Quote Originally Posted by Misifus View Post
This is the correct perception, it is the reality. There has been much pussification of the American male, though the Western European man is even more girl-like. Much of this has even crept into our military.
I know what you mean, but it seems to me to be more about the institutions, choked with rules and regulations, desperately covering their prodigious asses, and obsessed with trying to protect themselves from any claim that they failed to protect everyone in their charge from anything resembling an experience that might produce knowledge. A lot of the individuals seem to me to be quite eager to get out and have a look, but the barriers against it are almost insurmountable unless they show up with no institutional affiliation.

Quote Originally Posted by Misifus View Post
We are not. The capitulation is about complete.
Possibly so. I'm not at all sure, though, that (as I sometimes hear) the Chinese have discovered some magic formula for dominating and controlling the less developed world and are destined to dominate. I say that not from vast experience of Africa, but from a fair bit of experience in dealing with the Chinese. It's still relatively early days and there's a good bit of road left to travel, but I think some folks in Africa are destined to discover that while the Chinese might seem to be great benefactors in the short run, the long term intention is a bit different. Give 'em an inch, they'll take a mile, and they won't stop taking until they hit the backlash point. What form the backlash takes remains to be seen, but I strongly suspect that it will come, because I don't think the Chinese will stop pushing until it does.

I don't think the US is going to out-compete the Chinese for influence in Africa, but I do think it likely that the Chinese will wear out their welcome and make serious trouble for themselves... quite aside from the serious trouble they're already making for themselves on the home front. I don't buy the idea of the unstoppable Chinese juggernaut bound to consume the world.

I don't think the future of Africa lies with the Chinese or the Indians or the Russians, Europeans, or Americans. For better or worse, it's in the hands of the Africans.