this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023

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371

Fuck French Imperialism Rule (lemmy.tf)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf to c/196@lemmy.blahaj.zone

51 comments fedilink hide all child comments

That means fuck ECOWAS as a tool of the oppressors also. Critical support for every coup in Africa, and for the rights of Africans to demand the French and US militaries leave their country.

Critical Readings:

Neocolonialism by Kwame Nkrumah.
How Europe Underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney.
Rethinking Ownership of Development in Africa by T.D. Harper-Shipman.

Recommended readings:

Unsustainable Empire: Alternative Histories of Hawaii Statehood by Dean Itsugi Saranillio.
Radical Markets: Uprooting Capitalism and Democracy for a Just Society by Eric A. Posner and E. Glen Weyl.

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[–] 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de 70 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Critical support for every coup in Africa

Hurr durr Western imperialism bad Russian imperialism good

Why don't we get France (a democracy) to pressure their leaders to set up free and fair elections then get the fuck out after they're done (simplifying things here as it's a slow process to not create a power vacuum) rather than supporting a like-for-like swap of France for Russia or Chinese control of the country through debt?

I'm not against the premise of the post, just the caption which reads like mindless Russophilia

[–] Hegar@kbin.social 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Your comment about Chinese debt is uninformed - China holds a small percentage of total African debt and there's only 1 country (Zambia, iirc) where Chinese debt is even close to half of the debt.

Eurobond debt is far greater in almost every debt distressed African nation and is the debt that African leaders and bankers commonly cite as the problem.

The Chinese debt-trap story keeps being repeated by the US state department, but it does not reflect in any way the reality of African debt.

https://chinaglobalsouth.com/2023/07/13/graph-of-the-day-chinas-real-share-of-african-debt/

[–] match@pawb.social 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This article from the same source suggests China is at 54% of Zambia's debt, which is massive for a single country based off the other graphs: https://chinaglobalsouth.com/2023/05/31/how-zambias-debt-mix-is-forecast-to-evolve/

[–] Hegar@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Yep! Zambia is the only country where the numbers don't immediately disprove the debt trap narrative.

Contrasting Zambia's numbers with the percentage of China's total African debt percentage only highlights how low it is in other African countries.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nice strawman you’ve constructed there. Be a shame if someone set it on fire…

[–] 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de 38 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Oh no, are you having hallucinations? Because last I checked the majority of coups in former French Africa were Russia/Wagner backed so there's no strawman in sight.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

You’re advocating for FRANCE to DICTATE TO AFRICAN COUNTRIES HOW THEY CAN BE SOVERIEGN. Do you not see the irony in that statement? When has France ever set up “Free and Fair Elections” in ANY of their vassal states or neo-colonies? Was it a free and fair election when they murdered democratically elected revolutionaries? Was it fair when they dictated the currency and exchange rate for all of their vassals? Who do the people support? Have you even looked? It’s not France lmao.

[–] Darorad@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Maybe the coup should hold elections and invite international watchers. The colonial power being bad does not mean any action the subjects take is inherently justified. Each action needs to be morally weighed individually.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 2 points 1 year ago

I could see that, however, what we’ve seen in the past in similar instances, is that the West will dictate who the eligible parties for the elections are, as they (the French and US, among others) did in Vietnam, among other places and times. So I also see why the revolutionary government would be wary of such an event. Especially given the only interactions the west has had with them so far has been to tell them to surrender power by X date or risk military action against them. It doesn’t seem that there’s any particular desire or effort towards anything other than immediate return of the compromised presidency, which clearly isn’t going to happen.

[–] 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nice strawman.

I'm saying that the French people make it be known (as they're so good at making things known to the government - probably the best in the world) that they don't want their government to continue abusing their former colonies, then hopefully that gets pushed up the agenda for prospective parties, who then go on to organise a transition to full self rule. If that had happened before we wouldn't be having this discussion, so not only are you constructing a strawman by using the acts of former French governments against a hypothetical future one, you're not even destructing it properly as you're just saying "look this happened before" rather than actually giving reasons as to why your hypothetical future French strawman government would go against the will of their voters to maintain control over their former colonies.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So again, you don’t support Africans taking their sovereignty, but you do support French citizens asking their government to give African countries sovereignty.

Why would the French government vote against the will of their constituency? I don’t know, maybe you should ask them why they forced through that retirement bill earlier this year.

This all neglects the fact, that it is not the French governments NOR the French peoples right to determine African sovereignty, it is Africans right and theirs alone. I have a feeling you would’ve supported the French over Sankara just because he gained power in a coup.

[–] mounderfod@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So again, you don’t support Africans taking their sovereignty, but you do support French citizens asking their government to give African countries sovereignty.

both have the same result, and if the former is the only option then fine, but the latter certainly results in less death and suffering than a violent coup might

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 9 points 1 year ago

Well, they’ve had 50 years to surrender their neo-colonies, you can’t fault Africans for getting tired of waiting and seizing their sovereignty themselves. Or you can, but you’d be an idiot.

