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Nelson Mandela Dead At 95

Posted by timothy on from the specials-song-now-in-my-head dept.

New submitter Emilio Hodge writes "Nelson Mandela, the revered statesman who emerged from prison after 27 years to lead South Africa out of decades of apartheid, has died, President Jacob Zuma announces. He was 95." Mandela's death is covered by lots of news sources, of course, including The New York Times and The Washington Post.

33 of 311 comments (clear)

  1. What a great man by Finallyjoined!!! · · Score: 4, Insightful

    He will be sadly missed. Huge respect.

    --
    If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
    1. Re: What a great man by amiga3D · · Score: 4, Insightful

      People are a product of their times. While true that Mandela embraced violence he felt that he had no choice at the time. Terrible acts were being committed against his people by the government of South Africa. I think most telling was that when he finally overcame and was elected president he did not use that power to trample the former oppressors but instead used his power to heal his country. I think I was most impressed by how instead of imprisoning and executing former secret police he had them confess on video their crimes and then pardoned them. Some criticized him for this but they miss the beauty and power of the act. By having them confess on video he broke these men and made them small. If he had executed them in a wave of bloodshed then the backlash would have caused South Africa to take decades to heal, if ever. The legacy of these men will be forever shame and disgrace as is that of the apartheid regime. No hero is perfect and I feel that Mandela genuinely deserves the term.

    2. Re:What a great man by bmajik · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not that you're interested, but for the benefit of people who come across your posts, I offer this clarification:

      Read the Wikipedia article on Mandela. All of it.

      ANC/Mandela supported economic nationalism. He was honored by the Soviet Union for his pro-communist affiliations. In 61-62 he participated in a _bombing campaign_ to put pressure on the apartheid government.

      Mandela was anti-capitalist. Not as in, "bmajik says so", but as in, Mandela says so.

      Reagan and Thatcher were hesitant to cut off South Africa not because they gave a shit about Mandela or because they loved sticking it to black people; they saw SA as a pawn in the cold war. They didn't want a bunch of African Nationalist Parties starting communist and Russia-aligned states all over the untapped African continent.

      To Manela's credit, while he advocated for nationalizing of banks, gold production, other mining, and the abolition of private property, he didn't enact these policies when he eventually took control of the government. He was smart enough to understand that SA badly needed foreign investment, and nationalizing industry and destroying property doesn't get you investors.

      Mandela is a mixed bag. As terrorists go, he was a pretty pleasant one -- MK (the militant wing he was part of) only attacked infrastructure at night, hoping to minimize civilian losses.

      But, he was willing to resort to violence to bring about a communist revolution in Africa.

      You think Reagan and Thatcher were against that? You're right.

      Again -- read the WP article. I just summarized it here.

      --
      My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
    3. Re: What a great man by Alain+Williams · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You can't make an omlette without breaking eggs. He might not have been an angel 100% of the time, but overall he did the right things. He did much more good with his life than I have in mine, and more good that I suspect you have done.

    4. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Reagan & Thatcher opposed "sanctions". They didn't support apartheid.

      They supported the apartheid government, which is the same thing. It's like saying you support the German government in 1939, but you don't support Nazis.

      Both Reagan and Thatcher called Mandela "terrorist" well after the world could see the truth. They were trying to hold on to the last vestiges of white colonial Africa. May their names be erased from the Book of Life.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    5. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      So, when Thatcher and Reagan participate in "bombing campaigns" it's "fighting for liberty" but when Mandela does it, they call it terrorism. Yes, that sounds like what you're saying.

      Thatcher was "resorting" to her own campaign of violence in Ireland, and Reagan, disappointed that he didn't have a real war to fight, sent the marines to invade, uh, Grenada.

      South Africa was enormously helped by the influence of Nelson Mandela. Both the UK and the US were left worse off by the influence of Thatcher and Reagan, (may they burn in Hell).

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    6. Re:What a great man by bmajik · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I hesitated to respond to you because we live in entirely different worlds, and I don't think any number of Slashdot posts is going to fix that.

      However, to be clear, I wasn't implying that Reagan or Thatcher had a problem with violence.

      On the contrary; they had a problem with South Africa becoming a communist satellite. When the communist agitators resort to violence, that just makes it easier to convince the domestic public that the communists are bad. Obviously when it is bin Laden fighting the Soviets, violence is just fine. We both understand how it works.

      Regarding your last point: South Africa of today is one of the most dangerous and violent places on earth; Mandela did next to nothing to address black on white or even black-on-black violence. There was a huge white-flight out of SA during the 90s.

