See subject. Why is Africa such a shithole? I mean, there are some decent places, but compared to pretty much any other area of the world, it's in horrible condition. It's been that way for at least a few centuries. Why do the countries of Africa lag so far behind most other countries with respect to standard of living? Kind of a broad subject, but I'd like to see people's opinion on it. I understand that there are specific problems facing the many individual nations of Africa, but I'm attempting to look at the bigger picture.

7/30/2008 9:04:23 PM

too hot imo

7/30/2008 9:05:09 PM

well european colonization didnt help

7/30/2008 9:18:21 PM

^^^

why do you ask the question?

you already know the answer. everyone knows the answer. It's because of submillennial shifts of the tropic and equatorial climate cells.

7/30/2008 9:26:31 PM

it's cause of all those niggers!

but, seriously, it's a combination of colonization and the centuries of a hunter/gatherer lifestyle. pretty simple

7/30/2008 10:07:39 PM

geography played a huge role

7/30/2008 10:14:21 PM

Unlike many places in the world that were colonized by Europeans, Africa was left with virtually no social, civil, or economic institutions in place. It'd be like handing the car keys to a teenager who had never taken a drivers' ed course and who had, in fact, always been forced to ride in the back seat (or maybe the trunk).

In India/Pakistan, local involvement in civil life had been pretty strong for quite a while. In the Americas, you had existing local governments separating themselves from the mother country. Each of these cases involves relatively experienced people working with an existing infrastructure. Furthermore, the inhabitants of these areas often had long history of cities and large governments.

In sub-Saharan Africa, by contrast, you have large areas where blacks had -zero- experience in government, because that is what they had been allowed. They hadn't had the opportunity to learn from the colonial governments, and by and large they didn't have their own familiarity with municipalities or "national" governments. Outside of Egypt and a few other kingdoms, there was no African history of such things prior to the arrival of the whites.

But, the Europeans cut them loose and effectively said, "Good luck." That already left them at a huge disadvantage, because only a minute educated elite had any idea how to run a country. Compounding the problem was the positively brilliant fashion in which Africa was carved up, with national borders cutting across cohesive populations and former colonial masters granting authority arbitrarily to whichever group they thought closest resembled white people. This bred resentment, separatism, and border conflict.

These factors, coupled with a Cold War environment that ensured a steady stream of weapons to anyone who asked, meant that virtually every country in Africa ended up with a relatively large, untrained, angry, corrupt military, with its power-hungry leadership in factions that only occasionally sided with the actual government. These factions like to shoot at each other, causing political instability and violence that effectively halts all national improvement. Many African nations are full to the brim with natural resources, but nobody wants to invest in putting meaningful facilities in a country where it is likely to be shelled by government or resistance forces who are cutting off all the workers' hands besides.

Then of course there are those regions that simply don't have resources of any kind. Giant, arid deserts are only important when they're full of oil. Ethiopia doesn't qualify. The entire Horn of Africa's only relevance is its location by the Red Sea shipping lanes, and it can't capitalize on that because of political instability and piracy.

7/30/2008 10:14:44 PM

Short Answer: We don't know.

We do know that tropics in general seem to be problematic for growth.

We also know that institutions are important for growth and most african nations are only 40 or 50 years old.

Also, there are few nation states in Africa and nation states tend to do better.


That being said the big question is - Why are parts of Africa worse than they were in the late 1980s? Why is Africa moving backwards?

Aids obviously doesn't help, neither does malaria. However, statistical studies show that disease doesn't seem to be powerful enough.

There is some thought that it is the curse of foreign aid. Foreign aid has at times kept corrupt governments in business.

However, this is probably the biggest puzzle facing modern economics. In particular consider that much East Asia was as poor as Africa in the 1960s but is rapidly industrializing. Remeber, starving children in China, are why you need to finish your supper. Yet, as East Asia grows Africa slips backwards.

Understanding Africa is probably the biggest challenge we face in the early 21st century.

7/30/2008 10:17:32 PM

Quote :

"We do know that tropics in general seem to be problematic for growth."

They tend to have notoriously poor soil fertility for conventional agriculture, and they've also been historically disease-rich. It's rather difficult to get a proper country going if you can't grow anything and have malaria multiple times a year.

Quote :

"We also know that institutions are important for growth and most african nations are only 40 or 50 years old."

Right, but like I said, so is India, and it's doing OK. And the reason is because there the British had institutions in place that actually involved the Indians.

