August 4, 2013

Robert Mugabe wins again

Robert Mugabe, age 89, won a reported 61% of the vote in Zimbabwe last week, propelling him into his second third-of-a-century as ruler of the former Rhodesia. While he had to nominally share power with a rival for the last five years, his new 3/4th majority in parliament allows him to now govern alone.

Here are some music videos of what Zimbabwe looked like, despite international economic boycotts, when it was called Rhodesia in the mid-1970s.

It's a land blessed by nature. For example, the capital city is at 4,865 elevation, which makes for a pleasant climate.

Here's Theodore Dalrymple's 2003 City Journal article on his years in Rhodesia:
After Empire

As soon as I qualified as a doctor, I went to Rhodesia, which was to transform itself into Zimbabwe five years or so later. In the next decade, I worked and traveled a great deal in Africa and couldn’t help but reflect upon such matters as the clash of cultures, the legacy of colonialism, and the practical effects of good intentions unadulterated by any grasp of reality. I gradually came to the conclusion that the rich and powerful can indeed have an effect upon the poor and powerless—perhaps can even remake them—but not necessarily (in fact, necessarily not) in the way they wanted or anticipated. The law of unintended consequences is stronger than the most absolute power. 
I went to Rhodesia because I wanted to see the last true outpost of colonialism in Africa, the final gasp of the British Empire that had done so much to shape the modern world. True, it had now rebelled against the mother country and was a pariah state: but it was still recognizably British in all but name. As Sir Roy Welensky, the prime minister of the short-lived and ill-fated Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, once described himself, he was “half-Polish, half-Jewish, one hundred percent British.” 
Until my arrival at Bulawayo Airport, the British Empire had been for me principally a philatelic phenomenon. ... And my father—a communist by conviction—also encouraged me to read the works of G. A. Henty, late-nineteenth-century adventure stories, extolling the exploits of empire builders, who by bravery, sterling character, superior intelligence, and force majeure overcame the resistance of such spirited but doomed peoples as the Zulu and the Fuzzy-Wuzzies. Henty might seem an odd choice for a communist to give his son, but Marx himself was an imperialist of a kind, believing that European colonialism was an instrument of progress toward History’s happy denouement; only at a later stage, after it had performed its progressive work, was empire to be condemned. 
And condemned Rhodesia most certainly was, loudly and insistently, as if it were the greatest threat to world peace and the security of the planet. By the time I arrived, it had no friends, only enemies. Even South Africa, the regional colossus, with which Rhodesia shared a long border and which might have been expected to be sympathetic, was highly ambivalent toward it: ... 
I expected to find on my arrival, therefore, a country in crisis and decay. Instead, I found a country that was, to all appearances, thriving: its roads were well maintained, its transport system functioning, its towns and cities clean and manifesting a municipal pride long gone from England. There were no electricity cuts or shortages of basic food commodities. The large hospital in which I was to work, while stark and somewhat lacking in comforts, was extremely clean and ran with exemplary efficiency. The staff, mostly black except for its most senior members, had a vibrant esprit de corps, and the hospital, as I discovered, had a reputation for miles around for the best of medical care. The rural poor would make immense and touching efforts to reach it: they arrived covered in the dust of their long journeys. The African nationalist leader and foe of the government, Joshua Nkomo, was a patient there and trusted the care implicitly: for medical ethics transcended all political antagonisms. 
The surgeon for whom I worked, who came from England, was the best I have ever known ... Within a short time of the political handover in 1980, however, he returned to England—not because of any racial feeling or political antagonism but simply because the swift degeneration of standards in the hospital made the high-level practice of surgery impossible. The institution that had seemed to me on my arrival to be so solid and well founded fell apart in the historical twinkling of an eye. 
... I, whose salary was by other standards small, lived at a level that I have scarcely equaled since. It is true that Rhodesia lacked many consumer goods at that time, due to the economic sanctions imposed upon it: but what I learned from this lack is how little consumer goods add to the quality of life, at least in an equable climate such as Rhodesia’s. Life was no poorer for being lived without them. 
The real luxuries were space and beauty—and the time to enjoy them. ... The luxury of our life was this: that, our work once done, we never had to perform a single chore for ourselves. The rest of our time, in our most beautiful surroundings, was given over to friendship, sport, study, hunting—whatever we wished. 
Of course, our leisure rested upon a pyramid of startling inequality and social difference. The staff who freed us of life’s little inconveniences lived an existence that was opaque to us, though they had quarters only a few yards from where we lived. Their hopes, wishes, fears, and aspirations were not ours; their beliefs, tastes, and customs were alien to us. 
Our very distance, socially and psychologically, made our relations with them unproblematical and easy. ...
By contrast, our relations with our African medical colleagues were harder-edged, because the social, intellectual, and cultural distance between us was far reduced. Rhodesia was still a white-dominated society, but for reasons of practical necessity, and in a vain attempt to convince the world that it was not as monstrous as made out, it had produced a growing cadre of educated Africans, doctors prominent among them. Unsurprisingly, they were not content to remain subalterns under the permanent tutelage of whites, so that our relations with them were superficially polite and collegial, but human warmth was difficult or impossible. Many belonged secretly to the African nationalist movement that was soon to take power; and two were to serve (if that is the word to describe their depredations) as ministers of health. 
Unlike in South Africa, where salaries were paid according to a racial hierarchy (whites first, Indians and coloured second, Africans last), salaries in Rhodesia were equal for blacks and whites doing the same job, so that a black junior doctor received the same salary as mine. But there remained a vast gulf in our standards of living, the significance of which at first escaped me; but it was crucial in explaining the disasters that befell the newly independent countries that enjoyed what Byron called, and eagerly anticipated as, the first dance of freedom. 
The young black doctors who earned the same salary as we whites could not achieve the same standard of living for a very simple reason: they had an immense number of social obligations to fulfill. They were expected to provide for an ever expanding circle of family members (some of whom may have invested in their education) and people from their village, tribe, and province. 
An income that allowed a white to live like a lord because of a lack of such obligations scarcely raised a black above the level of his family. Mere equality of salary, therefore, was quite insufficient to procure for them the standard of living that they saw the whites had and that it was only human nature for them to desire—and believe themselves entitled to, on account of the superior talent that had allowed them to raise themselves above their fellows. In fact, a salary a thousand times as great would hardly have been sufficient to procure it: for their social obligations increased pari passu with their incomes. 
These obligations also explain the fact, often disdainfully remarked upon by former colonials, that when Africans moved into the beautiful and well-appointed villas of their former colonial masters, the houses swiftly degenerated into a species of superior, more spacious slum. Just as African doctors were perfectly equal to their medical tasks, technically speaking, so the degeneration of colonial villas had nothing to do with the intellectual inability of Africans to maintain them. Rather, the fortunate inheritor of such a villa was soon overwhelmed by relatives and others who had a social claim upon him. They brought even their goats with them; and one goat can undo in an afternoon what it has taken decades to establish. 
It is easy to see why a civil service, controlled and manned in its upper reaches by whites, could remain efficient and uncorrupt but could not long do so when manned by Africans who were supposed to follow the same rules and procedures. The same is true, of course, for every other administrative activity, public or private. The thick network of social obligations explains why, while it would have been out of the question to bribe most Rhodesian bureaucrats, yet in only a few years it would have been out of the question not to try to bribe most Zimbabwean ones, whose relatives would have condemned them for failing to obtain on their behalf all the advantages their official opportunities might provide. ... 
Of course, the solidarity and inescapable social obligations that corrupted public and private administration in Africa also gave a unique charm and humanity to life there and served to protect people from the worst consequences of the misfortunes that buffeted them. There were always relatives whose unquestioned duty it was to help and protect them if they could, so that no one had to face the world entirely alone. Africans tend to find our lack of such obligations puzzling and unfeeling—and they are not entirely wrong. 
These considerations help to explain the paradox that strikes so many visitors to Africa: the evident decency, kindness, and dignity of the ordinary people, and the fathomless iniquity, dishonesty, and ruthlessness of the politicians and administrators. 

