because of their history of Human Rights abuses This lead to a rather bizarre incident in South Africa were $9.3-million in cash was seized from a Nigerian delegation who entered the country to finalize an (illegal) arms deal. Accusations have been made that high ranking government officials had agreed to look the other way in a bizarre deal to exchange arms for dead bodies. Nigeria was not happy Well, guess there's always China and Russia 
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Jan 9, 2015 23:39
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kustomkarkommando posted:It's also worth mentioning that the US is currently refusing to sell heavy weaponry to Nigeria to combat Boko Haram because of their history of Human Rights abuses A lot of their stuff is pretty East Bloc stock anyway, so at least they'd be familiar with the stuff. If it isn't stolen and sold off to two-bit warlords elsewhere on the continent for profit... Can't really blame the US for staying away from the Nigerian military. They're pretty goddamn brutal too. They just don't gloat about it like Boko Haram does.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:43
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Broken Cog posted:Could you explain how infrastructure can be actively malevolent in the wake of the Europeans leaving? The only thing I can think of that it could be is that it was mostly built for exports and to support a rich overclass? Nigerian infrastructure doesn't exist. The cities are turning into modern metropolises, but when I would travel between them by bus, the modern highways dead-ended a couple miles outside town and broken single-lane, 50-year-old crumbled roads are all that's left. On only two trips (~24 hours in a van) I saw maybe half a dozen fatal wrecks by people going off cliffs, head-on collisions, etc. These are main roads between cities of multiple-millions of people, cities that have KFCs and airports.
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Jan 9, 2015 23:45
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Popular Thug Drink posted:divide and conquer - if we, the new colonial governors of Colortown, place the small Red minority in power above the Blue majority, their ancient enemy, the Reds are more likely to fall in line and stick with us out of fear of Blue reprisals. even after we leave the Reds, who inherit the government, may use their position to continue to exploit the Blues That doesn't really have to do with infrastructure, but more with a power vacuum left behind by European population control methods. Aliquid posted:Nigerian infrastructure doesn't exist. The cities are turning into modern metropolises, but when I would travel between them by bus, the modern highways dead-ended a couple miles outside town and broken single-lane, 50-year-old crumbled roads are all that's left. On only two trips (~24 hours in a van) I saw maybe half a dozen fatal wrecks by people going off cliffs, head-on collisions, etc. These are main roads between cities of multiple-millions of people, cities that have KFCs and airports. Thanks, that explains things!
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Jan 9, 2015 23:49
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Broken Cog posted:That doesn't really have to do with infrastructure, but more with a power vacuum left behind by European population control methods. infrastructure can be both physical and organizational. the department of transportation is just as much infrastructure as the roads they maintain
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Jan 9, 2015 23:54
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What's weird is that Nigeria does have an established civil service for all college grads and they seem to accomplish stuff. Other than this, Nigerian civil society is in tatters. Since independence, there's been a concerted effort to create a national identity, and shockingly it seems to have worked in large sections of the population. Everyone there is young, and everyone in the capital especially had optimism long-term in the country, if not its current capabilities.
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Jan 10, 2015 00:04
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You're looking at a region where almost all wealth and influence is derived from control of natural resources. They lack the robust service and industrial economies of anywhere to the North, West, or East of them. It's not particularly surprising that civil war, rebellion, and general violence is ubiquitous when you not only have local actors attempting to seize control but international actors as well.
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Jan 10, 2015 00:07
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Aliquid posted:Since independence, there's been a concerted effort to create a national identity, and shockingly it seems to have worked in large sections of the population. Everyone there is young, and everyone in the capital especially had optimism long-term in the country, if not its current capabilities. Do you happen to have any articles or such with regards to this?
