Yet there are still people who think lockdowns were beneficial and would gladly use them again. The UK’s traveling Covid circus doesn’t think it’s even important enough to question the policy.
Or even Ireland, or perhaps even that “prodigal son”, the USA.
Robbie K
1 month ago
Just like in Haiti, despite huge opportunities and natural wealth, there is always someone else to blame for the failings and that will of course be the white colonialists.
If the shoe fits wear it. Your hurt feeling as a white European does not supercede the reality that, Europe, through the IMF,UN, WHO, and other supranational bodies ar still screwing over Africa.
Firstly, you’re assuming Robbie is a “white European.”
Secondly, if “white European colonialists” are assumed to “still screwing over Africa” they can always take their money and expertise elsewhere.
And I’m sure the ones being “colonised” are perfectly capable of telling them to do so if they care to.
You are so wrong on this one. African countries recieve huge sums and resources from the west and international organisations. It is their culture of greed and corruption that leads them down this path every time.
Lots of that money ends up in the pockets of corrupt leaders. We are also pushing countries with fabulous fossil resources to give up sources of cheap energy for costly and ineffective renewables to satisfy first world climate hysterics.
Yes, low IQ savages in Africa are in control of their “countries” for the last 50 years at least.
They created nothing of value.
But they overbred thanks to Western science, medicine and technology.
Without it population of Africa would be less than 20% of current levels.
Savages would be running away from lions, throwing spears at each other.
But hey, their problems are all fault of the white people.
It’s culture, not genetics.
As a former refugee from a communist country I accepted a young Sudanese couple as house-mates in Melbourne, Australia in 2015.
They lived with me for almost 3 years.
Since I treated them like family, they invited me to tribal events.
This was a great honour. Truly.
The events involved eating together, leading to my discovery why there are so many skeletal toddlers covered in flies sitting in the dust on their own images in charities’ ads: age groups from toddler up were in groups, acted in groups. In complete freedom from any interference, any care of what other groups were doing.
Grown-ups were sitting together eating & chatting without anyone looking at what kids were doing, whether they had anything to eat etc.
Having children myself I felt very tense experiencing a complete lack of concern for what kids were doing.
Have you noticed mums rarely look malnourished, when they present their babies dying from hunger to doctors, as in news/documentaries?
This is a really stupid comment, completely missing the point of the article. Human beings are extremely closely related, whatever continent they live in. 99% of our time on Earth, human beings have lived in hunter gatherer band societies, which included Europe!
The ability to work in groups say, in your example, to kill dangerous predators and other animals for food, by otherwise weak mammals not endowed with sharp teeth and claws demonstrates great intelligence, not stupidity.
The average hunter gatherer was in all likelihood more, not less intelligent than people living in modern mass society, because the demands on individual ability was very much higher, for reasons of basic survival.
Actually those Africans who are hopefully beginning to smell a rat, have a point when they identify the WHO and other international organisations as neo, if crypto colonial in practice, if not intention.
One really despairs, that justified critique of (supposedly) progressive policies, which are divisive and disastrous, sometimes morph into old fashioned out and out racism, if the most idiotic kind.
Well said, Andrew. A bit harsh, but truly, the ‘do-gooders’ who go to Africa to help feed the poor don’t realize that the more poor you feed, the more the poor breed, and the more poor there are to feed.
In Gaza, Africa, and other places, when Western countries pour money and Western know-how into these places to ‘feed the poor’, they get little thanks and a population that explodes to 10x its previous levels.
Anthony Roe
1 month ago
Nigeria had abundant natural resources for a population of 10-15 million.
By manufacturing high added value goods that actually work and last.
Mark O'Neill
1 month ago
“Last week, a coalition of senior African academics accused the WHO of being “colonialist” in its plans for a new pandemic treaty that could allow it to plunge Africa back into lockdown.”
No, not colonialist but it is a bad idea nonetheless.
All bad ideas can be traced back to some form of white privilege. It’s the new version of the “white man’s burden,” and it’s every bit as obnoxious as the old one.
You are being wheycist again.
Think about poor Dianne Abbott.
The head of WHO is ok with Chinese colonialism.
