[Closed] Media hype regarding Nelson Mandela

well I thought he was quite good for being so forgiving and so unaffected by 27 years in prison but he was only President for 5 years and never had to get bogged down in day to day crap about inflation and unemployment etc. He just set up a truth and reconciliation hearing and smiled a lot.

But then maybe saving millions from race based civil war is more of an achievement.

The biggest problem is people like to moan. For some it is just getting in the way of their favourite TV show. For others it probably excites the casual racist in them. But most people just don't care about what is happening outside of their own bubble of existence. It's just highlighting the fact.

I think that the media coverage has been pretty good, however that said Bono can go and ***k himself. Arrogant patronising little weasel.

It is a real shame that he wasn't 10 years younger as I think that SA would be in a much better place if Mandela had managed 15 years as president rather than the 5. A truly remarkable man.

I don't think it's possible to overhype Nelson Mandela's achievement. I've had a Reduced Cynical Thoughts™
Day in his honour. It's quite nice.

I was irritated that the TV "news" on the day he died felt the need to spend its time on non-news waffle about him rather than mention any of the other stuff which was news - and said as much on the thread about that. However I have no issue with the ongoing media coverage - not many truly great men around, and he was certainly one of them.

[b]as I said no one is questioning how great he was[/b], just the media ie its all about who can be seen etc heres obama shaking hands with so and so heres blair with so and so

It's a first to blink thing. No channel wants to be the one who treats his death like a normal 95 year old.

And it wasn't the day he died. That was about 6 weeks ago.

"as I said no one is questioning how great he was, just the media ie its all about who can be seen etc heres obama shaking hands with so and so heres blair with so and so"

The Obama/Castro handshake is important if it's an indicator of a rapprochement between the US and Cuba, which is also relevant to Venezuela, which is relevant to global oil prices, which is relevant to everyone.

BTW - if the media you consume is only talking about Bono, then you should consume better media.

I've not really read much if whats been written this past week but in my opinion he's the greatest leader in the past 100 years, possibly longer. If thats what's been written then it's accurate.

Our glorious leader - Call me Dave tweeted a selfie from the memorial service. Classy. Appropriate. Statesmanlike. Like a trustafarian backstage at Glastonbury! What an utter and complete *ing *! There really aren't enough hours in the day for me to hate that smug photoshopped-faced bastard!

TBH, I cant think of a large story/issue out of which every last possible minute of "news" content that hasn't been squeezed. Quality/balance has given way to a need to fill the air time IMO.

Another view that came up do young folk actually know what he did or who he was ? Its not taught at school is it a forgotten history ?

That's one positive outcome to this over-reporting I suppose - a new generation made aware of Nelson Mandela's legacy in rebuilding a country where the population has seemingly insurmountable differences.

Call me Dave tweeted a selfie from the memorial service. Classy. Appropriate. Statesmanlike

I heard a bit of the House of Commons debate (yesterday?) on 5Live. Toe-curling. A bunch of politicians recounting stories of their recollections of him, for which read "bragging about their brief or tenuous encounters with him, hoping to bask in reflected glory and indicate how important they are".

Meanwhile republicans are up in arms because Obama shook hands with Castro at Nelson Mandella's memorial service..... I wonder if they understand the irony in that.

I wonder if any of the victims of the mandela football team will be there?

Oh, and he didn't get locked up for having his stereo turned up too loud.. which it seems has been overlooked by the worlds media.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-25327883

says it all...

I dont think we have seen coverage like it since Princess Diana was murdered

Edric 64 - Member
I dont think we have seen coverage like it since Princess Diana was murdered

POSTED 14 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

Or when the US government flew planes into those big buildings..

The irony, radio 4 this morning talking about the media hype

what has fundamentally changed for the working class in south africa ?

[i]what has fundamentally changed for the working class in south africa ? [/i]

You can walk down the road holding hands with a person of another race without fear of arrest? (I might be wrong there)

binners - Member

Our glorious leader - Call me Dave tweeted a selfie from the memorial service. Classy. Appropriate. Statesmanlike. Like a trustafarian backstage at Glastonbury! What an utter and complete *ing *! There really aren't enough hours in the day for me to hate that smug photoshopped-faced bastard!

Of course, the "selfie" was actually being taken by the Prime Minister of Denmark to include herself, David Cameron and Barak Obama, but don't let fiddling details like that get on the way of a good rant, eh?

Woppit +1 you do seem to get v upset at weird things Binners. Can't really blame the Danish PM, I would probably have done the same.

Bat fink +1

Jenkins has some strong views in The Guardian today.

