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> If the Nile collapses When, really. > western style environmentalism is quite a stretch Africa's natural resources have been raped and pillaged by the west

> If the Nile collapses When, really. > western style environmentalism is quite a stretch Africa's natural resources have been raped and pillaged by the west for many decades. Even today, most people in the west simply don't realize how the effects of that era are still felt strongly. Millions living under extreme poverty do not have the luxury of thinking about the environment when the price of that thought is not putting food on the table. Same can be said for the massive population growth. Birth control requires education, which requires prosperity, which Africa lacks almost completely. > If the Nile collapses Europe will see refugees streams of unimaginable magnitude. As someone in Western Europe who definitely believes this day will come, soon, I can only say we reap what we sow. The crimes of past European powers (think Belgian Congo for a single example) are slowly but surely catching up with the current generation and I think it's way too late to avoid the consequences.

wbl 9y ago
Mauritania already underwent the demographic transition. The Nile is no worse then the rivers of the US 50 years ago.
UweSchmidt 9y ago
"We reap what we sow" assumes an old testament concept of multi generational collective guilt and picturing your migration scenario penance, or divine(?) punishment sounds a little weird. Also, give Africa a little credit, literacy rates are up, maybe the problems can be tackled right over there? https://ourworldindata.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ourworldindata_literacy-rate-by-age-in-middle-east-and-northern-africa.png https://ourworldindata.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ourwor...
- babygoat 9y ago
  How about “Our children reap what we sow”?
  - UweSchmidt 9y ago
    How about trying to correctly attribute guilt to specific persons, committing specific crimes instead? Geopolitics is complicated and neither of us can take very little credit/guilt for the actions of any political entity that I happen to be part of.
    - pm90 9y ago
      While I agree that we must hold specific people accountable for their actions, atrocities cannot be carried out in the scale they were in Africa without the support of the societies that these individuals hailed from. In fact, the very racist viewpoints that contributed to the horrific actions didn't just happen by default; it is the host societies which held these views, and these individuals perhaps only took it to the most extreme conclusion. I agree that Geopolitics is complicated and don't really agree with applying "karma" to societies and nations, mostly because its not very constructive. But one has to admit that the facts do seem to paint that picture.
    - Mtinie 9y ago
      That’s fine, no guilt assignment in that case, just the current day outcomes of past generational decision making.
    - eropple 9y ago
      The economic if-thens are not moral (well, they are, but not in this sense). The idea that they have a bearing on guilt is projective. To be fair, you should feel guilty, and so do I, and I work to push back on my own country's historical indecencies.
      - dmpk2k 9y ago
        He should feel proud of vaccines and antibiotics too then, the greatest boon mankind ever had. Very proud indeed. The populations in Africa would be a tiny fraction of what they currently are were it not for Western innovations. Likewise, the West has utterly crushed global absolute poverty, and is the leading pressure that is trying to end the ancient practice of slavery. By every objective metric (child mortality, lifespan, literacy, starvation, absolute poverty), the world is a better place today than ever before. By a huge margin. Entirely thanks to the West. I only mention this because there seems to be this narrative that we in the West should feel bad for the past, yet the West has been a firm net positive in the world. Probably the greatest net positive there ever was... provided we survive global warming, that is. So if we're going to guilt-trip people today for the actions of some historical Westerners, we should adulate people too for the actions of some historical Westerners. But somehow that never happens. The West is objectively the best thing that ever happened to mankind.
- musage 9y ago
  > "We reap what we sow" assumes an old testament concept of multi generational collective guilt Nah. Here are some thoughts on it: https://medium.com/thinking-action-for-ethical-being/critical-reflection-c1bed49a345c https://medium.com/thinking-action-for-ethical-being/critica... I also have to think of how Jacob Appelbaum said his father told him that if there ever is another Holocaust, it'll be his fault because he didn't prevent it. It's easy to dismiss it as hyperbole or demanding the impossible from an individual, but I think it has an kernel that is near infinite food for thought at the least. It's not literally true. But it's also not completely false.
- gerdesj 9y ago
