American hostage beheaded.

[Rob Lister]

I'm not sure of the exact situation of the servitude described in your link, ...

***** Not my link, yours. Perhaps you mislinked? Perhaps I misclicked? rl

...but the slave trade in the Sudan is very much 'slavery' as we know it. Missionaries from Western countries have been buying freedom for slaves from the Sudanese for years. There are charities that are established to do just that... these are slaves, owned people, pure and simple.

Once again, do you have a reference?

Added in edit: I think it could certainly be argued that in many, if not most Arab states, slavery exists in terms of gender. Women have no say whatsoever in most matters and are subject to the whims of their husbands. Their husbands can do to them what they want without (much) interference from up to and including killing them. (humorous and not TOO serious comparison: much like it is here except for the gender of the slaveowner)

 

[hammegk]

Not in the Congo, apparently, nor Burma. Chechnya's right out. Zimbabwe? Forget it. Iraq - yes. Because it was the birthplace of civilisation, perhaps?

Perhaps not. What don't you understand about 1st world economies and a few million barrels per day of oil production?

 

[crackmonkey]

The link I provided was the first that popped up on Google. I've been aware of this situation for years - it's been reported on for some time. I have no links handy - Google 'Sudan slave trade' and see for yourself.

 

[Rob Lister]

The link I provided was the first that popped up on Google. I've been aware of this situation for years - it's been reported on for some time. I have no links handy - Google 'Sudan slave trade' and see for yourself.

Correct me if I'm mistaken but are you suggesting it is up to me to prove you are incorrect in your assertion?

 

[Mycroft]

Originally posted by Rob Lister
Correct me if I'm mistaken but are you suggesting it is up to me to prove you are incorrect in your assertion?

Well, you can't very well ask him to prove his own statement to be incorrect.

I don't think there is an official rule, but to me the informal nature of internet discussions implies that the burden to find information should be on the person who wants it. People can know many things without having handy links to prove it, people did know things before the internet came along. At the same time, being able to find information on the internet doesn't guarantee the information is true. If you want to cry "◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊!" you might be able to goad someone into doing the research for you, but it's still optional and not taking the effort doesn't necessarily mean concession.

You’re question on slavery is a good one. I also hear the charge leveled from time to time and wonder what is meant by it. I have read a few articles here and there, but in my opinion a few isolated examples are not enough to condemn an entire culture.

Here are a few such isolated examples:

http://www.eastwestcenter.org/events-en-detail.asp?news_ID=131

http://www.antislavery.org/archive/submission/submission2003-UAE.htm

http://www.antislavery.org/archive/submission/submission2002-sudan.htm

If you decide to do more research on your own, I'd be interested in the results.

 

[CapelDodger]

The Nuba mountains of Sudan have been a traditional source of slaves for Egypt and beyond, and there have been many reports of continuing raids in recent years. There has certainly been warfare going on there, with a pattern of government raids into the mountains at harvest-time to force the people up into the hills and steal or trash the crops. Truth is the first casualty of war, of course, and the tradition of slaving might have prompted these claims as propaganda. (Farrakhan, as I recall, denies the claims, which is perhaps a good reason for believing them. Islamic slaving is a bit of a problem for him.)

One thing for certain is that Islam does not have a problem with slavery. Like the Bible, the Koran deals with how slaves should be treated rather than condemning the practice. The Ottomans banned the practice in the 19thCE (I think after the Treaty of Berlin, 1878) under European pressure, but we can imagine how well that was enforced in the Arabian provinces. Ottoman administration in those days was notoriously corrupt and incompetent.

 

[CapelDodger]

from crackmonkey:

Leaving these problems as internal matters to be sorted out by the Islamic world is to abandon the search for a solution forever. The Islamic world (at least the African and Middle-Eastern branch) is as dysfunctional as it gets.

Something that occurred in Christendom, but not in the Muslim world, was the conflict between the spiritual and secular authorites - symbolised by the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor, and the parties of the Guelphs and the Ghibbelines. The secular authorities won and achieved separation of church and state, which reached its apotheosis in the US Constitution. (Then the French kicked the Pope out of Rome; gotta love those guys.) In Islam this conflict never happened; secular and spiritual were too closely entwined in what was, essentially, a religious empire. It was the limitation of Papal power that enabled the evolution of nation-states in Europe, and makes that evolution difficult to achieve in the Islamic world.

What the solution is I don't know. Perhaps a thousand years of conflict such as Christendom went through, but compressed into a shorter period by modern technologies. Basically I despair, which is probably why total disengagement (which I realise is impracticable) appeals to me.

