Dialogues: December 2018

Monday, December 31, 2018

Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Unfair Asian Critiques of Adichie

Gloria,

That wasnt exactly my point. In my initial post regarding Biafra, I said that it seems to fit the UN definition of genocide. As a legal matter, one would need to produce evidence that Igbos were targeted for elimination. I then replied to Ken and suggested that a commonsense idea of genocide, as distinct from the formal UN definition, seems to have as it criteria the targeting *and actual elimination* of a people (This is speculative on my part. I cant say with any certainty how people understand genocide). As an example, I cited the indigenous people of the southwestern US who were targeted and wiped out.

All Black Lives Matter,

brother shabazz

Pronouns: African

On Dec 31, 2018 6:48 PM, "Emeagwali, Gloria (History)" <emeagwali@ccsu.edu> wrote:

"i must say it saddens me to see such deepseated dissension still today about whether the case of biafra
was one of genocide when so many people died under tragic conditions."harrow

Does Yemen not fit the above definition? Many died and are dying under tragic conditions.
The "Houtis" constitute a sectarian religious group with Shiite leanings, opposed to
the Sunni government faction and the Saudi camp..

If genocide   is defined by a large body count in tragic conditions, Iraq in terms of the two Gulf
wars will make the list, too, especially given the difference in ethnicity of the belligerents - and the huge body count.

Was Biafra a target because of the ethnic identity of the people, therein, or because of its secessionist declaration - or both? Given the huge body count does this matter?

Kwame, Should we disqualify Biafra because there was no major reduction in the Igbo population, will that disqualify African American claims, too?

Scenario One
A   small population of 1,000 people loses 800 members in the course of open warfare with people of the same religion and ethnicity. Let us say that this one was a border war, and that the other side may have lost as many. Does this qualify as genocide?

Scenario Two
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with no planned intention to exterminate on either side. Does this qualify as genocide?

Scenario Three
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with the intention to exterminate. Does this qualify as genocide?

This may seem to be an exercise in semantics by some but I believe we need to identify the variables
associated with the concept before using it. The other option, of course, is to declare all wars as genocide, given the fact that countless numbers of   people die in the process.

GE

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Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Challenges and the Realities of Our Life Journey

great thanks for this philosophical piece

On Tue, 1 Jan 2019 at 00:37, Salihu Lukman <smlukman@gmail.com> wrote:

Challenges and the Realities of Our Life Journey

Salihu Moh. Lukman
smlukman@gmail.com
Progressive Governors Forum, Abuja

Life is all about challenges. We move across and between, often from smaller to bigger challenges, but most times changing shades and meeting other challenges in the course of avoiding other challenges. The reality is that our life journey is defined by the challenges we face and how we respond to them. Success or failure could simply be a function of how we interpret our responses to challenges.

Most times, we try to comfort ourselves with the suggestion that to be alive is indicative of our success in responding to challenges we face. No! Being alive simply means having the same lifelong opportunity to continue to respond to challenges. It may have little or nothing to do with our interpretation of how we respond to previous challenges. Although the kinds of challenges we face today may take bearing from the way and manner we respond to previous challenges, the reality is that so long as we are alive challenges will continue to steer us in the face. Overcome them and meet bigger challenges. Avoid them and meet another similar challenge of the same or lesser degree.

Progress, stagnation or retrogression is simply a function of whether we are dealing with bigger, similar or smaller challenges in life. Most times we tend to miss this natural logic of life when we seek to explain challenges we face in relations to other subterranean factors, which may only excuse our limitations in responding to challenges we face. When we do that we end up further weakening our individual capacities to respond to challenges.

Is it about families, workplaces, relationships, politics, organizations, name it, it is all about responding to challenges. In the case of families, in different forms, the manifestations vary from spousal conflicts, competitions, siblings' rivalries, children upbringing and managing their different forms of transitions to complex issues of keeping families together and managing individual choices of family members and how such choices impact on the family.

At the level of workplace, it is simply about survival, working to earn our monthly pay, accessing collateral opportunities to demonstrate our competences and through that perhaps get promoted and perhaps climb up the career ladder. There is also the associated element of managing or responding nuances colleagues, which could often have its own correspondingly enthralling or irritant value.

In relationship, politics and organizations, it is a bit more complex bordering on whether our choices and networks confer stronger capacity to respond to wider societal challenges. Maybe in the case of relationship, we could think in terms of whether we are serving as resources to capacitate others to respond to challenges or are we looking for others to help us to be able to respond to our challenges? In the case of politics, the issue could be whether we are contributing to solving societal problems or we are creating more problems? Is our organizational or associational lives create the capacity to empower our citizens to respond to challenges they face? Or are our organizations or associations looking more up to our citizens to be able to guarantee the survival of the organization or association?

