Looks like you could walk, in theory (but not legally):
> During one Sunday in October 1993, Wally Michalski and Mike Turner, working as contractors on the British side, used a pair of the Saracen bicycles to cycle the 100-kilometre (62 mi) round-trip from Folkestone to Coquelles and back again. The pair took around five hours to complete the journey, while wearing full overalls and needing to carry respirators.[1]
He reached Calais on the 19th and started from Dover on the 20th, so I'm assuming a ferry.
cjbayliss 25 days ago [-]
Having to deal with police four times a day on average on the part of the journey through Croatia is insane. I’d have given up and flown to the next country.
alwa 25 days ago [-]
It’s pretty wild, although if I were Mr. Kato I might be somewhat more grumpy about being jailed for 3 weeks in South Sudan, apparently on the authorities’ opinion that their immigration laws required ministry approval for his run [0].
I have to say I don’t find myself too surprised that anybody non-local doing extreme-long-distance running through insular Croatian towns might arouse the interest of the local constabularies—and I imagine the runner being a Ugandan guy would be an especially surprising sight to people in Croatia (91% Croat, 3.2% Serb, officially recognize 22 other ethnic minorities, none of them from Africa) [1]. Which I suppose is the point he was trying to raise.
> I have to say I don’t find myself too surprised that anybody doing extreme-long-distance running through insular Croatian towns might arouse the interest of the local constabularies
I don't live in Europe, but just help me out, why call the cops on a guy running down the road, in running gear, even if he's an ethnicity you rarely ever see?
lpapez 25 days ago [-]
Most of the comments here are missing the mark IMO.
The primary reason why he got so much police harassment is because Croatia is a EU Schengen border country, the patrols here are much stricter than everywhere else, and the associated problems are much worse as well.
I don't think it's entirely due to racism - if you were a border policeman, and you are tasked with bringing in people illegaly entering the country, what would you do seeing a person of color running on back roads near the border of an otherwise extremely ethnically homogenous country?
For every case of someone who entered legally and got harassed, they probably bring in thousands of people which they are supposed to bring in (ie. entered ilegally).
jdietrich 25 days ago [-]
If you're travelling through sensitive border regions, attracting unwanted attention is unfortunately an occupational hazard.
> Saying that you can’t come into Europe because you’re African is still racism.
Are you suggesting no countries in the world should have any border control?
You weren’t born here and don’t pay taxes here is pretty different from you’re African, right? So why do you say racism and not discrimination? Why do you say African and not non-European? Phrasing Europe’s border policy as racism against Africans is misleading and escalating, rather than edifying.
Let’s fix that: Saying that you can’t come into Europe because you’re not a European resident is discrimination based on country of residency that could look like racial discrimination if you’re not careful.
In as much as, ahem, some government policies actually are racist, it’s true that border policy does discriminate based on country of residence, but this is not necessarily racist. Europe is not necessarily discriminating against Africans, it’s discriminating all non-Europeans, including China, Russia, America, the Middle East, etc., right?
When people say racism it is often (usually?) referring to beliefs about other races being inferior in some way, or hate for other races. Racism typically means prejudice and antagonism combined with discrimination. Discrimination on its own without judgement may be necessary, and doesn’t mean there is any animosity or value judgements being made based on someone’s race.
kmeisthax 24 days ago [-]
To summarize / strawman, "Europe isn't racist, it's xenophobic, get it right!"
And to be clear, that's not wrong, but it's also a distinction without a difference. People will still feel discriminated against even if the source of that discrimination is different from what they named.
dahart 24 days ago [-]
All countries have border policy including yours, this isn’t about Europe, or about Africa. Why do you assume border policy is xenophobia, and not, say, logistics and resource and tax management? Why would you jump to a conclusion this has more to do with race than with money or stopping crime?
immibis 24 days ago [-]
If it's logistics and resources and tax management, why doesn't it apply between cities?
dahart 23 days ago [-]
I think some cities in the world do have borders with ID checks. Which cities are we talking about, specifically? In the US there are state borders that (edit: may) require ID checks. This is true in other countries too. And as others pointed out, you can’t cross private property boundaries in many locales either, whether it’s backyards or corporate property.
I can certainly think of several reasons why city border can and should be less restrictive than country borders, but I would first turn the question back to you, since your question involves unstated assumptions: why should it apply between cities? And then think about it carefully and see if you can imagine some reasons for why things are they way they are. A really big hint: think economics.
FWIW, the questions in this thread seem to be somewhat ignorant of history and global politics and economics. This stuff has been debated and written about ad nauseum, you can for sure find tons of material explaining how various countries/states/cities arrived at their border policies if you’re actually curious about it. I’m certainly no expert on it, so if your question is serious, please research the answer rather than wait for someone on HN to tell you.
The other thing your question implies, and others here are failing to acknowledge is the practical realities of the tradeoffs involved. There isn’t some perfect solution, that does not exist. This is an area of government that comes with both advantages and disadvantages no matter what policy is chosen. The goals are usually to balance the costs against the benefits. Assuming that lax borders is the answer is almost certainly the wrong answer. But, there are huge teams of smart people in every country who’ve studied and dealt with the logistics and legalities of policing borders. Sometimes there are brash politicians who dictate bad policy over the objections of many, but even so, to me it’s always absolutely wild to see armchair internet critics assume they know better and that obvious things have been completely missed. If you do think it can be improved and feel strongly, get involved!
immibis 23 days ago [-]
> I can certainly think of several reasons why city border can and should be less restrictive than country borders, but I would first turn the question back to you, I since your question involves unstated assumptions: why should it apply between cities?
For the same reason it should apply between countries - whatever those are. It should be obvious that I don't think there are good reasons. You've got unstated assumptions about countries.
Your comment contains a lot of non-arguments: "think about it if you're serious", "think economics, "[what you're saying] is almost certainly not the right answer", "practical realities", "huge teams of smart people" etc.
dahart 22 days ago [-]
You are on a soapbox challenging the status quo of every country on earth and I’m not, so you automatically have the higher burden of argument. I’m not defending the status quo, I only jumped in to help people who were making obviously incorrect and wildly negative assumptions about the reasons for border policies.
There are lots of reasons why the border policies between cities and countries might/can/should be very different, including but not limited to countries having a federal government or something analogous, and countries specifically wanting the free flow of citizens and their money within the country. Countries generally want the flow of citizens and money from other countries too, but they want control over what gets in the country. It seems fairly obvious to me that that strict city border policies everywhere serves little purpose and would be obnoxious and limiting for the people and the economy of that country, and that it would require a ton of enforcement resources that small cities don’t even have.
Here’s an analogy. Lots of companies have VPNs to get access to the company network. You don’t have a separate VPN for every team, or every building, or every computer. A few secret labs might have their own security, but by and large once you enter the company’s network, you have access to all the company resources. The VPN is like the country border. It’s a small hurdle for the employees of that company, but if there were hierarchical VPNs for everything everywhere in the company it would interfere with people’s ability to work and do very little to increase security; it would be net downside.
Again, it does not matter what my argument is. If you want to know the reasons why all countries in the world have border policies and why the country border policies are usually more strict than cities, the reasons have been written down, debated for hundreds of years, they exist and you are free to go read them if you’re actually curious (which you should be if you think it should change). They aren’t on Hacker News though, and no amount of opining on Hacker News is going to change the world’s border policies.
immibis 21 days ago [-]
> You are on a soapbox challenging the status quo of every country on earth and I’m not, so you automatically have the higher burden of argument.
This is also what was told to people who said that slavery was wrong, and I am not comparing borders to slavery.
dahart 20 days ago [-]
Hehehe. Smh. It’s also what is said to people who think the earth is flat. Some people just have beliefs that are ignorant of the things they can’t see. It seems like you just did compare borders to slavery, to complement your bogus comparison between borders and racism.
You can keep trying to poke some sort of specious logical hole in my arguments as long as you want, and it still won’t demonstrate anything, since I’m not arguing for borders and you’re not demonstrating any understanding of my points here. You seem unable to articulate any specific reasons, or even a specific goal. I’m not even sure what you’re proposing or arguing against. What do you want here? HN points? An actual discussion? Gain some realistic and practical understand why border policies exist? What?
hollerith 23 days ago [-]
>In the US there are state borders that require ID checks.
This is quite surprising. Was this a COVID measure? Specifics please.
dahart 23 days ago [-]
No, some states have had border checks for things like animals and produce/fruit (to prevent the spread of some diseases), among other things, for many decades. The California border is the one I’ve run into most often. They don’t always ask for ID, I misstated that, but there is a stop and they can scan license plates and look for suspicious activity.
hollerith 23 days ago [-]
Thanks. I expect that there is no punishment for refusing to show ID when asked at such a stop.
dahart 23 days ago [-]
Hehe, maybe review some of the huge swath of border checkpoint refusal videos on YouTube before making such an assumption. Some people get away with it, and some do not. Refusing to show ID might be justification for detainment or arrest.
Also, pro tip: when crossing the CA border, if they do ask for ID or ask for you to get out of your car, make sure to buckle your seat belt before you drive. The cops waiting there will pull you over for buckling 3 seconds after you start moving, I learned first hand.
Edit to add a few informative links, as I’m googling them, with some details that are new to me…
Furthermore, why aren't efforts being made to fix those problems to make mass migration from more countries viable? The existence of an emergency situation that justifies an authoritarian solution does not absolve the state from its responsibility to take action to prevent that situation from happening.
dahart 23 days ago [-]
What is the problem, exactly? What responsibility, exactly, does the state have to make mass migration viable? It seems like you’re making really big assumptions.
