The Real Nelson Mandela

Joel McDurmon, PhD, and Director of Research for American Vision has written an article on Nelson Mandela, “Lost Prison Manuscript Confirms the Real Mandela”. In the article, McDurmon assails the character of Mandela, labels him as a Marxist, communist revolutionary, who advocated violence. McDurmon based his analysis on a lost prison document reportedly discovered by Professor Stephen Ellis of the University of Leiden.

What ill-timed release, just in time for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s  Holiday, weeks before the celebration of “Black History Month”!

The article source is The Spectator, dated January 18, 2014.  Mandela, regarded in a separate article by the Spectator as the man the world loves, is accused of living a double-life, hiding his communism through a white-washed version of his autobiography, the Long Walk To Freedom, written by Rick Stengal.

The Spectator describes Mandela as pretending by day to be a moderate democrat, fighting to free his people in the name of values all humans held sacred. (If all humans held this sacred, Mandela would not have had to fight anything or anyone). By night, the articles says, he donned the cloak and dagger and became the leader of a fanatical sect known for its attachment to the totalitarian Soviet ideal.” (emphasis added)

While, Stengel, the author of the autobiography is the one who is said to have removed the “facts” concerning the real Mandela, there is no confirmation that it was deliberately concealed. The article gives two versions of Mandela with respect to violence and communism.

A Russian historian, Irina Filatova who also published on the subject says the above is fabricated. In fact, rather than charging the former South African President with the decision to go to war, Filatova states the following:

“The decision to go to war was actually taken by the Communist party, meeting in a prosperous white suburb, in a marquee where black Africans were outnumbered around two to one by white and Indian intellectuals. ANC president Albert Luthuli did not endorse the move to violence and MK was not the military wing of the ANC at all — it was the sole creation of the Communist party, and everyone involved in its high command was openly or secretly a communist.”

Yet, McDurmon accepts the account that Mandela was a lying, warmongering communist.

A Vision With Blurred Lines

What McDurmon seems to be disturbed about and eager to persuade readers of AV are statements in this alleged document that criticized the U.S. and also expressed sympathies with Cuba. See in the following quotes alleged to have been written by Mandela.

‘I hate all forms of imperialism, and I consider the US brand to be the most loathsome and contemptible.’

‘To a nationalist fighting oppression, dialectical materialism is like a rifle, bomb or missile. Once I understood the principle of dialectical materialism, I embraced it without hesitation.’

‘Unquestionably, my sympathies lay with Cuba [during the 1962 missile crisis]. The ability of a small state to defend its independence demonstrates in no uncertain terms the superiority of socialism over capitalism.’

No Mention of the Evils of Apartheid

Not once does McDurmon acknowledge the oppression and apartheid which Mandela fought against. Not once does he see nobility, courage and dignity in a man fighting not only for his rights, those of his fellow countrymen and even for his oppressors, an ideal which rises far above most oppressive regimes including that of America. Did America advocate for the Indians or the slaves to have equal rights? Would he have treated the Boston Tea Party and American revolutionaries in such manner? They were considered tyrants by England.

McDurmon’s position on Nelson Mandela is actually a denigration of the heroes of the American Revolution.  Benjamin Franklin sought foreign aid from the French. Americans enlisted Indians, who were also Sovereign nations and Germany sent soldiers to their aid.

What form of resistance and retaliation would McDurmon feel is acceptable for men defending their rights to accessibility of their own land and statehood? Did they not have the right to bear arms? Will McDurmon’s ideal of taking America back one county at a time suggest it be done without arms? We already have his response which follows later.

What experience does McDurmon have on in this regard? Walk in Mandela’s shoes of 27 years imprisonment as a political prisoner then come back and tell us something about freedom fighting and non-violence. When has he lived in Apartheid? (McDurmon was a beneficiary of Apartheid in the University of Pretoria.) When have you been enslaved or imprisoned as a freedom fighter? When have you had fire hoses spraying you down in public streets or attack dogs ripping your flesh while your eyes are filled with tear gas, and your head split open with night sticks because you were defending your God-given right to human decency and respect?

Is this the old path and “county” government you want to return to where each county takes the law in their own hands and does as it wishes without impunity from big government? And can we expect each county to bring the other to judgment when they all have the same ideology? Is that what happened in the civil war?

Where would justice be today had not freedom fighters for civil rights like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, stood up, endured Birmingham jails, and death threats only to fall by an assassin’s bullet after being targeted by good old American ideals while others were imprisoned as terrorists who desired to sit at the same lunch counter in McDurmon’s home town? Many fro m both sides joined the movement. Did he March with them and defend their right to freedom and civil rights?

