by Stephen Lendman

Voice of America reflects raw imperial power. It broadcasts US propaganda globally. On June 26, it said Obama “arrived in Senegal, the first stop of a three-nation African trip, focused on supporting democratic progress, and increasing US trade and investment.”

It’s his second African trip. He visited earlier as a freshman Illinois senator. He told Kenyans, “I want you all to know that as your ally, your friend and your brother, I will be there in every way I can.”

He lied. He’s a serial liar. Democracy is verboten. Washington tolerates none at home or abroad. America comes to exploit. At issue is controlling Africa’s rich resources.

Obama’s visiting Senegal, South Africa and Tanzania. He’ll return July 3. Why these countries? More on this below.

Controversy accompanies Obama. His one-week trip costs an estimated $100 million. At the same time, force-fed austerity harms growing millions at home. Poverty, high unemployment, hunger, and homelessness go unaddressed.

Obamanomics enriches corporate favorites and wealthy elites. Popular needs go begging to do so. Obama demands sacrifice. It’s forced on America’s most disadvantaged, unwanted and uncared for.

Foreign travel costs plenty. Hundreds of secret service, staff and others accompany Obama. Travel, accommodations, security and other costs are enormous.

Military cargo planes brought 56 vehicles. They include 14 limousines and three trucks. They’re specially built for security.

Bulletproof glass will replace hotel windows where Obama and his family stay. Entire floors are needed to accommodate security and staff traveling with him.

US fighter jets provide round-the-clock air cover. In 2011, estimated White House expenses were around $1.4 billion. They include staff, housing, travel, entertainment and perks.

Expenses rise annually. They’ve increased exponentially during Obama’s tenure. Perhaps they’ll approach $2 billion this year. Estimates exclude classified amounts.

What’s spent on Air Force One is secret. So are many other security related categories. Perhaps real White House expenses are double or more estimated amounts.

Americans pay plenty for presidents who betray them. Imagine what presidential largese could buy. America’s hungry could be fed. The nation’s homeless could be sheltered. Needy families could get free healthcare. Students hungry for knowledge could be educated.

Obama’s trip might have cost more. Initial plans included a Tanzania safari. Counterassault team protection against wild animals doesn’t come cheap.

Other Obama trips were criticized. Conservative estimates for his Hawaii vacations exceed $20 million. Perhaps they cost double or triple that amount. Air Force One’s estimated hourly rate is about $180,000.

Obama’s African visit reflects America’s scramble for its resources. They’re vast. They’re some of the world’s largest and richest.

They include oil, gas, gold, silver, diamonds, uranium, iron, copper, tin, lead, nickel, coal, timber, cobalt, bauxite, wood, coltan, manganese, chromium, vanadium-bearing titanium, and much more.

Continental agricultural lands are valued. So is offshore fishing. Senegal’s strategically important. It’s a regional hub. It borders Mali.

Washington provides military aid. The Pentagon trains Senegalese armed forces. America has an economic presence. Senegal’s eligible for preferential trade benefits. The African Growth and Opportunity Act provides them.

US exports include vehicles, machinery, plastic, rice, and textile goods. Senegalese resources are extensive. They include oil, phosphate, gold, iron, copper, uranium, chromium, nickel, zircon, titanium, limestone, salts, barytine and fish.

South Africa’s one of five BRICS countries. Others include Brazil, Russia, India and China. They comprise a significant economic and political block. They account for over 20% of world GDP.

They’re on three continents. They cover more than one-fourth of the world’s land mass. Their population exceeds 2.8 billion. It’s 40% of the world total.

They have their own Joint Business Council. It encourages free trade and investment. China and Brazil agreed to a bilateral currency swap line. It involves trading up to $30 billion annually in their own currencies.

Doing so moves almost half their trade out of US dollars. Other BRICS partners may make similar moves. They endorsed plans to create a joint foreign exchange reserves pool. Initially it’ll include $100 billion. It’s called a self-managed contingent reserve arrangement (CRA).

