Kevin Myers and the editors at the Indo are abhorrent

Kevin Myers may be known as someone whose "articles often offer criticism of left-wing opinion and the "liberal consensus", sometimes incorporating hyperbolic sarcasm and parody" but engaging in racist stereotypes in disgusting. It is very important to remember at this point that this vile piece of journalism was ok'ed by three editors at the Indo. He did not act alone. All four are guilty.

The article criticizes aid work and the system of world governance for not resolving issues of poverty and political instability during the past 20 or so years. Firstly, there are certainly valid criticisms to be made about aid effectiveness and distribution. I see the problems first hand in Cambodia.

However, the article uses the most horrible racist stereotypes and Myers is rooted in white male rich privilege. He is judging what he cannot understand, despite claims of having visited Ethiopia.

Sorry. My conscience has toured this territory on foot and financially. Unlike most of you, I have been to Ethiopia; like most of you, I have stumped up the loot to charities to stop starvation there. The wide-eyed boy-child we saved, 20 years or so ago, is now a priapic, Kalashnikov-bearing hearty, siring children whenever the whim takes him.

Just because you have been there, Myers, does not mean you have any understanding. In fact you sound like the typical backpacker - "I am so at one with the Cambodian people, even though I can't speak Khmer and have only been here for a day". One visit does not make you an expert. One visit does not entitle you to make sweeping generalisations about an entire continent. Nothing entitles you to make sweeping generalisations.

You are aware I presume that Africa is a continent and not a country because you write as if there are not thousands of different cultures, languages, poverty levels, education levels and a million other differences between a South African, an Algerian, a Kenyan, an Ivorian or a Ghanaian. Within each of the countries on the continent of Africa there are different tribes and traditions and you demonise them all. How typical - white colonisers have been doing it for years.

But, please, please, you self-righteously wrathful, spare me mention of our own Famine, with this or that lazy analogy. There is no comparison. Within 20 years of the Famine, the Irish population was down by 30pc. Over the equivalent period, thanks to western food, the Mercedes 10-wheel truck and the Lockheed Hercules, Ethiopia's has more than doubled.

Alas, that wretched country is not alone in its madness. Somewhere, over the rainbow, lies Somalia, another fine land of violent, Kalashnikov-toting, khat-chewing, girl-circumcising, permanently tumescent layabouts.

Indeed, we now have almost an entire continent of sexually hyperactive indigents, with tens of millions of people who only survive because of help from the outside world.

This dependency has not stimulated political prudence or commonsense. Indeed, voodoo idiocy seems to be in the ascendant, with the next president of South Africa being a firm believer in the efficacy of a little tap water on the post-coital penis as a sure preventative against infection. Needless to say, poverty, hunger and societal meltdown have not prevented idiotic wars involving Tigre, Uganda, Congo, Sudan, Somalia, Eritrea etcetera.

Wow you resort to the racist construct that sees black men as oversexed and intent on raping. That's not original. It's not new. It's one of the oldest stereotypes in the book.

You use racism to fuel the fear that is in Ireland that "they" are taking our jobs. "They" are using "our" women. You use your space to create and fan the fear. As thefreeslave eloquently says

Racism/white supremacy is a vicious, global system that has butchered too many human beings, physically, emotionally, spiritually. Yet, it too is a tool, a MAJOR tool and the means, the apparatus of control, rather than the end desired by the ruling class itself.

You use racism as a tool. You accuse "Africans" of being too reliant on aid. You put the blame on the victim. That's nothing new either. Rapists use that defense every day.

Broad brush-strokes, to be sure. But broad brush-strokes are often the way that history paints its gaudier, if more decisive, chapters. Japan, China, Russia, Korea, Poland, Germany, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the 20th century have endured worse broad brush-strokes than almost any part of Africa.

Oh really Myers? Been to Cambodia or Lao recently?

They are now -- one way or another -- virtually all giving aid to or investing in Africa, whereas Africa, with its vast savannahs and its lush pastures, is giving almost nothing to anyone, apart from AIDS.

Your statement that Africa is giving nothing to anyone, apart from AIDS, is... I'm not sure that there are words to express how truly revolting that statement is. Perhaps others will find words to cover that.

Your use of "AIDS" is offensive. No one uses that anymore. "People living with the HIV virus" is how people phrase things nowadays. I will probably be accused of being the PC police but words matter. And you Myers, chose the more offensive of all the available words. As a journalist, words are your craft and you use them to incite hatred.

I would prefer to fisk every point made but I find I don't have the stomach to keep rereading this bile. Legal proceedings should be taken. If anyone wants to respond personally to Myers - I'll be dropping him this post - his email is posted on the bottom of the webpage and reads kmyers@independent.ie