From Crisis to Crisis: Zimbabwe to Greece to Montana

 

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  • #8471

    Ilargi: I recently picked a comment out of the TAE comments section and turned it into an article , because it struck me as something more people shou
    [See the full post at: From Crisis to Crisis: Zimbabwe to Greece to Montana]

    #4628
    Greenpa
    Participant

    I’ll see your Zimbabwean, and raise you a Kenyan. I met this fellow at a global warming conference, he was there as a scientist from Australia. We got along well, swapped stories- and eventually, on day 3 of the conference, we got around to the fact that his parents had been white coffee planters in Kenya; and he was 12 years old when the Mau Mau came for them. They fought back. At 12, he killed grown men.

    He looked like a spectacular survivor to me; no sign of racism I could see; still working for the world. Yeah- there’s very bad stuff out there.

    #4630
    Nassim
    Participant

    Greenpa,

    It is worth remembering that the Mau Mau were not the only killers. One can say what one likes, but they were not occupying some foreign country and imprisoning the local intelligentsia to stop them from leading the rebellion.

    https://phys.org/news/2012-07-hidden-narratives-torture.html

    #4631
    Greenpa
    Participant

    Nassim- of course. Colonialism is one one of the very ugly and evil things out there; with extremely evil consequences. Just trying to see it from the personal perspective of a 12 year old boy, who’d grown up helping his parents plant and harvest coffee. Decades later, he seemed to have no blind anger. Not that I did a lot of prying.

    #4633
    Ken Barrows
    Participant

    No disagreement on Mugabe. But, if memory serves, whites in Rhodesia declared independence from the UK in November 1965 (the month of my birth so I think I am correct). Zimbabwe because black ruled in 1980. My uncle worked as an agronomist there for a UK company until 1993.

    Seems to me there was time for some whites and blacks to take leadership (like DeKlerk and Mandela) to transition to a Zimbabwe where skilled white farmers would help the country prosper. It’s a shame that didn’t happen.

    #4634
    ashvin
    Participant

    Truly insightful, inspiring story and words.

    It is not some misanthropic preoccupation but a visceral awareness of the implications of what I describe. This is not the providence of fiction but actual historical phenomenon. It is easy to dismiss something you have not experienced but that is a position of unexamined assumption and bias that must be exposed for what it is. It is not about making someone agree with you but to at least intellectually recognize the validity of the claim and to earn respect for your position. This again is at least a seed. I often summarize my goals as radical intention coupled with diplomatic action.

    We must now engage others in whatever ways we know how. It seems that many people think of “tolerance and respect” for others as just letting them go about their business without bothering them, or finding a way to accommodate everyone’s perspectives and beliefs without diminishing them or offending anyone. I fail to see how that will be anything but counter-productive now. If anything, it shows a deep lack of respect for the other.

    Instead, we must have “radical intention coupled with diplomatic action” as Alexander so eloquently puts it. Speak honestly and listen carefully. Treat with respect and stand firm with your convictions. Teach what you know and learn what you don’t. This type of mutual engagement is much easier said than done, especially in bitter climates, but I think sometimes we will find that doing it turns out to be much easier than we thought it would be. If it can be done in the most politically, socially, ethnically and spiritually fractured environments, then it can be done anywhere.

    #4635
    ZuluBuddha
    Member

    Ken, You are absolutely correct. Mugabe and the Zanu-PF were monsters born of Rhodesian parents. Ian Smith and the intractable and reactionary Rhodesian Front created the militant backlash that resulted in the Bush War by not working with the moderates to create a more inclusive and democratic system which they had ample opportunity to do so. On the other hand though it should be noted that the lions share of white owned farms were purchased after the war and the majority of whites that stayed in Zimbabwe were of a different mindset than the hardline Rhodies. Mostly the old guard went to South Africa, while those that stayed like my family truly identified Zim as home and worked to create something new. Even during the war my family was generally left alone. My Grandfathers Irish upbringing gave him a deep empathy for the colonized which was instilled in us. When he died hundreds of the locals came to his funeral and played the drums well in to the night. We all learned Shona growing up, my father even taught me to sing Ishe Komberera (God Bless Africa) formerly the Zim national Anthem (replaced by something more militant these days). My father started one of the first organic farms in Zim as well as a successful furniture factory training and employing highly skilled carpenters. Our family helped to start schools in the local communities as well as provide farm land. And when the Move For Democratice Change started gaining traction many whites and blacks from all walks of life organized together. My father was even abducted and disappeared for nearly two weeks for organizing with them. Things were not perfect, there was a lot of imbalance to be sure (a large part of which was simply access to the credit markets provided to Europeans) and I have abundant criticism of White Africa. However most of those that stayed in Zim truly believed in a new society and worked hard to make a new country. Ultimately what it comes down to in my view is a cynical power play by the Zanu-PF. They had a cultural wound they knew they could exploit for power and the economic instability produced from exploiting simply acted to concentrate economic power in there hands by eliminating any alternatives.

