Talk:Robert Mugabe/Archive 3

It seems to me that the long note on what to call Zimbabwe belongs in the Zimbabwe article, not here. RickK 05:20, 4 Aug 2003 (UTC)

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Mugabe is an asshole, and should be hanged for having deceived the people of Zimbabwe into believing that he was going to help 'liberate' them.

Kofi Annan is another example of a corrupt, authoritarian motherfucker. The UN in general has made liberating mid-Africa near-impossible--they have only served to further enslave a people who have for the past couple hundred years taken more crap than any other region on Earth. Khranus

Talk pages are to talk about articles, not about the subject of the articles. Your remark, being as POV as they are, will not help us writing a better article. Andre Engels 21:37, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Yes they will. 'NPOV' is about representing all opinions in a quasi-neutral manner. Though this fanciful notion will probably never completely manifest--it at least, in essence, regards all opinions as worthy of representation. Therefore this opinion should be in some way incorporated into the article. I think I'll do so myself, albeit in a more 'NPOV' manner, as soon as I feel like it, along with more information, quotes, etc. I knew a guy from Zimbabwe, personally, when I lived in the United States. He hated Mugabe, and told me many horrific things about the harsh reality of that country. Let's face it, the media isn't telling us the whole truth about that place. Khranus:.

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I think I know where some of the controversy surrounding that comment came from--and I'd like to clear it up.

I agree with Mugabe's statements that the United States merely wants to create a corrupt colonial government in Iraq--that is obvious. However, Mugabe himself is also a corrupt, twisted leader. People have been taught to think in 'good guy, bad guy' terms, as they did so erroneously during WWII, but this is almost never the case. At the moment, we have a battle being fought between several 'bad guys'. Very very few 'good guys' have been represented--and next to none have any political power anymore. Both the UN and the Bush regime are illegitimate, fascist organisations, and neither deserve the support of the people. Both are anti-human. Khranus (for analogy, just look at Hitler vs. Stalin during WWII. both powers were horrifically corrupt. both killed millions of civilians for political dissent. both were illegitimate and neither deserved the support of the people. The same situation with the Cold War.)

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Part of Mugabe's error is his obvious racism. He doesn't believe in freedom for ALL people, he believes in freedom for Black people, and no one else. This was demonstrated when he had innocent farmers murdered merely because they were white. This guy is a black equivalent to Hitler--he's not a good guy. Khranus

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Khranus:

Users who understand proper encyclopedic standards don't give a damn about your personal opinions. Find a more productive thing to do on Wikipedia; or find a more suitable forum for mouthing off about African leaders, African political crises, and socio-economic problems.

Just as the structure of the agrarian economy was the underlying foundation of so many revolutionary upheavals in the twentieth century (e.g., Mexico, China, Cuba, Algeria, and Vietnam, etc.), it has been in Zimbabwe since the land issue erupted in recent years. In other historical articles on social and political conflict in agrarian societies, we present the roles played by the landed upper classes and the peasantry without engaging in moral judgments on the basis of a very different set of cultural values (i.e. Anglo-American ones). We examine the range of historical conditions under which either or both of these rural groups become important forces for change.

Wikipedia is striving to reach the standards of the respected encyclopedias and sourcebooks, and we will not achieve this if the discussions on talk pages degenerate into mouthing off with your ideological and polemical platitudes, slogans, and clichés. 172 10:57, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC)