80 comments:

blogger said...

If not for the example of Zimbabwe, South Africa could be in the same spot. But SA blacks took notice and realized that if you get rid of the whites, so goes the economy.

Blacks and whites in SA are like European aristocrats and Jews long ago. The aristocrats knew Jews were talented, clever, and skilled with money and did much for the economy, but they also feared and resented the rising power of the Jews. They feared the golden goose turning into a bird of prey. I guess blacks who now run SA feel the same way. They need the whites but don't trust them.

Anonymous said...

Why does the Western media hate Mugabe? I know it's not because he's been bad to local whites. And it couldn't be for ruining Zimbabwe's economy. There must be something else that he's doing that irks the powers that be. Generally, a politician must be doing something right somewhere for the media to hate him so much. His wiki article mentions that he's anti-gay. But that wouldn't be enough, would it?

2Degrees said...

You've discovered Rhodesian music!

The UDI song is best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncZaVw86Cow

This is another good one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQMrD53Jofc

The content is slightly untrue:

"The cost of keeping this land free can never be too great."

The truth is that once the terrorists learned to shoot down airliners and started killing the survivors on the ground, White Rhodesia decided the sacrifice was too great.

And saving the best till last:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_TeugTCwuk

A more interesting story for those who can read Portuguese is the Guerra Colonial and the deportation of 1,000,000 Portuguese after the fall of the Portuguese Empire. JFK played a wholly despicable part in the whole sordid affair. A proto-Obama.

Anonymous said...

As with Detroit, socialism is to blame.

Mugabe couldn't spell SOCIALISM, much less practice it.

TGGP said...

"the fortunate inheritor of such a villa was soon overwhelmed by relatives and others who had a social claim upon him"
In "Empires and Barbarians" Peter Heather describes the collapse of the Romanized latifundia system due to the masses of Anglo-Saxon freemen which shared spoils. I know it's not entirely analogous, but I find that an interesting parallel.

Anonymous said...

Why does the Western media hate Mugabe? I know it's not because he's been bad to local whites. And it couldn't be for ruining Zimbabwe's economy. There must be something else that he's doing that irks the powers that be. Generally, a politician must be doing something right somewhere for the media to hate him so much. His wiki article mentions that he's anti-gay. But that wouldn't be enough, would it?

Good question. I've noticed this as well. The only reason I can think of is that he's a devout Roman Catholic, but would that really be enough?

YIH said...

After watching that YouTube video (and judging from the cars, cleanliness of the city and film wear) I'd say those were home movies from 1973, not 1983. By '83 it had already become Zimbabwe and had already begun it's decline.

Anonymous said...

Blacks and whites in SA are like European aristocrats and Jews long ago.


That's idiotic. It's the sort of faux history Jews like to tell themselves. The role of Jews in medieval Europe was nothing remotely like that of whites in SA.

Anonymous said...

White Rhodesians who came to South Africa in the early 80s had a saying, "Zimbabwe: Zero Intelligence Mainly Because All Bloody Whites Evacuated."

sunbeam said...

An honest question, if we actually have any readers here who have actually lived in South Africa or Rhodesia.

Why does anyone stay? Even pre-Mandela/Mugabe these places seemed ... totally uncool.

I mean could the Afrikaners ever produce someone like Jim Morrison?

There is no shortage of tough guys in the world, they just seemed like they committed the unforgivable sin as well: They were boring. And I think Africa made them that way.

All the action is somewhere else. No grand idea, no theory of anything is going to come out of this place. The climate, the very terrain make you stupid (literally if you believe the HBD arguments).

The whole place just seemed unbelievably nasty and vile no matter what kind of lifestyle you led, or pay you got.

Now it's worse and dangerous.

So why does anyone stay? I'd be on the next plane out, and thanking my lucky stars I was released from hell. Screw the Great Trek. What do you get if you win? You get to keep living in hell?

Whatever Africa's got, I don't want any of. I'll be perfectly happy to see it on a globe, and never think of it other than that.

I wonder if all those Chinese companies and workers know what they are getting into.

SFG said...

"In "Empires and Barbarians" Peter Heather describes the collapse of the Romanized latifundia system due to the masses of Anglo-Saxon freemen which shared spoils. I know it's not entirely analogous, but I find that an interesting parallel."

I always figured Germanic tribesmen were the NAMs of the 6th century--who knows what their IQs were back then? It took the Catholic Church a thousand years to civilize Europe.

Anonymous said...

What the heck the media loved Mugabwe until he got too evil to look the other way. The media throws just as much aspersions at Kwgame as they do Mugabwe and Kwagme is like the George Washington of Africa.

2Degrees said...

Why does the Western media hate Mugabe? ... His wiki article mentions that he's anti-gay.

Father was homosexual and so I have good gaydar. If Mugabe is 100%straight, then so is Rahm Emanuel.

Anonymous said...

"What the heck the media loved Mugabwe until he got too evil to look the other way."

There is a fallacy in the above statement. The media IS evil. You can't be too evil for the NYT and the Economist magazine. There must be another reason. It could be the gay thing or something to do with local mineral wealth (not sharing with the right people?) or who knows what. Could he be selling something important to China, Iran or North Korea?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous SFG said...
"In "Empires and Barbarians" Peter Heather describes the collapse of the Romanized latifundia system due to the masses of Anglo-Saxon freemen which shared spoils. I know it's not entirely analogous, but I find that an interesting parallel."

I always figured Germanic tribesmen were the NAMs of the 6th century--who knows what their IQs were back then?

Probably not too different from what they are like now. Germanic tribesmen were not exactly Ashkenazic Jews, who engaged in a millennium and a half of brain-boosting vocations. For the dirt-poor peasants of rural nations, life in 1500 AD was little different than life in 500 AD.

