Lynching on our Doorstep

http://www.hackersforcharity.org/hackers-for-charity/dec-14-lynching-on-our-doorstep/

by sp332 • 13 years ago

42 46 13 years ago

hackersforcharity.org

waterlion2• 13 years ago

I've seen this happen, also in Uganda. Absolutely terrifying.

FedRegister• 13 years ago

I would be firing my employee involved in the beating for being such a judgmental prick.

VLM• 13 years ago

I think you missed the part about village justice, that's an excellent way to get your shop burned down and not have any effect on society. Might feel good for awhile, especially if its not your shop, but a talking to might be a lot more effective WRT social change.

sp3325• 13 years ago

Very true, otherwise the bit about second chances rings a bit hollow!

seiji9• 13 years ago

How do we reconcile the part of humanity pushing advancement towards understanding the universe and creating entirely new paradigms every six months while half the world is still monkeys with sticks (and the monkeys inevitably get advanced technologies without the wisdom or maturity required to use it responsibly)?

alexsilver• 13 years ago

You start acting. That's how.

fit2rule• 13 years ago

Well, you start with your own education. Then, when you are confident that you are capable, you start with educating others.

How that works? Go there. Simply, go to the most impoverished place in the world that you can stand, and teach what you know.

This isn't so hard as it sounds, but for some reason is also (at the same time) one of the most difficult things in all the world for humankind to do.

Same as it ever was.

sp3325• 13 years ago

As explained in the article, every person's actions were explainable by aspects of our shared humanity. We are not inherently better than those people, we're just luckier about our surroundings. A human in fear of his/her life every day can't take any risks, so they can't make new paradigms. You can recruit these people to your "universe-understanding" side by changing their circumstances to be more like yours.

seiji9• 13 years ago

we're just luckier about our surroundings.

Quite. I've often wondered how different I would be if I was born to a higher higher (affluenza) or lower (government assistance) family.

We should make a point of getting people out of mud huts and away from mob mentality though. That's just good world building.

Or we can make another Uber for Buzzfeed. Get the top 10 cutest kittens EVAR delivered to your door in 20 minutes or less or you get free toppings next time.

amerika_blog• 13 years ago

"We are not inherently better than those people, we're just luckier about our surroundings."

It seems to me people choose their own actions. When enough choose badly, the society as a whole decays.

thenmar2• 13 years ago

It's a good question but I don't think the characterization of "glorious pioneers holding lanterns in the dark" vs. "monkeys with sticks" is fair.

seiji9• 13 years ago

Let's talk about dating.

The dating world is full of monkeys. Baristas, out of work actors, "office managers," bartenders, literal starving artists, set designers who make $15k/year for working 60 hours a week all year, .... (We're talking "this is what they do" people, not goodwill hunting "unlimited potential" people who turn into rocket scientists at the drop of at hat.)

Imagine you're a YC person: Altman or Dallas or Quinto or whoever they have these days. At what point in a relationship does it get annoying not being able to share the upper parts of what you are and what you do? Sure, you can always commiserate about the weather and the latest TV shows or what your 188th level Orc Paladin did in WoW this week, but does that give meaning to "high achievers?"

That's the lanterns in the dark versus the rabble of reality tv watchers.

(Cutting off some replies here: yes, there's a continuous gradient between "only-a-barista" and "only-a-serial-billionare," but there are levels people seems to get chunked into fairly easily after talking with them for 5 seconds to 5 minutes. yes, some of these positions are due to life circumstances and coincidences along the way, but that's the life we end up with—we can't all go back in time to be born to the mother of Bill Gates.)

Paul_S• 13 years ago

Courts in the western world also make mistakes, police brutality is a fact of life and deaths do sadly occur while in custody. Bad things happen everywhere.

seiji9• 13 years ago

police brutality

Yup. Just because we're not talking about shared grandmothers in villages doesn't mean we're more sophisticated. The brutal kill-the-infidel groups can form anywhere scared people with low self esteem get grouped together. "If I hurt these people, others will think highly of me!" Except here, the weak low self esteem people have electricity, chemicals, and guns instead of sticks and stones.

judk• 13 years ago

I hope you didn't mean that the way it looks. Which "half" is the "monkeys"?

seiji9• 13 years ago

The side without minds just going along with their tribal affiliations for the glory of their own actions.