Quote :

"That being said the big question is - Why are parts of Africa worse than they were in the late 1980s?"

I don't know that this is "the big question" just yet. I'm not even sure most of the countries have been around long enough to really identify an overarching trend. Looking back, it would seem a bit silly for someone observing in America in 1936 to ask why it was worse than it was in 1928.

And, as you said, one big thing that happened around the late 80's was the emergence of AIDS as a major concern. I'd be curious to hear more about how it doesn't seem to be having such a big impact; I don't think you're bullshitting me or anything, but it does seem to be kind of counterintuitive, especially with regard to much of southern Africa.

Quote :

"There is some thought that it is the curse of foreign aid."

I read a piece on this the other day that stuck me as depressingly well-reasoned. Not only does the money bolster corrupt/incompetent governments, but the presence of aid workers of various kinds makes it that much more difficult to get local people to take over the tasks foreigners currently supervise.

Quote :

"In particular consider that much East Asia was as poor as Africa in the 1960s but is rapidly industrializing."

I'm also not sure that this is so big a question. For one thing, many Asian countries went with specific economic plans -- import substitution, for example -- that were generally easier to implement with a cohesive population and functioning central government. It seems unlikely that South Korea would be making passably decent cars today if the country had historically antagonistic ethnic groups vying for power.

Also, proper industry had a stronger hold in much of Asia. Africa was, as I understand it, primarily a great source of natural resources. Asia, of course, just has a metric fuck-ton of people. In the one it makes sense to put the population to work digging shit out of the ground, and in the other it makes sense to put them to work in cities and factories.

7/30/2008 10:31:35 PM

I just don't know how going from zero government to shitty government made it worse.

7/30/2008 10:51:52 PM

This pretty well answers your question.

7/30/2008 10:59:41 PM

Sir Ian Smith was the last hope. The world shat on him.

*shrug*

That, and the rule of law is nonexistent.

7/30/2008 11:12:59 PM

my armchair anthropologist answer would be that it was not allowed to become civilized on its own - modern society was thrust upon it my Europeans. For whatever reason, when the human societies started spreading out from Africa, the societies that populated Europe and Asia seemed to have advanced their civilizations much faster than those who stayed behind in Africa, and faster also than the ones who made it all the way to the Americas. So when modern Europeans "re-discovered" Africa a few hundred years ago, they 1) pillaged and plundered, as we know, but 2) tried to build societies and civilizations in Africa based on what they had in Europe, but the Africans weren't ready for it yet. Then, of course, as others have pointed out, after pulling africa out of the stone ages in just a couple of centuries, Europe and then America up and left them all alone. Had civilizations in africa been given time to grow and develop technology of their own, or with trading from the outside but without the colonization, it would probably be a completely different place.

7/30/2008 11:17:10 PM

white people

7/30/2008 11:19:51 PM

Actually Africa is a beautiful place. It's where humans originally came from. If humans Sub-Saharan Africa is having trouble adapting to their environment then perhaps they should follow the example of every other animal capable of doing so and *gasp* migrate elsewhere *gasp*. But no, humans, despite their supposed superior intellect, seem incapable of realizing when the environment can no longer support their infectious numbers. Humans are far more likely to continue trashing the planet so they can drive their fat asses around in SUVs and spread their misguided hyper consumerism mentality to the rest of the world including Africa.

7/31/2008 12:21:39 AM

hockeywoman

Try to stay on topic. I'm sure there's a thread for you're whiny environmentalist rants. This isn't it.

7/31/2008 12:23:58 AM

Nothing "whiny" about it. And as the OP stated

Quote :

"Kind of a broad subject, but I'd like to see people's opinion on it."

so kindly stfu. By the way, your intriguing ideas seem to be vacant from the discussion at hand. At least I had something of worth to contribute as opposed to ad homs.

7/31/2008 12:29:34 AM

You're seriously going to blame SUV's for the problems in Africa?

7/31/2008 12:38:43 AM

I am blaming human complacency for the problems in Africa.

7/31/2008 12:40:40 AM

Watch the Movie "Lord of War," and you will get a good idea of what is currently wrong with Africa.

7/31/2008 12:42:10 AM

Also true.

7/31/2008 12:45:26 AM

Quote :

"I just don't know how going from zero government to shitty government made it worse."

Government has an enormous capacity to dick things up a lot more than no government. Of course, in the opinion of myself and pretty much everybody who isn't a Libertarian or anarchist, good government has the capability to do wonderful things.