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"... Ian Smith illegally declared independence ... " - aren't all declarations of indepedence illegal? Discuss (somewhere else) - Hotlorp 02:13, 11 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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The article is managing to stay reasonably NPOV, focusing on his anti-colonial role, as well as various interpretations of the recent troubles, but the recently added paragraphs are not well-conceived - reasons for each of the changes follow: Opposition to Mugabe comes from Western powers, internally, and a few African leaders, so the 'western-led' heading makes little sense. The argument that Mugabe responded to 'decades of pent-up frustration' is dealt-with more deeply in the paragraphs above. Calling Tutu and Kaunda, two of the most vocal African voices against apartheid, 'pro-western' is disingeneous, buying into Mugabe's deflections of all criticism as 'racist', and ignoring and suppressing African critics. The MDC is supported by both trade unions and white (ex)-landowners - categorising it as a western puppet is again a Mugabe charge to deflect criticism. The 'rich white' tag is Mugabe ignoring critics from the rest of the body. Greenman 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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172, please discuss your changes on Talk before reverting. It's not NPOV to call Mugabe a statesman and Kaunda a dictator. You cannot say Mugabe is 'responding to decades of pent-up frustration' and 'redistributing to indigenous Zimbabweans' when that's debated above in the same article. Also, the trade union opposition is some of the most vocal remaining internal opposition, so don't censor it out. And justify your 'pro-western' tag for all African opposition.

Greenman 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Um, 172 is, um, kind of sure of himself, and has an, um, interesting take on things. Read Kim Jong Il --Robert Merkel 02:35, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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Robert:

Make me into a staw man all you want. This doesn't bother me, so long as I'm really around to defend myself.

I will explain that "interesting take on things." It stems from sufficient training to forego your type of mindless moralism. I also avoid trapping myself in a provincial, particularistic "Kiplingesque" worldview. I do not assume that underlying conditions in a particular context (e.g., the level of economic development, political history, position in the international division of labor, institutional legacies, class stratification, sociocultural traditions, or other "structural" features) will not be major factors in either the onset or the outcome of historical processes.

I focus on structural constraints (administrative, cultural, economic, socio-political) that help explain long-run historical trajectories. Others, on the other hand, choose to personalize history, and chose an extreme voluntarism. Others choose to ramble on about how evil tip-pot dictators are to blame for everything. But this is an utter fantasy.

You accused me of being an "apologist" for Kim Jong Il. But in reality, I addressed how his regime is embedded in layers of constraints beyond his control, whether administrative, economic, international, or even climatic. In addition, from your standpoint, to explain anything in terms of security interests and strategic positioning (such as the DPRK's weapons proliferation), and not in an "evil" man's inherent drive to do evil things, is being an apologist.

Now, I do admit to letting my normative biases reach the surface from time to time on the Mugabe article. I wouldn't to this elsewhere, but I have to act as a counterweight to all the users ignorant of Africa's harsh realities. Everyone else has the tendency to view Mugabe from the vantage point of Western values and concerns (especially political liberties), while failing to understand the extreme importance of the land issue in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Greenman, on the other hand, brought some legitimate concerns. I stand behind the use of "pent up frustrations." I recommend researching the failure of the "willing buyer, willing seller plan." Then, you'd understand that we're dealing with forces beyond Mugabe's control. 172 05:29, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

If you want to argue with me on Kim Jong Il, might I suggest you do so on the appropriate page. Now that you've raised the issue again, I'll raise some specific parts of that article.--Robert Merkel 06:47, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Well, you should have placed that personal attack on the Kim Jong Il page in the first place. BTW, this is boring me. You seem to want to trap me into some little game of ideological attack and counter-attack, but I'm not really interested. 172 08:25, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Heh, "forces beyond Mugabe's control". No brutality so brutal that you can't come up with an excuse for it, eh? By that reasoning, you shouldn't be looking down on us ignorant Westerners for our "provincial" and "Kiplingesque" biases - it must be due to "forces beyond our control", and if, say, Leopold allowed terrible things in the Congo, it was also due to "forces beyond his control". Historical materialism is great! I can shoot someone whose car I want, and say "not my fault, it's just those darn harsh realities that made me do it."