If McDurmon and others loathe big government because poor and oppressed people find refuge in the same, it is largely a product of your own doing in small home town county courts where lynchings were as common as slaughtering hogs. It was big government that did for others what the small town county governments wouldn’t do, i.e. love your neighbor as yourself. They enforced the will of Christ on the small towns by military force employing the National Guard to ensure achievement of freedom, justice and equality for all which yet fails many in America.

So, it is the sin of racism and bigotry in part that led to big governments intervention in creating policies for the poor because of the avarice, greed and hatred of the county governments. During slavery the county governments took up arms against big government to maintain their old path, i.e. institutions of slavery. I am not making an argument for big government, but only attempting to place it in perspective relative to the subject at hand. Once they got a taste of the power and support from those who became supporters, they didn’t/don’t know where to stop.

The Shoe Is On The Other Foot

Now, many who followed the same practices of big government in their small counties are getting a taste of what it feels like to have someone else’s will imposed on them.  We’re not saying it is right. They are willing to fight for the freedom to have their guns but not for the slaves to have their freedom. While they were doing it in the small southern counties, they were blind to how it affected those whom they oppressed, disenfranchised and marginalized. They argued that the north violated the south’s constitutional rights by infringing on their rights to hold slaves as “property”.  Human dignity and freedom is not a constitutional right, but a right given to all by the Creator.

The chickens are coming home to roost! It was the small counties who made the laws that it was illegal to teach a slave to read, that a black man’s life was less valued, that he had no property rights, and was disenfranchised from full participation in the economic system.

Further, the welfare and privileges given to the rich far outweigh the food stamps and welfare given to the poor and everyone knows it but those hiding under a rock. I’m not an advocate of handouts nor am I against corporate incentives or tax breaks that create jobs. But, welfare is welfare. If America believed enough in all of its citizens to see that they were truly educated,  fed and fattened (which does not mean the government has to run the system) as they do some of its corporations, and kept some of their money at home versus burning it up in illegal ill-advised wars and bloodshed, we would all be much better off as Ron Paul and his supporters say.

If welfare makes derelicts on society then America’s corporations are the biggest derelicts. However, if Dr. Ben Carson can create programs and transform the education and status of the underprivileged so can the government big or small if it wants to. If they can’t, find someone who can or pay Dr. Carson and others like him to train them.

Mandela’s Right To Bear Arms

Even Jesus said, “if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight that I would not be delivered to the Jews” i.e. “lose his freedom”! He too would have used “foreign” aid sources to get guns for retaliation, expressed in his statement that he could have called 12 legions of angels. So, if Mandela were disposed to defend his rights for human dignity by bearing arms, he would have been following a principle taught by the founders fathers of this American Republic and Jesus himself. Is Christ a communist for suggesting he would use arms in an “earthly” defense of his freedom?

Further, we remember Oliver North and Ronald Reagan’s Iran contra scandal, where they sold billions of dollars of arms to the Iranians in exchange for hostages and the coverups which occurred even after Reagan admitted involvement. Much of the evidence was destroyed or withheld from declassification. Reagan also supported South African apartheid, extending the suffering having reversed the sanctions imposed by former President Carter.

McDurmon should praise Mandela even if he did seek arms from China. America does plenty of business with China today. Are we suppose to believe a country like the U.S. with a long history of slavery (which the U.S. arrogantly boasts it will never apologize for) and support for Apartheid would have given him arms? At the time would the British, the French or the Dutch? But Mandela’s right to bear arms is justified and argued by McDurmon himself in the following quote:

“Gun control is for the godless and hypocrites:

All godless regimes will seek to arm themselves but deny arms for the people. By “godless” here I include both those officially atheistic or secular humanist as well as those parties and politicians who retain a legacy of being “Christian” or religious in some way yet are devoid of a biblical worldview in substance. In other words, I also include the hypocrites under the heading “godless.” All such political organizations will in practice (even if not in word) favor gun control laws.”

Did this right to bear arms extend to the Black Panther Party who opened schools and created feeding programs for the neglected in their communities? Weren’t they advocating for the same rights as McDurmon? My brother, a Vietnam vet who fought for this country in extended tours of duty in Vietnam, (another illegal, ill-advised war of aggression by the U.S.), is nearly deaf from a hand grenade explosion he suffered in the war.

He also joined the Black Panthers, and was in the house during the Black Panther raid in Chicago (1969), when police fired between 82 to 99 shots which left Fred Hampton and Mark Clark dead. The only reason my brother survived is because of the skills he learned as a soldier in the Vietnam war. It was 4 :15 in the morning when the raid occurred and they were all asleep, yet it is allegedly reported that one shot was fired at police, a fact which remains in dispute until this day.  Does McDurmon believe the Black Panther Party had a right to bear arms or submit to  the “gun control of the godless and hypocrites”?