Make a list of the costs and benefits for both too lax and too strict borders for all the countries your ideas should apply to. Account for the costs and benefits of both incoming residents and outgoing residents, both from the point of view of the people moving, and from the point of view of the state. How would you balance lax borders against the downsides like weapons, drugs, human trafficking, and other criminal activity? Would you do anything to control the flow of too many people at once to places where there is no housing or utilities for them? Would you do anything to stabilize the economies of countries that lose or gain too many people in a short period of time? What do you propose for settling disputes about the border policy? If other people in your country don’t agree with your idea, how should the policy be decided? What would you say if you found out that the majority of people in the country you live in want strict borders, and vote for them?
immibis 21 days ago [-]
The state has a responsibility to keep people happy. If states keep people sad, we should abolish them because they have no good purpose. Borders don't keep people happy.
dahart 20 days ago [-]
Very telling that you didn’t address a single one of my questions…
Pls see Chesterton’s Fence. If you think borders serve no good purpose and that nobody is happy about them, it’s because you’re ignorant about borders and haven’t bothered to read anything or think about it at all. Lots of people want borders, and for better or worse, lots of people are happy about them, which is why they are there. You don’t get to take borders down until you understand and acknowledge the reasons they were put up.
Which state are we discussing? Can you point to a legal document or constitution for a country that defines the state’s purpose as keeping people happy? Maybe one exists, but I’ve never heard of that anywhere. I think in most countries, it’s your own responsibility to keep yourself happy. A lot of countries will, however, try to keep it’s citizens safe and try to protect the economy, and borders are seen as one of the tools to help meet those ends.
FredPret 24 days ago [-]
It’s not racist and you know that. They also would not want a white person without authorization.
Also, in your border-free dreamworld, how far does this go? Can anyone / everyone in the world come live in your country? How about your city? How about your backyard?
jstanley 24 days ago [-]
Country yes, city yes, backyard no.
People within a country can freely move between cities but can't freely use private backyards.
We're just saying it should be the same between countries as it is between cities.
AuryGlenz 24 days ago [-]
The end result of that is everyone moving to the rich countries with social safety nets, those countries then collapsing or removing those safety nets, and repeat until countries decide that was a terrible idea and we’re back to having borders except everything is a mess.
Countries aren’t geographic regions. They’re collections of people. If you magically swapped the populations of South Korea and Germany, those geographic countries would change overnight to be their demographic countries.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting your country to stay at least somewhat stable in its ideals, crime levels, particular problems, etc.
jstanley 24 days ago [-]
Just because a country has a social safety net for its citizens doesn't mean it has to provide one to any random person who comes to live there.
em-bee 24 days ago [-]
the point of a social safety net is to make sure people can afford a home and healthcare. excluding non-citizens from that, yet allowing them to stay here creates exactly the kind of situations that we do not want. and as soon as people get a job they also pay taxes, healthcare and social security, at which point it seems unfair to exclude them from those benefits. so i don't see a a way how this would even work. people living here either get a job, run a business or collect benefits. if they do neither, then how would they live? only independently wealthy people could do that without having some illegal income somewhere.
i am for the elimination of borders and free movement of everyone across the world, but that requires that we help raise the standard of living everywhere to remove the incentive for people to move just for economic reasons.
immibis 24 days ago [-]
> these countries then collapsing or removing those safety nets
How's that different from what's already happening with the borders in place?
dragonwriter 24 days ago [-]
> People within a country can freely move between cities
This is far from universally true, both because of legal direct constraints on internal migration and because of implicit controls which are the result of economic constraints (which are themselves part of the means by which societies are governed, whether or not they are overtly intended products of state policy.)
FredPret 24 days ago [-]
I’m saying it should be the same between countries as between back yards.
The same logic that justifies national government with tax-levying and rule-enforcing power also requires national borders. (ie, a group of people own this area together and will vote to determine what is done).
immibis 24 days ago [-]
They do those things at a local level too but you're still allowed to move between cities.
lupusreal 24 days ago [-]
In a world without borders, what's to prevent some wealthy Europeans from pooling their resources to buy up huge swaths of the Congo and doing colonialism, libertarian open borders style? Governments and borders are necessary.
dragonwriter 24 days ago [-]
Laws on land use that prevent “buying large swathes of land” from being equivalent to or enabling “doing colonialism”.
Open borders does not imply absence of laws.
lupusreal 24 days ago [-]
That is naive. The wealth disparity between nations is so great that if borders were done away with, people from wealthy nations would be able to trivially outspend people in poor countries. Once they own the land and the businesses, political power is theirs. Meanwhile the people from those poor countries might try to do the same in wealthy countries, but wouldn't have the resources for it. It would be katastroika on steroids.
immibis 24 days ago [-]
Then they can be removed in two steps. First, allow people to come and work to get wealthy so they can compete with other wealthy people. Second, allow wealthy people to spend money.
dragonwriter 24 days ago [-]
> The wealth disparity between nations is so great that if borders were done away with, people from wealthy nations would be able to trivially outspend people in poor countries.
Free movement of people does not mean that you don’t have extreme taxes on high-wealth individuals that they become subject to when they move.
> Once they own the land and the businesses
You are assuming, again, in addition to free movement of people a basically capitalist economic system in every country. That you are free to move to a country and live and, if you can find a job, work there does not mean that you can simply buy land and/or control of the non-financial means of production. It may mean you are as free to do so as local residents, but it doesn’t mean anybody is free to do so.
Note, that because even slightly capitalist countries – rich or poor – tend to provide relatively free movement of capital already, whether or not they allow free movement of people, this “buyout by remote elites” is already a problem for relatively poor capitalist (or even somewhat capitalist) countries, even with border controls – you don’t need to live in a country to buy up property and businesses there, and exercise control through such ownership.
immibis 24 days ago [-]
Also, they already do that. Borders are already open for very rich people.
immibis 24 days ago [-]
They do, in fact, allow people from majority-white countries to come without authorization.
FredPret 24 days ago [-]
The cause-and-effect here is “is your home country first-world / on a similar standard of living as us, and also not an enemy”.
So Japanese and South Koreans are probably more welcome than Russians, say.
mantas 24 days ago [-]
Some majority-white. As well as some non-white-majority.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
How can it not be entirely due to racism, if race is the only factor determining whether you stop someone who is jogging on the street in jogging clothes and likely athletic supershoes?
wholinator2 24 days ago [-]
Ya know, this is an incredibly interesting question. Because my instinct is to say that, if the patrols duty is simply to analyze anyone who stands out, and they do so in the proper channels without malice or harassment, then that would be the least racist possible scenario in which this occurs, some may say, not racist. But then even if the guard is kind and helpful, is the guideline "people who stand out must be questioned" racist itself? It sounds like yes. But then what justification do they have for that, is it genuinely that the vast majority of illegal crossings come from people who stand out? Or do most of them blend in, or is it just the stand outs that get caught, thus making it appear in data as if they're the problem and intensifying the patrols around them? Like the airplane problem.
Then the hypothetical, what if it were true that the people attempting to harm your society singularly visually differed? Would that be racism, some strange "justified racism" or simply not racism? If you say, we are not prosecuting on race, but on propensity to crime. Well that starts to sound like some things I've heard in my country, which we believe is racist. Interesting questions.
johannes1234321 24 days ago [-]
Well, the neighboring country to Croatia is Bosnia and Herzgovina. The ethnicy is similar and some from there also have motivation to enter illegally. Basing on race ignores those.
Also turning it around: Is it right for somebody, like the runner, who legally entered to repeatedly be treated bad just because others who share skin color do bad?
em-bee 24 days ago [-]
even better, the first check could have asked him for his route, and phone ahead to let their colleagues and especially the call centers know that he is coming. with a photo even. the reverse of a wanted poster. and if they had to deal with a lot of illegal immigrants in the area, the maybe could have asked him to wear something easily identifiable that someone else would not wear. maybe a number thing that's common for runners in a competition.
part of the problem is not only that he is checked, but how he is being treated during those checks.
i mean that's my experience in china. every interaction with authorities was extremely polite and friendly. even when it was an issue where i broke the law because i didn't register my new address in time. of course africans experience racism in china as well, so i can't say for sure that they would get the same treatment as me, but certainly not what this guy experienced in croatia.
after reading the article i found the links to other articles on the guardian site linked to this: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/oct/10/p... "Croatian police accused of burning asylum seekers’ phones and passports". the problem seems to be more than just never having seen a black person.
grujicd 25 days ago [-]
> so what's special about croatia
To add relevant context Croatia is at the edge of the Schengen zone. On the other side of the border are Serbia and Bosnia with less strict border controls and visa rules, so this is one of the roads for illegal immigrants to reach rich western countries. This and Hungarian borders are what's between them and their goals. Connect that with the fact that Croatia doesn't have non-white minorities, there were probably zero cases before this of black person wondering down the roads who was not an illegal migrant.
throw73848788 25 days ago [-]
Passport are also needed for deportation. I can not see any reason, why police would burn their documents. It creates a lot of extra paperwork and headaches.
Destroying passports is a normal practice for illegal immigrants. It extends their stay in EU by several years. Most countries are considered safe, and it is hard to claim you are from Syria with Egyptian passport.
mr_toad 24 days ago [-]
The police aren’t burning passports because it’s procedure, or even legal. It makes it harder for asylum seekers to prove where they’re from.
poincaredisk 25 days ago [-]
I'm not from Croatia, but for context
>ethnicity you rarely ever see?