They plan their own Development Bank. Initial capital will be substantial. Each country may contribute $10 billion for starters. It’s to fund infrastructure and other development projects.

It’ll operate separately from Western international lending agencies. It’ll challenge their global dominance. BRICS prioritize multipolarity. Achieving it perhaps can end Western debt bondage.

BRICS have more global trade than America. They’re too important to ignore. They challenge US dominance. They trade increasingly in their own currencies. They may eventually end dollar supremacy.

Perhaps a supranational one or basket of alternatives will do so. BRICS prioritize political and economic solutions. They reject military ones.

China’s the world’s largest exporter. India’s an information technology powerhouse. Brazil’s a dominant agricultural exporter. It’s highly competitive. It has vast amounts of fertile land. It’s known as “the world’s biggest farm.” Russia is oil and gas rich.

South Africa’s the continent’s largest economy. Its resources are worth an estimated $2.5 trillion. It’s rich in gold, platinum, uranium, chrome and manganese ore, zirconium, vanadium, and titanium.

It trades extensively with America. It’s second only to China. The PRC is Africa’s largest trading partner. It’s growing at the expense of America. President Xi Jinping prioritizes increasing strong economic relations.

African nations see China as a healthy counterbalance. It challenges traditional American and other Western dominance.  China’s rapid growth requires increasing amounts of many resources. Oil, gas, copper and others are needed.

Getting them creates competition and friction with America. Washington wants unchallenged global control.

AFRICOM was established to exploit the continent’s riches. Resource/mineral control defines America’s agenda. Securing them at China’s expense is prioritized.

Tanzania’s strategically important. It’s a regional hub. It borders eight countries. They include Kenya and Uganda to the north, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi to the west, and Mozambique, Zambia and Malawi to the south.

It borders the Indian Ocean. It’s south of the oil rich Horn of Africa. Its natural resources include hydropower, oil, gas, uranium, tin, phosphates, iron, coal, diamonds, gold, nickel land, rivers, lakes, wetlands, ocean waters, forest/woodlands, wildlife, and fish.

America’s interest throughout Africa is exploitation and dominance. It seeks it through the barrel of a gun. It prioritizes excluding China. It pressures nations to comply. It threatens, inveigles, and bullies. It relies more on muscle than diplomacy.

Beijing seeks strategic relations. It does so diplomatically. It seeks mutually beneficially economic ties. It offers lucrative no-strings investments. They’re too beneficial to refuse.

Obama likely plans more African visits. Others representing him come often. China’s omnipresent on the continent. In 2012, its trade totaled about $200 billion. It’s double America’s amount. Its investments are welcome.

They benefit countries receiving them. Beijing gets increasing access to vital African resources. Mutually beneficial relations assure them. China’s a welcome economic partner.

Washington has other objectives in mind. Brand Obama doesn’t sell well. “Hope and change” reflects unilateralism, bullying and conflict.

Global spying shows how America operates. China takes full advantage. It’s a reliable partner. It’s representatives are welcome when they arrive.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.  His new book is titled “Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

kristalparks.com

We are pleased to distribute this alert received from our associate Valerie Traina. As usual it seems as if it’s mostly women who man (sic) the front-line trenches. See if you can help, and always remember that passivity and indifference cost lives. Eventually our own.—PG

From: Valerie Traina

Please read this IMPORTANT message below from Kristal Parks, founder of Pachyderm Power! She is doing a powerful demonstration in front of the Chinese embassy in Washington, DC. from 19-28 June, in order to drive home the message that the Chinese lust for ivory is decimating elephant populations.  Please support her in any way you can. Start by spreading this message far and wide.

Thanks,
Val
Val Traina
vtraina2002@yahoo.com

 

 “Only when the last tree has died, the last river has been poisoned and the last fish has been caught, will we realize that we cannot eat money.” Cree Indian Proverb

¶

Dear Elephant Friend,

Thank you for caring about elephants!