 

[TillEulenspiegel]

The point isn't the motivation or the scale, it's that you have to appreciate that local cultures differ.

I agree with your assement, I thought that was in the body of my objection. I think that's not an exclusively American trait, I believe that You, our cousins across the pond, have a certain sense of propriety as well and when certain means of conduct ,even in war, are exceeded the reaction tends to be one of dis-belief. Even after all the wars in the 20th century.

Americans tend to think by default that even if another culture is startlingly different , that they want American style democracy , religious freedoms, women's rights, heck even the same kind of food. Do you remember when the USAF dropped supplies on Afghans they didn't know what the hell to do with peanut butter, so it became a toy. After the war in Vietnam you would think that we would reassess our beliefs. It has not happened. The US people were ill equipt psychologically to see the axiom "Wars are won in the will" played out in practice on their TV screens night after night. The same is true now, with a foe that is more then happy to die and harm innocents without reservation.

OOT perhaps . I believe that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are metastasizing into a greater, longer , broader culture war. I am not optimistic of the path or the outcome.

 

[CapelDodger]

TillEulenspiegel: The behaviour of lumpen Brits abroad is astonishing. At a Turkey-England soccer match a few years ago there were British supporters dropping their trousers - it passes for humour with them - in bars where there were local women working. "We was just 'aving a bit of fun ..." Two dead by morning.

At the diplomatic and government level, though, Europeans are way ahead of the US in appreciating cultural differences. Hardly surprising, given their history. This can be seen in the different approaches the UK and the US have taken in Iraq. While hardly perfect, the Brits have been less aggravating than the Yanks.

 

[CapelDodger]

from TiiEulenspeigel:

I believe that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are metastasizing into a greater, longer , broader culture war. I am not optimistic of the path or the outcome.

I'm rather more optimistic (unusal for a cynic like me). Actions like these beheadings revolt most Muslims, and they are the sea that the Islamists must swim in. There's good news from Algeria, where the top leaders of the Islamists have been killed. that revolting revolt seems to be on its last legs. It was one of the earliest results of the returning Afghan veterans, so perhaps these movements only have a limited life-span. All the same, let's keep our powder dry.

 

[Blue Monk]

from TiiEulenspeigel:

I'm rather more optimistic (unusal for a cynic like me). Actions like these beheadings revolt most Muslims, and they are the sea that the Islamists must swim in. There's good news from Algeria, where the top leaders of the Islamists have been killed. that revolting revolt seems to be on its last legs. It was one of the earliest results of the returning Afghan veterans, so perhaps these movements only have a limited life-span. All the same, let's keep our powder dry.

I think it should also be noted the high number of innocent Iraqis that are being killed by terrorists in Iraq. Not only do the deaths of civilians consistently outnumber the deaths of soldiers in these attacks against our military, their targeting of Iraqi officials is often producing only Muslim deaths.

I suspect that even among those with extreme views who might view civilian casualties as a result of an attack on a military target as collateral damage might not be as comfortable with this Muslim on Muslim violence.

 

[Skeptic]

At the diplomatic and government level, though, Europeans are way ahead of the US in appreciating cultural differences.

If what you mean by that is that Europeans are way ahead of Americans in "appreciating" that slavery, female circumcision, enshrined male superiority, dictatorial government, etc. are really "part of their culture" so nothing should be done about it, you're right.

This can be seen in the different approaches the UK and the US have taken in Iraq. While hardly perfect, the Brits have been less aggravating than the Yanks.

The truth is, what the Europeans call a "less agressive policy" and a "sophisticated understanding of cultural differences" really means "let's sit on our ass and do nothing".

Europe's foreign policy in the last fifty years had been one of total importence--Europe had not deposed one dictator, stopped one genocide, or prevented one communist revolution in all that time; even when a brutal dictator was practicing genocide in its own back yard in the Balkans only a few years ago, Europe could do nothing better than rush to ask the US to stop it.

So Europe pretends that its "do nothing" policy is not really a sign of impotence, but rather a sign of "sophistication", "soft power", "understanding of cultural differences", or whatever the euphemism for "doing nothing" is this week.

Who do they think they're fooling, I have no idea.

 

[rikzilla]

Oh! I wasn't aware that the USA was in the fray on 1st September 1939. At that time many politicians in the USA could not have cared less, what with their isolationalist policy and any assistance provided was done so without the knowledge of the population.

It appears however that the US learned a lot from Hitler as they took over the mantle on his demise.

Funny post...welcome to the forum!

But remember, America's isolationism was driven by it's pacifists not it's fascists. You can't have it both ways.

-z

 

[c0rbin]

You can't have it both ways.

-z

Damned if we do, damned if we don't.