  I agree with you (Uwe) that "We reap what we sow" is not really applicable here. That simplistic line of thinking could be applied to all sorts of current situations and past "injustices" (depending on your perspective.) You reap as you sow style arguments only really work when you have a simple cause:effect. We could play that style of argument ad absurdam in lots of ways, for example: GB decides to levy a (pretty small) tax on tea on her colonies a few years back, cue Boston Tea Party and other acts of terrorism on a grand scale. Blah blah blah ... history happens ... USA etc. It really isn't that simple. Facile, simplistic attempts to explain modern events based on single events from the long distant past - no matter how important at the time - are rarely helpful to understanding, let alone getting to a solution. Attempting to fit a pithy epithet to this sort of process is a bit unpleasant and disingenuous at best when chatting on an internet forum and might become dangerously destructive when wielded by a politician, especially one with real power. Covefe, anyone?
- alexasmyths 9y ago
  ? "We reap what we sow" is the opposite of divine punishment or penance - and really isn't rooted in anything spiritual, it's the most pragmatic advice ever given. 'You reap what you sow' means you're going to get the outcome you 'built for yourself' - not some kind of divine bit of intervention! As for Africa - the Africans will 'reap what they sow' in Africa, and it has little to do with 'Europeans'. They have abundant natural wealth and were they to organize themselves intelligently, they'd be fairing pretty well.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
vacri 9y ago
> The crimes of past European powers (think Belgian Congo for a single example) That's underselling it. It's not a 'single example', it's 'the most extreme example'. When you're mistreating your African colonies so badly that even other colonial nations are asking you to back off with the horror, that's pretty bad.
alexasmyths 9y ago
"Africa's natural resources have been raped and pillaged by the west for many decades. " Wrong. If you mean 'Oil (or some other commodity) was extracted mostly by Africans and sold to Westerners or Asians' - then sure. There is no 'raping' or 'pillaging' done by anyone, if there are negative consequences, it's almost invariably by the African 'leaders' themselves who are among the most corrupt and brutal in the world. 'The West' would be very happy if the leader/warlords invested in industry, and distributed their wealth more fairly. We'd be very happy if they took their billion dollar IMF loans - which were designed for infrastructure projects - and actually built those infrastructure projects as opposed to squandering it in so many ways from top to bottom - leaving the various countries with an ugly balance sheet. Where there has been more responsibility - such as in Botswana 's diamond extraction - we've seen more intelligent distribution of wealth, and as a result, higher standard of living etc..
chewz 9y ago
You cannot blame colonisation for everything for centuries. Those people made their own choices in recent decades embracing uncontrolled population growth and wasteful, unlimited consumption without any attempt to mitigate the results.
- smnrchrds 9y ago
  > wasteful, unlimited consumption That's where you are wrong. Their problems do not stem from wastefulness and greed, but necessity. It is not like farmers in impoverished countries cut down forests and use it as farmland so they can buy a better BMW, or that they sped so much on takeout that they can't afford to pay for a modern up-to-date irrigation system. They do what they do because it's the only way they can survive, to not starve. A few trillion dollars in infrastructure investment could solve the environmental issues for good, but that's the few trillions they do not have, which they would have had it if colonialism did not happen. If you have enough budget for either importing wheat so that your population would not starve or a new water treatment facility, guess which one you would choose. That's where this whole idea comes from that the European countries, who have enriched themselves at the expense of Africa, must help them rebuild their countries they destroyed.
  - chewz 9y ago
    To stick to Egypt example - population keept at the level of ca 4 millions (within current borders) for hundreds of years. Since 1970 to today population doubled from 40 to 80 million with no signs of abating. Nor any political effort to stop it. This has nothing to do with colonisation. Expotenial growth had impacted environment in spite of any sensible policies to either stop poluation growth or mitigate it’s impact on enviroment. This is result of poor policing in a Egypt. The country had enough resources to pursue different policies and just didn’t.
    - Jedd 9y ago
      It's worse than that. From TFA: > Egypt’s numbers have more than quadrupled since 1960; Ethiopia is adding roughly 2.5 million new people a year. The basin’s total population is on track to double to 500 million by 2050. And it's not a political effort that's required to reign that in -- except insofar as within certain countries, politics and religion are so interwoven that it's either impossible, or perhaps merely pointless, to try to separate them.

wbl 9y ago

Mauritania already underwent the demographic transition. The Nile is no worse then the rivers of the US 50 years ago.

