Mzansi Afrika

REMs and NDEs

Rapid eye movement sleep. REM sleep occurs in brief spurts of increased activity in the brain and body. REM is considered the dreaming stage of sleep. It is characterized by the darting of the eyes under the eyelids [Source].

Others say that it is, "the stage of sleep that is characterized by decreased muscle tone, rapid eye movements and dreaming," or "the stage of sleep during which the most vivid (though not all) dreams occur. During this stage, the eyes move rapidly, and the activity of the brain's neurons is quite similar to that during waking hours. It is the lightest form of sleep; people awakened during REM usually feel alert and refreshed." Have you ever been aware that you were asleep, but felt you couldn't move your legs or arms, and tried to scream? It's called sleep paralysis and it is due to REM. Your brain zaps your skeletal muscles and paralyses them.   

During rapid eye movement sleep, the brain's neurons are just about as excited as they are during waking hours. The resultant sleep is thus light, and that's when we dream.The phase "is marked by extensive physiological changes, such as accelerated respiration, increased brain activity, eye movement, and muscle relaxation." The dreaming is most probably due to the heightened brain activity and the relaxed, or "paralysed," voluntary muscles.         

It is said that the brain puts voluntary muscles into this lethargic state to prevent the dreamer acting out their dream. Sleep paralysis occurs when the brain awakes and forgets to rouse voluntary muscles. When sleep paralysis fails to occur (the brain doesn't zap skeletal muscles into paralysis), the person has REM sleep behavior disorder, or RBD; and such people often do act out their dreams.         

In the preceding paragraph I said, "the brain awakes and forgets to rouse voluntary muscles." What if it forgets for a good while? The brain's up, aware of what's going on, but the person can't move. Could this constitute an out-of-body experience? Turns out that yes, it could. And well, I'll be damned (no pun intended). First the healing power of prayer was scientifically disproved, and now this. And it seems to explain the whole experience, too, including the tunnel and the white light and the feeling of peacefulness, described by many who've had a near-death-experience.

In the REM study, "researchers compared 55 people who'd had a near-death experience to 55 people of the same age and gender who hadn't had this kind of phenomenon. For this study, a near-death experience was defined as a life-threatening event (such as a heart attack or traffic crash) when a person felt a number of sensations, including a sense of being outside their physical body, unusual alertness, seeing an intense light, and having a feeling of peace" [Source].

For one, people who had had near death experiences were found to have a badly regulated sleep/wakefulness frontier. These people can also have REM while they're awake and ... really, really awake. Segundo, "the same parts of the brain are activated when people dream as in near-death experiences" [Source]. And third, "the near-death study group had a significantly higher rate (60 percent compared with 24 percent)" [Source] of rapid eye movement intrusion.

Did we steal your brick making techniques?

Juan's comment: "I do not see why GP needs to make comments like, blacks were denied educational opportunities,in order to quantify his stance. How did whites deny them education? By tying them up and not allowing them to learn? Since when did it become our responsibility to educate other cultures? Since you advocate so strongly that your culture is equal to mine? Give me proof of where you invented something or built something that we cant or couldnt?

Or did we steal your brick making techniques and sand too? My arguments might seem like typical colonialist arguments, but history has very few instances that help YOUR arguments. We built these universities that you now claim as yours. Your arguments that AA is justified are all based on a belief that you would have built all this and achieved all this if we had never come here. Again history, nor the present, offer much proof to assist you." [Source]

Answering Juan's questions:
GP [Gauteng Blog] doesn't need to make comments like the one you suggest above. GP is under a moral obligation to at least think them. Not to quantify his stance but to prevent what happened from ever happening again. Apartheid South Africa denied black South Africans education by denying it to them. How else would you deny anyone education, when you're in a position of power? You say, "No." They did tie black people up, and banished some to an island, and did others in like only they know how, and not allowed them to learn, yes. In 1978 your folks spent $696 (4 306 Rands) on your education, as opposed to $45 (278 Rands) black parents spent on their child. Your responsibility has never been to educate other cultures, you're flattering yourself. The responsibility of people in power, anywhere, is see to it that everyone has equal access to schooling and to opportunity. No, my culture is not equal to yours. My culture is better than yours. Black people have built many things that white people didn't even dream of building, and vice versa.