    #4636

    For those who hadn’t got it yet, ZuluBuddha is Alexander’s nom de plume.

    #4637
    TheTrivium4TW
    Participant

    A “club” of financial criminals have captured most western governments and financial systems and installed Debt Money Tyranny – a fraudulent, debt based monetary system that systematically transfers the monetary wealth from the productive class to the parasitic financial crime club class.

    This fraud operates within a veneer of “free market” so that this club of criminal internationals financiers can then use their fraudulently obtained “debt receipt” (society’s debt, which is unpayable since their criminal club holds the debt receipt “money” required to pay it back) to secure control of the establishment organizations within society.

    This further entrenches their control over the collective mind and all establishment interests.

    States another way, it is a sophisticated financial tyranny is engineered to hurt the citizen badly by the time the whole process has run its course.

    A graph of money flows in this fraudulent system:

    https://www.keepandshare.com/doc/3325954/debt-dollar-tyranny-2-54k?tr=77

    Piled on top of the fraudulent foundation illustrated in the above money flow graph is the criminal bubble / bust operation being run by Big Finance Capital (a descriptive name of the criminal class running this operation – the wealthiest, most politically connected people on the planet Earth):

    https://www.keepandshare.com/doc/3324744/wmdebt-graph-3-79k?tr=77

    It’s all illegal – and they lie about a nonexistent “dual mandate” in order to cover the tracks from the people not educated in how to perform intellectual self defense via the Trivium.

    “The Ultimate History Lesson” with John Taylor Gatto (free on Youtube) explains the rational why this small groupd of criminal [D]elites feels they can commit unlimited crime against the rest of us AND THAT THIS IS DOING US A FAVOR!

    Netflix “the Empire in Africa” to see how this “club” of criminals oppresses and divides indigenous populations in order to asset strip nations.

    Then Netflix “A Film Unfinished” about raw footage Hitler took of the Warsaw Ghetto a few weeks before he shipped these people to the concentration camps.

    Your assignment – tell us all the fundamental difference between the current crop of [D]elites that rig fraudulent societal asset stripping monetary systems and deny resource opportunities so that 25 million people die of malnutrition every year and Hitler’s Warsaw Ghetto model other than size of real estate and lack of walls.

    Oh, and the fact this current crop of psychopaths are 1) much better marketers and 2) kill people in numbers Hitler could never imagine… 250 MILLION in a decade, all under the radar of the average citizen intellectual self defense capabilities.

    One might argue, as one retired physics professor did to me, that this is the result of the impoverished being “backwards” in some fashion.

    My retort is that sub Saharan Africa would look like the pinnacle of civilization relative to an America where the power and resources were cut off for a year.

    Vote “Yes” and get the word out on California Prop 37 – Label Untested GMO Pesticide “Food”

    #4640

    “I have seen it twice now.”

    This line impacted me the most. The fact that it has happened elsewhere does not mean that it will happen where I am now? Ignorance in the face of a line like that is downright stupid. Running off to the worst possible conclusion is scary. Yet aiming for the middle ground may also turn out to be ignorance.

    #4641
    sparky
    Member

    Hello…great article….I was thinking that I needed to stop reading sites such as this because it is sometimes too much information and a bit overwhelming. I was happy to see a positive note…I too live in Bozeman; I have a degree from the U of Ms….Mississippi….in economics but I now am a journeyman electrician…I do all types of electrical but am trying to branch into solar as much as possible.as I am also a big reader of the Oil Drum..I have done about 20 solar hookups..anyway If I can be of service let me know; I will offer all my services for free…my email is [email protected] I live on south sixth ave….we must all work together ….keep up the good work!…Daniel…

    #4642
    Nassim
    Participant

    ZuluBuddha,

    I sympathise with your experiences. I had to leave Egypt in ’62 because the government confiscated most businesses and farmland including my family’s factory, farmland and even home – it is now the HQ of their Social Security Organisation, which is rather funny when you think about it. 🙂

    However, there is one common factor between these two countries besides the obvious ones like foreign meddling, the corrupt military and so on. In both these countries the population was exploding. Egypt had 20 million when I was born in 1950 and now has around 80 million. In Zimbabwe, 42% of the population is 14 or less. Of course, the early deaths tend to skew the distribution, but it is not unusual for a woman to have 8+ children in places that part of the world. Also, let’s not forget that a huge number left the place.