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Jan 10, 2015 00:10
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Vermain posted:Do you happen to have any articles or such with regards to this? Nope! Just talking with dozens of colleagues who spread pretty evenly through the country's ethnic groups. I listened to local radio a lot in Abuja and all the stations were patriotic and calling for national unity while simultaneously criticizing the Jonathan administration for being the buffoons they are. Nigerian flags are everywhere, and the green-white-green national color pattern is ubiquitous. The National Anthem and Pledge are pretty drat inclusive and nationalist, but what country's isn't? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arise,_O_Compatriots i say swears online fucked around with this message at 00:21 on Jan 10, 2015 |
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Jan 10, 2015 00:19
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Popular Thug Drink posted:infrastructure can be both physical and organizational. the department of transportation is just as much infrastructure as the roads they maintain Fair enough, I can agree with that, but I'd still consider the situation he described to be more about a power vacuum. Anyway, this is going off-topic. Aliquid posted:What's weird is that Nigeria does have an established civil service for all college grads and they seem to accomplish stuff. Other than this, Nigerian civil society is in tatters. That sounds like a shimmer of hope at least. Maybe, just maybe, things will get a bit better when the next generation gets in charge if they can keep this up.
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Jan 10, 2015 00:21
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Aaaand here come the trolls to tell us that this was the fault of Islam, and not a complex series of interlocking causes that all ultimately lead back to colonialism.
---------------- Narciss fucked around with this message at 00:31 on Jan 10, 2015 |
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Jan 10, 2015 00:27
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icantfindaname posted:"what is it about subsaharan african languages that make them so attractive to aids-riddled third world militia members???????????" The Middle East is not a particularly poor place on a global scale. More middle of the pack really.
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Jan 10, 2015 00:43
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Minus the oil money it is. In the compound statistic of war+poverty it's probably close to the bottom only beating out Africa. Other parts of the world are as poor but not nearly as violent. I guess parts of SE Asia are pretty hosed up but it's rapidly improving there and the future looks bright. For the ME, not so much
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Jan 10, 2015 00:46
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Granted, it is also how you contextualize colonialism, Nigeria's status of a petrostate and the resulting dutch disease obviously has its own impact. As far as why Islamic extremism is so extreme, you probably need to look at exactly how stable much of the Middle East and North Africa is at this point and then it isn't such a mystery. Look at Yemen which is anything has much greater problems than Islamic extremism itself and it's future as a sustainable nation is very much in question.
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Jan 10, 2015 01:04
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icantfindaname posted:Minus the oil money it is. In the compound statistic of war+poverty it's probably close to the bottom only beating out Africa. Other parts of the world are as poor but not nearly as violent. I guess parts of SE Asia are pretty hosed up but it's rapidly improving there and the future looks bright. For the ME, not so much Iran has a GDP per capita that's ~%50 higher than China and ~%400 as high as India. Iraq is similar. Egypt is right around the Chinese level. Most of the violence in the Middle East is caused by extremist so I don't know if you can blame the existence of extremism on violence when they are the ones behind most of the violence.
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Jan 10, 2015 01:18
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Egypt's GDP per capita appears to be about half of China's ($3,314.36 USD for Egypt vs. $6,807.43 USD for China) from the World Bank data that I found. Are you looking at a different set of GDP calculations? It's important to note that GDP per capita is not always a great indicator of the typical citizen's actual welfare. If we're talking about causes of violence, having a relatively poor citizenry with a comparatively wealthy elite creates the conditions for ongoing violence, whether from civil wars, invasions, or just general banditry from people doing whatever is possible to escape from poverty.