And besides, they didn't go from "zero government to shitty government." They went from being ruled by experienced (if not well-intentioned) leadership to being ruled by completely inexperienced (and often still not well-intentioned) government.

Quote :

"tried to build societies and civilizations in Africa based on what they had in Europe, but the Africans weren't ready for it yet."

I think this severely underestimates the Africans, to say that they "weren't ready" for civilization. The simple fact is that they weren't integrated into it. They were manipulated by it, controlled by it, and never part of it. Admittedly, part of the reason for that probably stems from the fact that, when Europeans arrived, they didn't find a lot to build upon, as they did in much of Asia. But the Spanish, for all their raping and pillaging, managed to have local people involved with society at least enough that they didn't immediately collapse upon independence.

Quote :

"Had civilizations in africa been given time to grow and develop technology of their own, or with trading from the outside but without the colonization, it would probably be a completely different place."

There's some reason to think it would be different from how it is now, but not terribly different from how it was before the Europeans came along. It's apparent that, before whitey came along, most of Africa didn't have much of a reason to develop civilization of pretty much any kind. They weren't overpopulated and their basic needs were met. Because there weren't areas of relatively dense population, there was no need for urbanization or the rise of substantial governments in many areas.

Quote :

"If humans Sub-Saharan Africa is having trouble adapting to their environment then perhaps they should follow the example of every other animal capable of doing so and *gasp* migrate elsewhere *gasp*."

This isn't an option for a number of reasons. First and foremost, I should think, is that other places on Earth are run by governments that don't particularly want to have the population of Africa living in or passing through their countries as refugees.

7/31/2008 3:43:25 AM

Quote :

"There's some reason to think it would be different from how it is now, but not terribly different from how it was before the Europeans came along."

yeah, that's mostly what I meant. So i guess if they would have remained isolated, then they would probably continue the tribal or nomadic living for as long as it suited them, and adopted or developed technology as it benefited them.

7/31/2008 7:17:29 AM

It is not as difficult as some here let on. Africa is a terrible place because of the era most of it gained independence. At independence, many African countries had working free-market economies, corrupt but functional governments, and a functional civil society. Regretfully, when a country achieves independence it is rebuilt from scratch using the latest and greatest political and economic theory at the time. Regretfully, the practice at the time was state centric socialism. Regretfully, state centric socialism invariably results in economic disaster, especially under corrupt regimes, and only the strongest of political systems can survive the resultant depression. Few did, and so we have countries with failed economies giving birth to failed governments: cycle complete.

As such, had these countries been granted independence in 1910, or even in 1991, I believe they would have not fallen so far. Look at eastern Europe: their independence situation was far more harsh than Africa's, with no working economy to speak of, yet they have transitioned seamlessly to corrupt but functional societies. Had they gained independence in the 60s and 70s as Africa did then they too would have fallen for the trap and become failed societies.

7/31/2008 9:51:24 AM

^they have had a lot more constructive help by "people like them"*




white people look after other white people.

7/31/2008 10:19:14 AM

How much foreign aid was given to eastern european countries excluding Russia since 1991? While I'm sure it was a lot, how does it compare to the inflation adjusted amount of aid given to Africa since 1945?

And foreign aid is often a handicap, not an inducement to good economic and political systems.

[Edited on July 31, 2008 at 10:47 AM. Reason : .,.]

7/31/2008 10:46:26 AM

jchill2's first post made me lol

7/31/2008 10:47:48 AM

^^ that is why i said constructive help instead of saying that they received foreign aid. i was being very precise. foreign aid is often assumed to be monetary contributions but help can mean and be associated with many things that are not monetary. i consider europe having received much help while africa just got aid.

7/31/2008 11:36:55 AM

Then what help are you referring to? No western country sent troops to stabilize easter europe, and the western establishment is always eager to offer "advice" to any new countries. I seriously doubt substantially more advice was given to eastern europe, when a whole bunch of countries gained independence at once, compared to Africa, which was usually one at a time.

So, be more precise, as your current level of precision confused me.

7/31/2008 2:21:42 PM

BUSH DID IT!!!1

7/31/2008 4:32:15 PM

china did it?

7/31/2008 4:47:57 PM

aids and ebola and lions and tigers did it?

7/31/2008 4:50:14 PM

double posting did it?