UweSchmidt 9y ago

"We reap what we sow" assumes an old testament concept of multi generational collective guilt and picturing your migration scenario penance, or divine(?) punishment sounds a little weird. Also, give Africa a little credit, literacy rates are up, maybe the problems can be tackled right over there? https://ourworldindata.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ourworldindata_literacy-rate-by-age-in-middle-east-and-northern-africa.png https://ourworldindata.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/ourwor...

babygoat 9y ago
How about “Our children reap what we sow”?
- UweSchmidt 9y ago
  How about trying to correctly attribute guilt to specific persons, committing specific crimes instead? Geopolitics is complicated and neither of us can take very little credit/guilt for the actions of any political entity that I happen to be part of.
  - pm90 9y ago
    While I agree that we must hold specific people accountable for their actions, atrocities cannot be carried out in the scale they were in Africa without the support of the societies that these individuals hailed from. In fact, the very racist viewpoints that contributed to the horrific actions didn't just happen by default; it is the host societies which held these views, and these individuals perhaps only took it to the most extreme conclusion. I agree that Geopolitics is complicated and don't really agree with applying "karma" to societies and nations, mostly because its not very constructive. But one has to admit that the facts do seem to paint that picture.
  - Mtinie 9y ago
    That’s fine, no guilt assignment in that case, just the current day outcomes of past generational decision making.
  - eropple 9y ago
    The economic if-thens are not moral (well, they are, but not in this sense). The idea that they have a bearing on guilt is projective. To be fair, you should feel guilty, and so do I, and I work to push back on my own country's historical indecencies.
    - dmpk2k 9y ago
      He should feel proud of vaccines and antibiotics too then, the greatest boon mankind ever had. Very proud indeed. The populations in Africa would be a tiny fraction of what they currently are were it not for Western innovations. Likewise, the West has utterly crushed global absolute poverty, and is the leading pressure that is trying to end the ancient practice of slavery. By every objective metric (child mortality, lifespan, literacy, starvation, absolute poverty), the world is a better place today than ever before. By a huge margin. Entirely thanks to the West. I only mention this because there seems to be this narrative that we in the West should feel bad for the past, yet the West has been a firm net positive in the world. Probably the greatest net positive there ever was... provided we survive global warming, that is. So if we're going to guilt-trip people today for the actions of some historical Westerners, we should adulate people too for the actions of some historical Westerners. But somehow that never happens. The West is objectively the best thing that ever happened to mankind.
musage 9y ago
> "We reap what we sow" assumes an old testament concept of multi generational collective guilt Nah. Here are some thoughts on it: https://medium.com/thinking-action-for-ethical-being/critical-reflection-c1bed49a345c https://medium.com/thinking-action-for-ethical-being/critica... I also have to think of how Jacob Appelbaum said his father told him that if there ever is another Holocaust, it'll be his fault because he didn't prevent it. It's easy to dismiss it as hyperbole or demanding the impossible from an individual, but I think it has an kernel that is near infinite food for thought at the least. It's not literally true. But it's also not completely false.
gerdesj 9y ago
I agree with you (Uwe) that "We reap what we sow" is not really applicable here. That simplistic line of thinking could be applied to all sorts of current situations and past "injustices" (depending on your perspective.) You reap as you sow style arguments only really work when you have a simple cause:effect. We could play that style of argument ad absurdam in lots of ways, for example: GB decides to levy a (pretty small) tax on tea on her colonies a few years back, cue Boston Tea Party and other acts of terrorism on a grand scale. Blah blah blah ... history happens ... USA etc. It really isn't that simple. Facile, simplistic attempts to explain modern events based on single events from the long distant past - no matter how important at the time - are rarely helpful to understanding, let alone getting to a solution. Attempting to fit a pithy epithet to this sort of process is a bit unpleasant and disingenuous at best when chatting on an internet forum and might become dangerously destructive when wielded by a politician, especially one with real power. Covefe, anyone?
alexasmyths 9y ago
? "We reap what we sow" is the opposite of divine punishment or penance - and really isn't rooted in anything spiritual, it's the most pragmatic advice ever given. 'You reap what you sow' means you're going to get the outcome you 'built for yourself' - not some kind of divine bit of intervention! As for Africa - the Africans will 'reap what they sow' in Africa, and it has little to do with 'Europeans'. They have abundant natural wealth and were they to organize themselves intelligently, they'd be fairing pretty well.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