It took the Catholic Church a thousand years to civilize Europe.

Southern Europe was civilized long before then. Actually, "Europe" is a modern idea that had little relevance in 1500, and none at all a thousand years earlier. For most of history, there was the civilized Mediterranean Basin, and there was what is now Northern Europe. Climate change led to desertification of the southeast Mediterranean - and indirectly to the fall of Rome and Byzantium, the formation of Islam, the Crusades and Christo-Islamic Mediterranean partition, and the creation of modern Europe.

Baloo said...

Could it be that the media felt they had to condemn at least one African maniac leader to prove how objective they are, and Mugabe was picked at random?

Anonymous said...

All the action is somewhere else. No grand idea, no theory of anything is going to come out of this place.

The first heart transplant was performed by an Afrikaner surgeon in a South African hospital. That probably sounds pretty grand to the procedure's numerous modern beneficiaries.

anony-mouse said...

Its interesting to note the reaction of gays to anti-gay leaders.

Gays seem to dislike Putin but not Mugabe, don't seem to dislike any Muslim leader, didn't like Hitler (with some notable exceptions) and liked Stalin and Castro.

Whiskey said...

Life in 500 ... half pop of 300 AD, no coins for 300 next years, no trade, no gunpowder, no printing press, no Christianity, no moldboard plow and farming. All of that in 1500 ad.

Media hates Mugabe because misrule pushes massive refugees and makes a mockery of Black self rule.1

Anonymous said...


These considerations help to explain the paradox that strikes so many visitors to America: the evident decency, kindness, and dignity of the ordinary people, and the fathomless iniquity, dishonesty, and ruthlessness of the politicians and administrators.


Indeed

Anonymous said...

that was a pretty catch song :) thanks.. i guess he's a Rhodesian singer..

Anonymous said...

"Climate change led to desertification of the southeast Mediterranean - and indirectly to the fall of Rome and Byzantium, the formation of Islam, the Crusades and Christo-Islamic Mediterranean partition, and the creation of modern Europe."

How the hell did climate change cause all that? In 10 years will all imperial collapses of the past be blamed on homophobia? Do you know that the original Marxists explained EVERYTHING though class struggle?

The Western Roman Empire was overrun by Germanics because they were good at warfare. The original Romans, the ones who created the empire, were also good at it. But they imported a lot of Middle Eastern slaves to Italy to work for them, then they interbred with the freed slaves, then their government, military and religious ideology started resembling Middle Eastern ones in their organization (despotism) and performance, then they started hiring Germanic mercenaries to deal with the military side of that problem, and then the mercenaries got tired of serving the dilapidated Empire and took matters into their own hands.

Byzantium fell to the original, Mongoloid Turks - pretty fierce guys from the wild steppes. There have been lots of such invasions in history - the Huns, the Mongols, the original Indo-Europeans. Should we blame all of those on climate change?

You are correct in stating that the modern conception of Europe mostly grew out of Christendom, more exactly pre-Reformation Catholic Christendom. If north Africa got out of the Dark Ages Catholic, it would have been a part of "Europe" today. The Caucasoid race isn't a social construct, its division into sub-types (Nordic, Mediterranean, etc) isn't imaginary either, but "Europe" really is a social construct. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Anonymous said...

"Life in 500 ... half pop of 300 AD, no coins for 300 next years, no trade, no gunpowder, no printing press, no Christianity, no moldboard plow and farming."

Only the "no printing" and "no gunpowder" parts are true for Europe in 500 AD. The no-Christianity-in-the-year-500 claim is the best one, a true Whiskey classic. 500 AD was the 500th year since what event? Who exactly is alluded to by the D of AD?

Anonymous said...

Whiskey:

Life in 500 ... half pop of 300 AD,

Let's go through all the Dark Ages myths again. That age was "dark" because there was little history recorded, and the post-Roman power vacuum. Didn't mean that people didn't get on with their daily lives.

no coins for 300 next years, no trade,

There were coins and trade. The old Roman coins were rarer, and few new ones minted - but they still existed. Mass minting of coins didn't become practical until the national kingdoms grew to a certain size. As for trade, it existed after the Roman Empire just as it did before.

no Christianity,

500 AD, not 500 BC!

Though in a real sense, it depended where you lived. The Church had to compete with long-established pagan traditions, and had to work really hard to find followers. No indulgences, no inquisition, no simony, less emphasis on original sin ... thus was Christianity in 500 AD.

no moldboard plow and farming. All of that in 1500 ad.

Not the moldboard plow again...

Anonymous said...

"There's no such thing as "too evil" to the media. Mugabe's hated for the same reason Kim Jong-un is hated (it ain't for the concentration camps), the same reason Hugo Chavez was hated (it ain't the socialism): they're INDEPENDENT. Bastards they are, but they don't take orders from the Cathedral. That's enough."

I mostly agree with this. I'm curious about how exactly Mugabe expresses his independence. On the bastards thing: not knowing any of those countries from the inside, I don't know how much propaganda is involved in their NYT portrayal. Some of it could be like Saddam's WMD. Of course some of these guys COULD actually be bastards. And in Zimbabwe my sympathies are with the local whites, not Mugabe.

Hepp said...

I like Dalrymple, but the guy needs to develop some HBD awareness. Every few paragraphs he has a need to remind us that African peasants are capable, honest, and nice. All their problems come from historical circumstances, bad leaders, and cultures not conducive to success. It's like he feels guilty about skirting the PC edge, so he needs to keep making it as clear as possible that he thinks Africans are the greatest.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of bad African dictators, one guy who seemed to get singled out by the press as The Worst Dictator Ever was Idi Amin. At first, I never understood what made him any worse than any number of tinpot third world dictators, or why we should care about the goings-on in an insignificant African hellhole like Uganda.

But then I read that in 1972 Amin expelled all Israeli military advisors and thereafter became an outspoken critic of Israel.

As a lawyer in a courtroom melodrama would say - I have no further questions.

Baloo said...

In any case, great Dalrymple stuff. Coincidentally, Dalrymple's being criticized over at Occidental Observer. Linked HERE.


Anonymous said...

"I always figured Germanic tribesmen were the NAMs of the 6th century--who knows what their IQs were back then?"

About ten years ago I glanced through an academic book by an archaeologist or historian summarizing what was known about German civilization up to about the fall of Rome. Can't recall the title or author. Probably something about an investigation into German pre-history.

Based on material such as coins at various sites, origin of traded goods in graveyards, etc., his conclusion was that the Germans were more connected than we might expect, that the Germans were well aware of the Roman world, and that a Roman weaknesses when dealing with the Germans was that the Germans knew more about the Romans than the Romans knew about the Germans. In short, by the time it came to major conflict the Germans were more advanced than the Romans expected. That was particularly true after many Germans had served in the Roman army or received Roman military education growing up (such as the leader of the Germans in that battle of Teutoburg forest that wiped out 3 legions).

Might anyone know what book this was?

