Thank you Milly! Very well put!

Here is an article I wrote for my blog as a response.

Mr Myers, the obvious thing to do to an article like yours would have been to give a well thought out response in hopes of getting a productive dialogue started. But I don't think your article was designed for such things. No, I think it has a different purpose. I mean I can try and explain as to why the West is mostly responsible for the horrible situations that are happening in Africa today or every other continent for that matter and how it goes as far back as the days of Western colonialism and Slavery. I can also talk about the hypocrisy of the West and how it still exploits the rest of the world through fancily named organizations like "The World Bank", IMF, WTO etcetera. The hypocrisy was never more evident than at the recent G8 Summit where Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister, urged the rest of the world to" not waste food" as he and the rest of the leaders gorged on an 18 course meal . But of course, you already have the pre-canned standard answer, "Why is it's always the West's fault?' or ‘stop blaming others for your own failures'. No, I think there is more to your bile diatribe than just meets the stomach.
I can also start with the title of your article – "Africa is giving nothing to anyone – apart from AIDS" which is deliberately mean spirited but hopelessly flawed. Mr Myers, as you know, we had always been told that the first case of the AIDS virus was apparently discovered in Africa, if one is to believe the Western theory of the origin if the AIDS virus, of course. So, if that is true, the next obvious question is how did it get to the rest of the world? But as you confidently stated in your article, we Africans are incurably ignorant and incapable of doing anything as basic as feeding ourselves let alone come up with a plan to import a deadly disease to the other side of the globe. So, the next question is, did we actually give it to you, or did you take it from us? Yes, Mr Myers, we didn't give it to you – you took it from us, just like you did and still do with everything else. And who is the less intelligent ‘species' one in this equation?

I can also talk about how a man, who supposedly has seen it all first hand, can have such mean and hateful things to say about innocent victims? I am curious to know what made you care to ‘tour the territory on foot and financially' in the first place? Was it the human side, which I'm convinced you have none after reading your article, or your tabloid journalist side? Were you there for a sincere compassion cause or for a Kevin Cater picture moment? At least Kevin Carter took his life, whatever his reason. No, I am not suggesting that you do the same, because you don't strike me as the type with such conviction.

Your arrogance and pomposity, it seems, has no limit. You seemed to be worried more about your Irish readers than the readers from the rest of the world. How provincial one can get, especially when it comes at the expense of the miserable no good poor Ethiopians who have nothing to give to the rest of the world except a deadly disease.
And what exactly was the purpose of comparing the Irish famine to Ethiopia's? Aside from the factual inaccuracy you provided on the length of the," Great Irish Famine" which by most accounts occurred between 1845 and 1849, I really could not understand the logic. First of all, the Ethiopian population did not double, let alone more than double, between the 1980's and now. But "white lies" and all aside, don't you think you kind of defeated your own argument there with your point about the Hercules and Mercedes reference – cute to be sure – but so obviously obtuse? Of course we have more means to deliver food to many staving people compared to say 200 YEARS AGO! – thus helping people live longer.

As for the Lockheed Hercules reference, I am sure you are aware, being an accomplished and well travelled Western journalist and all, that when the West sends the Lockheed Hercules to some of these miserable famine regions, it also makes sure that it balances it out by sending a few other Lockheed products like the F-15's, F-16's, U2's etc to that same government for different reason. Right? You know, just to keep the cycle of what you called ‘idiotic wars' going.
You also had the audacity to write that we Africans are outstripping our resources. And which ones would those be, Mr. Myers? Let me see, could it be the oil that is being pumped out of the Nigerian Delta by Western murderous companies like Shell and Chevron or the diamonds which are being robbed from Sierra Leone and Liberia? How about in our own backyard in Ethiopia where your people are hoarding our indigenous grain, teff for their luxury as if we have a surplus of it? Yeah, ignore the West's insatiable and voracious appetite for natural resources and the plundering and polluting of the environment. But the facts don't matter, do they? It's always us the darkies, isn't it sir? Well, it's typical of the West. It's like beating an innocent man bloody, robbing his money, leave him on the ground and later charging him with loitering for letting his blood run on the ground. Talk about taking responsibility for your own actions.

But that's not what caught my attention about your article. It is something rather peculiar. Mr. Myers, to be honest, I have never seen such vivid and repeated sexual references for a serious and sobering opinion.
It starts with your bizarre characterization of people as:

"…dysfunctional economic, social and sexual system".

Sexual system? What is that Mr. Myers, – a new category to define the wretched in poor parts of the world?
Your hateful characterization was not limited just to Ethiopia. Oh no! You wrote of Africa as an entire continent:

"…of sexually hyperactive indigents, (emphasis mine) with tens of millions of people who only survive because of help from the outside world."