Hunger Strike to Save Elephants
Chinese Embassy, Washington DC,   June 19-28, 2013

When you love something with all your heart, you will do anything and everything in your power to protect and save it.

That is how I feel about the magnificent, incredible, noble Elephant.

WAKE UP WORLD!!!   Elephants are now tumbling over the cliff into the abyss of extinction.  Soon to be gone forever.  Forever.

Why?  For trinkets.  Those things that collect dust on a table.  Or, which are used to hold a cigarette!  OMG, we have indeed gone crazy, killing about 100 elephants a day  for greed and status.  The African continent is now a bloody killing field of elephants to supply the Chinese market for ivory.  We humans must rise above such blasphemy.

I know that Love is stronger than the dark forces of hate, ignorance and destruction.  We triumph in our efforts to save the Elephant Nation when we align ourselves with this power of Love.  Won’t you join us?!   

1.  Support us on line by clicking:  HERE

3. Send a check, payable to Kristal Parks (preferred) or Pachyderm Power! to:

Pachyderm Power!
% Kristal Parks
    1620 Utica St.
    Denver, CO  80204

Note:  I take no salary from your financial support, so every penny goes to the work!

THANK YOU!!!

Email us at:  KristalParks2@gmail.com

Kristal Parks, M.A.
KristalParks@earthlink.net
303-571-0801

____________

ABOUT KRISTAL PARKS

From The Washington Park Profile, a monthly newspaper:

As Activist Or Clown, She Carries a Message of Hope

by Susan Dugan

Long-time Denver activist Kristal Parks sits down and points to a photograph of a young Guatemalan girl. “My activism has always had a child component to it,” she explains. Take for example this child, Alejandra. Besides actions that included 10 years resisting nuclear weapons production at Rocky Flats, Parks spent time in Guatemala in the 1980s providing 24-hour protection for the girl and her activist mother to help stem the tide of “disappearing” Guatemalan citizens.

“They had a civil war for a very long time, and people were just disappearing off the street,” she says. “So the local people founded an organization to try to deal with the problem, but it’s against the law to organize like that. So the leaders of the organization (people like Alejandra’s mother) were in really great danger of losing their lives.”

Parks and other Peace Brigade International volunteers intervened by creating a visible international presence. “My job was to walk on the side of the sidewalk next to the street because when you disappear, somebody just comes around a corner and grabs you.” To protect her charges she’d sit on the outside at restaurant tables and behind them in movie theatres. Each day she’d accompany Alejandra to school and wait for her at the front gate.

Did she fear for her life? “Yes,” she says. “But my feeling was if anybody tried to harm her, they were going to have to kill me. Because it wasn’t right. And it was an incredible opportunity to use my class, my education, my nationality, my American looks to save another person’s life.”

The daughter of an American diplomat, Parks, who moved to Mexico at seven and to Spain at 12, considers herself culturally bilingual. “When I went back to Guatemala, it was like going home because the cultures are so similar,” she says. She also credits her early experience in Mexico with igniting her revolutionary spirit.”I became very aware of poverty and prejudice and injustice at a young age, she says. “My family lived in a nice big house, and we had servants, and there was a vacant lot next to me with people living in cardboard houses, and I began to ask questions. I have always felt responsible to act on what I know.”

By the time she graduated from California State LA with a degree in pre-med, that sense of responsibility began to take a strong spiritual and social turn. Her husband at the time had begun to get involved with the anti-nuclear movement in California. She had met Phil and Dan Berrigan, radical Jesuit priests at the forefront of the 1960s peace movement, and was also studying with Black Nationalist Ron Karenga, co-founder of Kwanzaa. “I remember him saying what Martin Luther King taught us is that love and non-violence do not work,” she says. “So I had him offering that on one hand, and people like Dan Berrigan on the other, and I was really asking myself where does my truth lie? I felt that nuclear weapons were really threatening the future of our children, and all life on earth. So I decided to throw myself in with the non-violent camp.”