Rarely... I was 20 years old when I first saw a black person in real life. This was in a center of a big city, and it surprised me so much that I remember exactly where and when it was.
Nowadays times have changed and it's not that rare in my country - at least in big cities. But I imagine a Croatian farmer seeing a black person - running! - and calling the police to investigate what the hell is going on.
aprilthird2021 25 days ago [-]
> But I imagine a Croatian farmer seeing a black person - running! - and calling the police to investigate what the hell is going on.
So is this common? I would not call the police immediately among seeing something odd or unusual that isn't threatening...
bombcar 25 days ago [-]
You wouldn't, but someone would. Cops get called all the time for out-of-the-ordinary things that you'd not even think of calling for.
Power failures, parked cars, loose animals, strange kids, balloons, weather, etc.
dudeinjapan 25 days ago [-]
For a laugh I used to read the local paper which published a log of police calls, they were along the lines of "A dead racoon was reported on Oxbow Rd. When officers investigated they found it was a hat."
Symbiote 25 days ago [-]
Loose animals can be a danger to traffic, and the police should be called.
I've done this when a horse had escaped from a field at the edge of a village.
k1kingy 25 days ago [-]
And as unfortunate as it is, some people see black people running in their neighborhood as a danger to society and will call the police (or in some cases will just hunt them down and kill the person themselves https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/federal-judge-sentences-three...)
spidersenses 23 days ago [-]
Very poor flamebait...
briandear 24 days ago [-]
In Spain people call the cops for seemingly everything. I had a bunch of race motorcycles I was unloading at my house and some idiot neighbor called the cops because they thought I was running an illegal repair shop. I had to spend almost an hour proving that my four kids raced semi-professionally. Even had to show them their race licenses before they realized that I was telling the truth. I have found in many places in Europe people have a very hard time minding their own business — especially old ladies. For reference, I’m a white American. So some Croatians calling the cops after seeing a black dude doing a Forest Gump in the middle of nowhere would certainly attract the attention of the local busybodies.
jajko 25 days ago [-]
This is schengen area border country, dealing with tons of smuggled immigrants, most of which are coming from Africa. While having from 0 to next to 0 local population of same/similar ethnicities.
First thing to many occur to especially older folks watching news is illegal immigrant running ie from busted police operation, not some epic runner. They definitely dont recognize running sportswear.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
I mean, that is literally racism, the assumption about the man, based on his race, is that he is an illegal immigrant
grujicd 24 days ago [-]
Which other assumption would be reasonable, considering Croatia's ethnic structure? You have to take local circumstances into account.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
But all of racism is based upon the idea of "reasonable assumptions". You don't need to assume. By your logic, stats can inform assumptions about black people being up to some crime, Arabs being up to some terror plot, Indians committing some rape, etc. etc. But the whole point is that one person should not be tarred by the assumptions others make about their ethnicity.
Your question is a trick. If only statistics make something reasonable, then the only "reasonable" assumption is that he is a criminal. And all racist assumptions will be "reasonable". But the very idea that a person should be assumed about based on his ethnicity is not reasonable or morally right.
24 days ago [-]
zxcvbnm69 25 days ago [-]
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llm_trw 25 days ago [-]
He's doing something weird hence the police calls.
I'm from that part of the world and had the same thing happen when I went camping.
The police officer asked if I lived in the west, then left me alone with a warning about bears and gypsies.
sabbaticaldev 25 days ago [-]
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sjducb 25 days ago [-]
It’s racism. I’m guessing you’re from the US, the least racist country in the world.
People see he’s a different race so they treat him badly because of it. No one is worried about being called racist.
He was arrested several times a day for being black. No one in the whole chain of events viewed this as a problem.
wholinator2 24 days ago [-]
Do you believe the US is the least racist country in the world or have i missed some sarcasm? I'm truly not trying to antagonize, just curious
0xffff2 24 days ago [-]
Who would you nominate? The US certainly has severe problems with racism, but everything I've ever read about other countries has led me to believe that this isn't actually a totally implausible claim.
> The WVS survey asks respondents from more than 80 countries dozens of questions, including one that asked respondents to identify types of people they would not want as neighbors. The more people of a particular country responded that they would be happy to have a neighbor of a different race, the more racially tolerant the respondents' country would be considered
sjducb 16 days ago [-]
That is based on 2 studies, one of which puts the US as one of the least racist countries and the other puts the US as among the most racist. Something is wrong.
The US is very racist by self reported observation of racism. However citizens of different countries have different definitions of racism.
If you use a constant definition of racism like “Would you live next to people of another race, yes/no?” Then you find that almost all Americans say yes (low racism) . In some other countries over 70% of people would not live next to a person of another race.
sjducb 24 days ago [-]
Name a country that is less racist.
foldr 24 days ago [-]
It depends a lot on which part of the US you look at. Here’s a high school having its first ‘integrated’ (i.e. not racially segregated) prom a mere 11 years ago: https://youtu.be/fDla-r2uj7U?si=Zun-NdDnjnSq0Yk4 The idea of formally separating an event like this by race would have been shocking 11 years ago in many Western countries. The US is ahead of the curve in some ways regarding racism, but it still has incredibly high levels of de facto racial segregation. As a Brit who lived in the US for a while, this was the aspect of US life that surprised me the most. Many white Americans still quite openly regard majority black towns or city districts as no-go areas (even though they don’t openly talk about it in racial terms). You see segregation on a smaller scale too (e.g. the common pattern of the restaurant with all white serving staff and all Latino kitchen workers). I’m aware that this kind of segregation isn’t usually the result of a deliberate evil plot to segregate people, but it’s still notable.
I am not saying that the UK is necessarily ‘less racist’ overall than the US. I think racism manifests itself quite differently in the two countries, so it’s hard to compare.
throwaway2037 24 days ago [-]
Canada. New Zealand. Jamaica.
sjducb 24 days ago [-]
Canada and New Zealand are part of the “west” so they’re very similar to the US.
Jamaica is a good pick. A non western country that has very low levels of racism.
Maybe the assertion should be that the US is amongst the least racist countries in the world. The US is clearly in a different league compared to Russia, China and India.
throwaway2037 23 days ago [-]
Why do you think Caribbean nations are not part of the "west"? How about countries in Africa or South America?
Why do you think Russia, China, and India are "more" (moar?) racist than the US? All three of those countries are continent-sized and (internally) wildly diverse. Interestingly, all three of them have significant minority groups that practice Islam, Buddhism, and Christianity, yet they are peaceful places to live. This whole Internet trope that the US is more or less racist than country X is weird. I see it so many times. Any country that had institution racism well into the 20th century (many!) is going to be working through a continent-sized garbage dump of cultural baggage. I don't care so much about any country's absolute state; I care more about their direction and progress.
Two interesting examples:
30 years ago Germany treated Turkish people, who had peacefully and legally settled thanks to the post-war guest worker programme, as second citizens. Today is completely different. There are ethnic Turks who are national ministers!
Less extreme: Both Italy and Romania have large populations of Roma people (outdated term: gypsy), but today they are more integrated into mainstream society than ever. 30 years ago they were absolutely second class citizens.
sjducb 23 days ago [-]
Regarding China, Russia and India. They’ve all got a big problem with the literal enslavement of people from ethnic minority communities. I think that’s racism.
South Africa is a very racist country. You’re not really replying to my comment please re read it.
throw73848788 25 days ago [-]
[flagged]
bigpeopleareold 25 days ago [-]
I think you should look up what the history of jaywalking laws actually are. They were lobbied by the automobile industry in the early 20th century.
tmountain 25 days ago [-]
People do run in the United States (tons of people). It is not a crime.
devilbunny 25 days ago [-]
I believe this is an example of a “joke”. Perhaps a “troll”. You may have heard of them.
canadianfella 25 days ago [-]
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tho24h23j4234 25 days ago [-]
[flagged]
gerdesj 25 days ago [-]
Thankfully our hero is made of sterner stuff than either you or me:
"On other occasions, however, he almost packed it in. In Uganda, his one-man support crew resigned, leaving him without a support vehicle or help at a time when his funding for the run was almost exhausted. To compound matters, all routes ahead involved either conflict or extreme risk."
ptspts 24 days ago [-]
Why would someone start this long run without enough funding secured for the whole length?
em-bee 24 days ago [-]
maybe he was planning to get more funding along the way (by selling his story for example) or some expected funding fell through. for something like this you don't have to have all funding sorted out the day you start. i mean, it would probably help, but i don't think it's wrong to start and see how far you can get.
dyauspitr 24 days ago [-]
Why do you have a mortgage?
mastermedo 25 days ago [-]
This surprised me too. I am from Croatia, and while there is a fair bit of discrimination against anyone that's different in the country, I am very surprised about this magnitude of it. I'm curious about the route he took. Some road types are illegal to run along, and coincidentally the one going from south to north along the coast is illegal to be on for pedestrians to my knowledge. I wouldn't be surprised if any pedestrian was stopped on that road, it's dangerous to run where the speed limit is over 100 km/h.
Symbiote 25 days ago [-]
He grew up in Britain, and would easily understand the concept and the symbolic "no pedestrians" signs.
