According to Intelligent Design theory, Ms Maathai is right, God did indeed intentionally inflict AIDS on humanity.

For what purpose, and whether it will ultimately be the net negative that it currently seems, are unknowable.

As for Black people dying more than any other peoples on the planet, help is on the way: Once 21st century American management and know-how are fully applied to wresting riches from Africa, Black people will stop dying in such large numbers.

The financial and moral benefits to the US are obvious.

Michael:

It would make sense for it to be a product of Design, since it punishes bad behavior. She says the opposite, that it was "created by a scientist for biological warfare,"

*throws up hands* Who knows why anymore? I think old Nobel was a bit tetched in the head anyway when he created the Peace Prize. Better he should have created a War Prize. He'd have found a lot more fitting nominees for that honor.

Yes, AIDS certainly punishes those doing illegal intravenous drugs, and those having non-procreative sex, but it also kills people eating bush meat, which seems like a rather poorly targeted punishment, considering that hunting is one of humanity's oldest activities.

Maybe the designer isn't all that intelligent.

Further, let's assume that AIDS is some kind of divine retribution for having anal sex.
Is that the kind of God that we can respect, one that metes out a decade of punishment by failing health, followed by lingering death, for having the "wrong" kind of sex ?
It's not even predictable, it's a random punishment of naughty folks, and some innocents caught in the crossfire. That's not a good way to change human behavior; most people will just have the mindset that although it could happen, it's likely to be the other guy, and not one's self, as with motorcycle helmets and auto safety belts.

Apparently God didn't learn much about humans while She was slumming with us as Jesus.

That concept of the reason for AIDS leads us directly back to the concept of God as a very powerful, ill-tempered human. Odin, Zeus, Jupiter...
Except Zeus didn't strike down many children getting medical work done while he was aiming his mighty lightning bolts at evildoers (and people who just annoyed him), did he ?
Therefore, we'd have to conclude that the Christian God was less powerful than the gods of old, if AIDS were some divine punishment.

Hardly a Universe-builder.

The best strategy to deal with sub-Saharan Africa is to let it run itself into the ground while setting up trade zones, guarded by European and Asian mercenaries like the Ghurkas, where anything of value may be found. Cut a deal with the local Head Cannibal and let it go at that.

Perhaps, in 20 or 30 thousand years, the indigenous population will have evolved to the point where they can interact with civilized people. Or, in a few decades, perhaps AIDS and other diseases will have wiped out enough of them so that there is no more serious impediment to colonization by Europe, Asia and America, than was posed by Australian aborigines to the Brits in the 19th century.

It would be unusual if American or Europe physically colonized anyone during the first half of the 21st century.
The "birth dearth" would have to end, for that to be likely.

The Chinese might decide to do something like that, for whatever reason.

America is currently quite overcrowded and millions of Americans would jump at the opportunity to open a new frontier in a fertile area, or even one with some mineral resources.

We must not live in the same America.

Actually, that's exactly true.
Don't you live in New Jersey ?

Come out West, young man, and you can live where you can't see the nearest neighbor, if you like, and as for mineral resources, they're begging to be found and exploited.
Why, here, even the wind and sunlight are valuable !

None of the above is an exaggeration or distortion of any kind - That's actually how it can be, if you choose.

Bart: The US is barely settled.

Come now, don't insult the swine. This woman is Michael Moore's sister.

Do we really need to rediscover why there are deep ancient bans on some human behavior?

Michael:

It's one of the most easily avoided diseases known to man. That some don't avoid it speaks of them, not of God.

How do children being born to women with AIDS avoid it?

There's a low transmission rate anyway but treatment during pregnancy reduces it even further.

The fact that they've found it in a sample taken in 1959 sinks her argument.

A good friend of my wife's, a nurse, died six months ago from AIDS.

She caught it from a test tube full of infected blood that broke while she was handling it.

From a child that got AIDS the Intelligent Design way: during childbirth.

Easily avoided?

Jeff:

Yes, easily avoided.

So, you're saying that AIDS is intended to punish African hunters ?

Because that's who'd be getting it if gays and drug users weren't.

The God of Intelligent Design is a moron, by your standards.

Michael:

Yeah, those dead hunters are stacking up like cordwood.

America's graduate schools
are filled with doctoral candidates from African
countries and most are about as smart as Wangari.

The lengths Americans will go to prop up their
belief in human equality would be laughable if
it weren't destroying our academic infrastructure.

In fact the whole pseudo-fields of
human ecology and feminist ecology were
created to allow openings for inferior
candidates.

JH,

Maybe in some of the sillier fields of academia but I can assure you from personal knowledge that there is no shortage of highly intelligent, motivated sub-Saharan Africans on math, science, engineering and ag faculties all across the States. It is far easier to find a smart African or West Indian than a smart Black American with the requisite training, discipline and intellectual curiosity to be on a major league science faculty or work in a techie field at the highest level.

oj:

If the point is to punish gays and addicts, then an "intelligent" design wouldn't kill anyone else.

That's primarily where ID fails, it can't point out any example where a human couldn't come up with a better design, which means either that the theory is bad, or that God is stupid.

Take your pick, but if it's the latter, you might as well worship me.
For one thing, I'll take your calls.

Michael:

You're confusing intelligence with flawlessness. Heart surgery requires intelligence but it also kills people.

Who needs a flawed god?

flawed Creations.

Who said the Designer was God or even a god?

If he could design life, how would he differ from a god?