She soon put her truth to the test by participating in a series of non-violent “witnesses” at the Lockheed Missile and Space Corporation. “Instead of recognizing your opposition as the enemy, it meant trying to transform the violence within us by witnessing to another way of dealing with problems besides bombing them,” she says.

Her actions carried grave consequences, and she soon found herself facing a possible eight-year jail sentence for trespassing and other more serious charges. Still, she and her co-defendants refused legal counsel because they chose to defend themselves on moral rather than legal grounds. ” I had a lawyer friend who volunteered to defend me and said I could get eight years,” she recalls. “I went to meet with her in jail, and there was a newspaper sitting out there with a picture of two swans swimming on the front page. I asked myself if those swans were worth eight yeas of my life, and I decided they were.”

She defended herself and ended up with only a 60 day sentence. “I wanted to speak profoundly and not have a lawyer get me off on a technicality,” she says. “That was freedom. They told me the judge had tears in his eyes.”

By the time Parks came to Rocky Flats as part of the non-violent resistance movement in December 1981, she had further honed her moral and spiritual beliefs. “We went in on Christmas day in a witness of prayer,” she says. “For me it is important where you pray. Praying at facilities of war gives your prayer a different kind of power and climbing over the fence in order to pray is saying I don’t accept this boundary to my conscience.”

The law, of course, has a different viewpoint. Parks found herself again jailed and eventually ended up spending 4½ months in solitary confinement. “I refused to cooperate because if I’m resisting that which is the cause of suffering outside the jail, I’m going to continue to resist it inside,” she says. “I felt they could break me physically and emotionally, but my soul was the one thing they could not touch. So I followed my conscience and accepted the consequences. I have claustrophobia, so it was really psychological torture to be in a five-by-eight cell.”

How did she survive it? She credits her spiritual training that draws on “the wisdom traditions, East and West. I’m most drawn to the contemplative Christian tradition and Zen Buddhism.”

She spent time meditating at St. Benedict’s monastery in Snowmass before and after every action. And she studied extensively with exiled Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh. “I used to say for however much time you spend in jail, you should spend an equal amount of time in a monastery, purifying your motives, taking down barriers that separate you from others.”

These days she’s still helping tear down barriers. Motivated by difficulties she’s experienced helping her recently disabled brother receive entitled benefits, she’s become a champion for the disabled. And she’s transformed herself again, this time into a children’s entertainer, playing characters, including a fairy, an angel, a magician, and a clown. “And I thought if I could be clear, centered and motivated by love, I could be a benefit to children.”

She performs at street fairs, in venues such as the Children’s Museum, and at private birthday parties. “I wanted to invite all of us to care for the earth, so I developed my one-woman show called The Enchanting Wonders of Nature. It uses humor, comedy and fantasy to educate. A caterpillar turns into a butterfly. It’s a metaphor for all our lives. No matter how much we’re crawling on the ground there is the hope of wings.”

 

Gandhi said: “There is no beauty in a garment that causes suffering”. The fur industry tortures and kills 4 million animals a year for vanity and greed. Kristal reminds people of this atrocity once a week at a fur store where she hands out leaflets and holds a protest sign.

 

 

“Re-Enchanting the World” is dedicated to preserving elephants and to protect them from the abuse and cruelty of circuses, other forms of entertainment and poaching.

 by Stephen Lendman

Previous articles discussed her. Calling her controversial stops short of accurately characterizing her. Moral depravity explains best. Vishay Prashad calls her the “queen of interventionist hawks.”  South African journalist Getahune Bekele said she’s a “consummate ally of grubby despots.”

Ray McGovern says she believes “hawkishness” is “safer” for career advancement than “thoughtful diplomacy.” Reuters called her “sharp-tongued.”