Alat said...

I'm curious about how exactly Mugabe expresses his independence. On the bastards thing: not knowing any of those countries from the inside, I don't know how much propaganda is involved in their NYT portrayal.

Going out on a limb here, my guess is that it began when Mugabe crushed the Ndebele and forced their leader, Joshua Nkomo, to toe the line in the mid 1980s. Nkomo was the West's man in the struggle against Rhodesia (Mugabe was the Soviets'), so the West may well have expected Nkomo to be left alone.

Then, in the early 1990s, Mugabe tried some small scale liberalizing reforms in the economy under pressure from the IMF, but got nothing in terms of increased foreign investment. That wasn't the West's fault, but I imagine Mugabe didn't see it that way. At the same time, Mandela's liberation and subsequent presidency in South Africa made him the darling of the Western media and Mugabe was almost forgotten.

Then, in the late 1990s, Mugabe's own supporters began to rock the boat to demand more redistribution. He turned to Britain for money, as usual, but didn't get it this time.
Then he turned on the whites to get the money and land he needed. It was a conscious, rational decision from his point of view, not a madman's lunacy of the day. The lunatics were the whites who remained in ex-Rhodesia after 1980...

As for the propaganda angle, I think many, if not most of the criticism these and other targets of the media is correct in regard to facts (not analysis!).I think in almost every country in the world there is something that can be used by the Western media/governments to whip up a frenzy if they wanted/needed to. Brainstorming now: Japan ("those xenophobic immigrant-refusing Shanghai-raping bastards"), Germany ("a country whose police has such wide powers in closing down political parties cannot call itself democratic, and look at how they treat their minorities"), France ("no freedom of speech, remember the Fabius-Gayssot law, run some features on imprisoned/exiled dissidents"), etc. Not that I believe that anything like these examples will actually happen, just that the media can use just about ANYTHING to justify agression, and that they have no need to be consistent in what it is they criticize. And once the target responds, the media has a field day. "This animal is very malicious; when attacked it defends itself".

Keep in mind that in most non-Western countries, there is a (usually tiny) middle and upper class which copies the social mores and consumer habits of the West. They are resisted by their countrymen, who regard them with a mixture of envy (if they could, individually, they'd want to lead the same lives, but they can't) and resentment ("those damn traitors and sell-outs"). The existence of this social group and the minor hassles or major persecutions they inevitably have to endure makes it both a a fifth-column ready to do the West's bidding, and source for sob-stories about oppression (real, exaggerated or, if need be, invented), which can then be used used by the West to attack the country in question. The attack may range from putting the country in the defensive, in that is has to keep explaining itself, on to international isolation, sanctions, subversion and, ultimately, armed invasion.

NOTA said...

My guess is that a lot of which world leaders become public enemies and which don't comes down to:

a. Some random forces early on determining the narrative.

b. Later stories following the narrative because it's easier and safer than departing from it.

This seems like the pattern in most media coverage. Early on, the narrative may be determined by who's friendlier to the US or Israel, or whose surface-level rhetoric is nastier-sounding, or whatever. But once the narrative is established, it is extremely hard to change.

Anonymous said...

As for trade, it existed after the Roman Empire just as it did before.

Not on nearly the same scale. There was a dramatic drop-off in long distance trade, and population dropped off sharply.

Steve Sailer said...

Idi Amin had a lot of personality.

Anonymous said...

Mugabe was a student of the Jesuits:

"Mugabe was raised as a Roman Catholic, studying in Marist Brothers and Jesuit schools, including the exclusive Kutama College..."

Kutama was a Jesuit college. Apparently when he was starting out the churchmen were all behind the young revolutionary. I vaguely recall a story about Catholics once smuggling him out of somewhere during some troubles dressed as a nun... After he got into power that seems to have all changed pretty fast.

A lot of religious folks probably fall into that category Dalrymple complains about: "...good intentions unadulterated by any grasp of reality."

NOTA said...

One thing I thought was really fascinating in that Dalrymple article was the idea of a fatally bad interaction between two otherwise functional cultures. You can have a western style set of institutions, in which people rise to positions of power and responsibility based on their individual merits and are rewarded accordingly. Or you can have an African style set of institutions, in which people rise to those positions based on family connections and tribe and such. But it's very hard to have those two cultures working together.

I wonder how many other examples of this broad phenomenon there are--two basically functional cultures interact, and some workable system from one culture just wrecks the orher because of its unsuitability to the receiving culture.

Five Daarstens said...

Here is a great new essay by Dalrymple on the morality of mass immigration and the Pope's response:

http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/49891/cat_id/13

Anonymous said...

Ok in maybe the media is evil, but the fact is the media covered a whole lot less for Stalin after Kreschev's denunciation than before. The media is a spin machine that sometimes has to stop spinning because things become to obvious. Again though no one addresses the earlier posters point about how little evidence there is that the media really does oppose him or even hate him. They hate a quality leader like Kwagame way more. The fact is the media focuses more on Mugawbe for reasons that istevers should like namely that he oppresses whites so its considered newsworthy. I really can't stand the lengths to which istevers take the enemy of my enemy is my fried. I mean honestly siding with the North Koreabs against the Cathedral is such a decadent attitude taken with full cognizance that American boys and nukes stand invisibly between isteve NK fan boys and NK nukes.

I just seems sometimes like to many istevers don't have any skin in the game so they incline towards blow it all up.

aristotelean veterinarian said...

But Steve, if you were cool like Steve Mcqueen used to be, you wouldn't concern yourself with things like this. Perhaps higher testosterone levels to focus one's self-absorption on --- and to bore oneself and, even moreso, those around oneself with--- would cure you of your concern for the losers in life who are stuck living in places like former Rhodesia. (for the record I am not as cool as Steve McQueen used to be, I have nothing but support for normal or even above average levels of testosterone, and I have nothing but contempt for Mugabe supporters, and I am not making any actual negative observation on your, or anyone else's, actual testosterone level).

Harry Baldwin said...

Speaking of Africa, I recently read John Updike's "The Coup," recommended by Steve. One of Updike's best I'll agree, very droll and with some interesting insights on Africa, though it seems to take place in an Africa populated by cosmopolitan intellectuals. The main character, Ellellou, attends an Midwestern American college, and there is a description of an unsatisfactory sexual experience with a radical coed in the headquarters of the Young Communist Club. It concludes with, "She had had no climax, and he had been distracted by the giant red poster of Lenin, goateed and pince-nezed, staring upwards with the prophetic fury of a scholar who has just found his name misspelled in a footnote."

Anonymous said...

"Ok in maybe the media is evil, but the fact is the media covered a whole lot less for Stalin after Kreschev's denunciation than before."