It is Marxist like him…
Mike Downing
1 month ago
The best / worst thing about being old (er) is that you’ve seen it all before; flares, wedgies, DM’s, Che Guevara posters …..
Oh, and the total incompetence of the IMF and the World Bank.
Anna Ford did a documentary aeons ago about how the Sudanese economy (an erstwhile ‘breadbasket’ of North Africa ) was wrecked by misjudged economic reforms tied to loans that all went bad. There followed economic collapse and the civil war which has left it as today’s basket case.
None of this detracts from the cronyism, greed and sheer incompetence of the rulers in these places but these international organisations are worse than useless and all need reform or winding up.
John Pade
1 month ago
Do 10, I=1 to n
If (I / 5)Then
Write (15,50)
n = n+1
10 Continue
Integer I
50 Format (‘Economists prophesy a prosperous future for Nigeria, the rest of the continent.’)
Thomas Wagner
1 month ago
The devaluation of the Nigerian naira by 230% over the past year,,,
This is not possible. Devaluation by 100% would render its value zero. As it is, it’s worth $0.000622 USD. Not much, probably not worth the paper it’s printed on, but not zero.
William Shaw
1 month ago
“a coalition of senior African academics accused the WHO of being “colonialist””
There’s a simple solution… stop funding them and focus all efforts elsewhere.
Let them fend for themselves.
Come on, you can not criticise savages for overbreeding.
JOHN CAMPBELL
1 month ago
Demographic context essential.
Andrew F
1 month ago
So two articles were published on UnHerd.
One about extremism and the other one about Nigeria.
I guess some people on here, never mind BBC or Guardian, still have a problem with understanding why multi-culti would never work?
David Giles
1 month ago
Aah I see. Not the disastrous COVID lockdown. No it’s a neoliberal CONSPIRACY. And no names are offered because, you know, conspiracy by clever, evil neoliberal conspirators.
What infantile rubbish!
David Harris
1 month ago
So nothing to do with its population doubling in the last 20 years?
Kat L
1 month ago
Was it just the median age though or the high use of anti virals?
Mike Bell
1 month ago
Nearly every country in the world is now suffering from debt -repayment burden either from Covid help or simply from economists claiming that borrowing would lead to growth.
The question is: ‘How is getting these interest payments?’ They must be the biggest transfer of assets from the poor to some rich in the history of humanity.
UnHerd Reader
1 month ago
There is another important and less well reported factor that contributes significantly to Nigeria’s woes, and that is the systematic persecution of the Christian’s in the Country.
There are almost 103 million Christians in Nigeria, which is almost half the country’s population of 222 million. In the Muslim-majority north of the country, the proportion of Christians is much lower – this is traditionally where most persecution of Christians has happened – but it continues to spread further south.
Christians in Nigeria continue to be terrorised with devastating impunity by Islamic militants and armed ‘bandits’ – particularly in the north and central regions of the country. The attacks are often brutal in nature and can involve destruction of properties, abductions for ransom, sexual violence and death. Believers are stripped of their livelihoods and driven from their homes, leaving a trail of grief and trauma.
More believers are killed for their faith in Nigeria each year than everywhere else in the world, combined. Men and boys are often specifically targeted, to undermine the growth of Christian families in the future. Women and girls face abduction and sexual violence, with the knowledge that sometimes their communities reject them when they come home.
Violence by Islamic extremist groups such as Fulani militants, Boko Haram and ISWAP (Islamic State in West African Province) increased during the presidency of Muhammadu Buhari, putting Nigeria at the epicentre of targeted violence against the church. The government’s failure to protect Christians and punish perpetrators has only strengthened the militants’ influence. The implications of the new president, Bola Tinubu, are not yet clear.
Christians living in the Sharia (Islamic law) states of northern Nigeria can also face discrimination and tremendous pressure as second-class citizens. Believers from Muslims backgrounds often experience rejection from their own families and pressure to renounce their new faith.
Source: Open Doors UK
Yet there are still people who think lockdowns were beneficial and would gladly use them again. The UK’s traveling Covid circus doesn’t think it’s even important enough to question the policy.
Britain as a society has evolved beyond questioning government policy.