By the way, when the case was being heard in Federal court, it was ultimately settled in favor of the Black Panther survivors demonstrating the legitimacy of their position. I have first hand sources that they always handled weapons legally and responsibly according to their Second Amendment and God-given rights.

One of McDurmon’s commenters suggested that he go on a dirt-digging mission into the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and expose him as he did Mr. Mandela. What kind of readers do AV attract? What is this vision they seek to uphold that attracts such requests?

I think part of the problem is they are advocating for a very narrow or limited vision, albeit held by a majority. That is my personal opinion, not to be ascribed to anyone else. Their American Vision is not truly a worldview but an American world view, and in part reminds me in some ways of the Dispensationalists Zionist vision. A tree is known by its fruit.

Silence on Dual Lives of Leaders Supported Through America’s Vision

I was unable to find any references to any criticism of the policies and  practices of the State of Israel or its leaders on the A.V. website. Where are the remarks citing the dual lives of David Ben Gurion, Ariel Sharon, or Benjamin Netanyahu? Not one single word on their site was found about the ethnic cleansing, genocide, land theft and foreign American guns and planes that are sent to Israel to kill innocent Palestinians and drive them off their land? Why not? Is it because the human dignity of Palestinians is un-American? Is the fact that these WMD’s come from America to Israel less of a moral and ethical issue than if they were supplied by China or Russia? Not all people of the world believe America is the home of the free and land of the brave.

Isn’t it America’s vision through its imperialist policies to support the Israeli regime at no charge and defend them at all costs right or wrong, to the tune of “billions” annually, and that to the detriment and burden of U.S. taxpayers? Why are not all Christians enraged at this welfare state? Or is it more politically correct to only speak of the Dispensationalists who want to speed up Armageddon so that two-thirds of Israel may die to satisfy their prophetic palettes?

Yes, American Vision does speak about the Dispensationalists support of Zionist Israel, and Christian Evangelicals embrace of Mandela, but what does it say about America’s embrace of Israel? Nothing! If it exists, I’d like to see it. Yes, there are some doctrinal studies about Dispensationalism but nothing said about the ethics and morals of breaking international laws, killing innocent children, bull dozing homes, stealing land, illegal occupation and caging humans like dogs.

An illegal settlement country filled with men who are considered terrorists by all rational people in the Arab and non-Arab world are overlooked to attack a man even considered by his enemies to be one of the greatest world leaders in modern history, a fact acknowledged by his world leader peers.  All his former enemies were at his funeral acknowledging his greatness. Why didn’t Netanyahu attend his funeral? Because their policies are diametrically opposed. Mandela understood that South Africa was not free until Palestine is free. That is too much for Israel’s Prime Minister to stomach even at Mandela’s death.

Lest it seem that such a stance is unbalanced in favor of the Palestinians, Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben Gurion said, if he were an Arab, he would resist the unlawful seizure of their country much more vigorously than the Palestinians are doing. He understood fully what the Zionists purpose was then, and is today, seen by the continual encroachments and bull-dozing of Palestinian homes as the complete eradication of the indigenous people of Palestine.  There is so much akin to American history that it is not a coincidence. Birds of a feather flock together.

Mandela and Calloway on Cuban Sympathies

As to Cuban sympathies, Mandela is not the only statesmen who expressed such. The British themselves have an outspoken leader and politician who likewise favors Cuba over the imperialism of America and Israel and so states it. George Calloway, British politician and broadcaster verbally indicted the U.S. Senate for their complicity in Iraq, Israel,  Cuba and many other countries around the world.

We need a much clearer vision, a broader vision, a Christ-centered vision. We need a world vision that embraces all humanity (Acts 17:26) with dignity and respect, not small county courts who often took the law in their own hands to do as they wished until forced to do right. This is the very reason such advocacy agencies were started in the first place. Until these counties can demonstrate the love of Christ and treat all men with respect proving they can first govern themselves, they are not fit for government. An example of that is that those in “big government” are the same ones who come from the small counties McDurmon wants to place in power. It amounts to nothing more than geography. I suggest America listen more to George Calloway than to George Bush. A man whose political party is “respect” has a lot going for him, not only in word, but also in action. He has spoken out on all the issues and does one heck of a good job at it. Mandella compromised with the South African government that saved their necks and for which many believed damaged their cause for true freedom. Regardless of what one thinks of Nelson Mandela, his legacy of world human equality survives him.

1. spectator.co.uk/features/9116391/the-mandela-files/

2 .americanvision.org/10020/lost-prison-manuscript-confirms-real-mandela/#sthash.pFPiLmjf.dpbs

3. americanvision.org/8207/1-samuel-13/#sthash.QUaxQPlY.dpbs