Others comments mention a route map, but I can't find it.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
I was surprised but apparently I was dumb, and people see a black person and think "criminal migrant" all the time and that it's somehow not racist to think that, lol. Very many comments in this thread saying exactly that.
grecy 24 days ago [-]
Pretty normal for a global traveller.
I delt with up to five extortion attempts a day for three years when I drove around Africa. Tons in Honduras too. I NEVER pay, because it makes it worse for those behind me, and now everyone has a cellphone worse for me too - if I pay $20 for them to leave me alone they’ll call the next checkpoint and let them know I’m an easy target.
You get used to it, and believe it or not I started looking forward to the game.
hipadev23 25 days ago [-]
Why did you have so many issues in Croatia? Traffic police and ID checkpoints?
noman-land 25 days ago [-]
"The police stopped me at least four times a day. Sometimes, I caught locals taking photos of me and reporting me to the police,” he said.
Thorrez 25 days ago [-]
Reminds me of Karl Bushby, who's walking from Chile to England. He made it to at least Kazakhstan so far.
Forgive my stupidity -- how is it possible to walk from the new world to the old? How does one walk over the oceans?
aendruk 24 days ago [-]
The linked article contains a map and written explanation.
Thorrez 24 days ago [-]
It's possible to walk from Alaska to Russia when the ocean there freezes over. Russia won't be happy if you do that though.
beretguy 25 days ago [-]
> They were detained by Russian border troop officers while they were crossing the Russian border near the Chukotkan village of Uelen, for not entering Russia at a correct port of entry. They were threatened with being banned from Russia, which would stop the journey.
You can always trust russia to be a pain in the neck, to put it mildly.
exe34 25 days ago [-]
I'm sure the US would just let anyone in at any point along their border...
anonzzzies 25 days ago [-]
if i have to believe musk, there is no issue at all doing that.
exe34 25 days ago [-]
concerning if true.
borski 25 days ago [-]
Luckily, it isn’t.
anonzzzies 24 days ago [-]
What? The almighty musk is lying about this? His whole presidential campaign is around needing more kids and illegal immigration. You didn't hand over your country to some criminals & grifters did you? Or maybe it was always in the hands of these people.
exe34 23 days ago [-]
Elon Musk lie? he would never.
lionkor 25 days ago [-]
What a terrible take. Go outside and touch some grass, and then throw away your documents and try to walk across any border on the globe.
beretguy 24 days ago [-]
Just yesterday/past few days russia bombed Ukraine on a Christmas Day, downed Azerbaijan Airlines plane and cut power cables between Finland and Estonia. My take is good. Your turn to touch grass and stop defending fascists.
briandear 24 days ago [-]
The Ukraine side has fascists of their own, see the Azov Battalion.
Also recall, Ukraine suspended elections until after the war. While that’s following Ukrainian law, that still sounds pretty undemocratic to me. Ukraine possesses Lviv which was Polish since the 1400s. Crimea was Russian from the 1700s as a result of a war with the Ottomans — a war started by the Turkish because they were made that Russia was interfering with Polish internal affairs. Russia has a much stronger claim on Crimea than Ukraine, historically speaking.
Lviv was stolen from Poland by a Soviet-Nazi agreement during World War II. If the Russians should leave eastern Ukraine, then certainly the Ukrainians should give Lviv back to Poland right?
My point is that the Ukraine conflict isn’t as black and white as people make it out to be. This entire conflict is based on overlapping and often contradictory versions of history. Claiming it’s a battle against fascism is glossing over the realities.
seabird 24 days ago [-]
The grumbling about the Azov Battalion and martial law in Ukraine is deflection. Pretty much every nation has some amount of paramilitary nationalism, and it should surprise nobody that a country at total war is going to suspend civil liberties. The war in Ukraine has basically nothing to do with fascism and everything to do with Russian revanchism that NATO would never allow to go unopposed, and it's pretty clear what's in the best interest of Western Europe and the US in this situation. Letting a perennial bad actor walk all over you because there's a veneer of largely irrelevant historical legitimacy over what is pretty clearly a test to see what you'll let slide is just stupid.
aguaviva 24 days ago [-]
Crimea was Russian from the 1700s
It became a Russian colonial possession around that time. But that did not in any way establish an innate "Russian-ness" to the peninusla that overrides modern international law. Specifically multiple treaties affirming Ukraine's sovereignty over the Crimea that Russia itself signed (and which the Crimean electorate also ratified in 1991 via an internationally recognized referendum). And which Russia again affirmed via another major treaty in 1994.
Russia has a much stronger claim on Crimea than Ukraine, historically speaking.
You can believe you want about historical "claims" and whatever they are supposed to even mean. The vastly bigger point (and the only point that really matters in this context) is that in the 21st century, we don't go around starting wars that will inevitably murder hundreds of thousands of people so at one side can get a shot at "correcting" past border resolutions (that it never formally disputed in the first place).
There is a name for this tendency - "territorial revanchism". You might want to look at what happened the last time a major power in Europe started to pretend to believe that it had a historical imperative to avenge and reverse prior "humiliations":
As does your country, I'm sure. That doesn't mean that other countries get to start invading and bombing your hometown willy-nilly. And if they did, I somehow doubt you'd be getting on HN to tell us that "It isn't as black and white as people make it out to be. After all, we've got fascists of our own in this country. So the invaders have a point too, you know."
This entire conflict is based on overlapping and often contradictory versions of history.
The history really isn't that complicated, and the whole idea that the conflict is in any way based on "history" is part of the fabric of myths used by the aggressor to justify its invasion and to mollify and deflect opposition to it.
The war is about the ideology and interests of the small clique that runs Russia's current regime. Not about Ukraine or its history.
lionkor 24 days ago [-]
Check out the history of Papua, Mr. CIA ;)
nadermx 25 days ago [-]
A man went on a mission to raise awareness. I'd say he accomplished that.
endofreach 25 days ago [-]
Unfortunately some sites make it hard to get past the headline with their banners (and ads) for me. So i won't know what he ought to create awareness for.
kitd 25 days ago [-]
It's in the first paragraph of the linked article, and is expanded on further down.
endofreach 24 days ago [-]
Well obviously you didn't get it... anyway, thanks for the downvotes.
Running in the other direction seems to be somewhat more dangerous.
debugnik 25 days ago [-]
> Bacca's naked, strangled, and decomposing body was found in bushes
> DNA testing suggested that Bacca was raped by multiple people, and not just Karataş.
How sad. Looks to me like the dangerous part is doing so as a woman, not the direction.
tdiff 25 days ago [-]
Being a woman may expose you to extra risks, but it doesnt mean men are safe there.
debugnik 24 days ago [-]
Of course, I just meant that it seems to have been the main factor in her story, rather than the fact that she entered Turkey from Europe. I can't really draw any general conclusions out of a sample of two; well, one, because this runner apparently didn't cross Turkey, so not really a similar route.
llm_trw 25 days ago [-]
They made it fine when going through Europe.
debugnik 25 days ago [-]
You surely understand one travels through the same countries when doing the same route in either direction. That's not what we meant here.
llm_trw 25 days ago [-]
You surely realize that you stop traveling when dead? In which case direction matters.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
These are not the same paths so direction is meaningless. This runner did not travel through Turkey
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
I would highly recommend looking at his Strava, he basically logs every day and the everyday kindness of strangers along his journey as well as the bad parts. We are humans, we are good and bad all mixed in one, and his run really reflects a depth of human experience, in my mind.
>>"Kato wanted his journey to draw attention to the earliest migration of humans from Africa and challenge the racist notion that people should “go back to where they come from”. Viewed as a whole, he said the run had underlined the positive aspects of migration and its potential to “create a more culturally connected and enriched global society”.
This is an epic feat and gives me hope for humanity. My hats off to Mr Kato!
pkkkzip 25 days ago [-]
How many hours was he running everyday? This is an insane amount of running. I wonder if there is any health implications?
ordersofmag 25 days ago [-]
7700/516 = just under 15 miles a day or around 100 miles per week. Typical mileage for any elite distance runner or even a decent D1 college runner (and low for an elite marathoner). But they often do it in one or two continuous sessions, often with significant intensity. The task of just covering the mileage in a day (without trying to do it in one go or trying do any of it fast) is nothing particularly exceptional. Heck as a slow 50-something dude I did 100 miles weeks during Covid when I had some free time. Health effects: assuming you were biomechanically inclined to do okay with lots of running and built up to it over a long enough time to avoid the usual overuse injuries it would almost certainly just make you healthier.
carabiner 25 days ago [-]
PCT thru hikers do about 18 miles per day over mountainous terrain with a 25 lb pack. They're moving at a slower walking speed though.
parthdesai 24 days ago [-]
Only on HN you'll see a comment like this downplaying the achievement. With Endurance sport, it's the lack of rest days that make it exponentially harder, you really can't compare with what you've.
RandallBrown 24 days ago [-]
15 miles a day is pretty tame for any long distance runner. Even without rest days. You're going to be doing 15 miles in ~3 hours. That's plenty of rest time.
I suspect this guy was actually running significantly more every day but also took some significant time off.
Russ Cook, who also ran the length of Africa, ran a route that was 2000 miles longer, in about 5 less months. He covered on average about 28 miles per day.
They're both very impressive accomplishments, but not as physically impressive as mentally, at least in my opinion.
parthdesai 24 days ago [-]
15 miles a day every day for about 1.75 years.