[quote=Nobeerinthefridge said]Or when the US government flew planes into those big buildings..

...or when they faked landing on the moon

...or when they faked landing on the moon

Or built that big [s]hideout[/s] themepark in the desert for the aliens to come on holiday...

I don't think it's possible to overhype Nelson Mandela's achievement. I've had a Reduced Cynical Thoughts™
Day in his honour. It's quite nice.

You've only had that 'Day' because it is in your own best interests to do so.......................

Oops, guess I'm not as good as the great man, then!

I particularly like the trademark logo - like you're going to patent it and make a stinking great pile of cash out of it - if you meant to have it there for that reason, then you sir are a comedy genius!

On a serious note, Long Walk to Freedom should be a set text in schools. It genuinely did make me want to be better in general. Then, unfortunately I reverted to type.............

what has fundamentally changed for the working class in south africa ?

I kind of agree with this. Mandela was a great man no doubt, but South Africa was far too screwed up a country for one man to fix. Whilst the end to apartheid will always be his legacy, in reality the country is still riddled with racial inequality, corruption, poverty, violence etc etc.

Not a country I'd personally have any ambition to ever visit.

TPbiker - shame its a great place with lovely people, scenery, wildlife etc. yes it has problems and it is easy to become overwhelmed by them. But one of Mandela's legacies is the fact that SA manages to muddle through. Great place for a holiday despite ( indeed possibly because of) the inequalities. I am off there in Sunday for a few days, fortunately after then funeral so won't be bumped off the flights to make way for VIPs (?!?) hopefully.

Long Walk to Freedom in R4s book of the week.

I used to be friends with a few white SA guys who said hard to get work out there because of their colour.

The coverage is much more justified than that of Princess Diana. Though I doubt that The Mail and The Express will still be referring to Mandela in every issue 15 years from now.

Surely to complain about the hype, you'd have to go looking for it?

I've seen all of 5 minutes of the coverage, seen Obama, Mandela's daughter (might have been), not Bono, Cameron or anyone else. I just turn it off or watch something I've Sky+ed. (Like Portrait Artist of the Year last night. Brill that was)

I've seen some links on social media to articles about Nelson Mandela alleging that in his younger days he was involved in, or sanctioned acts of violence & terrorism through his involvement in various anti establishment movements.

Difficult to tell if any of them have any truth in them, if there is any evidence on which to base the allegations, whether they are true but simply ignored, or are complete fallacies.

Anyone here that's better read than me care to offer an answer?

If they are true, then what does that say about out perceptions of people, and willingness to turn a blind eye when it 'suits us'?

Core - its fair to say that the ANC/Mandela's tactics changed over time. Nothing new or mysterious about that though. I don't think that your final sentence follows from this however. The world's (positive) judgment follows full understanding of his early tactics in the ANC and the reasons for them IMO.

So it's ok to kill people if you [i]mean well[/i] in the end?

core - Member

So it's ok to kill people if you mean well in the end?

Yes, only if you win.
If you loose then that is considered as murder and war crime etc.

Therefore, if a particular person wins the struggle against whoever they are then that person will be elevated to hero / saint / god / king / saver of the poor ...

🙄

My thoughts exactly

Core, not sure what you are trying to get at, but Mandela was "convicted" of sabotage and attempts to violently overthrow the government. No question of murder, ordering murder or manslaughter as far as I recall.

Maybe not, but that is what some of these articles suggest, I was simply enquiring whether they had any basis.

Maybe you should watch Cry Freedom and see what it meant to be a black person in SA in the Apartheid days.

Being arrested and held without trial because of your colour. Being beaten to death in a police cell and the official line is you hanged yourself.

In fact, have a look at the end titles to get the flavour

[url=

I think what Mandela and Biko and all of the (many) other unsung African 'terrorists' did was [u]just[/u] enough to get the country changed into something that humanity shouldn't be ashamed of.

"One mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter"
Anyway, think this is bad, wait until queeny dies. And she's done sod all.

teamhurtmore - Member

Core, not sure what you are trying to get at, but Mandela was "convicted" of sabotage and attempts to violently overthrow the government. No question of murder, ordering murder or manslaughter as far as I recall.

All former colonies would have some sort of struggles and the leaders that led the struggle would become the head of state once the "new" nation was legitimised. They would then become the father/mother of the independent state so given the title of heroes / heroines. The loser would then try to mend their defeat by "getting on the bandwagon" to "cherish" the new leader / nation in order to maintain "good" relationship with the new nation. That is the old skool ...