You didn't steal our brick-making techniques, you nicked the damned bricks themselves. Your arguments don't seem in the least like colonialist arguments, they are the very definition of colonialist arguments. History says the African was enslaved abroad and on his native content by those wielding more brutal weapons. Of course you built the universities, if by "you" you mean the one who was in power then. Who else could have built them? Oliver Tambo in Tanzania?

I don't know if the black person would have built "all this" if the white person "had never come here." It's hard to say because by coming here the latter destroyed communities and lives and culture and families, and carted the healthiest black people back to Europe and South America to help build those places. However, I'm interested in finding out how you know for a fact that Africans couldn't have. This must sound familiar to you: "[We have] raised the life standards of the occupied inhabitants in all areas (infrastructure, water, employment, universities and hospitals) much more than they could have achieved in any other scenario. [Source]"

Talking to Juan:
Black people have undergone quite a lot at the hands of white people. White people have undergone very little at the hands of black people, all over the world, but especially in America and in South Africa. I've always been amazed at how the transition from minority government to majority government did not turn uglier. There's of course the question of farmers getting killed. While that tragedy cannot be overlooked, I'm happy that there has been no all out bloodbath. From 1652 when Jan Anthoniszoon Van Riebeeck arrived till 1994 when Mr de Klerk stepped down, nastier things than you can imagine were meted out to the black population. That's 342 years, Juan, or three centuries and 42 years. And you can't take 12 years (1994 to 2006) of practically no ill-treatment!

For more than two years, Tutu's Truth and Reconciliation Commission listened as South Africans testified about atrocities committed by all sides under apartheid - abducted loved ones who never returned, torture in police cells, the formation of death squads and bodies burned beyond recognition as their killers enjoyed a barbecue on the side. [Source]

...it is in the economics of South Africa that the greatest crimes of apartheid are reflected, and where the greatest test of reconciliation will have to come. The country had the highest inequality in wealth distribution in the world -- 20 per cent of the population owning 75% of the wealth. [Source]

Just like you, I was scared of the swart gevaar, the bloodbath I thought was coming. But in the end you and I weren't afraid of the same swart gevaar. You were and are still scared of being swamped by the black wave of freedom. I was afraid black people would want to revenge. Well, in relative terms, they haven't. I still don't understand, however, how after more than three centuries of life under the weight of racism, the black South African doesn't beat the racist into a pulp, but instead reconciles with him. And it is the racist who now complains, after only 12 years of no discrimination against him. That's what assures me my culture is better than yours, Juan, and that by quite a stretch.

In your comment to my post you ask for "proof of where [blacks] invented something or built something that [whites] cant [sic] or couldnt [sic]" build. They've built an apartheid-free, bigotry-free, torture-chamber free, pass-law free South Africa, that's what. Want more examples? There's Thomas Jennings's invention.

Thomas Jennings was the first African American to receive a patent, on March 3, 1821 (U.S. patent3306x). Thomas Jennings' patent was for a dry-cleaning process called "dry scouring". The first money Thomas Jennings earned from his patent was spent on the legal fees (my polite way of saying enough money to purchase) necessary to liberate his family out of slavery and support the abolitionist cause. [Source] Let us not forget refrigerated trucks, the telegraphony, the McCoy Engine Lubricator (The real McCoy? It's him), the blood bank, the foil-electret microphone, and many other achievements. And the short shafted assegai.