[–] gowan@reddthat.com 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Since 1963? That cannot be true. Russia's not been involved with Africa that long.

[–] 1rre@discuss.tchncs.de 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I meant recent/ongoing, as I imagine the OP did in their caption, but I see how the confusion arose reading the comment in isolation.

That said, the Soviet Union did do their fair share of meddling in post-colonial Africa so it wouldn't shock me, but I can't remember which countries they were involved in off the top of my head so I couldn't say yes or no with any real confidence

[–] gowan@reddthat.com 3 points 1 year ago

It's not enough fir them to take the crown from France. I disagree with 22 since 1963 but they have killed more than Russia/The USSR did.

[–] Ignacio@kbin.social 53 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Critical support for every coup in Africa, and for the rights of Africans to demand the French and US militaries leave their country.

No critical support for the rights of Africans to demand the Russian and Wagner militaries leave their country? Because you're replacing one colonialism with another colonialism. Should I point out that Wagner is paid with African natural resources like diamonds? What is the difference between the exploitation from France and the exploitation from Russia?

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I’ve yet to see any evidence of Wagner interference in these coups, and in fact, the countries they’ve been taking place in most recently have been countries with heavy western military presence, not Wagner. Not to mention, the suggestion that Africans are not capable of performing a coup themselves to me smells of paternalism, but that may not be your implication and I’m sorry if I misinterpreted it.

[–] Ignacio@kbin.social 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm not talking about them performing a coup. Although I don't like coups, they're property of nobody but themselves, and eventually democracy will return.

But French troops doing bad stuff, or doing neither bad nor good stuff (that's doing nothing at all), that doesn't mean they should be replaced by another foreign nation troops, being either private or not. If we agree that African nations are sovereign enough to decide their own future, they're also sovereign enough to defend themselves, or to ask for help to neighbouring countries in exchange of nothing. But in the countries we're talking about, they asked for help to another potential colonial nation in exchange of natural resources, that could be manufactured in place, thus creating employment, wealth and other benefits.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 3 points 1 year ago

That’s a perspective I can understand. I was pretty disappointed to see Wagner given a mine in Burkina Faso, for sure.

I think, though, that unfortunately, it is an inevitable consequence of western reaction to the coups and their history of suppressing African sovereignty.

Fighting off jihadis(which is what Wagner is being contracted to do in Burkina Faso) is a global problem, and can’t be tackled by any one nation, especially not a poor, landlocked one like Burkina Faso. However, the wests actions in fighting Islamic extremism in Africa has been so heavily fraught with abuse of Africans among other issues that I don’t think we’ll ever see the return of trust between West Africa and the West, and so, when paired with the global Wests refusal to work with the coup governments, and tendency to issue sanctions which even further damage civilian populations while leaving governmental structures nearly untouched (and not to mention that sanctions have been definitively proven to increase support for a regime), the newly free African nations have no choice but to look to alternative economic blocs for support, and in our current world, that alternative block is essentially just Russia.

[–] yetAnotherUser@feddit.de 4 points 1 year ago

https://archive.ph/0xLUh

Not a successful coup but rather the planning of a coup. About the recent coups, there's somewhat of a lack of information. Time will tell whether Wagner was influencing the coups. What is obvious is Wagner is certainly supported by a large portion of the population, seeing as there's Wagner flags everywhere.

Then there's also Russia + Wagner attempting to gain control over Moldova

[–] corrupts_absolutely@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

wagner might not be involved, and im not sure if the organisation will exist as is for long, but presence of russian flags and putin chants in sunday are surely natural?

https://yewtu.be/watch?v=W2i2r5XKnbM

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I see a few Russian flags indeed, thanks for the link. Importantly, what I don’t see, are Russians. Hong Kong protestors carried US flags, but I don’t think many people think that the US orchestrated them, we’ve seen similar across the world in various times and places. I’m not sure why they’re waving Russian flags, but I sure would love to ask them. Maybe I’ll talk to my Ghanaian friends and see if they have any experience with support for Russia in their nation, but last I heard, he hated Russia and China as much as he hates France, and more than he hates the US.

[–] corrupts_absolutely@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

there are vast social media disinformation networks employed by russia and now deceased prygozhin, which could be one of the way russia and wagner could become popular among the demonstrants. perhaps theres some other link(such as the economic copperation), but i have no knowledge on state of affairs in africa.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 1 points 1 year ago

That’s very true. Nearly all major nations employ cyber-criminals in other countries to spread narratives and control dissent. I don’t see why Africa would be any different in being targeted. I’m pretty involved in local Ghanaian affairs through local Ghanaian friends and family, and I’ve yet to see anything suggesting he or his support Russia, but it’s such a small sample size from only one country, I hesitate to use it as evidence for or against anything. He does support the coup though, and he’s even more angry at ECOWAS than I am, and his own government which he believes is gearing up for war.

I’ll ask him what he thinks of Russia though, I don’t think I’ve ever directly broached the subject with him.

