Year: 2010

The Mississippi is a mess. I live in the agricultural, rural upper midwest, and one of the nasty surprises lurking beneath the rich green fields is that the rivers are ugly stews of fertilizers and herbicides and pesticides from agricultural runoff. We have data that it hurts people, too: premature births and birth defects show seasonal fluctuations that peak for children conceived in the spring and summer, when the chemicals are being sprayed into the air and are dribbling into the streams. The villains are agribusiness and overproduction and the corn ethanol boondoggle and horrors like the fecal lakes associated with swine farms. Louisiana’s environmental problems are partly the product of Minnesota’s toxic largesse.

It needs to be known. The Bell Museum at the University of Minnesota has been producing a documentary called Troubled Waters: A Mississippi River Story for the past several years, and it was supposed to have its premiere in October.

The documentary has been indefinitely postponed. Somebody doesn’t want you to see it.

Who, you might wonder, could have shut down the UM’s movie? It was the university itself. They claim it was for further scientific review, but by all accounts, this movie has been rigorously vetted throughout, and that explanation just doesn’t hold up. The other disturbing fact is that the source of the pressure seems to have been University Relations, a department not known for its attention to scientific rigor, but with a mission of responding to community interests. We’re a land-grant university, by the way, in an agricultural state.

Karen Himle is Vice President of University Relations, which is the office that determined the film needed “scientific review.” She is married to John Himle, president of Himle Horner, a public relations firm that represents the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council. The Council is a strong proponent of ethanol and industrial farming, both of which are critiqued in the film. John Himle was also president of the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council from 1978 to 1982 and his organization currently serves as a “member” of the Council.

The University’s “conflict of interest” policy was called into question last year by the Minnesota Daily, which also cited Karen Himle’s summary of her outside sources of income as including Himle Horner and Nebraska farmland crops.
While Himle Horner’s client records are not public (something that has drawn the ire of some in the community as former co-owner Tom Horner is running for governor), Himle Horner was still representing the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council as recently as this summer.

So who is calling the shots at the University of Minnesota? Academics and scientists with some intellectual integrity, or lackeys of big business who care most about short-term profit, no matter the cost to the environment and public health?

Don’t bother answering, I know what the answer will be.

Ordinarily, not much is heard about Malawi -a country that was ruled for so many years by the late dictator, Kamuzu Banda. Apart from the recent case of a gay couple convicted and later pardoned by President Mutharika who is also the current Chair of the African Union, Malawi is hardly in the news.

But that does not mean that all is well with this country. No, all is not well with ‘Nyasaland’. Malawi like many other African countries is trapped in the vicious circle of poverty, ignorance, superstition and religious fanaticism. Independence has not brought this nation emergence and prosperity. Education has not resulted in emancipation, civilization and enlightenment. The different religious groups in the country are living together in peace; they are not fighting or killing each other as is the case in Nigeria. But many Malawians are suffering and dying due to crazy religious notions, superstitious and irrational beliefs. Unfortunately nothing is being done by the government to address this ugly situation. Instead the politicians are busy travelling overseas or are engaged in political infighting and scheming to win or influence the next election.

Palpable misery, despair, stagnation, resignation and alienation prevail in the land.

I arrived in Malawi two days ago to address meetings at Chancellor College in Zomba and in Blantyre. A local humanist group, the Association of Secular Humanism in Malawi, is organizing the events. One of the issues in the news here is the tragic story of five children, Lamace, Etta, Annie, Petro and Maria who threw themselves into fire at night after prayers in a bizzare case of mass suicide. Three of them died on the spot but two, Petro and Maria were rescued and  taken to a local hospital. Photos of the fire and the bodies of the three that roasted to death appeared on the front page of the dailies. I was shocked to see the graphic images and to read about this horrifying incident. I was more shocked by the way the government had handled the matter.

The father of the children told a local newspaper that he recently noticed the children’s strange behaviours and complained to local authorities. It appears they did nothing to call the children to order. According to him, the children established a ‘strange church’ in his house and commenced their prayers around 10 pm each day. He tried stopping them without success. And on this fateful night, the children, in the course of praying, made fire with some household items which they soaked with petrol. At the end, they took off their clothes and jumped into the fire holding copies of the Bible. Three of them who died on the spot have since been buried.

No one knew exactly what led the children into acting in such a ‘strange’ way. But some of the witnesses interviewed by a local newspaper said the children acted on the advice of a local pastor who told them that their parents were responsible for their joblessness and not getting married. He advised them to burn the items in their home because that was where the parents hid their magic. The village head, Matope, blamed the churches which he said were misleading the people for this horrible incident. He promised to summon the religious leaders in the area so that ‘they could explain what type of worshipping this is’. This kind of bizarre religious experience is not new to Malawi.

Last year, police rescued some women who locked themselves up in a hut in one of the country’s remote villages. They were reading their Bible, fasting and praying for weeks expecting some revelations from God. Poverty, ignorance, hopelessness and bad governance have driven many Africans to religious insanity, absurdity and extremism. Africa is literally in a dark age. There is a proliferation of churches, mosques and worship centers. Blind faith, thoughtlessnes and spiritual mumbo jumbo direct people’s lives. Many Africans spend a lot of their time praying, fasting and keeping vigil at their homes, in churches, on the hills (also known as holy mountains) and in valleys, besides rivers and streams. There are few countries  that promote and encourage critical thinking, scientific temper and technological intelligence. Many Africans devote much of their time to all sorts of crazy, useless and meaningless spiritual nonsense. And this is the time they could have used productively to acquire relevant skills and lift themselves out of poverty by working to generate income for themselves. Instead of developing their potentials, most Africans have embraced this fashionable nonsense of blaming others – one’s parents, grandparents, witches and wizards, the West, colonialism and imperialism for all the problems and difficulties they encounter in life.

Unfortunately, the local authorities are doing nothing to tackle religious nonsense and its discontent among Africans. Instead,  African states are sponsoring, aiding and abetting the spread of religious absurdities including the misleading messages of priests, pastors, imams and witch doctors. The educational system in most parts of sub-Saharan Africa has virtually collapsed. Most industries have been shut down or taken over by foreigners because Africans lack the required skills – the scientific and technological skills to manage these companies efficiently and profitably.

The police and jusice system is corrupt and inept. African governments are not creating institutions to fight religious indoctrination and promote reason and critical thinking. There are no programs to combat the negative influence of churches, mosques and traditional belief systems and liberate Africans from mental slavery and religious stupor.

Surely, humanists in Africa are in for an uphill task.

Leo Igwe wrote from Malawi.