This is factually wrong. Western governments and media turned away from Stalin in 1946. Khruschov denounced Stalin in 1956. Stalin gradually abandoned Communism in the late 1930s and early 1940s, though not in name, only in spirit. Starting in 1937 he killed most of the Old Bolsheviks, with whom Western governments and media sympathized. He legalized the Russian Orthodox Church in 1943 (it had been banned by the aforementioned Old Bolsheviks). He started pursuing conservative social policies. Those things, plus his rejection of the Baruch Plan in 1946, were the causes of the split. By the time Khruschov denounced Stalin, Stalin had been a villain in the West for a full decade.

David Davenport said...

From Wikipedia, Battle of the Teutoberg Forest:

The legacy of the Germanic victory was resurrected with the recovery of the histories of Tacitus in the 15th century, when the figure of Arminius, now known as "Hermann" (a mistranslation of the name "Armin" which has often been incorrectly attributed to Martin Luther), became a nationalistic symbol of Pan-Germanism. ...

Nope, Luther was correct. Arminius -> H'arminius -> H'arminn. Some vernacular Latin speakers back then dropped their H's.

Steve Sailer said...

"... Lenin, goateed and pince-nezed, staring upwards with the prophetic fury of a scholar who has just found his name misspelled in a footnote."

That's a great line.

Anonymous said...

Cow milk is 'racist' for favoring white stomachs over non-white ones. Cows are KKK.

2Degrees said...

Anonymous said

About ten years ago I glanced through an academic book by an archaeologist or historian summarizing what was known about German civilization up to about the fall of Rome. Can't recall the title or author. Probably something about an investigation into German pre-history

I once listened to a lecture by a German acholar called Mommsen, who said something like this. Could it have been one of his books?

Anonymous said...

Interest in places like Rhodesia is important, since it is now clear, with the wisdom of hindsight, that the flagrant war by the Western elites on their "own" white working and lower middle classes, and which is now ramping up rapidly, was only made possible by the earlier successes in places like Rhodesia.

If Rhodesia (and,later, South Africa) had held out against the "International Community" (in fact the modern version of the Comintern), then I sincerely doubt that the Tony Blairs and Hillary Clintons of this world, and their fellow-travellers, would have felt confidant enough to have mounted their full scale assault on Western Civilization.

Apart from which, Rhodesia was a beautiful place, and an intense emotional experience. The reason Mugabe is hated, IMHO, is that by wrecking the country, he exposed as fraudulent and indeed psychotically detached from reality the entire neo-Marxist project, thus putting it a serious risk. He had, indeed still has, to be neutralized.

But no-one will actually do anything serious about him. In reality, these third world despots have carte blanche, at least to the extent they mainly persecute whites.

Whites, by the way, who in no small measure fought against Nazi Germany, and knew a real fascist (like Mugabe) when they met one.

Anon.

Anonymous said...

Why does the Western media hate Mugabe?

The British media hates Mugabe (read: Economist and the London Times). The British upper class and middle class has its own litany of contradictions. Many have relatives and/or friends who were white Rhodesians. While they were happy to paint Ian Smith as some kind of Fascist, they expected that once Mugabe took power, he would turn the country into a multiracial paradise. Mugabe did not do this and the sufferings of the white Rhodesians were felt more personaly by the British upper class and middle class (the establishment, I have read many articles in the London Times about this) than in the case of other countries that got screwed up because of their foolishness.

Mugabe, by the way, was a darling of the Western left in the 1970s and 1980s. he was a product of the London School of economics which was filled with West-hating leftists.

Reg Cæsar said...

Gays seem to dislike Putin but not Mugabe, don't seem to dislike any Muslim leader, didn't like Hitler (with some notable exceptions)

…like Tom of Finland. Who dressed half the gays of the 1970s. And allowed bottoms to pass for tops.

Anonymous said...

But no-one will actually do anything serious about him. In reality, these third world despots have carte blanche, at least to the extent they mainly persecute whites.

Did Pol Pot persecute any whites?

Anonymous said...

Except that it isnt you know factually wrong. You know someone the media really hated, Nixon. Why'd they hate him? Because in 1948 (which is after 1946) he exposed Alger Hise as a communist. Not to mention the fact that it was only in 1956 that it became at all unfashionable to support Stalin in western europe which as you may know has a media as well. Did the media like Stalin in 1950 as much as they did in 1935 no probably not but they certainly weren't reporting on the Ukranian starvation or gulags two things that knew about as early as Walter Duranty in the 1930s. I have to say that his topic has been very revealing to me about the motivations of most istevers. They would support a man who ruthlessly oppresses his white population because he is kind of maybe opposed by the Cathedral.

Anonymous said...

Its safer to attack Mugabe than to face the fact that many of Zimbabwe's problems are down to black rule. In fact he can be used to distract attention from that, the right sort of whites can tut tut about him.

Anonymous said...

I like Dalrymple, but the guy needs to develop some HBD awareness. Every few paragraphs he has a need to remind us that African peasants are capable, honest, and nice. All their problems come from historical circumstances, bad leaders, and cultures not conducive to success. It's like he feels guilty about skirting the PC edge, so he needs to keep making it as clear as possible that he thinks Africans are the greatest.

HBD does not mean constantly thinking the worst of Africans (or anyone else). I accept HBD, but having lived in both Zimbabwe and the U.S., I share Dalrymple's general view of African peasants (in Zimbabwe, at least, I can't comment on most other countries). Most are kind, decent, hardworking people. This is compatible with them not having as high an IQ as whites and not generally being as good at participating in or running a modern industrial society. In general they are much more pleasant people to be around than African-Americans. (For example, they possess a great deal more of the conservative virtue of gratefulness, despite having far less wealth than their American cousins.)

On another note, would you consider doing a blog post about Botswana sometime, Steve? Botswana is one of the least corrupt and highest GDP countries in Africa, and unlike South Africa its relative prosperity cannot obviously be explained by the efforts of whites. For those of us who accept HBD and that Africans are, in general, worse at governing a modern industrial society, I think it is instructive to examine exceptions to this rule, to see what kinds of factors or practices might encourage improvements in other African countries as well.

Anonymous said...

I should also say, as someone who lived in Zimbabwe, that Mugabe is every bit as bad as the media portrays him to be, and quite possibly worse. (I am rather discouraged to see people here doubting this, in fact.) The country as a whole only began to really deteriorate after the land reforms in the late 90s, but this is not because Mugabe only turned bad then. As Alat alluded to, in the early 80s his (North Korean trained) army brigade slaughtered 20,000 Ndebele civilians (the Ndebele are the minority ethnic group in Zimbabwe; Mugabe is Shona, the majority group): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gukurahundi .

Mugabe was still popular through the 90s and is indeed still popular today in some rural areas, but I have little doubt that he would not have won any of the post-2000 elections had they been free and fair.

Dave Pinsen said...

"HBD [should] not mean constantly thinking the worst of Africans (or anyone else)..."

Well said. Acknowledging the humanity of African peasants, as Dalrymple does, isn't kowtowing to political correctness, just being empathetic and honest. Dalrymple did cite the "superior intelligence" of the European colonists, which helped them prevail over "spirited but doomed" African peoples.