I want to know why you're scared. You're not angry, as you purport to be. You're scared. Is it because you think the world as you knew it careened and went belly up, and now you have no landmarks? Is it because we "don't really [want] a solution to racism, it's too sweet, this freedom to blame other people for your own mistakes. While I can be racist I don't have to look in the mirror and see what's wrong with me, with my people. I can just find fault with the other side. This is how the human race resolves problems, it's always somebody else's fault. You know what the best part of that is? You. Right now you think I mean somebody else, you think I'm talking about the other race. [Source]"

Racial bias makes you stupid

It does, although I meant it in a scientific way. Apparently we all have implicit racial prejudice, and not only that, we also harbour negative or positive feelings based on sexual preference, gender, age and other, usually non-determining factors. An Implicit Association Test, or IAT, gauges the relative ease with which participants are able to link certain groups of people, for example, gay people, and the concepts of "clean" and "soiled." Ease of association, determined by judgment speed, is considered evidence for an implicitly-held attitude toward that particular social group. If participants are quicker to link "clean" with "heterosexual," for example, as compared to "homosexual", then they're considered to be biased in favour of heterosexuals. In other words, they're prejudiced against homosexuals.

A 2003 experiment revealed that people who have implicit racial bias are "left mentally exhausted after interacting with someone from a different race. [Source]" The tests were conducted on white people, but the result is surely the same on prejudiced, black people. 30 white students took a computer test asking them to classify given names as of black or white people, and given words as being positively or negatively oriented. Testees who took longer to hit the button for positively oriented words following a black name (like for Sipho below) were considered implicitly biased. Ponder this:

 

1. Flash: SIPHO MAHLANGU 1-2-3   Flash: GREAT

2. Flash: TOM HENDRICKS 1-2-3   Flash: GREAT

Then the testees were first made to interact with either a black or a white interviewer on some controversial topic, then immediately given a cognitive test on something unrelated to that topic. I can imagine the topic being Affirmative Action, a subject that has animated the South African blogosphere (see this first post, this second one, and this third one) since it came into play. A short time, considering that after more than 40 years it is still a hot subject in the United States. Much of the information concerning its life-span can be gleaned from Fact Monster's US Affirmative Action time-line.

Lastly, the testees were shown photos of unfamiliar black and white men, with a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanner studying their brain. There was a clear link between IAT-measured racial prejudice, poor performance on the post-interview cognitive test, and brain activity picked up by the scanner. In effect, when shown snaps of black men, the frontal lobe areas ("associated with reasoning, planning, parts of speech, movement, emotions, and problem solving" [Source], or the executive function of controlling emotion and thought) of the brains of all the white participants lit up. But no frontal lobes lit up when the participants were shown the snap of a white man.

Folks who have implicit racial prejudices are left mentally tired after interacting with a person or people of a different race. Hidden racial bias makes them stupid. The study suggests that it may be because they're trying to quell their prejudice. Use the Harvard IAT to measure your own non-bias, or bias. Ponder this post, your score on the IAT and decide whether it all teaches us anything worthwhile about ourselves. Even with the static flash test above, one sees how far implicit bigotry can go.

Say you're a white European American who truly believes that a person should not be judged by the color of his or her skin.

Despite that egalitarian attitude, according to new Northwestern University research, subconscious -- or implicit -- bias can emerge subtly but quickly from its hiding places in the psyche and cause even well-meaning whites to look at identical facial expressions of African Americans and European Americans and see greater hostility in the African American faces.

Or take whites' perceptions of racially ambiguous faces that combine both African American and European American features. If the expression on the racially ambiguous face is hostile, European Americans are more likely to identify it as African American [Source].

Egyptian newspaper published cartoons 4 months ago

It's interesting to note that the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, published in the Danish press, were also published by an Arabic Egyptian newspaper 4 months ago during Ramadan.

(via Freedom for Egyptians)

Bono, Gates and Gates

Bono, Gates and Gates were selected people of the year by Time Magazine this time around. And why not? Bono has fought valiantly to have the debts of poor countries cancelled, with some success. Bill and Melinda have donated millions, nay, billions, to the poor. Is the argument that Bono is just a clue-less rock star valid? Is the argument that the Gates are giving away their dosh because they don't know what to do with it valid? No, they're not. Bono is a rock star but he's also someone who created the fashion line

Edun, co-created with designer Rogan. Edun's earthy but chic duds, which are created from organic materials, are made in family-run factories in South America and Africa with fair-labor practices [Source].

