Expand the war on Terrorism!

[SINthysist]

Lets rush the Marines and Special Forces to the aid of 5 year-old girls in South Africa who are being terrorized by AIDS sufferers who believe that deflowering a virgin is the cure! I have a better "cure" in mind...

 

[Mister Ryder]

Tell me that isn't true???

Sick bastards!

 

[SINthysist]

It is absolutely true. It is also being ignored by a lot of the media. I have to wonder, what would one's motivation be for putting a story like this on the back-burner?

 

[SINthysist]

Thank God for DrudgeReport.com

There have been several articles I have seen over the course of the last few months, but this is the one I saw this morning that was perticuarly abbhorent.

http://www.reuters.com/news_article...EZSFEYKEEATIIWD?type=worldnews&StoryID=543449

[For those who hate to click on links, here is an exerpt

By Patricia Reaney

LONDON (Reuters) - A third of all child rapes in South Africa are committed by school teachers, researchers said in a new report on sexual violence against young girls.

"The world needs to wake up to the fact that schools are a major site of sexual harassment and rape for children," said Dr. Rachel Jewkes of the Medical Research Council in Pretoria.

Jewkes and her colleagues found that 33 percent of South African women raped before the age of 15 were attacked by teachers, another 21 percent by relatives and a similar number by strangers or acquaintances.

The national survey interviewed 11,735 women between the ages of 15 and 49. Jewkes found that 153 women, or 1.3 percent, said they had been raped before the age of 15.

Of those, 15 percent were attacked between the ages of five and nine. Eighty-five percent were attacked between the ages of 10 and 14.

"Our findings confirm that rape of girls, especially in school, is a substantial public health problem in South Africa," Jewkes said.

"Our data have highlighted it in South Africa but it is occurring in many other countries and it is a message which I don't think has got through to governments," she said in a telephone interview.

Some 21,000 cases of child rape were reported to police in South Africa last year. Activists say countless thousands of others were never reported.

South Africa has been rocked by a recent spate of baby rapes thought to be linked to a myth that sex with a virgin will cure a man of AIDS. ]

 

[p_p_man]

It is absolutely true. It is also being ignored by a lot of the media.

It's been in the media, off and on, for about a year now.

I think most people know about it but are too apathetic to do anything about it.

ppman

 

[SINthysist]

What motivates apathy towards a story like this?

Bigger issues?
It's not happening to me?
Is South Africa an enemy?
Is it culturally-related?
Does it not sell Ad space?
Are we just completely overcome by all the bad things in the world?

 

[p_p_man]

What motivates apathy towards a story like this?

Bigger issues?
It's not happening to me?
Is South Africa an enemy?
Is it culturally-related?
Does it not sell Ad space?
Are we just completely overcome by all the bad things in the world?

Too many other issues going on at the same time.

The public can't keep an interest in everything all at once.

As a fish and chip nation, we have a saying:

today's headlines, tomorrow's fish and chip wrapping...

ppman

 

[bluespoke]

Too many other issues going on at the same time.

The public can't keep an interest in everything all at once.

As a fish and chip nation, we have a saying:

today's headlines, tomorrow's fish and chip wrapping...

ppman

So sad, but true.

In the UK, the war on terrorism and the continued inabilty of our own government to deal with the National Health Service and transport are always more likely to reach the top spots on the news.

I imagine that the 'media' consider that the public at large are not overly concerned as it's not happening here.

Unfortunately that attitude just ensures that the story very rarely surfaces. I suspect the same could be true of the U.S.

 

[WriterDom]

Perhaps they need a hate crime law in South Africa.

 

[lavender]

 

[SINthysist]

So when the Europeans, Russians and Chinese gang up on us over missle defense and our inability to submit ourselves to international will, we are correct in telling them to go take a flying fuck. After all, it's something happenig in our country.

Why can't they have more of a UK fish'n'chips relationship with us?

 

[Weird Harold]

What motivates apathy towards a story like this?

Pragmatism.

This is a story that the international community can do nothing to solve. Would even invading South Africa and imposing a draconian military rule do anything to stop this immediately?

This is an internal police matter for the South African government to handle. All international governments can do is offer moral support and advice. Private international organizations can (and probably do) offer counseling to victims but even they can't do much to prevent this.

It's simply a case of "there's nothing that I can do about this, so why are you telling me about it."

 

[SINthysist]

Liar Liar (the movie) something about,

I'm gonna stand here and take it in the ass...

You've been here before.

You are saying we can't get up the fever on this one with some press and some humanitarian efforts for the people with AIDS including education and medication.

But the world did interviene in Yugoslavia. I know it's apples to oranges, yet...

 

[EthiopianPrince]

Unfortunately, rape is occuring in every democracy. In South Africa, it is just a matter of degree. As for the spread of AIDS, supporting NGO's that empower women (international planned parenthood, etc.) may be the best way to go.

P.S. Some may critique South Africa for its violence and AIDS, as a kind of superiority complex (the idea that once whites stopped running the country, it went to Hell). Although the challenges South Africa faces are real and serious, other nations are facing these challenges to a greater or lesser degree.

 

[lavender]

 

[SINthysist]

We pick and choose where we will intervene. FOr example, the day the SOviet Union collapsed was the day we should have intervened in Cuba.