      Perhaps you think this is a positive outcome. I don't.

      No racial reconciliation is perfect, of course. I would say that the US probably didn't do enough to help re-enfranchise blacks, and that South Africa may have done a bit too much.

      The bottom line is this: I very much enjoyed living in the Reagan years America. I very much would NOT have liked living in the Mandela years SA.

      I think Reagan and Thatcher were both great, as far as people who have actually held office go, and I am disappointed that the Reagan we got was nowhere close to the Reagan that campaigned. I was all for abolishing the Depts of Ed, Energy, and the ATF. Very disappointed with Reagan on that score...

      The other transgressions in his career (military adventurism) bother me, but I don't think they actually bother Reagan detractors that much. The people who bitterly hate Reagan tend to hate him for reasons that his supporters like him. Similarly, if you accuse Thatcher of being a union buster or for cleaning up free loaders on the dole, people like me will say "bravo Thatcher".

      The bottom line is that you and I probably agree that Reagan/Thatcher supported a bunch of wars and terrorists that they shouldn't have. But you shouldn't pretend like that is the basis for your displeasure with them. Especially not when every other US and UK leader since (some of which you've certainly hated LESS, if not mildly supported) has done the same exact shit...

      --
      My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
    7. Re: What a great man by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Mandela was working against a government who developed such things as the 'street sweeper' ultra-high capacity shotgun for crowd control

      When a freaking beast has their boot on your throat it is impossible to play nice

      The greatest credit to Mandela is that when he did gain power he did not succumb to stupid behavior (land grabs, nepotism and economic decline) like his neighbor Mugabe

    8. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If sanctions are not effective, why are they used so avidly against Iran?

      Well...there you go again, bringing up inconvenient questions.

      I think the answer is, sanctions work in Iran because it's just a bunch of muslims getting hurt, but they don't work in South Africa because some rich white racists lost money.

      Mandela pleaded with the world to keep the sanctions in place against the apartheid South African government. He pleaded with Thatcher and Reagan to support those sanctions, and for his troubles they labeled him a "terrorist" and did everything they could to thwart the end of apartheid.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    9. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "Reagan and Thatcher supported Apartheid", please do some research, preferably not on wikipedia, and revert.

      Did they support the apartheid government?

      Case closed.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    10. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Informative

      Thatcher never called Mandela a terrorist

      That's interesting, because the Tories apologized for her having called Mandela a terrorist.
      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/cameron-we-were-wrong-to-call-mandela-a-terrorist-413684.html

      and it's even been argued that she played a pivotal role in ending it.

      How funny is it that people post links without reading them. Here's the headline of the story you link to:

      How Margaret Thatcher helped end apartheid - despite herself

      And here's an interesting quote from that story:

      A close aide once told me that she opposed apartheid more on the grounds that it was a sin against economic liberalism rather than a crime against humanity. She also was bitterly against sanctions of any sort â" they were a crime against free trade. She even went on denouncing them after Britain and the rest of the Commonwealth had imposed a ban on sporting contacts and other marginal sanctions. She boasted that she alone had managed to fight off demands for stronger sanctions.

      Advised by her husband, Dennis, who had business interests in South Africa, she felt that anything that damaged wealth creation must be bad for South Africa. She was also a great admirer of Laurens van der Post, the South African writer and traveller later exposed as a fraud, who also opposed sanctions on the country. He introduced her to Mangosuthu Buthelezi, the Zulu leader, who played an ambivalent role in the struggle against apartheid, splitting from the ANC in 1979 and accepting "homeland" status for Kwazulu. His movement, Inkatha, helped the South African police repress ANC rebellion in the townships.

      That's right, Margaret Thatcher's household income came in part due to South African investments under apartheid.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    11. Re:What a great man by Solandri · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Reagan & Thatcher opposed "sanctions". They didn't support apartheid.

      They supported the apartheid government, which is the same thing. It's like saying you support the German government in 1939, but you don't support Nazis.

      The Nazis were democratically elected into power. If you supported democracy, you had to support the Nazis in 1939 (prior to their invasion of Poland in September). I opposed the younger Bush and voted against him both times, but I supported his government because he fairly won a democratic election.

      There's this baffling tendency for people to try to oversimplify other people's actions and motivations to one single factor. That's almost never the case. Support or opposition is usually based on a myriad of factors, and quite often one's support can be a borderline thing chosen only because it's the lesser of two evils. It's very possible to oppose apartheid, yet support the (then) current government of South Africa because you feared if they lost power the government which replaced it would be much worse than apartheid.