Funny, you bring us Russ Cook, his body was literally breaking down. Again, 15 miles on average is tame for a long distance runner. It's starts to become exponentially harder when there are no rest days involved. Both of the achievements are nothing to scoff at.
sangnoir 24 days ago [-]
> 15 miles a day is pretty tame for any long distance runner.
His Strava log clocks him at double that (34+ miles per day) over the last couple of days. So I'd say the average is not representative of his normal, on-the-road pace - which makes sense because he was detained for 3 weeks, visited extended family for part of the 517 days in addition to whatever breaks he took.
throwaway2037 24 days ago [-]
28 miles per day? That is 45 km. How is that possible? What would your feet look like? When I read about people who did immensely long walks, it is always your feet that give out.
gamblor956 24 days ago [-]
I had several friends who ran 15-20 miles/day 7 days a week pre- and through- COVID.
At a slow enough pace (relative to the individual), 15-20 miles isn't a hard run for many distance runners. (For the BQers in the bunch, their recovery pace was faster than my race pace. However, their race paces would be considered recovery paces for professional marathoners.)
aurareturn 24 days ago [-]
>7700/516 = just under 15 miles a day or around 100 miles per week.
Does your calculation factor in the lost time when he had to stop due to immigration, war zones, being jailed for weeks? IE. When he does run, he could be running 25 miles/day but on some days, he runs 0.
lemontrees 25 days ago [-]
[flagged]
dyauspitr 25 days ago [-]
You can walk 3 miles an hour at a leisurely pace. That’s a 5 hour walk everyday or probably like a 3-4 hour run. Really not all that bad if you’re used to it.
afthonos 25 days ago [-]
He ran an average of 15 miles a day. That is absolutely within the normal levels of human endurance if you build up to it.
thehappypm 25 days ago [-]
I think that’s about the average of what a typical Appalachian Trail hiker does, which means that it is very well within the bounds of reality for a regularly able and very motivated person
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
Looking at his Strava he seems to be doing more like 20-30+ miles a day
pineaux 25 days ago [-]
For all the people reacting that this is not a lot. Don't forget he has had a lot of border troubles, police troubles, money troubles and support troubles.
Including rest days, I would estimate his running days at somewhere around the 400.
That would mean about 20 miles per running day. So 6 miles short of a marathon, each day.
bevan 24 days ago [-]
It is insane in today's world! But big mileage (barefoot, no less) is something we evolved for. Check out the great book Born to Run by Chris Macdougal which explores that concept.
gregwebs 24 days ago [-]
Micah True, a hero of Born to Run, died after the book was published at age 58 of heart failure while doing a 12 mile training run.
bevan 24 days ago [-]
Yes, that's explored in the sequel. He lives on in Urique, Mexico where his likeness is plastered everywhere and is the namesake for the big annual race in that town.
andrewstuart 25 days ago [-]
Extreme exercise such as distance running damages the heart.
The article you linked doesn’t support the statement made about it. The evidence is mixed but shows worse overall outcomes for those overdoing it. Here’s a scientific publication that’s clearer that recommends 1-2 days off per week, and no more than 5 hours running per week.
> Recent research has raised alarms about the potential for plaque buildup and scarring in the heart in some long-distance runners. Yet other studies have suggested that when marathoners get heart disease, they may be able to weather it better than non-runners.
All articles discuss scarring and physical signs but no clear link between exercise and worse life outcomes. The article you cited noted most issues resolve themselves within a few weeks after a race. There are literally 0 people exercising at “race intensity” day after day, which is completely different kettle of fish to your regular training run. Kato here certainly isn’t doing that.
Given many professionals and amateurs run over 5 hours per week and easily break 5/6 miles at a time. A quick search will show strong runners regularly hit 6-8 hours per week.
Cyclists will cover greater distances and times and, apart from Pantani (who was doped to the gills), you don’t see them dropping dead of heart attacks despite regularly covering 10-20 hours a week. Similar for triathletes.
So no, the evidence really isn’t there that distance running causes heart disease.
gregwebs 24 days ago [-]
That's another incorrect summary. From the journal article there are multiple studies that have shown worse long-term outcomes from large amounts of exercise:
> Other studies also have confirmed the long-term adverse effects on myocardial structure (18,27–30,32), including one study suggesting that the CAD event rate during 2-year follow-up was significantly higher in the athletes than that in controls
> Recent studies have suggested that long distance runners may have increased levels of atherosclerosis and CAD (18,37). In a study 6 years ago, male marathon runners had paradoxically increased coronary artery calcification (CAC) as measured by computed tomography (CT) CAC scoring (21). A very recent study of men who completed at least one marathon yearly for 25 consecutive years (n = 50) compared with 23 sedentary controls demonstrated increased total plaque volume (P < 0.01), calcified plaque volume (P < 0.0001), and noncalcified plaque volume (P = 0.04) compared with those with EEE (Fig. 3) (37). Despite the fact that runners have better overall CAD risk profiles, these results underscore the potential for very heavy EEE to increase the severity of CAD through mechanisms largely independent of the traditional CAD risk factors.
> Very high doses of running, however, were associated with trends of worse survival compared with either nonrunners or groups of low- and moderate-dose runners.
> However, when dividing runners into quintiles of doses (miles·wk−1, running days per week, min·wk−1, and running speed), with the exception of speed (faster running always had a trend for better survival), quintile 1 (<6 miles·wk−1, 1 to 2 times per week, <51 min·wk−1) had similar mortality reductions as those in quintiles 2 to 4 and a trend to slightly greater benefit than those in quintile 5 (Fig. 4).
There are other studies that have not shown long-term adverse events. The evidence isn't conclusive and most people need more exercise, not less. But it's prudent to caution committed runners about overdoing it with this information so they can make their own informed decision.
scott_w 24 days ago [-]
> There are other studies that have not shown long-term adverse events. The evidence isn't conclusive
So after all that, you end up agreeing with me.
throwway120385 24 days ago [-]
It's entirely possible that the CAC response is evolved to have some protective factor for endurance running.
gregwebs 24 days ago [-]
Humans didn't evolve for endurance running though. Endurance running although a widespread concept was performed very rarely. For the tribes in Africa used as examples- they endurance hunted one particular animal prone to over heating at one particular time of the year when the ground was muddier and they run slower. Most cultures endurance hunted more rarely than that.
Humans evolved to be upright and thus are poor at running with only 2 legs. But we evolved to have very good heat dissipation since we had the intelligence to easily stay warm, etc without fur. Good heat dissipation gives us good endurance in warm weather, but 4 legged animals out run us for short and long distances as long as they don't get over heated.
dahart 24 days ago [-]
Important quotes from that video: “You can exercise all day, it seems, if you keep it down.” And “let me be clear about this: there is no single step you can take in your life to ensure robust health and remarkable longevity than a habit of daily exercise.”
FWIW, there are some more recent studies that flatly contradict this claim [1] [2], so YMMV with a TED talk. My father has been a long-distance runner for 50 years, and he thinks that it is possible to do heart damage in very extreme cases, but these cases including being more committed than most Olympic athletes. The problem is when doing competitive racing type running without ever taking a break for recovery. He does know a couple of people who ran too fast and too much and had to quit due to what he calls “overtraining syndrome”. He specifically said he thinks Deo Kato isn’t likely running fast enough to cause overtraining syndrome. In the video, you might notice the data he shows depends on running pace; In the TED video, James didn’t separate miles per week from pace (at for example ~6:50). This means that distance alone - miles per week - doesn’t necessarily prove anything, miles might not be associated with risks until it’s enough miles that there’s no time left to rest.
There is a real danger here of scaring people who should exercise more, of giving the wrong impression or a backwards summary to the vast majority of people who will never ever run the risk of over-exercising so much they could cause heart damage. Your summary left out the part where James pointed to the absolute consensus that an hour a day of “vigorous” exercise is known without a doubt to be very beneficial. There’s also a danger of giving a misleading impression about the risks of not exercising compared to the risks of extreme exercise. The data in the video at ~5:10 shows not exercising leading to dying many years earlier, while there is no data here that shows extreme exercise leading to higher mortality; all it shows is that the benefits plateau. There’s some data and discussion on incidence of heart problems, but not outcomes. Essentially the summary should be: exercise all you want, and if you are wondering if you’re exercising too much, then you’re nowhere near the threshold - the very few people exercising enough to do heart damage are extreme and already know they exercise too much, because they’re compromising on work, hobbies, friends, and family in order to exercise. ;)
When he got tired, he slept. When he got hungry, he ate. When he had to go... he went.
baud147258 23 days ago [-]
> I didn’t feel that I belonged in [Croatian] society.
Why is he surprised? He doesn't speak their language, is just a privileged sportman running through their town/city/village.
jamieplex 23 days ago [-]
Now THAT is true grit....
ajaixncicknd 25 days ago [-]
[flagged]
highcountess 25 days ago [-]
[flagged]
mb7733 25 days ago [-]
He lives in London.
pineaux 25 days ago [-]
He lives in London
eesmith 25 days ago [-]
Quoting the linked article:
> The epic run was conceived by the London-based Kato to highlight the history of human migration and the discrimination faced by many black Africans, a message underlined by the fact he endured daily racism from police and passersby in parts of Europe.
Running to the 'epicenter of global subjugation and decimation of large parts of Africa' seems part of the point for the run.
workfromspace 25 days ago [-]
I don't like his take on Czechia: while being stopped by police 4 times is not pleasant, I'm guessing it's nothing compared to the (lack of) safety in many countries in Africa, South/Central America and Asia. [0]
In the meantime, could someone with experience (i.e a local) please tell me about the current safety of and racism against a white person in Cape Town, where he started his peace run? Is it safer than Johannesburg? I'd love to visit South Africa, but I'm too scared of visiting there nowadays.
prmoustache 24 days ago [-]
Czechia has never been mentioned.
