rsk@pucc-j (Wombat) (01/17/86)
In article <704@pucc-j> I wrote: >This may be premature, as I am not aware of any potential Usenet hosts >in South Africa, but I think we should anticipate future developments >and, as a body, refuse to connect any of our hosts to any host in South >Africa until apartheid disappears from that country. I received a great many letters in response to this; I have included the relevant text below, along with the "From:" line. My apologies if I've forgotten anyone, or accidentally mangled a letter; I did edit this by hand. Now, then. I would like to clarify one or two things. I posted the article to net.general based on (1) the description of net.general (2) the potential impact to the entire net, should such this action be seriously considered, (3) the description of net.politics, and (4) the shortness of the note. I did not post it there out of carelessness; it is my first article in net.general in several years on the network. Onwards. I was accused of hypocrisy, ignorance, bad motives, stupidity, tunnel vision, but not (fortunately) bestiality. It amazes me how many conclusions various persons were able to draw about my knowledge of South Africa, my concern thereof, my reasoning abilities, and my sociopolitical philosophy just from those four lines. It also amazes me at how incredibly rude some of the responses were; but then again, I pride myself on my ability to be incredibly rude in return. I would like, however, to thank those of you who wrote calm, reasoned responses; after reading these, and doing some reflection, I am now convinced that we (ie. Usenet) are better off keeping politics and network policy separate; and that a connection to S.A. might in fact be beneficial (to me, this means "fights apartheid") in roughly the same sense that a free press is beneficial to a democracy. I suggest that if further discussion is warranted, that it be moved to net.politics. Wombat ------ From: utcs!shindman@purdue (Paul Shindman) Au contraire, Rich....I think it would be a great idea to get as many sites in South Africa on the net as possible. The major problem with the white attitude there is that they have a very restricted press, and the net would serve to bombard them with a bit more of reality. Granted, they may censor the incoming articles, but one would still be able to send them e-mail. Think of the letter writing campaigns that could be undertaken! Ostracizing SA will not solve the problem. Beating (figuratively as much as possible) into their thick skulls that apartheid is stupid is much preferable to leaving them in the dark thinking that they have such a wonderful country. From: purdue!topaz!seismo!enea!kuling!kpj@ECN (KPJ Jaakkola) Why? It would not help anybody, would it? Also, I hate to see USEnet become other stupid playground for political (religious) debates. To be frank, sir, I must point to You that the USA is not very much democratic than is the South Africa. And I wouldn't say that USA is to be kicked out either. In USA, money is the great thing. In SA, race is the great thing. So, what's the difference? From: Jacob Levy <jaakov%wisdom.bitnet@WISCVM.WISC.EDU> Crap! When is a country OK and when is it not OK? Why are all people in a country to blame for the government's policies? Who is to decide what is an OK country to talk to and what country is "bad"? You (I.E the USA) did not suspend mail and telegraph ties with Germany, Japan or Italy during WW2. Why now, when there's not even a war (yet) between the USA and SA? While you're at it, why not exclude Israel, France (they love to hate the USA..), Libya, Syria, ... From: Greg Cline <cline%dartmouth.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA> STOP ABUSING NET>GENERAL!!!!!!! Political discourse belongs in net.politics!!! From: ihnp4!seismo!philabs!aecom!diaz@ECN (Dan Diaz) Dear Richard: I disagree with your proposal that no S.African connections to USENET be permitted. First of all the type of people who use USENET are usually university students and young professionals-not the sort of people who have installed and maintained apartheid. Secondly I am really bothered with the S.Africa issue becomming so single-minded that I think it best to leave USENET out of it. That is, with all the repressive regimes around the world we choose to isolate S.A. because it is 'in' to be anti- Apartheid. Not that the government needs to get its act together, but we must not forget the millions suffering in equally or more repressive regimes. If the USENET was predominantly Nicaraguan and it was proposed that the US systems be cut off due to our country's support of the Contras I don't think you would like it at all. From: David England <purdue!topaz!seismo!mcvax!comp.lancs.ac.uk!de@ECN> I'll second that ! From: ihnp4!seismo!harvard!panda!genrad!marc@ECN (marc) i don't think we should drag politics onto this net. i agree that the racial views of South Africa are disgusting but the network as a whole should not take a stand pro or con. If we do so then we will be obligated to take similar stands against regimes like Marcos. As diverse as this network is i find it difficult to believe that any form of consensus could be obtained (on any subject). i do feel that polical viewpoints should be expressed on appropriate newsgroups. System administrators also should decide on their own if they wish to attach to a SA node (this being akin to ethical investing which in my personal opinion is a crock). cheers, marc (if you are investing in gold and you don't wish to buy Kruggerands, you might think that the Canadian Maple Leaves or the US $10 gold coin are safe since they don't say SA. Think again, almost 90% of that gold came from the government of SA, as does many other precious metals. With all that wealth at stake we might very well take similar views!) From: ihnp4!qubix!lab@ECN (Larry Bickford) "Unless you are willing to first take action against any puppet government kept in power by the U.S.S.R, you are a hypocrite to suggest anything against South Africa." From: purdue!topaz!seismo!mcvax!xisl.uucp!jmc@ECN (John Collins) This is yet another example of the idiotic exercise of group hypocrisy which blinkered people who should know better get into on a daily basis. Is South Africa the Worst Violator of human rights in the world? Choose between being black in SA and non-CP member in USSR. Know which I'd prefer. Is South Africa the only country to practice apartheid? Try Australia (Genocide of Tasmanians - Central Australian Aboriginal reserve etc etc), Zimbabwe (Mugabe's treatment of Nkomo's tribe) need I go on. Is "Any host" in South Africa by definition likely to support it? No more than I support everything M Thatcher does. Probably less. For your information I am in the process of setting up a link to South Africa so you can boycott me if you like. At least I shall preserve my integrity which is more than can be said for the propagators of this sort of garbage. From: wolit@mhuxd.UUCP (Jan Wolitzky) I'm not sure how threatened Pretoria would feel by a cutoff of Usenet, but if one were to consider the indispensible role of the South African passbook system in maintaining Apartheid, the indispensible role of IBM computers in maintaining the passbook system, and the indispensible role of U.S. computer professionals in maintaining IBM, then the possibility of a far more effective boycott might become apparent. From: martinl@molihp.UUCP (Martin M Lacey) Nice try, but in my opinion that is a very bad idea. The Net *purpose* is the exchange of information and discusion of ideas. Restrictions, if any, should only apply to material goods. Finding out how the people there are thinking and what is *really* going on is an important part in eliminating the idea of aparthied. They only way of *forcing* a change is to make as many people aware of the situation as possible - democracy ya' know. In fact, I would like to see such a connection occur; talk about getting what you have to say out to PEOPLE :-). From: clewis@mnetor.UUCP (Chris Lewis) Um, err, well, there's lots of potential usenet hosts in the USA, maybe we should (as a body of course) refuse to connect any of our hosts to possible US sites until the USA stops interfering in Nicaraugua and El Salvador. Just a thought... Just kidding... But, then again, maybe not... Can't we keep this thing apolitical? From: tektronix!sdcrdcf!trwrb!trwrba!cepu!ucsbcsl!iltis@purdue (Ronald A Iltis) I disagree. What are you going to do - start a bonfire with tires and burn me? Or set the ANC after me? Keep it in net.politics so I don't have to read your self-righteous blathering. From: ihnp4!uw-beaver!ssc-vax!bcsaic!ted@ECN (Ted Jardine) The whole concept of what you propose is utter and unmitigated nonsense!! I do not support the idea of apartheid. I do not enjoy seeing the South African government and some of the South African white people acting so stupidly and ignorantly. But I doubt seriously that you know any more about South Africa and/or apartheid than what you have seen on TV news. Learn something about So. Africa before leaping to open your oral cavity. And don't listen to just the bleeding hearts. Think about what it would mean if you were a white So African and were being asked to give up the control of your affairs and destiny to a people who, through no fault of their own, were ill-prepared for government. Then look at what has happened in other African countries taken over by black Africans: Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia); Zaire; Mozambique; Uganda; and