      If all choices were easy, politics wouldn't exist. Politics is all about having to decide between difficult (and often unpalatable) choices. Armchair quarterbacking is all about criticizing those making those difficult choices, by pretending that the negative consequences of the other choices don't exist.

    12. Re:What a great man by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I very much enjoyed living in the Reagan years America.

      Did you know that the average annual growth in GDP under Reagan was less than it was under Jimmy Carter? That doesn't figure in to your Reagan hagiography, does it?

      Of course "living in the Reagan years America" was good, especially compared to the years after his trickle-down insanity kicked in.

      Sometime, go take a look at the trend in middle-class income, starting with Ronald Reagan. In many ways, we're still living in Reagan's America. It's still his trickle-down voodoo economics. Even Pope Francis has recently weighed in on Ronald Reagan's beloved "supply-side" economics, calling it a "new tyranny".

      And it's only very recently that we're starting to see people begin to push back, as they start to understand what Ronald Reagan really did to this country.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    13. Re:What a great man by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Sanctions are basically a way to do something and be seen as doing something, without actually having to do something even more distasteful or controversial.
      It's like wearing a "down with those guys!" tee-shirt.

      It's a compromise between doing something utterly stupid like going to war and between losing all political support by being seen as a supporter of the other regime. Ie, Reagan opposed the sanctions and which caused a lot of people to erroneously conclude that he must have supported apartheid.

      The political arithmetic isn't too hard. Your choices boil down to being seen as supporting the existing regime, ssupporting the opposition to the regime (ie, arming them, giving them money, etc), or sanctions. Of course there are nuances in between those extremes.

    14. Re:What a great man by clarkkent09 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Reagan after the Congress vote on SA sanctions:

      "America - and that means all of us - opposes apartheid, a malevolent and archaic system totally alien to our ideals. The debate, which culminated in today's vote, was not whether or not to oppose apartheid but, instead, how best to oppose it and how best to bring freedom to that troubled country ....
      Punitive sanctions, I believe, are not the best course of action; they hurt the very people they are intended to help. ...
      It would be tragic to lose this opportunity to create a truly free society which respects the rights of the majority, the minority, and the individual. There is still time for orderly change and peaceful reform. South Africans of good will, black and white, should seize the moment."

      He (correctly IMHO) believed that gradual change was the best course and that suddenly weakening the government would hand the power to ANC which at the time was a strongly anti-capitalism, pro-USSR, extremely violent (look up its practice of "necklacing") movement.

      It is to Mandela's credit that he controlled such a vicious organization and managed to bring about peaceful change instead of the race and ideological war that would have taken place with just about anybody else in his place.

      --
      Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
    15. Re:What a great man by riverat1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's very possible to oppose apartheid, yet support the (then) current government of South Africa because you feared if they lost power the government which replaced it would be much worse than apartheid.

      And Nelson Mandela is probably the major reason RSA didn't devolve into a civil war or become like Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) after apartheid ended. His leadership in those first few years after the change held the country together.

    16. Re:What a great man by mjwx · · Score: 4, Informative

      Reagan & Thatcher opposed "sanctions". They didn't support apartheid.

      They supported the apartheid government, which is the same thing. It's like saying you support the German government in 1939, but you don't support Nazis.

      The Nazis were democratically elected into power. If you supported democracy, you had to support the Nazis in 1939 (prior to their invasion of Poland in September). I opposed the younger Bush and voted against him both times, but I supported his government because he fairly won a democratic election.

      The Nazi's were elected, but not democratically.

      In 1933, the Nazi's had an organisation called the Sturmabteilung or SA (commonly called the brown shirts) which acted as a private army for the Nazi party. Their role during the election was to act as standover men to watch who voted for who and to provide "assistance" to people who voted incorrectly. The German election of 1933 was pretty much rigged and immediately after the election Hitler set about destroying the democracy, stabbing his political enemies and adsorbed the SA into the German army.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilung

      It has no equilency to the election of George Bush (either of them).

      Now I did not vote for Tony Abbott in the Australian elections, I do not support the Abbott government as is my democratic right to oppose an elected government and I will take any steps, legal under Australian laws to oppose and democratically remove the Abbott government because I believe the Abbott government is bad for Australia (he's essentially our George W Bush and in his 2 months in office has proved this in spectacular fashion). The brilliant thing about democracy is that the leaders dont get to rule by fiat until the next election and that you are allowed to be critical or in open opposition of a government. Of course Abbott supporters will oppose me (as is their right), but I'm not worried as Abbott seems to be proving my points for me.