Objective discussion of group differences need not be fueled by spite and an urge to constantly demean others. This is a real challenge presented by certain bloggers in this space, whose atheism descends into a sort of nihilism.

Anonymous said...

I lived in Rhodesia a few years before Dalrymple (Bulawayo, in fact) so I can attest to the accuracy of his report (which I read some time age).

FYI -- one reason South Africa was "ambivalent" towards Rhodesia was because of Cecil Rhodes' role in engineering the British conquest of the Boer Republics.

One can hardly blame the Boers' descendants, the Afrikaaners, for feeling ambivalence towards a nation named after Rhodes.

Not entirely logical, I suppose, but human behavior rarely is.

Anonymous said...

Cheery thought for the day: Rhodesia was the canary in the coal mine.

The rest of the West can look forward to the same future.

(Come on, you have to admit Eric Holder would make a good Mugabe!)

Anonymous said...

2Degrees said:

"I once listened to a lecture by a German acholar called Mommsen, who said something like this. Could it have been one of his books?"

You listened to Mommsen? Mommsen's been dead a century -- what are you, a vampire?

2Degrees said...

You listened to Mommsen? Mommsen's been dead a century -- what are you, a vampire?

Sorry, my mistake. One of the speakers in the lecture series at St Anthony's was another Mommsen who deals with Holocaust history. I got him mixed up with another guy who gave a lecture on Roman Germania in the same series.

Anonymous said...

Michael Hart's "Understanding Human History" provides the best answer to this. To be specific, the Germans conquered the Romans because they had higher IQ. Hart specifically addresses the historical trend of Northern peoples invading and conquering Southern ones. The reason this happens is that Northerners are more cold-adapted and selected for higher IQ. As for why the lower IQ Middle Easterners and Egyptians developed civilization first, it was because they were in a climatic "sweet spot" that allowed them to develop agriculture sooner, thus giving them a huge head start over the higher-IQ Northern Europeans.

I'm not convinced by this. I don't see how we can infer that the ancient Germans had higher IQ than the Romans. They may have for all we know, but there's no good evidence for it. Taking over the decaying remnants of an empire is not good enough evidence for it. The Arabs took over decaying Christian areas in the Mideast, the Turks took over the Byzantines, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were smarter, and I don't see why various German tribes taking over the Roman Empire would either.

Unknown said...

Mommsen had sons who shared his last name. They then had sons kind of like how when someone in 1875 said i saw adams speak they didnt go what are you a vampire. Wasnt even the original poster but this kind of know it all shitiness is a plague on this site.

Hepp said...

"HBD does not mean constantly thinking the worst of Africans (or anyone else). I accept HBD, but having lived in both Zimbabwe and the U.S., I share Dalrymple's general view of African peasants (in Zimbabwe, at least, I can't comment on most other countries). Most are kind, decent, hardworking people. This is compatible with them not having as high an IQ as whites and not generally being as good at participating in or running a modern industrial society. In general they are much more pleasant people to be around than African-Americans. (For example, they possess a great deal more of the conservative virtue of gratefulness, despite having far less wealth than their American cousins.)
"

I can't speak to niceness and such, but Dalrymple consistently and explicitly denies that blacks are any less competent and able than whites. For example: "Just as African doctors were perfectly equal to their medical tasks, technically speaking, so the degeneration of colonial villas had nothing to do with the intellectual inability of Africans to maintain them."In Dalrymple's view, blacks only do poorly because of nepotism. He explicitly denies HBD factors, consistently.

Anonymous said...

What about Daddsen?

NOTA said...

Hepp:

Not unless he also tells us what fraction of native blacks became doctors. Blacks have a significantly lower IQ than whites on average, and yet Tyson DeGrasse really is a very smart guy, much smarter than most whites. So, for that matter, are the medical students at Howard University.

Without affirmative action (probably the opposite was going on in Rhodesia at the time), the black doctors were probably every bit as talented as the white doctors. Fewer blacks could probably manage to become doctors there, that's what you would expect from the difference in intelligence distributions, but the ones who did become doctors you would expect to be pretty good. And Dalrymple was there at the time, as a doctor, and reports that. Even if this did not agree with the rest of what you'd expect, you'd be smarter to take the report of an intelligent trained observer on the scene over the predictions of your model of the world.

Silver said...

"The Arabs took over decaying Christian areas in the Mideast, the Turks took over the Byzantines, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were smarter, and I don't see why various German tribes taking over the Roman Empire would either."

Yes, the rampant reductionism of HBD has been recognized as a problem for some time. IQ is such a powerful hammer that wherever you turn things rapidly starts looking like nails.

Dr Van Nostrand said...


I can't speak to niceness and such, but Dalrymple consistently and explicitly denies that blacks are any less competent and able than whites. For example: "Just as African doctors were perfectly equal to their medical tasks, technically speaking, so the degeneration of colonial villas had nothing to do with the intellectual inability of Africans to maintain them."In Dalrymple's view, blacks only do poorly because of nepotism. He explicitly denies HBD factors, consistently."

Im not sure he denies, he is just not as obsessive about it as some loons.
His point is obviously lost on you:A culture which breeds nepotism,corruption and all that can still create a critical mass of individuals in a society which can keep it running-but barely.
People with high IQs also make errors in judgement with regard to their long term prospects- see decline of upper class white populations in Europe and U.S due to low fertility

Some learn the hard way-Rwanda actually is doing pretty well these days.Sadly what is needed in Zimbabwe is total collapse

What is keeping Africans from learning from their mistakes is the West through all forms of aid is subsidizing their mistakes.
When they have famines and AIDS epidemics due to their own faulty methods of farming and sex,they need to learn to endure the consequences so that such things do not occur again.

In the end,the Western elites saw how "brilliantly" their bail out policy for Africans was working so they decided to impose it domestically!
Yes many of these elites are Jews and yes they should be held accountable.And Ill throw this in as a bonus- they use your babys blood in their Passover Matzos
There! Happy?

Anonymous said...

The cause of the rampant spread of AIDS in Africa is industrial-scale heterosexual promiscuity, aggravated by untreated STD's which increase blood exposure, coupled with the cultural desire for "dry" sex resulting in vaginal trauma and even more blood exposure, plus the cultural reluctance to use condoms or any other barrier style contraception.

Anon.

Dr Van Nostrand said...

@NOTA

In Africa, there is a preference for "dry" sex and involves salt and god knows what else which actually makes matters worse when it comes to catching the virus
Also there is homosexual sex in Africa but not how the West understands it. It is more like the Mid Eastern version-the dominant or male position is still considered heterosexual or normal while the one getting pounded is the effeminate or "gay" character in this scenario
It is actually similar to the pre modern West -Greeks ,Romans etc
Of course there are exceptions to the rule.Julius Caesar was known as a husband to every wife and wife to every husband!Ie he fulfilled both roles

Dr Van Nostrand said...