And we don't even use Viagra! Can you imagine if we did?
You sounded like a white Southern racist during the days of slavery in the US, when you flawlessly managed to infuse your racist tendencies with your curious sexual obsession with Africans and wrote:

"Indeed, voodoo idiocy seems to be in the ascendant, with the next president of South Africa being a firm believer in the efficacy of a little tap water on the post-coital penis as a sure preventative against infection."

Journalism at its best!
There's more. Recounting one of your many past good deeds, you spoke of a young man in Ethiopia by declaring:

"The wide-eyed boy-child we saved, 20 years or so ago, is now a priapic, Kalashnikov-bearing hearty, siring children whenever the whim takes him."

You know Mr Myers, a normal and decent human being would be happy or even proud of his own humanitarian act in extending a helping hand to a child who, through no fault of his own, was put in a miserable situation, no matter how that person turns out as an adult. But I sensed some serious anger and bitterness in that statement of yours. What were your hopes for that wide eyed young man, anyways? Were you hoping he would join the Catholic Church? No, I am not hinting at anything here and yes I do know that you are of the Catholic faith. Stop being so sensitive! Anyway, at least that ‘wide eyed 20 year old' had, right or wrong, the courage of his convictions to fight for what he believed in. In other words, Mr Myers, he was not a coward like some who have convinced themselves that they are part of the solution by sitting behind a computer and by picking on innocent victims who can not defend themselves. Speaking of cowards, don't you come from a country where, as recently as 10 years ago, innocent men women and children were being blown up in a cowardly way in the streets in your cities instead of fighting the enemy face to face like the 20 year old you wrote about?
But back to your comment. Priapic? As curious as I was about your comment on the "dysfunctional-ity" of our "economic, social and sexual system", the word "priapic" jumped out at me like African cheetah at a racist European tourist. And being the uneducated, voodoo riddled, wide-eyed African that I am, I looked it up in the dictionary. And the most common definition of the word is:
Priapic – overly concerned with masculinity and male sexuality.

Are you starting to see the pattern here yourself?
You continued:

"How much morality is there in saving an Ethiopian child from starvation today, for it to survive to a life of brutal circumcision, poverty, hunger, violence and sexual abuse…"

Funny you mentioned sexual abuse because just the other day, I was reading about employees from a Swiss NGO who were accused of child molestation in Addis Ababa, where they were there to supposedly help needy children. Well well, Mr. Myers, it seems that some Europeans have a different opinion than yours. I guess some Africans, especially young boys and girls, may indeed have something to give to the rest of the world especially to Europeans. How is that for a ‘broad-brush stroke'? How does it feel when it brush runs on the other direction?

I also skipped a few sexual references, because I figured you'd get the picture by now. You have more sexual references in one article than a gynecologist diagnosing a patient with STD. Is this just simply your style or perhaps a symptom to a more serious and personal issue like a deprivation of some sort which manifests itself in one's everyday life? Subconsciously, of course? And I am not being flippant about this; I am very serious.
After I read your article, I was curious about you so I looked you up on the internet, to see your contribution to the world. I even saw your picture and could not help muse how you could have fit real comfortably with those Afrikaners who have been killing and torturing black people in South Africa during Apartheid. But who am I to judge? That is reserved only for you intelligent European types, right?

What is strange about your views is that, for an isolationist, you seem to have your nasty and lascivious fingers caught in almost all parts Africa more often than a six year old's hand in a cookie jar. And of course, predictably, I found a few more similar hateful articles about this race and that color.

So, what is the purpose of your article? What is the subtext of it? What exactly are you suggesting Mr. Myers? Population control for Africans only especially Ethiopians? Even though you have not come out and told us directly, the only conclusion we – at least speaking for myself, can come to is that you'd rather see these starving people die than see them multiply. In other words, since we Ethiopians only have the AIDS virus to offer to the rest of the world, it is best to let us die and reduce our population to a manageable number so on your next financial tour you do not have to give as much.

But the problem with that approach is that, as stated in your ‘honest' and ‘factual' article (according to many readers including, sadly enough, some Ethiopians) we are multiplying faster than we are dying!

So there are, as far as I can tell, two other ways of controlling a population. One is exterminating people in mass, a la Hitler or Stalin, but it appears that the West is having difficulty keeping up with the ‘legal' or ‘justified' way of killing innocent people using fake or as you called it, ‘idiotic wars' in Iraq, which by the way you enthusiastically supported.

The other way is population control through some sort of government policy. But as you have concluded in your article, we Africans are inherently stupid and incapable of implementing such intelligent policies. So, since it is practically impossible to prevent a bunch of "sexually hyperactive indigents" from having intercourse, the only other option is to let them have sex but prevent them from conceiving. I am no expert in this field, but it seems to me that there is only one way to accomplish that. And that is to convert every starving male population in Ethiopia to homos… No you are not suggesting that, are you? Hmmm, now I see where that animosity and bitterness towards that 20 year old came from! Unfortunately for you Mr Myers, that kind of stuff is not only frowned upon strongly in our country, (not that there's anything wrong with that) but it can also be a source of some undesired pain and discomfort especially for someone like you. I guess you don't know us Ethiopians as well as you thought you did.

http://lelatensae.blog.com/

This for all ethiopian , NO EXEPTION.