As a matter of fact, Africa is crossed partially or completely on a fairly frequent basis by white backpackers and bikepackers. You can find numerous guides and reports on the internet. Also, around 16% of the population of Cape Town is white.
Having said that even in the most dangerous places in Africa the problem is not necessarily racism but inequalities and unemployment. Cross a place where unemployment is high and education level is low due to inequalities, crime will be rampant regardless of average skin color. If you happen to have interesting goods or be seen as a vulnerable, you may have problems. Hence the reason you might have issues in some places in Cape Town but not in a peaceful village somewhere else in Africa. And said peaceful village that could happen to have been very dangerous in another time when same country was in civil war.
I am not saying racism against white people don't exist, but there is no reason to oppose racism against white people to a black guy running to raise awareness about racism. That guy is probably against any form of racism, especially as his life partner happens to be white.
aprilthird2021 24 days ago [-]
Look at the mental gymnastics you need to do to hold this worldview.
1. Not 4 times. 4 times per day every day you are in the country
2. Don't complain about racism in 1st world if you are from the 3rd world because the 3rd world isn't safe. Conveniently missing that racism here is between ethnicity of the 1st world towards 3rd world ethnicities, so basically this absolves all racism in that direction in the 1st world.
3. I'm scared of visiting South Africa because of racism, but a black man scared of racism in Europe where the police are constantly called on him, that's no big deal and he shouldn't complain, which I'm doing right now.
workfromspace 24 days ago [-]
1. Yeah, 4 times a day is a lot and I'm sorry for him. Although I would like to learn more about the details. (I.e other comments mentioning about illegal crossings etc)
2. I'm sorry I didn't fully get this (English is not my first language) but I'm also from a 3rd world country).
3. I'm guessing you are in the USA bubble (which always had and still have a racism problem on a different level) and don't know much about Europe. In Europe, racism would almost never result in any physical violence or not being allowed any rights.
infrawhispers 24 days ago [-]
Racism would almost never result in any physical violence or removal of rights in Europe? Hahahahah this gave me a great laugh.
https://therunningchannel.com/deo-kato-completes-run-from-ca...
Does anyone know how he ran from continental Europe to England?
https://www.runnersworld.com/uk/news/a63224509/deo-kato-lond... https://www.instagram.com/p/DDynCvFAph_/?img_index=1
> During one Sunday in October 1993, Wally Michalski and Mike Turner, working as contractors on the British side, used a pair of the Saracen bicycles to cycle the 100-kilometre (62 mi) round-trip from Folkestone to Coquelles and back again. The pair took around five hours to complete the journey, while wearing full overalls and needing to carry respirators.[1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycling_in_the_Channel_Tunnel
He reached Calais on the 19th and started from Dover on the 20th, so I'm assuming a ferry.
I have to say I don’t find myself too surprised that anybody non-local doing extreme-long-distance running through insular Croatian towns might arouse the interest of the local constabularies—and I imagine the runner being a Ugandan guy would be an especially surprising sight to people in Croatia (91% Croat, 3.2% Serb, officially recognize 22 other ethnic minorities, none of them from Africa) [1]. Which I suppose is the point he was trying to raise.
What an astonishing extreme of human endeavor.
[0] https://archive.is/4T13g [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Croatia#:~:t...
I don't live in Europe, but just help me out, why call the cops on a guy running down the road, in running gear, even if he's an ethnicity you rarely ever see?
The primary reason why he got so much police harassment is because Croatia is a EU Schengen border country, the patrols here are much stricter than everywhere else, and the associated problems are much worse as well.
I don't think it's entirely due to racism - if you were a border policeman, and you are tasked with bringing in people illegaly entering the country, what would you do seeing a person of color running on back roads near the border of an otherwise extremely ethnically homogenous country?
For every case of someone who entered legally and got harassed, they probably bring in thousands of people which they are supposed to bring in (ie. entered ilegally).
https://www.ndtv.com/offbeat/indy-nelson-man-who-visited-eve...
https://www.pap.pl/en/news/pole-wrongly-sentenced-life-congo...
Are you suggesting no countries in the world should have any border control?
You weren’t born here and don’t pay taxes here is pretty different from you’re African, right? So why do you say racism and not discrimination? Why do you say African and not non-European? Phrasing Europe’s border policy as racism against Africans is misleading and escalating, rather than edifying.
Let’s fix that: Saying that you can’t come into Europe because you’re not a European resident is discrimination based on country of residency that could look like racial discrimination if you’re not careful.
In as much as, ahem, some government policies actually are racist, it’s true that border policy does discriminate based on country of residence, but this is not necessarily racist. Europe is not necessarily discriminating against Africans, it’s discriminating all non-Europeans, including China, Russia, America, the Middle East, etc., right?
When people say racism it is often (usually?) referring to beliefs about other races being inferior in some way, or hate for other races. Racism typically means prejudice and antagonism combined with discrimination. Discrimination on its own without judgement may be necessary, and doesn’t mean there is any animosity or value judgements being made based on someone’s race.
And to be clear, that's not wrong, but it's also a distinction without a difference. People will still feel discriminated against even if the source of that discrimination is different from what they named.
I can certainly think of several reasons why city border can and should be less restrictive than country borders, but I would first turn the question back to you, since your question involves unstated assumptions: why should it apply between cities? And then think about it carefully and see if you can imagine some reasons for why things are they way they are. A really big hint: think economics.
FWIW, the questions in this thread seem to be somewhat ignorant of history and global politics and economics. This stuff has been debated and written about ad nauseum, you can for sure find tons of material explaining how various countries/states/cities arrived at their border policies if you’re actually curious about it. I’m certainly no expert on it, so if your question is serious, please research the answer rather than wait for someone on HN to tell you.
The other thing your question implies, and others here are failing to acknowledge is the practical realities of the tradeoffs involved. There isn’t some perfect solution, that does not exist. This is an area of government that comes with both advantages and disadvantages no matter what policy is chosen. The goals are usually to balance the costs against the benefits. Assuming that lax borders is the answer is almost certainly the wrong answer. But, there are huge teams of smart people in every country who’ve studied and dealt with the logistics and legalities of policing borders. Sometimes there are brash politicians who dictate bad policy over the objections of many, but even so, to me it’s always absolutely wild to see armchair internet critics assume they know better and that obvious things have been completely missed. If you do think it can be improved and feel strongly, get involved!
For the same reason it should apply between countries - whatever those are. It should be obvious that I don't think there are good reasons. You've got unstated assumptions about countries.
Your comment contains a lot of non-arguments: "think about it if you're serious", "think economics, "[what you're saying] is almost certainly not the right answer", "practical realities", "huge teams of smart people" etc.
There are lots of reasons why the border policies between cities and countries might/can/should be very different, including but not limited to countries having a federal government or something analogous, and countries specifically wanting the free flow of citizens and their money within the country. Countries generally want the flow of citizens and money from other countries too, but they want control over what gets in the country. It seems fairly obvious to me that that strict city border policies everywhere serves little purpose and would be obnoxious and limiting for the people and the economy of that country, and that it would require a ton of enforcement resources that small cities don’t even have.
Here’s an analogy. Lots of companies have VPNs to get access to the company network. You don’t have a separate VPN for every team, or every building, or every computer. A few secret labs might have their own security, but by and large once you enter the company’s network, you have access to all the company resources. The VPN is like the country border. It’s a small hurdle for the employees of that company, but if there were hierarchical VPNs for everything everywhere in the company it would interfere with people’s ability to work and do very little to increase security; it would be net downside.
Again, it does not matter what my argument is. If you want to know the reasons why all countries in the world have border policies and why the country border policies are usually more strict than cities, the reasons have been written down, debated for hundreds of years, they exist and you are free to go read them if you’re actually curious (which you should be if you think it should change). They aren’t on Hacker News though, and no amount of opining on Hacker News is going to change the world’s border policies.
This is also what was told to people who said that slavery was wrong, and I am not comparing borders to slavery.
You can keep trying to poke some sort of specious logical hole in my arguments as long as you want, and it still won’t demonstrate anything, since I’m not arguing for borders and you’re not demonstrating any understanding of my points here. You seem unable to articulate any specific reasons, or even a specific goal. I’m not even sure what you’re proposing or arguing against. What do you want here? HN points? An actual discussion? Gain some realistic and practical understand why border policies exist? What?
This is quite surprising. Was this a COVID measure? Specifics please.
Also, pro tip: when crossing the CA border, if they do ask for ID or ask for you to get out of your car, make sure to buckle your seat belt before you drive. The cops waiting there will pull you over for buckling 3 seconds after you start moving, I learned first hand.
Edit to add a few informative links, as I’m googling them, with some details that are new to me…
https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone#are-immigr...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Border_Patrol_in...
https://repository.law.uic.edu/jitpl/vol30/iss4/1
Make a list of the costs and benefits for both too lax and too strict borders for all the countries your ideas should apply to. Account for the costs and benefits of both incoming residents and outgoing residents, both from the point of view of the people moving, and from the point of view of the state. How would you balance lax borders against the downsides like weapons, drugs, human trafficking, and other criminal activity? Would you do anything to control the flow of too many people at once to places where there is no housing or utilities for them? Would you do anything to stabilize the economies of countries that lose or gain too many people in a short period of time? What do you propose for settling disputes about the border policy? If other people in your country don’t agree with your idea, how should the policy be decided? What would you say if you found out that the majority of people in the country you live in want strict borders, and vote for them?