Along with 1914 & 1939 COVID was one of the greatest catastrophes in British History.
I trust there will NOT be another.
Not just British.
Will any African nation bring back its coloniser? (Or China? Or Russia? Or perhaps India?)
Or even Ireland, or perhaps even that “prodigal son”, the USA.
Just like in Haiti, despite huge opportunities and natural wealth, there is always someone else to blame for the failings and that will of course be the white colonialists.
If the shoe fits wear it. Your hurt feeling as a white European does not supercede the reality that, Europe, through the IMF,UN, WHO, and other supranational bodies ar still screwing over Africa.
By subsidizing them to the gills?
Never respond to Unherd Reader, a leftist that spews nonsense all day. Just wait long enough and they will blame Trump for Nigeria. Nuts.
Firstly, you’re assuming Robbie is a “white European.”
Secondly, if “white European colonialists” are assumed to “still screwing over Africa” they can always take their money and expertise elsewhere.
And I’m sure the ones being “colonised” are perfectly capable of telling them to do so if they care to.
You are so wrong on this one. African countries recieve huge sums and resources from the west and international organisations. It is their culture of greed and corruption that leads them down this path every time.
Lots of that money ends up in the pockets of corrupt leaders. We are also pushing countries with fabulous fossil resources to give up sources of cheap energy for costly and ineffective renewables to satisfy first world climate hysterics.
Something is happening but the remedies are best left to the innovators not the government.
Don’t their leaders bear some responsibility?
If I go to a loan shark and find myself in trouble, who’s to blame?
Yes, low IQ savages in Africa are in control of their “countries” for the last 50 years at least.
They created nothing of value.
But they overbred thanks to Western science, medicine and technology.
Without it population of Africa would be less than 20% of current levels.
Savages would be running away from lions, throwing spears at each other.
But hey, their problems are all fault of the white people.
It’s culture, not genetics.
As a former refugee from a communist country I accepted a young Sudanese couple as house-mates in Melbourne, Australia in 2015.
They lived with me for almost 3 years.
Since I treated them like family, they invited me to tribal events.
This was a great honour. Truly.
The events involved eating together, leading to my discovery why there are so many skeletal toddlers covered in flies sitting in the dust on their own images in charities’ ads: age groups from toddler up were in groups, acted in groups. In complete freedom from any interference, any care of what other groups were doing.
Grown-ups were sitting together eating & chatting without anyone looking at what kids were doing, whether they had anything to eat etc.
Having children myself I felt very tense experiencing a complete lack of concern for what kids were doing.
Have you noticed mums rarely look malnourished, when they present their babies dying from hunger to doctors, as in news/documentaries?
This is a really stupid comment, completely missing the point of the article. Human beings are extremely closely related, whatever continent they live in. 99% of our time on Earth, human beings have lived in hunter gatherer band societies, which included Europe!
The ability to work in groups say, in your example, to kill dangerous predators and other animals for food, by otherwise weak mammals not endowed with sharp teeth and claws demonstrates great intelligence, not stupidity.
The average hunter gatherer was in all likelihood more, not less intelligent than people living in modern mass society, because the demands on individual ability was very much higher, for reasons of basic survival.
Actually those Africans who are hopefully beginning to smell a rat, have a point when they identify the WHO and other international organisations as neo, if crypto colonial in practice, if not intention.
One really despairs, that justified critique of (supposedly) progressive policies, which are divisive and disastrous, sometimes morph into old fashioned out and out racism, if the most idiotic kind.
Well said, Andrew. A bit harsh, but truly, the ‘do-gooders’ who go to Africa to help feed the poor don’t realize that the more poor you feed, the more the poor breed, and the more poor there are to feed.
In Gaza, Africa, and other places, when Western countries pour money and Western know-how into these places to ‘feed the poor’, they get little thanks and a population that explodes to 10x its previous levels.
Nigeria had abundant natural resources for a population of 10-15 million.
All a bit stretched now with almost 230 million.
Thanks to Western science, medicine and technology.
They’re headed for 377 million.
Only that?
Is it because another 200 millions are heading to Europe?
How does Japan compete on natural resources vs. population?