Perhaps, partly because we today have a mindset of quick fixes and shortcuts, a lot of these are taken for granted. Everyone tends to expect a number of these issues that confront us as challenges to naturally fall in place. Our young ones are hardly oriented to struggle and prepare themselves to invest by way of hard work, efforts, patience, diligence and learning to be able to respond to challenges. Part of the unfortunate reality is that we end up setting ourselves up for endless failures, denials and finding excuses for our individual and collective limitations.

Therefore, as we welcome 2019, I want to remind all my associates - family members, friends, colleagues, my leaders, political associates, etc. to focus more on the critical issues, which is our capacity to deal with challenges, which comes all the times with a lot of pain, irritation and aches. Our joy and happiness would be determined eventually by how we are able to continually respond to higher and higher challenges.

May 2019 bring about higher challenges than the ones we faced in 2018. And may God almighty continue to endow us individual and collectively as a nation to effectively respond to all our challenges. Finally, may we, as Nigerians, conquer all our challenges of nation building in 2019, overcome all our national frustrations and proudly emerge as a united people irrespective of our differences. HAPPY NEW YEAR 2019!

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USA Africa Dialogue Series - Best wishes for 2019

My Dear Friends:
Let's all have a truly New Year, a truly, truly New 2019! I mean, let it be a truly new year in every sense of it--in every thought, plan and action of ours. I pledge to make it so. Let it be a new beginning, a new journey towards our Lord's gracious and ultimate embrace.
May you realize, and may you achieve all of the best and all of the most positive desires that you wish for yourself in the new earthly year of 2019!!
Let's never forget how infinitesimal each of us is in this universe of more than 7 billion fellow human beings. And so, let's be abundantly thankful to the Holy Spirit for ALLOWING us to survive and even prosper during 2018, despite our sins.
Best and warmly wishes for 2019 to each and every one of you!!!

Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Unfair Asian Critiques of Adichie

"i must say it saddens me to see such deepseated dissension still today about whether the case of biafra
was one of genocide when so many people died under tragic conditions."harrow

Does Yemen not fit the above definition? Many died and are dying under tragic conditions.
The "Houtis" constitute a sectarian religious group with Shiite leanings, opposed to
the Sunni government faction and the Saudi camp..

If genocide   is defined by a large body count in tragic conditions, Iraq in terms of the two Gulf
wars will make the list, too, especially given the difference in ethnicity of the belligerents - and the huge body count.

Was Biafra a target because of the ethnic identity of the people, therein, or because of its secessionist declaration - or both? Given the huge body count does this matter?

Kwame, Should we disqualify Biafra because there was no major reduction in the Igbo population, will that disqualify African American claims, too?

Scenario One
A   small population of 1,000 people loses 800 members in the course of open warfare with people of the same religion and ethnicity. Let us say that this one was a border war, and that the other side may have lost as many. Does this qualify as genocide?

Scenario Two
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with no planned intention to exterminate on either side. Does this qualify as genocide?

Scenario Three
A population of 1,000 people loses 800 members while fighting people of a different race, ethnicity or religion over a border dispute with the intention to exterminate. Does this qualify as genocide?

This may seem to be an exercise in semantics by some but I believe we need to identify the variables
associated with the concept before using it. The other option, of course, is to declare all wars as genocide, given the fact that countless numbers of   people die in the process.

GE

Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Fwd: Is One of Africa's Oldest Conflicts Nearing Its End?

thanks for this fascination account of what's happening with the western sahara.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin.adepoju@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, December 31, 2018 1:34:26 PM
To: usaafricadialogue
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Fwd: Is One of Africa's Oldest Conflicts Nearing Its End?

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: The New Yorker <NewYorker@newsletter.newyorker.com>
Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2018 at 20:31
Subject: Is One of Africa's Oldest Conflicts Nearing Its End?
To: <toyin.adepoju@gmail.com>

Plus: Sarah Larson recommends a new podcast about Y2K, and Anthony Lane reviews "Stan & Ollie."
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Dispatch

Is One of Africa's Oldest Conflicts Finally Nearing Its End?

John Bolton and a former German President have helped spur the first negotiations over the Western Sahara in six years.

By Nicolas Niarchos

Lights and ferris wheels spell out the year 2000 next to a body of water.

Podcast Dept.

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2018 in Review

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Puzzles and Humor

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Daily Shouts

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By Liana Finck

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