Don't make an ass out of yourself. I said that socio-economic, international, and institutional factors explain forces can constrain the range of possibilities of agency (i.e. historical actors). I did not say that any of these "structures" or "forces" determine anything. The two extremes of determinism and replacement are not historically valid. You're only proving to me that you're an illiterate when it comes to these matters. 172 09:53, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I hope nobody's being fooled by 172; this is just a particular POV that he's been trying to push in all over the place. Check out History of the United States (1980-present) for an example of the hypocrisy - 172 added plenty of gratuitous little digs at Reagan as part of an effort to blame him for everything bad that happened in the 1980s (no "forces beyond his control" operating there, apparently). So much for 172's pretended NPOV! Stan 09:06, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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Yeah, and no historian or social theorist recognizes any changes in social and economic structures, social conflict, demographic trends, or ideological ferment as having, in any way, underpinned anything in history, right?

These "forces" are just the silly ideas of a bunch of Marxists, right? Prior to periods of upheaval, such as the English Civil War, the French Revolution, the Revolutions of 1848, the US Civil War, and the Chinese Revolution, everything was all well and good, and things were stable, right? It's just that had a bunch of silly agitators and evil men running around agitating things and blowing everything out of proportion, right?

Sigh. In the real world, I don't have to deal with this crap. 172 09:46, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

"Ass"? "Illiterate"? "Crap"? Use them first, you're the loser. But it's funny, I was reading not too long ago about how Teddy Roosevelt exploited his superior's absence at the Navy department one afternoon to make sure that the Spanish-American War went the way he wanted. Not exactly an impersonal force acting according to the dictates of the dialectic! Stan 17:47, 20 Dec 2003 (UTC)

What's your point? Do you have any relevant evidence suggesting that the land issue is a non-issue in Zimbabwe? 172 00:43, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I didn't say it was a non-issue. But Mugabe had the choice of heating it up or cooling it down, and he chose to heat it up. That was his free choice. It's the job of a leader to make those kinds of choices; something often not understood by people who've never held a leadership position themselves. Stan 06:42, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

The French Revolution may have had its Jacobians, but it was just and a historical necessity. The fair distribution of land in Zimbabwe is a just cause as well. This issue was swept under the rug for two decades. It's about time that many in Zimbabwe would no longer accept the concrete manifestations of white supremacy. 172 04:45, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Brutality and random murder is never "just and a historical necessity"; Gandhi, MLK, etc prove that nonviolence works too. It is the misfortune of the French not to have been blessed with a leader who could have changed the regime without engaging in a Reign of Terror. But I know you have a guilty conscience about Mugabe - if you really thought that all of his actions were just and necessary, you would have no problem describing them explicitly, instead you're editing out the details and using lots of weasel words. Stan 08:10, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Wrong. You fail this test. See your talk page. 172 15:04, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

In the meantime, we can stop criticizing the past military dictators of Latin America for being "brutal." After all, those Commie agitators were outta control -- it was a matter of historical necessity to smack 'em down. User:64.7.89.54 07:24, 16 Jul 2004

OK guys - time to cool off and tone things down. We are all here to make Wikipedia a better place - calling each other names will not do that. K? --mav 02:21, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)~

Actually, I don't think 172 is here to make WP a better place. I think he's here seeking personal validation - note how he always claims to want people's opinions about his writing, but then gets progressively defensive, rude, then abusive if the opinions aren't deferential and admiring. Stan 06:42, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Personal validation? That would be the case if I had a fetish for abuse. And BTW, I'm only going to reciprocate your own rudeness and hostility. 172 06:52, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

It does seem irrational that you keep trying. Stan 07:20, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Blah, blah, blah. If you're running out of material, check out Logical fallacy for some more debating tips. 172 07:30, 21 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Both of you please stop it. How about taking a break from editing this and other articles that are causing you trouble and come after you clear your heads? --mav

"Professional historian" 172 can't seem to get his head out of his ass and realize that not everything is white colonial & corporate oppressors vs. Marxist revolutionaries who have to remove certain rights for the "greater good." Trey Stone 08:43, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)