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Jan 10, 2015 01:43
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Iran is also one of the most stable, wealthiest countries in the ME, using it as an example is hilariously dishonest. In PPP per capita terms Egypt is at $7000, Iraq at $6000, Syria at $5000, Yemen and Palestine both around $2500. Compare India at $6000 and quickly rising, China at $12000, Thailand at $14000, Brazil at $15000, Malaysia at $25000
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Jan 10, 2015 01:54
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Vermain posted:It's important to note that GDP per capita is not always a great indicator of the typical citizen's actual welfare. If we're talking about causes of violence, having a relatively poor citizenry with a comparatively wealthy elite creates the conditions for ongoing violence, whether from civil wars, invasions, or just general banditry from people doing whatever is possible to escape from poverty. Yeah, you're talking about relative deprivation rather than absolute deprivation though I would add a caveat to your statement on economic inequality as it relates to civil wars, most of the major scholars that have studied "vertical" inequality (inequality between individuals) have found no correlation between the prevalence of Civil Wars and vertical inequality (based on GINI and other metrics). There have been a couple of micro studies that show that vertical equality can lead to civil wars but no macro study has shown a pattern. Most of the focus has shifted to "horizontal" inequality, economic disparity between groups (regional/ethnic etc.), which tacks closer.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:25
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My Facebook news feed has been exploding about the shooting in France. No one has said anything about this massacre.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:28
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kustomkarkommando posted:Yeah, you're talking about relative deprivation rather than absolute deprivation though I would add a caveat to your statement on economic inequality as it relates to civil wars, most of the major scholars that have studied "vertical" inequality (inequality between individuals) have found no correlation between the prevalence of Civil Wars and vertical inequality (based on GINI and other metrics). There have been a couple of micro studies that show that vertical equality can lead to civil wars but no macro study has shown a pattern. Most of the focus has shifted to "horizontal" inequality, economic disparity between groups (regional/ethnic etc.), which tacks closer. Very good to know - thank you for your correction.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:32
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enraged_camel posted:My Facebook news feed has been exploding about the shooting in France. No one has said anything about this massacre. Probably doesn't help that Boko Haram massacring villages is an almost daily/weekly occurrence.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:39
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enraged_camel posted:My Facebook news feed has been exploding about the shooting in France. No one has said anything about this massacre. Because this is common in Nigeria, although the scale of this incident seems bigger than usual. Everyone is just desensitized to "Boko Haram does terrible thing" and similar stories. I think most people can't handle the constant outrage needed to react to every terrorist attack in the world. A few days ago around the Paris attack a bomb killed 32 people in Yemen, and it doesn't have its own thread and no one is talking about it. I don't think it means people are vapid or being petty in what they are outraged about. A terror attack in Paris is rarer and much different than one in Nigeria or Yemen.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:42
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Looks like they're livin' la vida Boko  
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Jan 10, 2015 02:53
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Hybrid children watch the sea Pray for Father, roaming free
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am i incorrect in noting that "boko haram" is just a catchy name applied by the media and that boko haram as a group is more of a loosely connected group of semi-autonomous cells and not a front in the same way isis is? because i had that idea in my head, swear ive read it somewhere but couldn't find anything from a brief googling.
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Jan 10, 2015 02:54
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Your Weird Uncle posted:am i incorrect in noting that "boko haram" is just a catchy name applied by the media and that boko haram as a group is more of a loosely connected group of semi-autonomous cells and not a front in the same way isis is? because i had that idea in my head, swear ive read it somewhere but couldn't find anything from a brief googling. Yes, you are incorrect. Boko Haram, Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'Awati Wal-Jihad, is a real thing with an actual leadership structure and a solid infrastructure that is unified behind the goal of massively loving things up in the area. I mean I suppose it's possible there are just random dudes killing poo poo and calling themselves 'Boko Haram' wandering around, but mostly it's an actual group.
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Jan 10, 2015 03:11
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Boogaleeboo posted:Yes, you are incorrect. Boko Haram, Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'Awati Wal-Jihad, is a real thing with an actual leadership structure and a solid infrastructure that is unified behind the goal of massively loving things up in the area. I mean I suppose it's possible there are just random dudes killing poo poo and calling themselves 'Boko Haram' wandering around, but mostly it's an actual group. okay thank you.
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Jan 10, 2015 03:12
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Vermain posted:Egypt's GDP per capita appears to be about half of China's ($3,314.36 USD for Egypt vs. $6,807.43 USD for China) from the World Bank data that I found. Are you looking at a different set of GDP calculations? My mistake, I was looking at data for PPP. Using those numbers they are about equal, apparently a dollar in Egypt goes farther than in China. Also those numbers were from 2011-2013 so stuff may not have gone quite as much to poo poo as it is now. I'm pretty sure almost every developing nation has a wealthy elite and an impoverished underclass, I would be surprised if it was all that worse in say, Egypt than in India or China. Looking at the Gini coefficient from Wikipedia it looks like China is actually more unequal than Egypt.
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Jan 10, 2015 03:25
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