Comment by _akei | Hacker News Reader

Comment by _akei | Hacker News Reader

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Those in power will certainly prefer your kind of thinking. With your kind of thinking, Nelson Mandela wasn't going to be released from jail. I doubt they were even gonna send him to jail. They were going to quietly execute him. Apartheid wasn't going to be defeated, and black South Africans were still going to be treated like animals in their own country. It was reporting by British media, politicians, celebrities and ordinary citizens that put pressure on the apartheid government to end apartheid. What is happening in another country does affect you. Those people will soon be running to your country when life becomes unbearable.

Same as holocaust, I am sure Hitler was going to prefer that other countries don't report on what was happening so that he can continue to eliminate all German Jews. When he was done, he was going to move to neighbouring countries and continue until he reaches your backyard. By then, it will be too late.

What Donald Trump tweets, does affect me directly because Google Play on my Huawei phone can stop working with one announcement from him. I need to be up to date with the politics of the US. Recession in USresults in recessions all ov er the world. We are part of one global community and what happens on one corner of the world is everyone's problem.

I'll focus on my town and country before thinking about things happening 10k kilometres from me and on which I have absolutely no power whatsoever. That's why we're supposed to elect competent politicians btw, to take care of the serious business we citizen know jack shit about.

We can take a current event, hong kong, besides posting memes on reddit and #thoughtsAndPrayers on twitter what are people outside of the region doing ? Nothing. You can be aware and upset about something, if you don't do shit about it you're better off taking care of your local community. I also doubt we can compare the vast majority of the click bait news spewed by mainstream media and the holocaust. There is a very big difference between a war next door and whatever happens in the other side of the world.

Let's reverse your argument, what about Vietnam, Irak, Afghanistan ? the US managed to (initially) get public support for those through the medias, are they a net good for the average citizen ?

Believe me, those memes are helping to raise awareness. We must always raise awareness. We won't always succeed but we must always try our best.

> It was reporting by British media, politicians, celebrities and ordinary citizens that put pressure on the apartheid government to end apartheid

Not just British, it was a global effort and a global boycott. The British government of the time wasn't a supporter of Mandela.

> I am sure Hitler was going to prefer that other countries don't report on what was happening so that he can continue to eliminate all German Jews.

The Holocaust was barely reported at the time. Much of the details were only discovered by horrified Allied troops that overran the camps. Internment and the other racial discriminatory laws were reported; and the wave of Jewish refugees was, along with the high levels of opposition to taking in refugees.

Some of those have very striking parallels today.

I singled out Britain because they were the most vocal in the fight against apartheid. Maybe it was because they were our former colonisers. They are the ones who imposed sanctions that helped. As for US, it was in fact the CIA who gave apartheid government intel which led to the arrest of Nelson Mandela.

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