Perhaps the only thing I didn't quite catch in this whole story is why Ali Hewson, a.k.a. Mrs Bono, didn't get the recognition, too. After all, she works as hard against poverty, albeit without hogging the spotlight.

And Bill, what about Bill? First off, let me say that the man's software is bad. For the richest guy in the world, it's really inacceptable. But that's neither here nor there. Bill Gates is a philanthropist and he helps people with one of the few things he has at his disposal to help people with: money. We don't really care if he's giving it away because he doesn't know what to do with it, do we? Besides, if he's giving it away to charity, he does know what to do with it, doesn't he? And Melinda? Let's leave Mrs Gates out of it, because the other lady didn't get the same recognition, although she's worked hard, too.

Paul Theroux, the great travel writer, says that Bono is "endlessly shouting for people to hand over money [which doesn't] solve the wider problem of poverty [Source]." What has Mr. Theroux done to alleviate poverty? He's also said that

There are probably more annoying things than being hectored about African development by a wealthy Irish rock star in a cowboy hat, but I can't think of one at the moment.

I can, and it has to be the slamming of one of the few people who are using their stature to do their share. Of course Bono isn't going to eradicate poverty in developing countries. But he's helping reduce it. That's good enough.

By the way, the name of Bono and Ali's clothes line, Edun, is "nude" backwards. The jeans all have a poem on the pocket, and the material used is organic, while the labour used is local, and from the countries involved themeslves. What more would you want?

Capital Punishment

It is true that it sounds more benign when called thus: capital punishment. But it is 'killing'. Let's call it not capital punishment, not the death penalty, but killing. Stanley Tookie Williams died today after being injected with a lethal concoction. Let us not say that, either. Let us say, Stanley Tookie Williams was killed today. Tookie had allegedly taken the lives of four of his countrymen. That sounds too soft, too; he had allegedly killed four people with a shotgun at point blank. So he deserved to die. Or did he?

Who killed these people? If we kill Tookie for killing, who kills us for killing Tookie? Who kills the person or people who killed 30,000 civilians in Iraq, plus about 2,150 American soldiers, plus non-civilian Iraqis? Tookie had no right to do what he did. What right have we to "do to him what he did to others?"

The pain of family and friends must necessarily come into play. Tookie's victims had family. The pain must be tremendous, even after such a long time (The crime occurred 26 years ago). Twenty-five years ago someone pressed the trigger of a machine gun and blew my sleeping, three-year-old nephew to bits, brain and guts and all. A few years before, the same person or someone else had snuffed out my brother's life. We don't know how or where. We were never given the body. I'm in no way trying to compare pains, but rather to make my statement more understandable. It is the statement that "if those who kill your loved ones are killed for it, the former do not return." If you quote that, credit it to me, Rethabile Masilo. What's more, I feel that the perpetrators of those crimes against my family are now in deep shit, both as human beings, full-stop; and as human beings before God. If my family and friends had gotten them killed, and then gloated and pranced, wouldn't we be the ones in deep shit today? Besides

I know from talking to many others who have shared that chamber with me before that when months or even years have gone by, there will be no real closure or peace after what we saw Tuesday morning. Williams will not be alive for the supporters who wanted to save him, and the people he was convicted of killing will still leave huge empty spaces in the hearts of their loved ones. [Source]

Killing is wrong, no matter who does it and for whatever reason. Let's start from there, before we even think of working our way out toward whether Tookie should have been pardoned, or whether the killer of 30,000+ people should go scot free, or whether the system is or is not flawed, killing innocent people, or whether the system is or is not racially biased, killing more minorities than other Americans, or whether religion gives us the right to play God and kill, or whether killing criminals lowers the crime rate... Let us start from the beginning and gently remind ourselves that killing is wrong. Now, what? But let us start there.