[Edited on July 31, 2008 at 4:50 PM. Reason : doh]

7/31/2008 4:50:14 PM

Quote :

"Regretfully, state centric socialism invariably results in economic disaster"

Which of course is why Norway and Sweden are currently begging for the table scraps from the rest of the world.

Look, I know you're the laissez-faire guy and so you have to put in your two cents about how socialism is bad. I get that. But in many of these countries, actual Marxism probably would have represented an improvement over the bizarre mishmash of pseudo-socialist ideas, traditionalism, and capitalist enterprises from Europe and America making best advantage of the situation, something which I often can't fault them for. The continent was literally a gold mine. I can't be too upset at everyone who wanted a piece, though I am frequently enraged by the steps some took.

Many African countries went to something they called socialism. Sometimes they took steps that even kind of resembled socialism. But the fact is, even if they'd desperately wanted to board the Marxist train very few of Africa's countries ever had the cohesiveness of government to achieve it.

Quote :

"Look at eastern Europe: their independence situation was far more harsh than Africa's, with no working economy to speak of, yet they have transitioned seamlessly to corrupt but functional societies."

People in Belarus, Moldova, and former Yugoslavia might beg to differ. And they had economic building blocks -- industrial infrastructure, and sometimes extremely fertile land. And the formerly functional economy in Africa that you mention, like its civil society and government, was compromised almost entirely of Europeans and a very, very small elite of other races. When the Europeans left, they took the economy with them, just like everything else.

Quote :

"How much foreign aid was given to eastern european countries excluding Russia since 1991? While I'm sure it was a lot, how does it compare to the inflation adjusted amount of aid given to Africa since 1945?"

Well, even if you adjust for inflation, that's still 46 extra years of aid going to more numerous countries in a place that was poorer to begin with.

Quote :

"No western country sent troops to stabilize easter europe"

So is your goal here just not to include Yugoslavia in any of your arguments? Shall we pretend there was only one communist entity in Eastern Europe that collapsed around 1991?

Quote :

"I seriously doubt substantially more advice was given to eastern europe, when a whole bunch of countries gained independence at once, compared to Africa, which was usually one at a time."

Seventeen countries in Africa became independent in 1960, thirteen of those between June 20 and August 20.* The collapse of the Soviet Union freed 12 nations in Eastern Europe, most of which had been independent up until World War 2, and one of which (East Germany) was promptly unified with a western economic powerhouse. Furthermore, the period during which these twelve nations gained independence was longer than the two months we see in just one spat of African independences.**

Thus not only is your statement factually wrong, it fails to take into account the wide gulf between Africa and Eastern Europe in terms of their situations.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decolonisation_of_Africa

**http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Soviet_Union_(1985-1991)#Aftermath_of_the_failed_coup

[Edited on July 31, 2008 at 5:22 PM. Reason : ]

7/31/2008 5:22:15 PM

Quote :

" But in many of these countries, actual Marxism probably would have represented an improvement over the bizarre mishmash of pseudo-socialist ideas"

How does this at all disagree with what I said? I did not mention Marxism and the only thing I disagree with is the assertion that the governments at independence lacked the ability to make Marxism work. I think they could have, and becoming a soviet colony would have been a major improvement on the path they did take (better to starve than get shot).

Quote :

"And the formerly functional economy in Africa that you mention, like its civil society and government, was compromised almost entirely of Europeans and a very, very small elite of other races. When the Europeans left, they took the economy with them, just like everything else."

Complete bullshit. Even Zimbabwe to this very day still has a sizeable number of white farmers trying to operate in a wasteland of a country. Where did you get this idea? Yes, the foreign colonial beurocrats left and took their families. But the foundation of a capitalist society, property owners, could not take it with them because Africa invariably had an extraction based economy (farming, mining, services, etc) which are tied to the land and you absolutely cannot take them with you. As such, in almost every history I have ever read the elites of the economy stayed to try and make a go of it under the new country. Statistics show this out: years after independence, the new countries usually kept operating without economic collapse. It was only after the initial period of calm that sudden and abrupt confiscation of the means of production would start punching holes in the old system until, one day, everything not bolted down vanishes at gun-point. It is true, not all collapses were started for economic reasons (socialism), some were just down right political failures and in those instances your analysis is correct.

Quote :

"Seventeen countries in Africa became independent in 1960, thirteen of those between June 20 and August 20."

I stand corrected. Thank you.

Quote :

"Thus not only is your statement factually wrong, it fails to take into account the wide gulf between Africa and Eastern Europe in terms of their situations."