    #4643
    Doubled
    Participant

    Peak oil.com has a very good article today: “Trade-Off”: A Study In Global Systemic Collapse

    Below is an executive summary and comments about the paper. Also I have included the URL to the complete paper (PDF warning)

    Page 40 had a very lead in:

    IV. Converging Crises in the Financial, Banking & Monetary System

    In this section the context in which an unprecedented and catastrophic shock could occur sometime within this decade is presented.
    The first sub-section considers the implications of massive credit expansion and global imbalances over decades. At the heart of this is too much debt relative to GDP.

    https://peakoil.com/generalideas/trade-off-a-study-in-global-systemic-col…

    https://www.scribd.com/doc/100103277/Financial-System-Supply-Chain-Cross-…

    DAD

    #4645
    Alexander Ac
    Member

    BI has and excellent article on “catastrophic China deleveraging”:

    https://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-end-gamethe-dark-side-of-a-great-deleveraging-2012-7

    Alex

    #4646
    snuffy
    Participant

    Its interesting to listen to one who has been in a collapse,or two…and lived to tell the tale.This post reminds me of ferfal from Argentina,but his take is much more security-oriented. Building community is the key,as far as I can see,but that take time we all might not have.Things appear to be cracking around the edges as we speak .

    Bee good,or
    Bee careful

    snuffy

    #4657
    mrawlings
    Member

    One of the things that really jumped out at me was the following:
    “Needless to say something like this has a huge impact on the psyche of a teenager. It pretty much wiped out any normalcy bias about what to expect from our political or economic systems. It also seeded a deep philosophical and practical anarchism within me.”
    Late in my teens I experienced a medical condition/situation that left me with some pretty big scars and a mild case of PTSD- a tumor the size of a tennis ball in my nasal cavity. 19 years later everything is fine, but contemplating a potentially life threatening diagnosis (for a period of a few months until after the surgery, it could not be determined whether the tumor was cancerous or not) certainly did a number on my normalcy bias. I’ve often wondered to what degree this formative experience has fostered in me a willingness to contemplate, discuss and accept unpleasant realities.
    As an avid consumer of news and information from a variety of sources I am increasingly dismayed at what seems to me to be a pattern of “reaction formation,” a determined and willful self-deception in the face of facts that present clear challenges to conventional thinking about the nature of the reality and our relationship to it. Even among people who have in the past openly expressed support for or understanding of concepts of resource limits; damage to ecosystems through pollution/degradation; the ponzi-nature of the global economy; etc- I am seeing among even these people a desperateness to cling to the status quo, to the extent that they are engaging in mental contortions to find ways to explain how everything is going to work out fine because of … fill in the blank.
    I really find myself feeling more discouraged than ever, when at a time that I might expect to see more people waking up, I see them going even more determinately to sleep. I expect this sort of thing from those in the mainstream media, politics, academia, and the like- but from where I stand even people who seemed to know which way the wind is blowing, even some of these people are beginning to engage in magical thinking. To paraphrase JHK, if we can’t come up with even a basic, general consensus about the reality we face, we are well and truly fucked. Of course I don’t expect people who think the world is 6000 years old and that any day Jesus will be coming back to rain hellfire upon the likes of us sinners to come together with us to build a consensus about the nature of reality. But what is it going to take to shake people out of the Normalcy Bias that they cling to ever more desperately with each passing day?

    #4672
    snuffy
    Participant

    Mrawlings,

    I can think of a number of things that will ‘get the attention’of those who are living a “Normality Bias”…but most of them occur at the same time their world is crashing down around their ears…starvation,lawless thugs[besides the police],fuel shortages…all of these “experiences”will educate anyone with 2 brain cells working in tandem,regardless of religious conviction,that all is not well with their happy world.

    But it takes a hellava shock to wake some folks…

    Bee good,or
    Bee careful

    snuffy

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