[lelanthran]

> Surely the righteous West could’ve freed those slaves and not fought to keep them for centuries?

Where did I claim that the West was not at fault?

(The rest of your argument relies on this sort of strawman so there's no need to respond to it).

[yunohn]

There is no strawman?

Your whole post relies on blaming SA for what happened to them, using their fellow SAfricans who exploited them (alongside the West) as a fall-guy. That’s a very unfair characterisation of colonialism and its modern effects, like I claimed in my post.

Further, similarly to the way you dismissed the West for purchasing slaves, you skipped over Shell getting away with bribing the poorer previously colonised country.

[lelanthran]

> Your whole post relies on blaming SA for what happened to them, using their fellow SAfricans who exploited them (alongside the West) as a fall-guy. That’s a very unfair characterisation of colonialism and its modern effects, like I claimed in my post.

No, I did not claim that, I am saying that the voters in South Africa are voting in policies based on color and racial lines, not based on their self-interest.

> Further, similarly to the way you dismissed the West for purchasing slaves,

I did not dismiss the West for purchasing slaves (I said that they should not have), I merely pointed out that native Africans were enslaving their neighbours (and worse) well before they started selling their slaves to the West.

> you skipped over Shell getting away with bribing the poorer previously colonised country.

I did not;

1) No accusation was made that Shell was bribing anyone,

and

2) I pointed out very clearly that mining rights are usually SOLD to the highest bidder by the state. If the state does not then use that money for its citizens, you can hardly blame the source of the money. Since the state is legitimately elected by the voters, the voters have only themselves to blame when their leaders (whom have been in charge for the last 30 years almost) take all the money.