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South Africa's Nelson Mandela dies in Johannesburg[W102]

Zyphlin

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Mr Mandela led South Africa's transition from white-minority rule in the 1990s, after 27 years in prison for his political activities.

He had been receiving intensive medical care at home for a lung infection after spending three months in hospital.

Announcing the news on South African national TV, President Jacob Zuma said Mr Mandela was at peace.

"Our nation has lost its greatest son," Mr Zuma said.

Source

With the death of a rather renowned world figure, what is your take on the man, his life, and his legacy?
 
With the societal problem he was facing he acted with an admirable amount of restraint and strived towards a peaceful solution especially as apartheid drove on and conditions worsened for him personally. There are very few people who would act the way he did, with forgiveness, reconciliation and moral integrity.

The level of deification is a bit disconcerting. He should have ditched his wife immediately and done more to distance himself from terrorism. He had flaws but freedom fighters tend to have them. He was among the greatest of the 20th century.
 
With the societal problem he was facing he acted with an admirable amount of restraint and strived towards a peaceful solution especially as apartheid drove on and conditions worsened for him personally. There are very few people who would act the way he did, with forgiveness, reconciliation and moral integrity.

The level of deification is a bit disconcerting. He should have ditched his wife immediately and done more to distance himself from terrorism. He had flaws but freedom fighters tend to have them. He was among the greatest of the 20th century.

Would you at least agree that comparing him to Gandhi is absurd?
 
White man put him in jail. That is all people want to know. He will be Saint Nelson by the end of the week.
 
White man put him in jail. That is all people want to know. He will be Saint Nelson by the end of the week.

He was black and passed one significant piece of legislation during his time in office.....sounds like someone else I have heard of........
 
Would you at least agree that comparing him to Gandhi is absurd?

His hands are not as clean as Gandhi (though ironically he thought blacks in South Africa should be treated lesser than Indians early on), MLK or Daniel O'Connell - no. The level of adversity he faced was far greater though so his moral evolution is more impressive.
 
His hands are not as clean as Gandhi (though ironically he thought blacks in South Africa should be treated lesser than Indians early on), MLK or Daniel O'Connell - no. The level of adversity he faced was far greater though so his moral evolution is more impressive.

"Not as clean? Good lord man he was commander of a faction of the ANC that killed and maimed hundreds of civilians in a terrorism campaign.

"Nelson Mandela was the head of UmKhonto we Sizwe, (MK), the terrorist wing of the ANC and South African Communist Party. At his trial, he had pleaded guilty to 156 acts of public violence including mobilising terrorist bombing campaigns, which planted bombs in public places, including the Johannesburg railway station. Many innocent people, including women and children, were killed by Nelson Mandela’s MK terrorists."


3 Things You Didn
 
The greatest statesman of the past century. He was a man of peace who recognised that circumstances don't always allow you to be a pacifist. He won, and he showed that great leaders show magnanimity in victory; they turn former enemies into friends and partners. He told the truth, both about the evils of the Apartheid régime and on wider, world issues. He exuded integrity, lightness of spirit, compassion and dogged determination. He was the opposite of partisan and the diametrical antonym of bigotted.

It doesn't surprise me to read those posters denigrating his memory, when you see who those posters are. Meh! They can knock themselves out. There's nothing a misanthropic nonentity on an internet forum can say that will alter the legacy of a truly great man. Best they get it out of their system here. Vent away, Sawyer!
 
"Not as clean? Good lord man he was commander of a faction of the AFC that killed and maimed hundreds of civilians in a terrorism campaign.

"Nelson Mandela was the head of UmKhonto we Sizwe, (MK), the terrorist wing of the ANC and South African Communist Party. At his trial, he had pleaded guilty to 156 acts of public violence including mobilising terrorist bombing campaigns, which planted bombs in public places, including the Johannesburg railway station. Many innocent people, including women and children, were killed by Nelson Mandela’s MK terrorists."


3 Things You Didn

Which is about as troubling as being a member of the Free French during Nazi Occupation. Not all regimes understand diplomacy. You do understand what apartheid South Africa was like?

What is remarkable about Mandela is that he became completely non-violent and promoted reconciliation.
 
Which is about as troubling as being a member of the Free French during Nazi Occupation. Not all regimes understand diplomacy. You do understand what apartheid South Africa was like?

What is remarkable about Mandela is that he became completely non-violent and promoted reconciliation.

Just don't compare him to Gandhi, they are night and day, worlds apart and when you say their names in the same breath you slander Gandhi.
 
My take is he was a terrorist that the left made into a hero. They turned him from a murderer of innocent civilians into a Gandhi.

Mandela only became militant after the apartheid government of South Africa conducted the Sharpeville Massacre, which killed 69 unarmed protesters, and wounded hundreds more. When the government is gunning unarmed people down, you stop being peaceful, and you fight back, which is what Mandela then began to do. Who were the terrorists at that time? The government of South Africa, of course.
 
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Just don't compare him to Gandhi, they are night and day, worlds apart and when you say their names in the same breath you slander Gandhi.

I wouldn't compare him to Gandhi, he was a very different kind of revolutionary. I think he is much more in the mould of George Washington, Simon Bolivar or Kwame Nkrumah.
 
Mandela only became militant after the apartheid government of South Africa conducted the Sharpville Massacre, which killed 69 unarmed protesters, and wounded hundreds more. When the government is gunning unarmed people down, you stop being peaceful, and you fight back, which is what Mandela then began to do. Who were the terrorists at that time? The government of South Africa, of course.

I have no problem with true freedom fighters that attack enemy positions but he conducted a terror campaign that purposely targeted women and children. That is unforgivable and comparing him to Gandhi is sickening.
 
I wouldn't compare him to Gandhi, he was a very different kind of revolutionary. I think he is much more in the mould of George Washington, Simon Bolivar or Kwame Nkrumah.

Did George Washington bomb civilians in banks and stores? Guess I missed that part of History. :roll:
 
Did George Washington bomb civilians in banks and stores? Guess I missed that part of History. :roll:

People do what they must. David ben Gurion bombed the King David Hotel in Tel-Aviv, and killed many, when the Jewish people were fighting for their homeland. And, as far as murdering civilians, the government of South Africa murdered thousands, and put many more in concentration camps. Mandela was fighting fire with fire. The government of South Africa started that war, and reaped what they sowed.
 
Did George Washington bomb civilians in banks and stores? Guess I missed that part of History. :roll:

Different times, hard to compare, but he certainly was no pacifist... for the times he would have been considered a terrorist.
 
The greatest statesman of the past century. He was a man of peace who recognised that circumstances don't always allow you to be a pacifist. He won, and he showed that great leaders show magnanimity in victory; they turn former enemies into friends and partners. He told the truth, both about the evils of the Apartheid régime and on wider, world issues. He exuded integrity, lightness of spirit, compassion and dogged determination. He was the opposite of partisan and the diametrical antonym of bigotted.

It doesn't surprise me to read those posters denigrating his memory, when you see who those posters are. Meh! They can knock themselves out. There's nothing a misanthropic nonentity on an internet forum can say that will alter the legacy of a truly great man. Best they get it out of their system here. Vent away, Sawyer!

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Different times, hard to compare, but he certainly was no pacifist... for the times he would have been considered a terrorist.

That's exactly your kind of typical, uninformed idiocy. He was a military general duly appointed to command the Continental Army and conducted himself according to the customs and rules of warfare of . . . the times.
 
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