By manufacturing high added value goods that actually work and last.
“Last week, a coalition of senior African academics accused the WHO of being “colonialist” in its plans for a new pandemic treaty that could allow it to plunge Africa back into lockdown.”
No, not colonialist but it is a bad idea nonetheless.
All bad ideas can be traced back to some form of white privilege. It’s the new version of the “white man’s burden,” and it’s every bit as obnoxious as the old one.
A bit ironic for African academics to call the WHO colonialist when the head of the WHO is an African academic.
You are being wheycist again.
Think about poor Dianne Abbott.
The head of WHO is ok with Chinese colonialism.
It is Marxist like him…
The best / worst thing about being old (er) is that you’ve seen it all before; flares, wedgies, DM’s, Che Guevara posters …..
Oh, and the total incompetence of the IMF and the World Bank.
Anna Ford did a documentary aeons ago about how the Sudanese economy (an erstwhile ‘breadbasket’ of North Africa ) was wrecked by misjudged economic reforms tied to loans that all went bad. There followed economic collapse and the civil war which has left it as today’s basket case.
None of this detracts from the cronyism, greed and sheer incompetence of the rulers in these places but these international organisations are worse than useless and all need reform or winding up.
Do 10, I=1 to n
If (I / 5)Then
Write (15,50)
n = n+1
10 Continue
Integer I
50 Format (‘Economists prophesy a prosperous future for Nigeria, the rest of the continent.’)
This is not possible. Devaluation by 100% would render its value zero. As it is, it’s worth $0.000622 USD. Not much, probably not worth the paper it’s printed on, but not zero.
“a coalition of senior African academics accused the WHO of being “colonialist””
There’s a simple solution… stop funding them and focus all efforts elsewhere.
Let them fend for themselves.
Amazingly nothing on the demographic context.
Come on, you can not criticise savages for overbreeding.
Demographic context essential.
So two articles were published on UnHerd.
One about extremism and the other one about Nigeria.
I guess some people on here, never mind BBC or Guardian, still have a problem with understanding why multi-culti would never work?
Aah I see. Not the disastrous COVID lockdown. No it’s a neoliberal CONSPIRACY. And no names are offered because, you know, conspiracy by clever, evil neoliberal conspirators.
What infantile rubbish!
So nothing to do with its population doubling in the last 20 years?
Was it just the median age though or the high use of anti virals?
Nearly every country in the world is now suffering from debt -repayment burden either from Covid help or simply from economists claiming that borrowing would lead to growth.
The question is: ‘How is getting these interest payments?’ They must be the biggest transfer of assets from the poor to some rich in the history of humanity.
There is another important and less well reported factor that contributes significantly to Nigeria’s woes, and that is the systematic persecution of the Christian’s in the Country.
There are almost 103 million Christians in Nigeria, which is almost half the country’s population of 222 million. In the Muslim-majority north of the country, the proportion of Christians is much lower – this is traditionally where most persecution of Christians has happened – but it continues to spread further south.
Christians in Nigeria continue to be terrorised with devastating impunity by Islamic militants and armed ‘bandits’ – particularly in the north and central regions of the country. The attacks are often brutal in nature and can involve destruction of properties, abductions for ransom, sexual violence and death. Believers are stripped of their livelihoods and driven from their homes, leaving a trail of grief and trauma.
More believers are killed for their faith in Nigeria each year than everywhere else in the world, combined. Men and boys are often specifically targeted, to undermine the growth of Christian families in the future. Women and girls face abduction and sexual violence, with the knowledge that sometimes their communities reject them when they come home.
Violence by Islamic extremist groups such as Fulani militants, Boko Haram and ISWAP (Islamic State in West African Province) increased during the presidency of Muhammadu Buhari, putting Nigeria at the epicentre of targeted violence against the church. The government’s failure to protect Christians and punish perpetrators has only strengthened the militants’ influence. The implications of the new president, Bola Tinubu, are not yet clear.
Christians living in the Sharia (Islamic law) states of northern Nigeria can also face discrimination and tremendous pressure as second-class citizens. Believers from Muslims backgrounds often experience rejection from their own families and pressure to renounce their new faith.
Source: Open Doors UK