Relevant reading: http://www.huffingtonpost.com

Global Voices

I've just done my first round-up of South African blogs for Global Voices. You will find it here.  I wasn't able to mention all the good local political blogs - there are so few of them, I didn't want to put all my eggs in one basket so to speak because I'll be doing a round-up every two weeks. So I will get round to including other great blogs like fodder , The Fishbowl and Gabbahead.

Global Voices is an amazing online project seeking to provide cyberspace for bloggers in developing countries, and countries that are generally lost in the din of US and other big country voices. Global Voices is holding a conference in December which has been sponsored by the Reuters news agency, so it's definately been noticed. Rebecca MacKinnon, one of the pioneers behind Global Voices writes:

"Global Voices Online was born at last year’s workshop for international bloggers, held on the final day of the Votes Bits & Bytes Conference put on by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School. Our blog has now emerged as the leading online portal and guide to international blogs beyond North America and Western Europe. It has also become the hub of a growing community of international bloggers who want to build a better global conversation."

As well as South Africa, I'll also be looking at Mozambique, Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia and Botswana. Unfortunately for some reason blogging hasn't really taken off on these countries, with the slightly lesser exception of South Africa. So if anyone knows of any blogs from this region that fit into the "issues based" genre, I would appreaciate it if you could let me know.

Sasol Watch

On the first of September last year a huge accidental explosion took place at the Sasol petrochemical plant in Secunda, South Africa. The blast ultimately ended up taking the lives of 10 workers. Sasol has grudgingly taken part in a public enquiry into the accident, but every step of the way has provided as little co-operation as they could possibly get away with. For one thing, the petro giant has refused to make their own internal inquiry into the accident public, for another they have paid minimal compensation to the families of those killed or injured. Many of those affected by the incident were contract workers, and because they were not directly employed by Sasol, the corporation was able to avoid paying any compensation other than covering hospital bills and funeral costs.

What makes this even worse, is that Sasol has a hidden history of covered up accidents that take place on a fairly regular basis. In fact, it would not be off the mark to say that Sasol has an appalling safety record. Now, a South African blogger is keeping watch on Sasol, and trying to keep the story in the limelight. I hope you will give Sasol Watch a visit, and support this local effort to hold a large corporation accountable to the people and to the public. Blogging of this nature, has not really taken off in South Africa, but I hope that my regular readers at least, will provide some support to this effort.

ANC on Zim

Today's statement issued by the ANC responding to the UN report on the forced removals in Zimbabwe could not be softer. But I guess that's what we've come to expect from Mbeki regarding our errant neighbour.

"ANC STATEMENT ON INTERNATIONAL RESPONSE TO ZIMBABWE SITUATION

The African National Congress appreciates and supports the efforts of the South African Council of Churches (SACC) to provide humanitarian assistance to Zimbabwe.

The ANC urges South Africans to support the work of the SACC to mobilise relief for Zimbabweans affected by Operation Murambatsvina.

The ANC has also noted the findings and recommendations contained in the report of UN Special Envoy Anna Tibaijuka. The recommendations provide a basis for further engagement by stakeholders in Zimbabwe and the international community to address some of the matters raised in the report.

In particular, the ANC supports the recommendations of the UN Special Envoy that the United Nations should work with government of Zimbabwe to mobilise immediate assistance from the international community to provide humanitarian assistance, and for conditions to be created for sustainable relief and reconstruction.

The report correctly identifies the need for all stakeholders in Zimbabwe to work together, with the assistance of regional and continental organs, to address these and other challenges facing the country."

All they've basically done is given verbal support to those wishing to provide humanitarian relief, and asked for the international community to work together to provide relief and reconstruction. Not the slightest suggestion to halt the removals which continue to take place, and not a hint of condemnation against Mugabe for his abuse of human rights.

On the other hand, I do agree with the ANC that it's important for regional and continental organs to address the "challenges" facing Zimbabwe - but then they must act, and surely this must start somewhere with other African leaders standing up to Mugabe.

More bombs

In the past two weeks, Turkey and London, and in the early hours of today Egypt was bombed. The death toll in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheik is currently at 59.

I don't even know what to say anymore, it's damn scary.