RIP: Nelson Mandela

[cartman]

After a lengthy battle with various illnesses, the great Nelson Mandela passed away in South Africa today at the age of 95.

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/12/05/17500450-nelson-mandela-dead-at-95

[claphamsa]

bah! beat me to it.

[DaddyTorgo]

beat me

[DaddyTorgo]

You knew it was coming, but still...sad day. The world's lost a great man.

[cartman]

Yep. He was one of the towering world figures of the past 50 years. Transcended the role of politician or statesman. Although things are by no means peachy keen in South Africa today, things would have been 10,000 times worse if he wasn't there as the first post-Apartheid leader.

[DaddyTorgo]

Did someone just change your title to "Death Herald?"

[cartman]

It has been that for a while. Not sure exactly when it changed.

[PilotMan]

Yep. He was one of the towering world figures of the past 50 years. Transcended the role of politician or statesman. Although things are by no means peachy keen in South Africa today, things would have been 10,000 times worse if he wasn't there as the first post-Apartheid leader.

This. RIP. He was a special kind of person that only comes along once a generation.

[ISiddiqui]

RIP

[BillJasper]

You knew it was coming, but still...sad day. The world's lost a great man.

+1

[BYU 14]

Very few like him have ever come along, great man, greater legacy. RIP

[Young Drachma]

What a life.

[digamma]

RIP. Pretty amazing life.

(And thanks to Darren Rovell I know that you can rearrange Mandela to say Lead Man.)

[MacroGuru]

I don't know if any of you experienced it recently. But when Invictus was released, my kids fell in love with the movie and asked me all sorts of questions about Mandela. I made them research him, apartheid and everything dealing with South Africa and his presidency. They came away with an inspiring view of him and made me proud.

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.


RIP...

[tarcone]

What a great human being. He was one person I would have loved to sit down and talk with.
Amazing man.

RIP

[Peregrine]

Really sad day - I wonder if we'll ever see his like again as leader of a country.

[flere-imsaho]

In history, very very few activist / revolutionaries have effectively made the transition to statesmen in the sense that they effectively lead a functioning state. This, combined with the fact that Mandela also engineered what was, in the end, a relatively peaceful, sustainable, and non-recriminatory transition of power, are two of the many reasons he is such a historic figure.

[RainMaker]

I really didn't know the history as much as I should have. Reading through stuff it's crazy how repressive that old regime was and how many people supported it around the world. Some of the lawmakers who are praising Mandela were calling him a terrorist 30 years ago.

[molson]

I really didn't know the history as much as I should have. Reading through stuff it's crazy how repressive that old regime was and how many people supported it around the world. Some of the lawmakers who are praising Mandela were calling him a terrorist 30 years ago.

Considering how repressive the old regime was, it's kind of interesting to me how it was determined somewhere along the way that Mandela, the rebel, was never going to be beloved by the Western World, despite what he was rebelling against, until his image was transformed into "folksy grandpa". OK, some of that image transformation was real, and based on age and new circumstances, but rebel Mandela was pretty important too, and it seems like we're still a little afraid to embrace him (and I have to think he never died out entirely in Mandela's own heart and mind).

[DaddyTorgo]

I'm 100% behind rebel Mandela.

[SirFozzie]

Ted Cruz is someone I disagree with a lot. However, his facebook post was gracious and well thought out.

His Facebook followers, however, are a bunch of asses.

https://www.facebook.com/tedcruzpage/posts/10152099242462464

[ISiddiqui]

I really didn't know the history as much as I should have. Reading through stuff it's crazy how repressive that old regime was and how many people supported it around the world. Some of the lawmakers who are praising Mandela were calling him a terrorist 30 years ago.

Well he was a terrorist (and there is the question can terrorism be justified if facing an oppressive regime, which all sorts of modern day consequences)... but he emerged out of prison a person who wasn't into violence anymore, but was into forgiveness and that's is what really made him praiseworthy (IMO).

[molson]

Well he was a terrorist (and there is the question can terrorism be justified if facing an oppressive regime, which all sorts of modern day consequences)

It's tough to have that debate in modern times with the modern emotions surrounding the term "terrorist", but it's the one I find the most interesting. We Americans should love a good revolution though. It's KIND of hard to put myself exactly in this position, but I figure if I was a black guy in South Africa in the 50s, I probably would not be as restrained as Mandela and the Umkhonto we Sizwe were. But, they obviously did carry out quite a bit of violence. But, I think there's a time and a place where violence is necessary. I think most people think that, we just pick and choose who we want to criticize for carrying out violence, because it's a pretty easy go-to.


... but he emerged out of prison a person who wasn't into violence anymore, but was into forgiveness and that's is what really made him praiseworthy (IMO).

And ya, of course, maybe the post-transition stuff was a more important and impressive part of his life because it's exactly what South Africa and the world needed just then, and it would have been easy to go a different way and settle more old scores. I just find the rebel stuff more interesting, maybe just because it's kind of "forbidden" and I get the feeling it's hard to find real info on it that's not either minimized or exaggerated.

[RainMaker]

Well he was a terrorist (and there is the question can terrorism be justified if facing an oppressive regime, which all sorts of modern day consequences)... but he emerged out of prison a person who wasn't into violence anymore, but was into forgiveness and that's is what really made him praiseworthy (IMO).

Terrorist is a subjective term. Helmut Hirsch was technically a terrorist. Same for American Revolutionaries. Ultimately you're judged on what side you stood on and for many in the world, they stood with the old South African regime which was pretty terrible.

[cartman]

A good place to start is reading the documents from the trial for he and his co-conspirators. His opening statement (which he thought would be his own eulogy) does a good job of spelling out just how and why he arrived at the choices he did.

Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory (http://db.nelsonmandela.org/speeches/pub_view.asp?pg=item&ItemID=NMS010&txtstr=rivonia)

[bhlloy]

And ya, of course, maybe the post-transition stuff was a more important and impressive part of his life because it's exactly what South Africa and the world needed just then, and it would have been easy to go a different way and settle more old scores. I just find the rebel stuff more interesting, maybe just because it's kind of "forbidden" and I get the feeling it's hard to find real info on it that's not either minimized or exaggerated.

This, infinitely this. Post apartheid SA isn't the greatest place in the world, but after the rise to power it could have been an absolute bloodbath and I don't know if Mandela was the only person who could have stopped it being but I suspect he truly was.

Also yeah, it's always a bit dicey when Americans start to call freedom fighters terrorists given the history of the country. I think certain things require different tactics and methods and what was going on in SA definitely did at the time.

[Lathum]

My Brother in LAw is South African and I have had the good fortune to spend a lot of time with him and his family. To hear them speak about him it is hard to quantify the immense influence MAndela had.