 

Others condemn her bloody hands. Banality of evil describes her. Death and destruction don’t bother her.  She was quoted once saying, “The only thing we have to do is look the other way.”  More on Rice below. Reports suggest humanitarian warmonger Samantha Power will replace her as UN ambassador. Senate confirmation is needed. She and Rice played leading roles in urging “humanitarian war” on Libya.

[pullquote] The incurable rot at the center of the current system explains the durability of ubiquitous scum like Susan Rice. A gangster system needs skilled, amoral consiglieri like her. All in all, the choice again says more about Obama’s high-handed duplicity than about Rice herself, who’s comfortable being an efficient servant of the Empire.  [/pullquote]

Genocidal slaughter followed. Africa’s most developed nation was ravaged. So-called responsibility to protect is code language for show no mercy. When America intervenes, with or without NATO partners, death, destruction, resource theft, exploitation and human misery follow.  Current National Security Advisor Tom Donilon announced he’s stepping down. He has his own cross to bear. In May, Foreign Policy contributor James Mann called him “Obama’s gray man.” His “vast influence” on foreign policy stokes controversy.

One unnamed source called the National Security staff under his stewardship “a snake pit.” Donilon was Deputy National Security Advisor under General James Jones. He called him a “backroom technocrat.”

He’s been politically active since working for Jimmy Carter. He did so straight from college. He went on to law school. After graduation, he joined Warren Christopher’s law firm. Later, Christopher became Clinton’s Secretary of State.  Donilon came along as his chief of staff. He also served as Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs. From 1999 – 2005, he held senior executive Fannie Mae positions.

He also served as chief lobbyist. He earned millions of dollars doing so. He pressured Congress for deregulatory-freedom. Bush administration officials willingly complied.  He was involved during housing bubble inflating years. He shares responsibility with others for what happened. From 1986 – 1993 and from 2003 – 2005, he was an O’Melveny & Myers law firm partner. In 1988, he was CBS Evening News chief political analyst.

Before entering Obama’s presidential campaign, he was a Goldman Sachs and Citigroup legal advisor. He’s been a hustler/con artist/bully throughout his political and private careers.  He’s part of a Washington/Wall Street bipartisan cesspool of corruption and imperial lawlessness. As National Security Advisor, it includes geopolitical priorities. He once said Obama’s “not a president who’s at all shy about the use of force.” Obama’s record, of course, speaks for itself.

Donilon’s other affiliations include the Council on Foreign Relations, Aspen Institute, US Chamber of Commerce, Brookings Institution, and Bilderberg Group. Since 1999, he’s been a registered lobbyist.

Donilon urged Rice’s appointment as World Bank president. She wanted upgrading to Secretary of State. John Kerry was chosen. Rice stayed on as UN ambassador.  As National Security Advisor, she’ll be chief presidential aide on national security issues. Unlike other presidential appointments, Senate confirmation isn’t needed.  Obama calls her “extraordinary.” Her style matches Hillary Clinton. She deplores peace, nonviolence, diplomacy and social justice. Her outbursts reflect bullying, bluster and arrogance.

Her support for US lawlessness makes her complicit. She relishes imperial spoils. She’s indifferent to human suffering. She’s a monument to wrong over right. She’s a disgrace and embarrassment to her country, position and humanity.

Her abrasive style makes more enemies than friends. She’s one of America’s worst ever envoys. A previous article said said she has major unexplained conflicts of interest.  She and her husband own “at least $1.25 million worth of stock in four of Canada’s eight leading oil producers.” She has up to $600,000 equity in TransCanada Corp. It’s building the environmentally destructive Keystone XL pipeline.

Her holdings also include $11 million of more in Royal Bank of Canada, as well as lesser equity in other Canadian financial institutions funding XL. She and her husband have a net worth estimated at between $23.5 and $43.5 million. They’ll have to explain how they accumulated it. Perhaps it was the old-fashioned way.