[–] sbv@sh.itjust.works 29 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm trying to track down a list of the leaders.

As far as I can tell this goes back to a Reddit post that has been removed. The top-voted comment goes through a list and says why those leaders weren't assassinated by France.

Anyone have a list?

[–] gowan@reddthat.com 18 points 1 year ago

You can find a bunch mentioned in the comments. If it includes El-Sadat as the comments suggested I'd be wary of the list as France did not kill him The Muslim Brotherhood claimed to.

[–] suny@lemmy.blahaj.zone 26 points 1 year ago (3 children)

what is tankie propaganda doing on my tankie-free community, go away to lemmygrad with this shit

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 17 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Supporting popular uprisings against neocolonial compradore regimes is tankie propaganda now? I’ll be sure to tell my entire Food Not Bombs group they’re all tankies, and that we can no longer practice anarchism anymore because some guy on lemmy says we’re tankies because we support the right of the African people to self-determine.

What praxis groups are you a member of that support the ousted government despite the popular support for the coups? I’d be interested in knowing, so I can be sure to never give material support to such a reactionary organization.

Edit: Also, two comments in three months, only one of which (this one) in 196. For being your community, you sure contribute a lot less than I and many others do.

[–] suny@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

you sound like you're in dire need of a shower and a grass touching session

as per your edit, i'm shy and also have better things to do than having twitter level discourse with annoying anarchists that whine about western imperialism while suspiciously getting defensive about russian influence in recent military coups (not popular uprisings) :^)

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 1 points 1 year ago

I definitely could use a shower, I woke up late today, but I touch grass every day on my way to feed the chickens before I go to work for the day, thanks for your concern. Usually I’m wearing shoes, but I’ve been trying to toughen the soles of my feet recently, so I go barefoot basically anytime I’m at home.

[–] omni_memer@lemmy.blahaj.zone 16 points 1 year ago

Tankie is when you oppose french neocolonialism

[–] cnnrduncan@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago

Acknowledging the bad things that Western nations have done doesn't mean that you think it's alright for Russia/China to do the same bad things

[–] Zoboomafoo@lemmy.world 19 points 1 year ago

Bold claim, mind backing it up with a source?

[–] boredtortoise@lemm.ee 18 points 1 year ago

Support for coups from the people. Not every coup

[–] TotallynotJessica@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Colonialism bad, but this post sets off too many red flags. Critical support to all coups? Critical support too often means silencing of valid criticisms. I've only ever seen people using that term unironically if they believe things like democratic centralism are a good idea. Some coups make things better, some make thingd worse. Some could even allow reactionaries to gain power or result in neocolonialists gaining more control.

Also, that Radical Markets book is fishy. Posner seems like a sleazy neoliberal and while Weyl has a point with quadratic voting, I don't want that applied to the government. I think that we should redistribute excess capital held by private individuals to the people evenly so that no single individuals can wield power without having it given willingly.

Edit: grammar

Edit 2: God I'm tired.

[–] celeste@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Source? For fact checking reasons and stuff

[–] LaChaleurDeLaNuit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Why would you want to check that? Just trust me bro.

[–] CephalonKappa@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

You belong on hexbear lol

[–] cacheson@kbin.social 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

C'mon now. You may find BartsBigBugBag annoying, and "critical support" is kind of sus, but they're not anywhere near hexbear's level:

There's been no assertions here that anyone should end up "against the wall".
From what I've seen BBBB tends to argue mostly alone against a larger audience. Hexbears intentionally show up en masse to overwhelm their opposition.
BBBB's arguments appear to be genuine. At the very least, they're not flooding the thread with annoying image macros and pictures of pig shit.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’ve been here (3 days) longer than you lol.

[–] mustardman@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Yes but tankies go on Hexbear. It's the Lemmy Law.

[–] Femcowboy@lemm.ee 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

For those asking for lists/sources, I did a quick duckduckgo search and here is the first thing I got. Just taking a quick glance and seeing Gaddafi on the list leads me to believe the claim is at least slightly dubious. Yeah, sure, France was involved in that revolution, but his death at the hands of his own countrymen was immortalized in a snuff film you don't wanna watch.

https://www.africanexponent.com/post/10487-france-has-always-carried-evil-imperialism-with-it

[–] LaChaleurDeLaNuit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

People need to have a bad guy to point their finger at. And trust me, as a French-Israeli citizen I know what I'm talking about 😬 Folks will give a lot of moral and life lessons before sweeping their front door first, as we say in french.

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[–] Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Wow! I never learned about this!

France and the US... Murdering our neighbors... Destabilizing foreign countries... All learning from the lessons from the UK.

[–] Franzia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 1 year ago

Thank you for the reading recommendations!

[–] deft@ttrpg.network 5 points 1 year ago

top tier post

[–] iforgotmyinstance@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Enjoying unprecedented stretches of world peace while simultaneously denigrating the nations which enforce it.

Imagine being so privileged.

[–] BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf 13 points 1 year ago

When has there been world peace? Or do people in places like Yemen just not count as people to you?

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