Pls see Chesterton’s Fence. If you think borders serve no good purpose and that nobody is happy about them, it’s because you’re ignorant about borders and haven’t bothered to read anything or think about it at all. Lots of people want borders, and for better or worse, lots of people are happy about them, which is why they are there. You don’t get to take borders down until you understand and acknowledge the reasons they were put up.
Which state are we discussing? Can you point to a legal document or constitution for a country that defines the state’s purpose as keeping people happy? Maybe one exists, but I’ve never heard of that anywhere. I think in most countries, it’s your own responsibility to keep yourself happy. A lot of countries will, however, try to keep it’s citizens safe and try to protect the economy, and borders are seen as one of the tools to help meet those ends.
Also, in your border-free dreamworld, how far does this go? Can anyone / everyone in the world come live in your country? How about your city? How about your backyard?
People within a country can freely move between cities but can't freely use private backyards.
We're just saying it should be the same between countries as it is between cities.
Countries aren’t geographic regions. They’re collections of people. If you magically swapped the populations of South Korea and Germany, those geographic countries would change overnight to be their demographic countries.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting your country to stay at least somewhat stable in its ideals, crime levels, particular problems, etc.
i am for the elimination of borders and free movement of everyone across the world, but that requires that we help raise the standard of living everywhere to remove the incentive for people to move just for economic reasons.
How's that different from what's already happening with the borders in place?
This is far from universally true, both because of legal direct constraints on internal migration and because of implicit controls which are the result of economic constraints (which are themselves part of the means by which societies are governed, whether or not they are overtly intended products of state policy.)
The same logic that justifies national government with tax-levying and rule-enforcing power also requires national borders. (ie, a group of people own this area together and will vote to determine what is done).
Open borders does not imply absence of laws.
Free movement of people does not mean that you don’t have extreme taxes on high-wealth individuals that they become subject to when they move.
> Once they own the land and the businesses
You are assuming, again, in addition to free movement of people a basically capitalist economic system in every country. That you are free to move to a country and live and, if you can find a job, work there does not mean that you can simply buy land and/or control of the non-financial means of production. It may mean you are as free to do so as local residents, but it doesn’t mean anybody is free to do so.
Note, that because even slightly capitalist countries – rich or poor – tend to provide relatively free movement of capital already, whether or not they allow free movement of people, this “buyout by remote elites” is already a problem for relatively poor capitalist (or even somewhat capitalist) countries, even with border controls – you don’t need to live in a country to buy up property and businesses there, and exercise control through such ownership.
So Japanese and South Koreans are probably more welcome than Russians, say.
Then the hypothetical, what if it were true that the people attempting to harm your society singularly visually differed? Would that be racism, some strange "justified racism" or simply not racism? If you say, we are not prosecuting on race, but on propensity to crime. Well that starts to sound like some things I've heard in my country, which we believe is racist. Interesting questions.
Also turning it around: Is it right for somebody, like the runner, who legally entered to repeatedly be treated bad just because others who share skin color do bad?
part of the problem is not only that he is checked, but how he is being treated during those checks.
i mean that's my experience in china. every interaction with authorities was extremely polite and friendly. even when it was an issue where i broke the law because i didn't register my new address in time. of course africans experience racism in china as well, so i can't say for sure that they would get the same treatment as me, but certainly not what this guy experienced in croatia.
after reading the article i found the links to other articles on the guardian site linked to this: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2024/oct/10/p... "Croatian police accused of burning asylum seekers’ phones and passports". the problem seems to be more than just never having seen a black person.
To add relevant context Croatia is at the edge of the Schengen zone. On the other side of the border are Serbia and Bosnia with less strict border controls and visa rules, so this is one of the roads for illegal immigrants to reach rich western countries. This and Hungarian borders are what's between them and their goals. Connect that with the fact that Croatia doesn't have non-white minorities, there were probably zero cases before this of black person wondering down the roads who was not an illegal migrant.
Destroying passports is a normal practice for illegal immigrants. It extends their stay in EU by several years. Most countries are considered safe, and it is hard to claim you are from Syria with Egyptian passport.
>ethnicity you rarely ever see?
Rarely... I was 20 years old when I first saw a black person in real life. This was in a center of a big city, and it surprised me so much that I remember exactly where and when it was.
Nowadays times have changed and it's not that rare in my country - at least in big cities. But I imagine a Croatian farmer seeing a black person - running! - and calling the police to investigate what the hell is going on.
So is this common? I would not call the police immediately among seeing something odd or unusual that isn't threatening...
Power failures, parked cars, loose animals, strange kids, balloons, weather, etc.
I've done this when a horse had escaped from a field at the edge of a village.
First thing to many occur to especially older folks watching news is illegal immigrant running ie from busted police operation, not some epic runner. They definitely dont recognize running sportswear.
Your question is a trick. If only statistics make something reasonable, then the only "reasonable" assumption is that he is a criminal. And all racist assumptions will be "reasonable". But the very idea that a person should be assumed about based on his ethnicity is not reasonable or morally right.
I'm from that part of the world and had the same thing happen when I went camping.
The police officer asked if I lived in the west, then left me alone with a warning about bears and gypsies.
People see he’s a different race so they treat him badly because of it. No one is worried about being called racist.
He was arrested several times a day for being black. No one in the whole chain of events viewed this as a problem.
Number 1: New Zealand.
Number 73: USA
Methodology:
> The WVS survey asks respondents from more than 80 countries dozens of questions, including one that asked respondents to identify types of people they would not want as neighbors. The more people of a particular country responded that they would be happy to have a neighbor of a different race, the more racially tolerant the respondents' country would be considered
The US is very racist by self reported observation of racism. However citizens of different countries have different definitions of racism.
If you use a constant definition of racism like “Would you live next to people of another race, yes/no?” Then you find that almost all Americans say yes (low racism) . In some other countries over 70% of people would not live next to a person of another race.
I am not saying that the UK is necessarily ‘less racist’ overall than the US. I think racism manifests itself quite differently in the two countries, so it’s hard to compare.
Jamaica is a good pick. A non western country that has very low levels of racism.
Maybe the assertion should be that the US is amongst the least racist countries in the world. The US is clearly in a different league compared to Russia, China and India.
Why do you think Russia, China, and India are "more" (moar?) racist than the US? All three of those countries are continent-sized and (internally) wildly diverse. Interestingly, all three of them have significant minority groups that practice Islam, Buddhism, and Christianity, yet they are peaceful places to live. This whole Internet trope that the US is more or less racist than country X is weird. I see it so many times. Any country that had institution racism well into the 20th century (many!) is going to be working through a continent-sized garbage dump of cultural baggage. I don't care so much about any country's absolute state; I care more about their direction and progress.
Two interesting examples:
30 years ago Germany treated Turkish people, who had peacefully and legally settled thanks to the post-war guest worker programme, as second citizens. Today is completely different. There are ethnic Turks who are national ministers!
Less extreme: Both Italy and Romania have large populations of Roma people (outdated term: gypsy), but today they are more integrated into mainstream society than ever. 30 years ago they were absolutely second class citizens.
https://www.walkfree.org/global-slavery-index/
"On other occasions, however, he almost packed it in. In Uganda, his one-man support crew resigned, leaving him without a support vehicle or help at a time when his funding for the run was almost exhausted. To compound matters, all routes ahead involved either conflict or extreme risk."
Others comments mention a route map, but I can't find it.
I delt with up to five extortion attempts a day for three years when I drove around Africa. Tons in Honduras too. I NEVER pay, because it makes it worse for those behind me, and now everyone has a cellphone worse for me too - if I pay $20 for them to leave me alone they’ll call the next checkpoint and let them know I’m an easy target.
You get used to it, and believe it or not I started looking forward to the game.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Bushby
> The swim covering 179 miles (288 km) was achieved in 31 days as part of his global expedition on foot.
With the help of Azerbaijan's coast guard and some swimmers. Wow!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Salopek
https://outofedenwalk.nationalgeographic.org/
Mastodon: https://masto.bike/@nabili Strava: https://www.strava.com/athletes/113690657
You can always trust russia to be a pain in the neck, to put it mildly.
Also recall, Ukraine suspended elections until after the war. While that’s following Ukrainian law, that still sounds pretty undemocratic to me. Ukraine possesses Lviv which was Polish since the 1400s. Crimea was Russian from the 1700s as a result of a war with the Ottomans — a war started by the Turkish because they were made that Russia was interfering with Polish internal affairs. Russia has a much stronger claim on Crimea than Ukraine, historically speaking.
Lviv was stolen from Poland by a Soviet-Nazi agreement during World War II. If the Russians should leave eastern Ukraine, then certainly the Ukrainians should give Lviv back to Poland right?
My point is that the Ukraine conflict isn’t as black and white as people make it out to be. This entire conflict is based on overlapping and often contradictory versions of history. Claiming it’s a battle against fascism is glossing over the realities.
It became a Russian colonial possession around that time. But that did not in any way establish an innate "Russian-ness" to the peninusla that overrides modern international law. Specifically multiple treaties affirming Ukraine's sovereignty over the Crimea that Russia itself signed (and which the Crimean electorate also ratified in 1991 via an internationally recognized referendum). And which Russia again affirmed via another major treaty in 1994.