Tanzania to name just a few. It certainly doesn't justify apartheid, nor the bad behaviour of some white So Africans, but it should give pause before jumping in to the fray. I've lived in South Africa. My wife and I have friends there, both black and white. Social change is very easy to talk about, but a damn sight harder to accomplish without alot of violence. So how about taking your idea and putting it in the trash, where it belongs? From: ihnp4!uw-beaver!ssc-vax!bcsaic!dorothy@ECN RIGHT ON!!! From: jmoore@mips.UUCP (Jim Moore) If the issue should arise, I would invite the opportunity to exchange ideas with the people living with the situation in South Africa. Should we follow the lead of Prime Minister Bote(sp?), and censor information flow between South Africa and the rest of world? Economic sanctions obviously do serve to put pressure on a country to behave in a particular manner. But I fail to see what information flow sanctions could do except help a repressive government hide its dirty laundry. From: gam@amdahl.UUCP (G A Moffett) Ridiculous! "Let's ban the press from South Africa; let's boycott all mail and telephone communications with South Africa..." And so on. Ridiculous. Fortunately, it is a matter of individual choice of sites to connect to South Africa, not a net-wide policy issue. [ And no, we don't have any such connections. Not that we wouldn't, as far as I'm concerned ] From: nyssa@abnji.UUCP (James C. Armstrong) The subject of boycotting or not South Africa may be a legal one. Does anyone know the current state of Government regulation on the flow of technical information to South Africa? From: jj@alice.UUCP First, get this to net.poliics. This is NOT a topic for net.followup! Second, what ever gives you the idea that the government of South Africa would PERMIT Usenet to cross it's borders? Frankly, given the attitude of USENET, I think that the question is moot, i.e. USENET would be banned in less than 5 seconds. Stuff and nonsense! Freedom of information is counter to SA's survival. USENET is certainly free, albiet badly abused, and there even exists SOME information hidden in less used corners. From: elkins@ttidcc.UUCP (Richard Elkins) Should we really play God with potential net-users in every country of the world? Can you guess their political and moral state of mind? What if its a machine owned by black aficans? Do we ask them what color they are first? To the contrary, the more information, ideas, and opinions which flow to the troubled spots of the world, the better. We're talking about lifeblood. I have a feeling your intentions are good but I think that this suggestion has immense potential for unintended harm. From: dick@tjalk.UUCP (Dick Grune) Discontinuing communications is the last resort of the incompetent. Would you stop mail (letter mail) connections with Albania, Lybia, Israel, South Africa, Red China, the US, Tai-wan or any other country you disagree with polotically, if you had the power? Which ones exactly? And how about telephone? From: ihnp4!hplabs!pesnta!pesnta!pyramid!amiga!dusty@ECN ... uh excuse me sir/madam, but could you please clarify your real name to me, and be so kind as to inform me in just what town/city/district/ state or country I must have been in, in order to have cast a ballot for you, to have become my spokesperson/representative? Since my feeble memory doesn't seem to remember you, and I therefore conclude (perhaps in error!) that you've 'self_elected' same said self to the unenviable position as my spokesperson! Perhaps I could ask that you, as my self appointed champion and spokesperson, would instead of committing me to your course of action, stand out--as a real leader should--by taking the lead and proclaim to the world, "I, <insert name and elected (or imagined) position>, do hereby state for all the world to hear and see, that <insert stated position (you may choose one or more of: USSR out of Afghanistan, USA out of Cuba....there's lots...)>". Then you will only need to exercise that position, and you sir/madam will stand head and shoulders obove the rest of the masses--and true to yourself! What a brave and honest person you must be to stand that way! As for me, I've found out over the course of many years that the "_let's_ _all_climb_on_the_bandwagon_" knee-jerk reactions, serve only to support those that espouse them. I do not condone any action that imposes slavery--real of contrived--upon others. But I feel that I can keep more aware of the world by listening and understanding. Then using that inform- ation to educate and apply more gentle forms of persuation. That way your subject may remain your friend--as opposed to surely becoming your enemy. -- Rich Kulawiec pucc-j!rsk or rsk@asc.purdue.edu