Reddit reviews Sick Societies: Challenging the Myth of Primitive Harmony

Murder is often the largest cause of death for hunter-gatherer societies. This was covered very well in the book Sick Societies.

>So, Reddit has obviously already made up its mind about which one of us is right and which one is wrong, but I feel the need to offer a rebuttal anyway. I'll address your points one by one.

Don't let that bother you. Mob rule is illegitimate and shame on anyone who downvotes something merely for the sake of disagreeing with it.

>Sure, the animistic/tribal societies in sub-Saharan Africa were prone to endemic warfare

Tribal societies almost always have a higher murder rate than developed nations. 1 Some societies cannot be permitted to exist in their current states while maintaining an illusion of universal human rights.

>but that warfare was much smaller than that which we see today

Warfare was much smaller in Europe too at that time. Technological advancements have made war more deadly for everyone (though "smart" bombs are helping to mitigate some of that now). What doesn't happen in modern societies with modern military technology as much is things like genocide, rape and infanticide which always existed in tribal warfare.

>As such, I have no reason to believe that our European societies can teach much of anything to their African counterparts.

WW1 and WW2 brought forth essentially a second enlightenment with the human declaration of rights and Geneva and Hague convention (the latter two were earlier).

>"Christianizing the savages" won't help anything.

Whoa now, I closer identify with LeVeyan Satanism or Neo-Paganism. You won't hear me advocating that. While European and American Christians dislike homosexuals they almost never commit violence against them. It says a lot when Fred Phelps's family is the worst batch of Christians you can think of.

As for Rhodesia, it wasn't anywhere near as horrible as it's portrayed now. Sure, suffrage wasn't universal (neither was it in America for the majority of its existence) but any property owner could vote and their were black members in parliament. In fact, Rhodesia wasn't even fond of South Africa but like Finland joining the Axis during the Winter War they had to put their differences aside. Universal suffrage could have implemented without destroying the country and committing genocide against white farmers.

>I would ask if you can provide any concrete examples of fucked up shit going on in pre-colonial Africa?

That's rather hard to ask considering the majority of tribes had no written language. We know through anthropology that primitive tribes are almost never nice places to live in.

>The arguments you used in your post are the same arguments that the European powers used to justify colonization the first time around.

One of the justifications used for England and France to colonize Latin America was that the Spanish were doing things to the locals that made even 17th century peoples blush.

For the record, you write quite well.

relevant: http://www.amazon.com/Sick-Societies-Challenging-Primitive-Harmony/dp/0029089255

it's a fictional narrative. this book does a good job of countering the narrative.