Let us try that again. Eastern Europe needed to throw out foreign beurocrats and replace them with locals. At the same time, Eastern Europe needed to scrap the entire state-run economy because it was out of date and uncompetitive to build it anew from scratch, unemployment exceeding half in extreme cases. And markets, something the locals had no experience operating, needed to be invented from scratch and priced effectively fast enough so everyone could avoid starvation.

Conversely, Africa needed to throw out foreign beurocrats and replace them with locals. At the same time, nothing. Most everything was already privately owned and operating competitively in internal and international markets with existing competitive prices for labor, goods, and food.

I stand by my statement. Africa did not die at independence. It committed suicide over time. But I recognize 'socialism' is not the whole story. A country where a visible minority owns everything was a major push for socialism.

7/31/2008 6:13:34 PM

1) No infrastructure

2) Absurd levels of corruption within government

3) Poor central banking

4) A population with no education and limited skillset

5) Tough environmental conditions

6) Relief effort funding that only brings about more suffering

8/1/2008 12:57:31 AM

Quote :

"I did not mention Marxism and the only thing I disagree with is the assertion that the governments at independence lacked the ability to make Marxism work."

I apologize if equating "state-centric socialism" with "Marxism" is a greater leap than you're willing to accept. Regardless, you've addressed my main point, made a counter-argument, and then immediately abandoned it. Yes, with an influx of Soviet "colonial" forces could have enforced Marxism/socialism/leninism/communism/stalinism/whatever-the-fuck-ever on Africa countries. My point was that these countries themselves were incapable of instituting such a system on their own, and indeed without immense outside intervention.

Quote :

"But the foundation of a capitalist society, property owners, could not take it with them because Africa invariably had an extraction based economy (farming, mining, services, etc) which are tied to the land and you absolutely cannot take them with you."

It appears from your entire post and this quote in particular that you have managed to confuse "mercantilism" with "capitalism." I honestly can't think of a better way to make my point.

Quote :

"Eastern Europe needed to throw out foreign beurocrats and replace them with locals."

False; the bureaucracy was predominantly local. It may have been communist and heavily influenced by the government in Moscow, but it was, at the very least, native-grown. Perhaps a different tack is called for here.

Quote :

"At the same time, Eastern Europe needed to scrap the entire state-run economy because it was out of date and uncompetitive to build it anew from scratch"

How is this substantially different from the out-of-date, uncompetitive economies in Africa? Oh, I forgot, those weren't "state run." Tell it to the people who live in Zaire/Congo, which was the private property of the Belgian monarch.

Quote :

"And markets, something the locals had no experience operating, needed to be invented from scratch and priced effectively fast enough so everyone could avoid starvation. "

Eastern Europe had experience with markets. Talk to anybody in a communist country who can speak freely and they'll tell you the same thing. You may want to throw up an arbitrary distinction that separates "black" markets, but they're the same god damned thing with a couple of unusual pricing variables thrown into the mix.

Besides -- and I'll repeat this yet again -- every part of the Soviet empire had fairly recent experience operating markets as well as independent government. The same cannot be said for large swaths of Africa where traditional economies continued to predominate from a time before European colonization until the modern day.

Quote :

"Most everything was already privately owned and operating competitively in internal and international markets with existing competitive prices for labor, goods, and food."

Based on what, precisely? The fact that the European companies that owned everything valuable were privately owned?

Quote :

"Africa did not die at independence."

I don't know when it died, but Africa was fucked long before independence, anyway.

8/1/2008 4:18:22 AM

Quote :

"Which of course is why Norway and Sweden are currently begging for the table scraps from the rest of the world."

Norway and Sweden are in many ways more capitalist than America. The dictionary definition of "socialism" is state ownership of the means of production. High taxes and a strong welfare state are redistribution of the fruits of production, they have nothing to do with the means of production, which in the case of Norway and Sweden, with the exception of a few state owned interests, are privately owned and operated, making them 90+% capitalist countries.

Quote :

"It appears from your entire post and this quote in particular that you have managed to confuse "mercantilism" with "capitalism." I honestly can't think of a better way to make my point."