The new skool is to hype it up via media etc to let the world see that they (former oppressors) are there to help build a new nation. Doing this is merely to hype up individual political profile and to reduce guilt.

I doubt many followed the footsteps of Ghandi to have non-violent struggle but others may think differently.

🙄

according to 4 seperate neighbours who have all moved from south africa in the last 2 years, theres going to be one hell of a fight for power and mineral resourses there in the next few years,they got out while they could,some of the stories they have about killings and muggins make london town look like a playschool.

Sorry chewkw, I do not recognise SA in either of your stylised models.

I do, however, have sympathy with some criticism of the coverage and the sanctification of Mandela. Simon Jenkins expresses this much better than me:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/10/mandela-coverage-banality-of-goodness

The world may crave a "Mandela-like icon", but to what end? For serious media outlets to discuss him alongside Mother Teresa, Gandhi and Jesus of Nazareth is barking mad. He was Nelson Mandela. After seeing their former president doused in virtue and squeezed dry of glory by an assembly of world celebrities, South Africans should repatriate his reputation. Mandela gave them signal service for a brief few years in the 1990s, and if it suits them to revere him as a symbol of unity, goodness and peace, so be it. That is their business.

But the South African quality I recall Mandela possessing to the full was not saintliness, it was a hardened sense of irony. I doubt if he is wearing the BBC's tin halo right now. I would bet he is laughing his head off.

Quite!

teamhurtmore - Member

Sorry chewkw, I do not recognise SA in either of your stylised models.

Just a generalisation not particularly aiming at SA.

However, there are some similarities though.

I'm pretty sure this is along the lines of how that Jesus story started. Thoroughly decent bloke I'm sure, but not the son of god.

You don't have to look that far (geographically) to see an example of what could have happened if Mandella wasn't there to guide the nation through the transfer of power.

The chances of it NOT kicking-off spectacularly were so remote - the fact that it went as well as it did (albeit far from perfectly, and with a long way to go) almost meets the definition of miracle as far as I'm concerned.

I'd like to know more about de Klerk.

I'm not sure how I feel about the current positive discrimination in RSA - Part of me sees it as a necessary evil to redress the huge inequality within the country, but another part of me feels like they should be adopting a more principled approach. I guess one needs to be pragmatic, "just wait another 30 years" isn't gonna cut it when the vast majority of the population are on the receiving end.

Hands up here who remembers Apartheid-era SA?

I spent a bit of time there in the 1980s, whites only schools, trains, beaches...27 million people without representation, that kind of thing.

It took a while for me to fully understand the implications of it, in no small part thanks to a great man who refused to turn the tables on his former captors and instead set them on a better path.

Things aren't perfect, indeed Mandela himself would be first to admit so, but it's a heck of a lot better than either Apartheid or the aftermath of a bloodbath. I challenge any other politician of our age to do better.

[quote=PJM1974 said]Hands up here who remembers Apartheid-era SA?

Not directly in the same way as you, but I think plenty of us were well aware by the late 80s, at which point all boycotts were in full swing (I tend to think that cases like Zola Budd only helped to raise awareness).

As batfink puts it so well, it's quite incredible how smooth the transition has been. Sure it might still be a bit of a mess, but it's a hell of a lot less of a mess than it could be.

The leadership of Saffer SINCE Mandela shows how good he was for the country. I do find it rather ironic that now the whites are out of the way the ANC gets on with the important business of descriminating along sectarian/tribal lines. I wonder if they see the irony...
Still;this is about Mandela,so worth the hype? All things being relative in today's society with our expectations of our leaders and for his attempts to put aside his bitterness for the opp to try and reshape SA? Probably.( despite my natural Scottish adversion to public displays of emotion) A whiter than white example to all humankind? God no.

Fairly interesting....
http://thebackbencher.co.uk/3-things-you-didnt-want-to-know-about-nelson-mandela/

I'm not sure about it's truth/bias though.

I've seen some links on social media to articles about Nelson Mandela alleging that in his younger days he was involved in, or sanctioned acts of violence & terrorism through his involvement in various anti establishment movements.
Difficult to tell if any of them have any truth in them, if there is any evidence on which to base the allegations, whether they are true but simply ignored, or are complete fallacies.

""One mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter"

People who say this are lazy, ignorant bellends. Lazy because they haven't thought about what they are saying. Ignorant because they don't know what terrorism is. Bellends because it's a cliche.

But its true though. Just depends which side your on. The victor writes history.
I might be a "lazy ignorant bellend" but I try to have a civilized discusian before hurling random insults.