1) What has Ethiopia achieved since World War II?
2) Why does Ethiopia still needs food aid from other countries?
3) How come Ethiopia does not have population control in place?
4) Why do we still hate and kill each other?
5) How come everyone in Ethiopia wants to leave Ethiopia?

In essence, what Kevin Myers said are all true regardsless of what kind of person he is. Even if he is racist and thinks blacks are inferior, well, we didn't prove him wrong.

The goal of shabya and tplf bosses was that to get what they wanted by any possible and outrageous meanses. Both infectors came into Ethiopia and began to destroy the lives of the youth and the innocents. Ethiopians,think about the circumstances of life before and after the arrival of tplfshabya infectors into Ethiopia. Who brought hiv/aids virus into Ethiopia?

he talks absolut rubbish to hear this shit article its commen in europe its not new.its not a natural disaster its man made so time will tale we will get over it .

specialy our journalist you don need to let people know their crap.. please even in england we fade up of the metro news paper every monthe a child from 1977 famine stile displaying it and get money out of it they get charity 30 million pound the money goes to help their own people specialy in the poor inferstracter area we even don get quarter of it its businesse as usual.the aim is ovious to put bad image in our country to stop the flow of turist.

thats it.stop trash donation and get real!!!!

This Irish writer for Irish Indepent paper forgets his history and does seem not to gather enough information. The above titled book written a while ago by an Irish English teacher in New York City about the sorrowful and tragic family history in Irland comes to my memory. The book deals with a specific Irish family which came to USA but failed to survive and the family went back to Ireland and could not survive the harsh reality of the country few decade ago.

It is a true document by the teacher who really beautifully depicted his place under the British Imperialism imposed upon the Irish people until recently. It was an eye opener to the whole world and to any body who wanted peace, freedom and justice for the Irish people. It was a moving story told by a son of Irish family how his father was not able to take care of his dead mother out of poverty and diseases .

Hunger and starvation was one of the biggest guns used by the British to make the Irish people submit to their rules for centuries. The family never had enough food to eat or the father had any job to earn enough money for the family; if he did any, he spent it on alcohol

Frank was very young when his mother passed away and her body was cremated and they were trying to transports it somewhere in Northern Ireland big city and since his father was alcoholic they went to a pub and the father got drank and forget the ashes in one of the pubs in a big city.

When they realized they did leave the ash on the counter top in one of the pubs they kept running around to recover it. Even after death a body of an Irish mother was abused , it had a penetrating message to all of us.
The immediate reason seems to be the alcoholic father but it was the system that had made him so and forced his father to behave so irresponsibly towards his own dead wife.

A man was abused by a colonial system to lose his own respect and respect for the dead. This true story took place in our own life time and the book was a big hit and it was made into a Hollywood block buster movie in late eighties. I loved reading the history of the Irish people and their endurance against tyranny of the British Lords and colonialism. The history of enslaved Irish people is very scary and frustrating history.

But the current writer seemed to forget the history of his own people after mere few decades of prosperity of Ireland and the coming of peace and freedom after they managed to throw away the yokes of British Imperialism . They are very gallant people and if you want to know bravery and endurance go and read the history of the Irish people. Belfast and Dublin from the north to the south they stood up for their freedom and finally they got it.

We must do that and never depend on any kind of help from the west. It is wasting us as an nation and as a people. An economist from London School of Economics once told me he figured out that we did not need spoon feeding but must be self reliant people to fish for own to manage to harvest enough food for our people. To come back to the writer from Irish Independence he seemed to get angry at our leaders and the civil wars that had engulfed the whole African continent for many years now. He is giving us a message that we must be able to create peace in our country as they had managed to stop warring and building Ireland from one of the poorest nation in Europe to the second richest country within just 20 years.
If our people want something new , we may look deeply into the current history of the Irish people and especially their ability to turn around their country in all respects of world economies and within the European union. I am a kind of intrigued about their abilities to attract so much investments to their country. How did they manage to create such a strong economy within two decades.? How did they get the educated class and forced it to be one of the richest modern middle class in the history of the whole Europe?
The writer is talking to us from this point of view and inviting us to do something for ourselves.

One correction to the writer he does not know all parts of Ethiopia and all our people do not depend on
Food aid to make babies. They work hard and produce their foods to live as a nation. Too much exaggeration.
About AIDS, he is just parroting what has been said many years ago on one of major daily’s in USA about the origin of this killer disease. I have never bought the idea that AIDS came from the jungle of Congo in Africa and then passed to human and then a French pilot got infected and passed it to Canada and then it came to San Francisco, California. He is baseless journalistic idiot who accepts what he is told to believe. I am not sure if he is a racist but he sounds like a one.

Sabataa Dubbii