Mugabe couldn't spell SOCIALISM, much less practice it."

You dont need be a Harvard grad to practice the politics of envy,resentment and grievance mongering which are the pillars of socialism

A borderline insane tinpot dictator will manage it just fine even if he cant pronounce the word

Re Western media and Mugabe

Isnt it just possible that the Western media got this one right? Broken clock and all that.
I dont think it has too much to do with him being anti gay (though it doesnt help). Most non Western leaders are quite anti gay and very few are singled out for this type of vilification

David said...

>you'd be smarter to take the report of an intelligent trained observer on the scene over the predictions of your model of the world<

You'd be smarter to take hard data on IQ over impressionistic essays.

>Ill throw this in as a bonus- they use your babys blood in their Passover Matzos
There! Happy?<

Happier than you, apparently.

As to people's landing in scenes and later calling themselves/being called intelligent and trained, there are many examples of this, and here is one.

>In Dalrymple's view, blacks only do poorly because of nepotism. He explicitly denies HBD factors, consistently.<

Correct, and not only consistently just in this article, but also in other writings.

Daniels - the real name (or is it?) of Dalrymple - is a pull-yourselves-up-by-your-bootstraps intellectual courtier from the blame-the-poor Thatcher/Blair years, puffed on account of it, and riding a small surfboard of deserved fame for reiterating in nonalcoholic Jamesianese (so unlike that of the other great neocon - the late Christopher Hitchens) the truth that whining is morally corrupting and above all, unattractive...a truth which anyone who has attained his majority respects in principle if not always (as Mr. D/X never seems to grow less amused to recall) in practice. I see nothing in him, particularly nowadays when he has slipped further into memoir mood and produces would-be philosophical travelogues, scanty impressions of here and there, this and that. Like another Red Diaper Baby, David Horowitz, he has thrown all his bombs and sits in a kingdom of thinning smoke.

Anonymous said...

corrupt tribalism, the gift that keeps on giving.

Anonymous said...

Julius Caesar was known as a husband to every wife and wife to every husband!Ie he fulfilled both roles

You may be mixing Caesar with Alexander. Caesar was not homosexual, he was slandered by his enemies as being one (and yes this was a slander among the Romans until they became totally debauched). There is almost no evidence (other than slander by his political enemies) that he was a homo (revisionist history by homosexual academics doesn't count - that's right up there with African studies claiming that Jesus was black). What was that Churchillian quote? "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth can get its pants on".


Hepp said...

"Im not sure he denies, he is just not as obsessive about it as some loons.
His point is obviously lost on you:A culture which breeds nepotism,corruption and all that can still create a critical mass of individuals in a society which can keep it running-but barely.
People with high IQs also make errors in judgement with regard to their long term prospects- see decline of upper class white populations in Europe and U.S due to low fertility"

I don't know why you think his point about nepotism was lost on me. I understand it. But he still denies HBD.

A more egregious example is in one of his books where he writes something like "I'm writing about the British underclass. American readers who may think genetics are important should know that our underclass is white." HBD and cultural explanations are not naturally antagonistic; both obviously explain the world to some extent. But Dalrymple believes it's only culture, making him no different from a person who would argue that genes are everything.

Art Deco said...

Speaking of bad African dictators, one guy who seemed to get singled out by the press as The Worst Dictator Ever was Idi Amin. At first, I never understood what made him any worse than any number of tinpot third world dictators, or why we should care about the goings-on in an insignificant African hellhole like Uganda.

But then I read that in 1972 Amin expelled all Israeli military advisors and thereafter became an outspoken critic of Israel.

As a lawyer in a courtroom melodrama would say - I have no further questions.


Your Jew-hating makes you stupid.

Amin began butchering the populace large scale after taking power in 1971. Ca. 1976, press reports were putting the death toll to date somewhere around 300,000. Pound for pound, Francisco Macias in Equatorial Guinea was supposedly worse, but he was operating at a smaller scale. Amin also did odd things that attracted attention, like insisting that British expatriates doing business in Uganda carry him on their shoulders long distances ("a new white man's burden") and holding an Air France airliner full of Israeli citizens hostage.

The explusion of Israeli technical advisors and diplomats from one Tropical African country after another occurred in 1973 and was not at all exclusive to Uganda. What happened in 1972 was the expulsion of the domestic East Indian minority. Middlemen minority are often abused here there and the next place, notably Jews when they occupy those niches.

2Degrees said...

The comment about Caesar being gay is from Suetonius. I know because I have spent my life acquiring useless paper qualifications. I only did the language papers and avoided the history so I could be wrong, but Suetonius never gave me the impression of being anti-Caesar. He mentioned a lot of stuff like Caesar being paranoid about being bald, but that doesn't necessary equate to a smear campaign.

Dr Van Nostrand said...

You may be mixing Caesar with Alexander. Caesar was not homosexual, he was slandered by his enemies as being one (and yes this was a slander among the Romans until they became totally debauched). There is almost no evidence (other than slander by his political enemies) that he was a homo (revisionist history by homosexual academics doesn't count - that's right up there with African studies claiming that Jesus was black). What was that Churchillian quote? "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth can get its pants on".


I think you are confused.Alexander did have his Hephaestion whose relationship Aristotle described as one soul abiding two bodies.It was also compared by contemporaries and later historians to that of Achilles and Patroclus
There are other inaccuracies in your statement.Refer to my previous post the pre modern Western and African and Mid East understanding of homosexual relations.
While I dont doubt gay or PC pro gay historians wish to present these figures as gay, it doesnt work as while they had sex with males ,it didnt preclude being attracted to women,getting married and having children.
They would likely scoff at gay pride parades and likely crucify anyone who for even suggesting gay marriage become law.
Their problem with current gays would be to their eyes, a traitorous failure to procreate and produce sons to serve their country's future wars.
As for Jesus being black ,that is nonsense obviously. But is it anymore nonsensical than Jesus being blond and blue eyes which is how Jesus is portrayed in the Western world?
And yes Israel was conquered by Greeks and Romans(some of whom were blond)as other Indo European peoples among them such Philistines(originally a Hellenized Northern European people) and Hittites(one of King Davids general was Uriah the Hittite whose wife Bathsheba David had seduced).
But the Bible would be sure to point out any unusual features of Jesus like it did with David who red hair and ruddy complexion.. which was apparently pleasing to God!I am surprised the much maligned red heads(especially in UK where they are often stabbed for that reason alone) dont bring that up more often!
Anyway ,also remember Israel is pretty close to Africa as well and Syria Canaan area before the establishment of ancient Israel was a satrapy of Egypt.There are paintings of Ramses hunting lions and bears in Syria.
Israel was again invaded by Egypt during the reign of Rehoboam(son of Solomon) by the the Pharoah Shishak.Though interestingly this particular Pharaoh is unique for being describes as a blonde of Libyan origin and not native Egyptian ancestry.Later Ethiopians and then Ptolemies would take over the royal house of Egypt and Egyptian control over their destiny wouldnt be return until the Arabized though still native Gamal Abdul Nasser some 2000 years later!

