Meeting with People From South Africa

Today I met in Buenos Aires with a blog reader and his friends. They come from South Africa and we spent a while talking about the problems our countries have.

It was surprising to notice all the similarities, even if our countries seem to be so different.

Among the similarities, there’s a government that  supports criminals more than the victims. Criminals hardly do any time at all. People are encouraged not to defend themselves. The majority of the population being poor and corrupt, they support governments of similar characteristics. In South Africa the problem is government sponsored hatred against white people, here the problem is government sponsored hatred against the middle class, “poor” vs “rich”.

In both cases, we just don’t know what its like to live without serious home security. Over there in south Africa guarded communities are the way to go if you want to live safely and even that isn’t enough. They told me of a home invasion hear their home in SA where a 15 year old girl got raped by the attackers.

The same thing happens here, attacks to home within these guarded communities occur often.  At first, a wall around the community and a few guards, mostly for show was enough. As crime gets worse the security is put to test and often found to be insufficient. You need a walled perimeter, preferably a second fence for protecting the perimeter. Guards going around it and posted inside the community. 

We also talked about how people that have a good education, professionals such as doctors and scientists end up leaving the country. It was surprising to hear that over there in South Africa they have similar programs to avoid the “brain” emigration and programs to bring people back. How can blame them for leaving?

Another coincidence was that the SA government is trying to control the media through new laws. I explained to them that such a thing already happened here with the “K Media Law”. In both countries, the government promotes these laws claiming they will bring more freedom of speech, that these are measures against the monopolies running the media groups. The truth is that these laws only ensure that the government has greater control over the population and public opinion by controlling the press, TV and printed media.

I told them how after this law was passed, we saw journalists, actors and actresses all of a sudden siding with the government, fiercely attacking anyone has anything other than a official point of view. Its pathetic what people will do for a political position or to have their own TV show or productions in the public, government run channel. 

Piquetero thugs carrying long batons block the avenue in front of us as we talk about the situaiton in Argentina and South Africa.

As we talked, “piqueteros” carrying batons started to cut the Cordoba Avenue right in front of us. Thugs in the government payroll protesting for some reason or another, mostly to show that they can get away with anything. Apparently the same thing happens in South Africa.

I love meeting with blog readers. These are great opportunities to learn from what other’s experiences.

Take car folks

FerFAL