From October 1997 to January 2001, she was Bill Clinton’s Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs. She supported Washington’s imperial Afghan and Iraq wars.  She urged longterm occupation. She endorsed imperial war on Libya. She falsified claims about Gaddafi forces committing mass rapes. She ignored Western-enlisted death squad atrocities.

She’s been silent about them throughout Obama’s war on Syria. She blames Assad for Western imperial crimes. She asked for UN authorization to wage war.  She favors partnering with Israel against Iran. She wants one regional country after another ravaged and destroyed. She wants “no daylight” between US and Israeli policy.

She endorses permanent imperial direct and proxy wars. She has longstanding blood on her hands. As UN envoy, she supports Washington’s war on humanity.  As National Security Advisor she’ll have Obama’s ear to escalate it. She represents everything people of conscience condemn. She’s criminally unqualified for any public or private position.

She called Russian and Chinese Security Council resolution vetoes “disgusting” and “shameful.” Both countries oppose war. They’ve blocked it full-scale so far. How much longer remains to be seen. Expect Rice to push hard for direct intervention. She’s done it already. She did so against Libya. She urges regime change. She favors doing so belligerently. She proliferates lies for support. The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity said she “belongs in the big house, not in the White House.”

Her rap sheet includes complicity in major crimes. In 1993, she served on Clinton’s National Security Council. From 1997 – January 2001, she was Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs.  She was involved in proxy genocidal wars on Congo. Washington unleashed Ugandan and Rwandan forces. Eastern Congo was ravaged. It’s happening again. At stake are vast mineral resources. They’re largely untapped.

They include oil, gold, diamonds, copper, uranium, cobalt, and tantalum. It’s a rare earth essential for manufacturing high-tech electronics. Nuclear power producers need it. Rice has close ties to Rwanda’s Paul Kagame. He’s a US stooge. Washington trained him at Fort Leavenworth, KS. She’s connected to Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni.

He and Kagame are two of many African “grubby despot” US allies. They serve at the behest of Washington. They stay in power as long as they remember who’s boss.  They serve American interests. They exploit their own people in the process. Countries like Congo, Somalia, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia, Nigeria and others have been plundered for decades.  Millions have died. Poverty, unemployment, disease, death, deprivation, and human suffering define large parts of the continent. Exploiting its resources matter most.

Africa’s the world’s most impoverished, long-suffering, war-ravaged continent. Western imperialism bears most responsibility. Post-WW II, America’s been the lead belligerent.  It’s the only region where US military and civilian diplomatic functions are combined. AFRICOM runs things. As Obama’s envoy, Rice plays a leading role. She did earlier under Clinton.

As National Security Advisor, she’ll add to her rap sheet. It’s already bloodstained. She’s morally unqualified for any public or private office.  The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity is right saying “she belongs in the big house, not in the White House.”

Many other imperial co-conspirators belong there with her. Perhaps it’s the only way to end Washington’s war on humanity.  It’s more than ever threatened under Obama. With Rice as new National Security Advisor, it may not survive on their watch.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached atlendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.  His new book is titled “Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com. 

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.  It airs Fridays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour

Weird but true—

Pacific Standard [1] / By Louisa Lombard [2]

Elaborate greetings are the norm, I’ve found, when one enters a Central African village. So it was a surprise when I noticed that many people weren’t shaking hands the morning I arrived in Tiringoulou, a town of about 2,000 people in one of the remotest corners of the Central African Republic, in March 2010. I soon found out the reason: the day before, a traveler passing through town on a Sudanese merchant truck had, with a simple handshake, removed two men’s penises.

As best I could reconstruct from witness accounts, the stranger had stopped to purchase a cup of tea at the market. After handing over his money, he clasped the vendor’s hand. The tea seller felt an electric tingling course through his body and immediately sensed that his penis had shrunk to a size smaller than that of a baby’s. His yells quickly drew a crowd. Somehow in the fray a second man fell victim as well.