Each country was run differently as a colony during the run up to independence. But you must understand that even under a fully free economic system, these African nations would still be poor. You need to remember this was 1960, even America had a fourth of its people living as destitute illiterate sharecroppers in rural areas. Wealth and productivity has a strong educational component, this is why even South Africa today has whole armies of poor blacks living in the countryside. And no amount of effort was going to change the chief exports of the countries from agricultural goods to electronics when the vast majority of the population could not read. As such, I feel safe in my assertion that African economies were productive and competitive at that time with what they were doing.

Quote :

"Based on what, precisely? The fact that the European companies that owned everything valuable were privately owned?"

Americans are not well paid because we own everything. Lots of us work for foreign owned companies. I read a statistic recently that a majority of the large-cap companies in Australia are wholly foreign owned. What makes us well paid is competition for our labor from companies, regardless of who owns them. As such, when eastern europe collapsed and foreign companies flooded in to take advantage of cheap wages, those wages started to rise quickly once the surplus labor ran out. If you are right and Africa had been starved of companies by their colonizers, then freedom at independence would have fixed that problem as companies from elsewhere flooded in seeking cheap labor and cheap assets. But they did not, because the philosophical consensus at the time was that they already had too many foreign owned companies and the government needed to start state owned companies, with disasterous results both then and now.

Quote :

" The same cannot be said for large swaths of Africa where traditional economies continued to predominate from a time before European colonization until the modern day."

Traditional economies such as barter and trade in a marketplace with sanction and protection from local authority?

One of Africa's recurrent problems was the resumption of tribalism. But Africans leaving their countries and living overseas seem to be able to put tribalism aside to live and work in a free economy. It is my belief that what you list as Africa's problems were symptoms. Had the economy worked after independence the African populace would not have reverted back to traditional ways. There would have been enough bribe money to keep the government operating and enough jobs to keep the populace from reverting to old ways. But, we know that would never be the case with a socialist philosophy in place.

8/1/2008 10:22:18 AM

except for the exceptions,

from what i've noticed,

places that the British colonised are way better off years after colonisation ends, than with other colonial powers - especially the French and Belgians

8/1/2008 10:34:52 AM

True, Zimbabwe wouldn't be having all the current issues were it not for the fact that, somehow, there are educated people living somewhere in the country. Or, more correctly, were.

But in 20 more years, it'll have degraded to what most of the other countries are at, and it won't matter who originally was the colonial power.

8/1/2008 10:54:32 AM

^^True.

But I didn't observe it myself.

I read about it.

[Edited on August 1, 2008 at 10:56 AM. Reason : sss]

8/1/2008 10:55:06 AM

Quote :

"places that the British colonised are way better off years after colonisation ends, than with other colonial powers - especially the French and Belgians"

If we put "has the common law" into a regression on economic growth its one of the more powerful predictors.

Quote :

"I don't know that this is "the big question" just yet. I'm not even sure most of the countries have been around long enough to really identify an overarching trend. Looking back, it would seem a bit silly for someone observing in America in 1936 to ask why it was worse than it was in 1928."

Broadly speaking, I think for the most part there are two classes of macro-economists. Those who think about why the developing world and Africa in particular are so poor and those that think about what happened to the western world, and the US in particular, in 1929.

So perhaps, we are looking at this from two different level. Are instiutions likely the issue in Africa, sure. Is it related to colonialism - it seems likely. But the question of the exact mechanisms by which Africa fails to converge are still the question of debate.

Or to put it another what, what is the smallest set of factors that we could change today that would cause Africa to converge towards the rest of the world. This I don't think we know.

Not to mention, while I am unconvinced by it, the racists do have an argument that has yet to be conclusively refuted. That is, that it is genetic difference which dominate the African experience.

8/1/2008 2:45:22 PM

No, the genetic thing has been disputed, because if you take the Africans out of Africa they do very well.

8/1/2008 3:01:21 PM

8/1/2008 9:05:40 PM

^^ OBAMA!!!!!!

8/2/2008 12:12:11 AM

^^^ ODB!!!

8/2/2008 12:13:21 AM

I wonder how similar the genetic pool of Africa today is from a few thousand years ago. If anything has been naturally selected for recently, I don't think it's helped them as a society.

8/2/2008 12:29:50 PM

Quote :

"I wonder how similar the genetic pool of Africa today is from a few thousand years ago. If anything has been naturally selected for recently, I don't think it's helped them as a society. "

What sort of thinly veiled racist bullshit is this?

8/2/2008 12:34:29 PM

seriously

8/2/2008 12:59:22 PM

Western "free-trade" programs and the like don't seem to be helping.

8/2/2008 1:06:02 PM