Dr Van Nostrand said...



My source for Caesars pecadilloes is the handy Caesar and Christ by Will Durant.While Mr Durant is more than happy to include all sorts of juicy gossip and scandal about the ancients, he is careful to mention the source and their motivations and as well as his judgement on whether or not such accusations are accurate

He writes of Caesar..."The youth took readily to oratory and almost lost himself in juvenile authorship.He was saved by being made military aide to Marcus Thermus in Asia.Nicomedes ruler of Bythynia took such a fancy to him that Cicero and other gossips taunted him with having "lost his virginity to a king"
Back in Rome, he divided his energies between politics and love...As this was a purely political marriage(Caesar and Pompeia),he did not scurple to carry on liaisons in the fashion of his time;but in such number and with such ambigendered diverstiy that Curio(father of his later general) called him omnium mulierum vir et omnium virorum mulier-"the husband of every woman and the wife of every man."He woudl continue these habits in his campaigns,dallywing with Cleopatra in Egypt,with Queen Eunoe in Numidia, and with so many ladies in Gaul that his soldiers in fond jest called him moechus calvus, the "bald adulterer"

..Sorry had to include this amazing anecdote in young Caesars life as well
Pirates captured him on the way (from Rome to Asia) ,took him to one of their Cilician lairs and offered to free him for twenty talents($72,000);he reproached them for underestimating his value , and volunteered to give them fifty.Having sent his servants to raise the money, he amused himself by writing poems and reading them to his captors.They did not like them.He called them dull barbarians and promised to hang them at the earliest opportunity.When the ransom arrived he hurried to Miletus,engaged vessels and crews,chased and caught the pirates,recovered the ransom, and crucified them , but being a man of great clemency, he had their throats cut first. Then he went to Rhodes to study rhetoric and philosophy.

Dr Van Nostrand said...

"The Arabs took over decaying Christian areas in the Mideast, the Turks took over the Byzantines, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were smarter, and I don't see why various German tribes taking over the Roman Empire would either."

Yes, the rampant reductionism of HBD has been recognized as a problem for some time. IQ is such a powerful hammer that wherever you turn things rapidly starts looking like nails."


I agree with both of you.I would take it further. This bizarre and pathetic quest of the white HBD to prove that the ancient Germanics had high IQ actually leads to truly stupid conclusion and in a delicious irony this makes them stupider
This reminds me of the rather humoros bind Hitler got himself into when he commissioned German archaelogists to dig up "proof" that ancient Germans were just as sophisticated as the Romans. When all that kept cropping were some rudimentary dwelling and inferior pottery, Hitler quickly and quietly abondoned the project and just continued with the time honored Nordic supremacist tradtion of just co opting other cultures and civilizations (Vedic,Egyptian,Greek,Roman,Persian) as their own.

Dr Van Nostrand said...

d observer on the scene over the predictions of your model of the world<

You'd be smarter to take hard data on IQ over impressionistic essays."

All this tells me about you is that you seem to be some weirdo shut in. What use is hard data if not backed up by real world experience.
You remind of the Al Beruni's observation of Indian astronomers who knew their astronomical charts and tables pretty well but failed to point to the constellations in the sky(India at the time was a declining civiliztion)

>Ill throw this in as a bonus- they use your babys blood in their Passover Matzos
There! Happy?<

Happier than you, apparently."

And you deduce this how?Im not a shut in ,so Im likely to happier!



>In Dalrymple's view, blacks only do poorly because of nepotism. He explicitly denies HBD factors, consistently.<

Correct, and not only consistently just in this article, but also in other writings."

Did he ever outright deny it? Not mentioning is not neccesarily denying though in his case it implies that it isnt that important

Daniels - the real name (or is it?) of Dalrymple - is a pull-yourselves-up-by-your-bootstraps intellectual courtier from the blame-the-poor Thatcher/Blair years,|"

WTF? Thatcher may have been sladered as "blaming the poor" but Blair? How do you put both of them in same sentence much less share the same backslash?!
BTW TR/AD is for a sure a bigger fan of Thatcher than Blair but by no means does he absolve her of blame(in his opinion) of the cultural decline of Britain.

puffed on account of it, and riding a small surfboard of deserved fame for reiterating in nonalcoholic Jamesianese (so unlike that of the other great neocon - the late Christopher Hitchens)"

Im pretty sure TR is not a neocon.Thank you for stamp of approval for TR("deserved fame"). Where would he be without your snark and condescension?
And BTW he is not really a fan of Christopher Hitchesn who you equate him with

the truth that whining is morally corrupting and above all, unattractive...a truth which anyone who has attained his majority respects in principle if not always (as Mr. D/X never seems to grow less amused to recall) in practice. I see nothing in him, particularly nowadays when he has slipped further into memoir mood and produces would-be philosophical travelogues, scanty impressions of here and there, this and that. Like another Red Diaper Baby, David Horowitz, he has thrown all his bombs and sits in a kingdom of thinning smoke."

You have said a lot of...nothing. Nothing at best. The above is the verbal equivalent of a baboon hurling faeces at the sun completely oblivious to the effects of gravity...

Dr Van Nostrand said...

@Hepp
I don't know why you think his point about nepotism was lost on me. I understand it. But he still denies HBD."

My point was that HBD isnt as important to him as culture. To be sure he never said that Africans would be just as capable as say Ashkenazi Jews when it came to intellecutal achievements but they are smart enough to creat enough technocrats to run the nitty gritty of society.But their main failing is the social structure which is pre modern

A more egregious example is in one of his books where he writes something like "I'm writing about the British underclass. American readers who may think genetics are important should know that our underclass is white." HBD and cultural explanations are not naturally antagonistic; both obviously explain the world to some extent. But Dalrymple believes it's only culture, making him no different from a person who would argue that genes are everything."

Well you do seem to imply that genes do matter more than culture if not "genes are everything". Im sure he has heard all the canards of this or that group having high or low IQ.
I think his reasoning is simple-it is easier to change culture than genes and perhaps a change in culture leads to a change in genes(compare IQ of mud hut dweleing Germans with the BMW creating Germans of today due to Classical and Christian influence)
So start with culture and see where it goes

Dr Van Nostrand said...

Idi Amin had a lot of personality."

Probably because he ate other personalities

Anonymous said...

The media does not "hate" Mugabe. They cannot ignore his record of utter disaster when they discuss him but he is rarely discussed. The media hated Ian Smith - hated. He was in the news all the time along with his government and was subject to constant attack. The level of attention paid to Mugabe is a fraction of the level of attention paid to Smith. Mugabe is just one more failed dictator and Zimbabwe is no different than Angola or Mozambique. The only reason people know Mugabe's name is because he did one thing the media actually likes, took power from the white minority.