Hearing all this, I was less shocked than intrigued. As an anthropologist who studies the region, I was familiar with the problem of penis snatching. What surprised me was that the phenomenon—or, depending on your perspective, the rumor—had made it as far as Tiringoulou.

Reports of genital theft have spread like an epidemic across West and Central Africa over the past two decades, in tandem with what appears to be a general resurgence of witchcraft on the continent. Anthropologists have explained this rise as a response to an increasingly mystifying and capricious global economy. Which is to say that when the workings of capital are as genuinely obscure as they are in today’s Africa, proceeding behind a veil of complexity and corruption, rumors of “occult economies”—often involving a trade in human organs—offer a less mystifying explanation for the radical disparities in wealth on display.

That said, genital theft is neither new nor confined to Africa. Similar panics afflicted Central Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries. (Malleus Maleficarum [3], a book-length jeremiad against the dangers of witchcraft from 1486, includes a discussion of sorceresses who “take away male members” and keep them in birds’ nests.) And in 1967, an outbreak of koro—the belief that the penis is retracting into the body—overwhelmed hospitals in Singapore.

In Africa today, scholars who study penis snatching understand it mainly as an urban phenomenon—an extreme expression of the anxieties that pervade a city when villagers become urbanites en masse, living among throngs of unfamiliar people. That’s because most cases have been reported in crowded spots like Lagos, in Nigeria, and Douala, in Cameroon. But here I was in Tiringoulou—a dusty, peanut-growing hamlet so small and poor it barely has a market. If penis snatching had previously been a city dweller’s fear, now it seemed that not even the remotest places would be spared.

But spared from what, exactly?

It’s fair to say there are victims on both sides of the penis-snatching equation.

Shortly after the disturbance in the Tiringoulou market, members of the armed rebel group that governs the town arrested the traveler and subjected him to a harsh interrogation—for his own protection, they told me later. Had they left him to the mob, the town’s women would have torn the stranger limb from limb, they reasoned. But the protection, such as it was, did not last long: the supposed thief was executed by gunshot later that day. (Aware that international law frowns on summary execution, the rebel commander who oversaw the execution relayed a different version of events: he said the thief had mysteriously vanished from his holding cell.)

As for the men whose penises were stolen, several eyewitnesses assured me that the appendages did indeed shrink dramatically. I can’t offer such an intimate eyewitness account myself, but I did visit one of the men at his home, and he clearly seemed to be suffering. He lay propped on one elbow, slack and listless in loose sweatpants, on a woven mat in the shade outside his house. A handful of friends kept him company. Over cups of sweet tea, I asked them about how they understood the recent events.

Penis snatching, they said, was a means of supplying an illicit and lucrative trade in organs. Cameroonians and Nigerians—people from places “where they have multistory buildings”—were seen as particularly well versed in the business. “You see how advanced Cameroon is?” someone said. “It’s because they are so strong in commerce of all kinds, including in genitals and scalps.” The stolen organs, my companions said, are sold to occult healers for use in ceremonies, or else they are quickly fenced back to victims of penis snatching for a price. But the real money was to be made in Europe. One man who had spent some time living in Cameroon said he had heard of a woman there who was nabbed by airport security while trying to smuggle several penises to the Continent inside a baguette.

I asked the town doctor what he thought. Could he help the victims? He shook his head slowly—as if trying to gauge how much I believed about the whole affair—and then responded, “Western medicine is no match for this magic. It is a mysterious thing.”

Mysterious indeed. But perhaps no more so than certain afflictions that are less strange to us in the West. If penis stealing seems beyond-the-pale weird, consider what people in Tiringoulou might think upon hearing of Americans who starve themselves near to death because their reflection in the mirror convinces them they are fat.

 

Source URL: http://www.alternet.org/world/penis-snatching-rise-africas-genital-stealing-crime-wave-hits-countryside

Links:
[1] http://www.psmag.com/
[2] http://www.alternet.org/authors/louisa-lombard
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum
[4] http://www.alternet.org/tags/penis-snatching
[5] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B