Wait, that doesn't clear anything up.

Also see: UK football hooliganism, SF/LA sports riots, SF/Berkeley injustice riots, and YC circles making rich well known people richer and weller knowner.

sswaner• 13 years ago

Start by leaving the word "monkey" out of any discussion involving African people.

seiji9• 13 years ago

Whoops. Didn't mean it that way (or read the post long enough to figure out where or who in the world it was referencing).

We're all apes anyway, not monkeys.

nilved3• 13 years ago

Is this deliberate or accidental racism?

sp3325• 13 years ago

Looks like seiji didn't know "monkey" is a strong racist term, and just used it to describe behavior. Still insulting but not racist.

mindslight• 13 years ago

Is this deliberate or accidental sanctimonious groupthink topic derailing?

dylandrop• 13 years ago

You could see it this way, or you could also claim that those "creating entirely new paradigms" themselves don't have "the wisdom and maturity required to use it responsibly". (See: nuclear weapons, nuclear power facility meltdowns, climate change, overfishing, the list goes on and on.) Perhaps a desire to live in a state of less technological advancement is in most cases just fine. Not at all defending stoning here, but you should realize that technologically advanced societies have a great deal of problems, in most cases to a larger scale than tiny undeveloped countries.

pessimizer• 13 years ago

the part of humanity pushing advancement towards understanding the universe and creating entirely new paradigms every six months while
half the world is still monkeys with sticks

These categories are not exclusive. Middle-class professionals are the authors of most of the horrors of the modern world. Just because you can do math and/or program for a smartphone doesn't mean that you don't have utterly irrational and/or repugnant views.

the monkeys inevitably get advanced technologies without the wisdom or maturity required to use it responsibly

They "get" them because middle-class people sell them for profit, or give them away because they agree with what the "monkeys" are doing.

kylemaxwell3• 13 years ago

The white man's burden truly is a difficult one to bear.

/sarcasm

rcavezza• 13 years ago

I'm not familiar with this blog so I had to look up some of the background for the story.

Although I couldn't find this in the blog, I believe The Keep refers to some type of missionary/community food kitchen the author runs or is a part of. [1]

Mzungu is term used in the African Great Lakes region to refer to people of European descent [2].

[1] http://www.hackersforcharity.org/hackers-for-charity/nov-28-...

[2] Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mzungu

sp3325• 13 years ago

The Keep is a restaurant, but they also run "The Jinja House" which is a bed-and-breakfast guesthouse for adoptive parents and traveling missions teams. There is also the Computer Training Center http://www.hackersforcharity.org/computer-training-center/

phaus• 13 years ago

Jonny Long gave some amazing talks at security conferences. He also wrote Google Hacking, and No Tech Hacking, which are equally amazing.

When he was at the top of his game, he rediscovered his religion and moved to Africa to start Hackers for Charity. One of their most noteworthy projects is a school that teaches computer/ it skills in order to help these people find jobs.

Its a great charity and Jonny Long is a great guy.

nilved3• 13 years ago

Warning: Attack Detected. All activity has been logged.
Sorry, but we do not allow the use of TOR users on our network, due to abuse and attacks from TOR users in the past, you have ruined TOR for everyone who uses it for legit reasons.
We do not have an issue with TOR in and of itself, and do not believe in censorship, but over the years, it has been widely used and abused by attackers, and as such, we take this into consideration when protecting our websites.

I couldn't read this article because of this nonsense. It gives me the impression that it's probably not worth reading, but does anybody have a mirror so I can see if I'm wrong?

sp3325• 13 years ago

http://web.archive.org/web/20131217174220/http://www.hackers...

crygin• 13 years ago

It gives me the impression that it's probably not worth reading

Would you be willing to expand on this impression? I've worked with a number of charities who have suffered various minor website attacks, and blocking Tor (only for non-activist sites, of course) is a common mitigatory technique.

sdoowpilihp• 13 years ago

We are as civil as we are financially afforded.

jlcx• 13 years ago

Greater financial resources might help, but I don't think they're necessary or sufficient.

ornangeblue• 13 years ago

That may be true of you, or your people. Some people need to make excuses, I guess.

eplanit• 13 years ago

I guess HN is sending too much traffic there. Getting 500s for 20 minutes now.

Lynching on our Doorstep

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