vacri 9y ago

> The crimes of past European powers (think Belgian Congo for a single example) That's underselling it. It's not a 'single example', it's 'the most extreme example'. When you're mistreating your African colonies so badly that even other colonial nations are asking you to back off with the horror, that's pretty bad.

alexasmyths 9y ago

"Africa's natural resources have been raped and pillaged by the west for many decades. " Wrong. If you mean 'Oil (or some other commodity) was extracted mostly by Africans and sold to Westerners or Asians' - then sure. There is no 'raping' or 'pillaging' done by anyone, if there are negative consequences, it's almost invariably by the African 'leaders' themselves who are among the most corrupt and brutal in the world. 'The West' would be very happy if the leader/warlords invested in industry, and distributed their wealth more fairly. We'd be very happy if they took their billion dollar IMF loans - which were designed for infrastructure projects - and actually built those infrastructure projects as opposed to squandering it in so many ways from top to bottom - leaving the various countries with an ugly balance sheet. Where there has been more responsibility - such as in Botswana 's diamond extraction - we've seen more intelligent distribution of wealth, and as a result, higher standard of living etc..

chewz 9y ago

You cannot blame colonisation for everything for centuries. Those people made their own choices in recent decades embracing uncontrolled population growth and wasteful, unlimited consumption without any attempt to mitigate the results.

smnrchrds 9y ago
> wasteful, unlimited consumption That's where you are wrong. Their problems do not stem from wastefulness and greed, but necessity. It is not like farmers in impoverished countries cut down forests and use it as farmland so they can buy a better BMW, or that they sped so much on takeout that they can't afford to pay for a modern up-to-date irrigation system. They do what they do because it's the only way they can survive, to not starve. A few trillion dollars in infrastructure investment could solve the environmental issues for good, but that's the few trillions they do not have, which they would have had it if colonialism did not happen. If you have enough budget for either importing wheat so that your population would not starve or a new water treatment facility, guess which one you would choose. That's where this whole idea comes from that the European countries, who have enriched themselves at the expense of Africa, must help them rebuild their countries they destroyed.
- chewz 9y ago
  To stick to Egypt example - population keept at the level of ca 4 millions (within current borders) for hundreds of years. Since 1970 to today population doubled from 40 to 80 million with no signs of abating. Nor any political effort to stop it. This has nothing to do with colonisation. Expotenial growth had impacted environment in spite of any sensible policies to either stop poluation growth or mitigate it’s impact on enviroment. This is result of poor policing in a Egypt. The country had enough resources to pursue different policies and just didn’t.
  - Jedd 9y ago
    It's worse than that. From TFA: > Egypt’s numbers have more than quadrupled since 1960; Ethiopia is adding roughly 2.5 million new people a year. The basin’s total population is on track to double to 500 million by 2050. And it's not a political effort that's required to reign that in -- except insofar as within certain countries, politics and religion are so interwoven that it's either impossible, or perhaps merely pointless, to try to separate them.