      --
      Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
    17. Re:What a great man by Smauler · · Score: 4, Insightful

      He's one of the reasons... I believe De Klerk was also massively important. I see his role as similar to Gorbachev's, at the end of the USSR. They both could have held on to power, they both could have kept the status quo to some extent.

    18. Re:What a great man by flyingfsck · · Score: 4, Informative

      You just have no fscking idea do you? How the hell do you use 250,000 hand grenades and 140 tons of explosives for peaceful purposes? If you want to ignore all the people who died because of his callousness, maybe you should think of the children his wife murdered?

      --
      Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    19. Re:What a great man by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 4, Informative

      Thing is, ANC did deliberately target civilians. Churches, that kind of thing. A lot of that came up in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

      So yes, ANC were definitely terrorists. Fighting for a just cause, perhaps, but the definition is about the means, not the ends.

  2. He will be missed... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...he was...like...Morgan Freeman 2.0 down there...

  3. Mandela taught forgiveness by JoeyRox · · Score: 5, Insightful

    To be imprisoned for 27 years but still have the selflessness to bring peace and freedom to his country so that nobody should share his fate is the essence of compassion, generosity, and forgiveness. He is a shinning example of the human spirit.

  4. RIP Bill Cosby by Niterios · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just wait for all the Bill Cosby pictures with the caption "RIP Nelson Mandela".

  5. Local perspective by Any+Web+Loco · · Score: 5, Informative

    South Africa's Mail & Guardian is worth a read - local perspective.

  6. Re:Not news for nerds by RLiegh · · Score: 4, Informative

    Because it's "stuff that matters."

  7. Truly a South African icon by _UnderTow_ · · Score: 5, Funny

    I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Anit-Apartheid activist Nelson Mandela was found dead in his South Africa home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in this community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly a South African icon.

  8. Re:Not news for nerds by CanHasDIY · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How is this relevant on /.? I mean no disrespect

    Well, you've shown it, intentionally or not.

    Anyone old enough to have at least a 10th grade education should know why Nelson Mandela was an important person, and why his death is relevant to everyone on the planet.

    IMO.

    --
    An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
  9. One word by bob_super · · Score: 5, Informative

    "Ubuntu"

    Learn a bit.

  10. Really deserved his Nobel Peace Prize by dkleinsc · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress took power, they were in a position where they could well have taken revenge for a couple of centuries of repression by the English and Afrikaners. He led the effort to do something else (the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions), so that his country would not tear itself apart the way so many of its neighbors had done, repeatedly.

    I'm not saying South Africa is a paradise compared to, say, the UK, but it's doing a heck of a lot better than Zimbabwe or Lesotho, and his decisions had a lot to do with that.

    --
    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
    1. Re:Really deserved his Nobel Peace Prize by clarkkent09 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If we are to be honest rather than PC, whites were the reason South Africa was the most developed country in Africa (by far) and not a mess of poverty, crime, war, disease, violence and disease like every other African country. I would say he was smart, not generous, when he made a deal with whites instead of trying to force them out like Mugabe did.

      --
      Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  11. My own Mandela story by spaceyhackerlady · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When Nelson Mandela turned 70 there was quite a bit of coverage in the news here. He was still in jail, so I called Cape Town information, got the number, phoned the jail and left a message ("Happy Birthday!") for him.

    The man who answered the phone sounded like he'd been on the phone a lot that day. He was also very careful to take down my name and where I was calling from. I suspect that until the government changed there would have been little point in trying to get a visa to visit South Africa...

    ...laura

  12. Nelson Mandela dies at 95 by richy+freeway · · Score: 4, Funny

    Respect where it's due... That's 5 miles an hour faster than Paul Walker!

  13. Re:All of us who were around back in 1990 ... by Smauler · · Score: 4, Informative

    Mandela, ~ unlike all other hypocritical politicians all around the world, ~ is a dude who was TRUE TO HIS WORDS.

    I think his actions speak louder.

    "The TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission) found that torture was "routine" and was official policy – as were executions "without due process" at ANC detention camps particularly in the period of 1979–1989."

    Mandela founded MK, because he thought the ANC was not militant enough.

    I think he was right and just to do most of the things that he did. Brushing under the carpet military and terrorist tactics like most seem to do now, because he was on the right side, is unhelpful IMO.

    It wasn't his words that influenced politics in South Africa, it was his actions, however unsavoury they were. Also, yes, I do know he was in prison when those attacks took place. The organisation he founded carried out the attacks.