Russia has a much stronger claim on Crimea than Ukraine, historically speaking.
You can believe you want about historical "claims" and whatever they are supposed to even mean. The vastly bigger point (and the only point that really matters in this context) is that in the 21st century, we don't go around starting wars that will inevitably murder hundreds of thousands of people so at one side can get a shot at "correcting" past border resolutions (that it never formally disputed in the first place).
There is a name for this tendency - "territorial revanchism". You might want to look at what happened the last time a major power in Europe started to pretend to believe that it had a historical imperative to avenge and reverse prior "humiliations":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revanchism
The Ukraine side has fascists of their own
As does your country, I'm sure. That doesn't mean that other countries get to start invading and bombing your hometown willy-nilly. And if they did, I somehow doubt you'd be getting on HN to tell us that "It isn't as black and white as people make it out to be. After all, we've got fascists of our own in this country. So the invaders have a point too, you know."
This entire conflict is based on overlapping and often contradictory versions of history.
The history really isn't that complicated, and the whole idea that the conflict is in any way based on "history" is part of the fabric of myths used by the aggressor to justify its invasion and to mollify and deflect opposition to it.
The war is about the ideology and interests of the small clique that runs Russia's current regime. Not about Ukraine or its history.
Running in the other direction seems to be somewhat more dangerous.
> DNA testing suggested that Bacca was raped by multiple people, and not just Karataş.
How sad. Looks to me like the dangerous part is doing so as a woman, not the direction.
https://strava.app.link/5KsFE3BoEPb
This is an epic feat and gives me hope for humanity. My hats off to Mr Kato!
I suspect this guy was actually running significantly more every day but also took some significant time off.
Russ Cook, who also ran the length of Africa, ran a route that was 2000 miles longer, in about 5 less months. He covered on average about 28 miles per day.
They're both very impressive accomplishments, but not as physically impressive as mentally, at least in my opinion.
Funny, you bring us Russ Cook, his body was literally breaking down. Again, 15 miles on average is tame for a long distance runner. It's starts to become exponentially harder when there are no rest days involved. Both of the achievements are nothing to scoff at.
His Strava log clocks him at double that (34+ miles per day) over the last couple of days. So I'd say the average is not representative of his normal, on-the-road pace - which makes sense because he was detained for 3 weeks, visited extended family for part of the 517 days in addition to whatever breaks he took.
At a slow enough pace (relative to the individual), 15-20 miles isn't a hard run for many distance runners. (For the BQers in the bunch, their recovery pace was faster than my race pace. However, their race paces would be considered recovery paces for professional marathoners.)
Does your calculation factor in the lost time when he had to stop due to immigration, war zones, being jailed for weeks? IE. When he does run, he could be running 25 miles/day but on some days, he runs 0.
https://youtu.be/Y6U728AZnV0
https://journals.lww.com/acsm-csmr/fulltext/2015/03000/exerc...
> Recent research has raised alarms about the potential for plaque buildup and scarring in the heart in some long-distance runners. Yet other studies have suggested that when marathoners get heart disease, they may be able to weather it better than non-runners.
All articles discuss scarring and physical signs but no clear link between exercise and worse life outcomes. The article you cited noted most issues resolve themselves within a few weeks after a race. There are literally 0 people exercising at “race intensity” day after day, which is completely different kettle of fish to your regular training run. Kato here certainly isn’t doing that.
Given many professionals and amateurs run over 5 hours per week and easily break 5/6 miles at a time. A quick search will show strong runners regularly hit 6-8 hours per week.
Cyclists will cover greater distances and times and, apart from Pantani (who was doped to the gills), you don’t see them dropping dead of heart attacks despite regularly covering 10-20 hours a week. Similar for triathletes.
So no, the evidence really isn’t there that distance running causes heart disease.
> Other studies also have confirmed the long-term adverse effects on myocardial structure (18,27–30,32), including one study suggesting that the CAD event rate during 2-year follow-up was significantly higher in the athletes than that in controls
> Recent studies have suggested that long distance runners may have increased levels of atherosclerosis and CAD (18,37). In a study 6 years ago, male marathon runners had paradoxically increased coronary artery calcification (CAC) as measured by computed tomography (CT) CAC scoring (21). A very recent study of men who completed at least one marathon yearly for 25 consecutive years (n = 50) compared with 23 sedentary controls demonstrated increased total plaque volume (P < 0.01), calcified plaque volume (P < 0.0001), and noncalcified plaque volume (P = 0.04) compared with those with EEE (Fig. 3) (37). Despite the fact that runners have better overall CAD risk profiles, these results underscore the potential for very heavy EEE to increase the severity of CAD through mechanisms largely independent of the traditional CAD risk factors.
> Very high doses of running, however, were associated with trends of worse survival compared with either nonrunners or groups of low- and moderate-dose runners.
> However, when dividing runners into quintiles of doses (miles·wk−1, running days per week, min·wk−1, and running speed), with the exception of speed (faster running always had a trend for better survival), quintile 1 (<6 miles·wk−1, 1 to 2 times per week, <51 min·wk−1) had similar mortality reductions as those in quintiles 2 to 4 and a trend to slightly greater benefit than those in quintile 5 (Fig. 4).
There are other studies that have not shown long-term adverse events. The evidence isn't conclusive and most people need more exercise, not less. But it's prudent to caution committed runners about overdoing it with this information so they can make their own informed decision.
So after all that, you end up agreeing with me.
Humans evolved to be upright and thus are poor at running with only 2 legs. But we evolved to have very good heat dissipation since we had the intelligence to easily stay warm, etc without fur. Good heat dissipation gives us good endurance in warm weather, but 4 legged animals out run us for short and long distances as long as they don't get over heated.
FWIW, there are some more recent studies that flatly contradict this claim [1] [2], so YMMV with a TED talk. My father has been a long-distance runner for 50 years, and he thinks that it is possible to do heart damage in very extreme cases, but these cases including being more committed than most Olympic athletes. The problem is when doing competitive racing type running without ever taking a break for recovery. He does know a couple of people who ran too fast and too much and had to quit due to what he calls “overtraining syndrome”. He specifically said he thinks Deo Kato isn’t likely running fast enough to cause overtraining syndrome. In the video, you might notice the data he shows depends on running pace; In the TED video, James didn’t separate miles per week from pace (at for example ~6:50). This means that distance alone - miles per week - doesn’t necessarily prove anything, miles might not be associated with risks until it’s enough miles that there’s no time left to rest.
There is a real danger here of scaring people who should exercise more, of giving the wrong impression or a backwards summary to the vast majority of people who will never ever run the risk of over-exercising so much they could cause heart damage. Your summary left out the part where James pointed to the absolute consensus that an hour a day of “vigorous” exercise is known without a doubt to be very beneficial. There’s also a danger of giving a misleading impression about the risks of not exercising compared to the risks of extreme exercise. The data in the video at ~5:10 shows not exercising leading to dying many years earlier, while there is no data here that shows extreme exercise leading to higher mortality; all it shows is that the benefits plateau. There’s some data and discussion on incidence of heart problems, but not outcomes. Essentially the summary should be: exercise all you want, and if you are wondering if you’re exercising too much, then you’re nowhere near the threshold - the very few people exercising enough to do heart damage are extreme and already know they exercise too much, because they’re compromising on work, hobbies, friends, and family in order to exercise. ;)
[1] https://www.outsideonline.com/health/training-performance/ex...
[2] https://www.utsouthwestern.edu/newsroom/articles/year-2019/e...
PS you’re not the Andrew Stuart of Sudoku/puzzle fame are you?
No I am the Andrew Stuart of no fame.
Why is he surprised? He doesn't speak their language, is just a privileged sportman running through their town/city/village.
> The epic run was conceived by the London-based Kato to highlight the history of human migration and the discrimination faced by many black Africans, a message underlined by the fact he endured daily racism from police and passersby in parts of Europe.
Running to the 'epicenter of global subjugation and decimation of large parts of Africa' seems part of the point for the run.
[0]: https://www.numbeo.com/crime/rankings_by_country.jsp?title=2...
In the meantime, could someone with experience (i.e a local) please tell me about the current safety of and racism against a white person in Cape Town, where he started his peace run? Is it safer than Johannesburg? I'd love to visit South Africa, but I'm too scared of visiting there nowadays.
As a matter of fact, Africa is crossed partially or completely on a fairly frequent basis by white backpackers and bikepackers. You can find numerous guides and reports on the internet. Also, around 16% of the population of Cape Town is white.
Having said that even in the most dangerous places in Africa the problem is not necessarily racism but inequalities and unemployment. Cross a place where unemployment is high and education level is low due to inequalities, crime will be rampant regardless of average skin color. If you happen to have interesting goods or be seen as a vulnerable, you may have problems. Hence the reason you might have issues in some places in Cape Town but not in a peaceful village somewhere else in Africa. And said peaceful village that could happen to have been very dangerous in another time when same country was in civil war.
I am not saying racism against white people don't exist, but there is no reason to oppose racism against white people to a black guy running to raise awareness about racism. That guy is probably against any form of racism, especially as his life partner happens to be white.
1. Not 4 times. 4 times per day every day you are in the country
2. Don't complain about racism in 1st world if you are from the 3rd world because the 3rd world isn't safe. Conveniently missing that racism here is between ethnicity of the 1st world towards 3rd world ethnicities, so basically this absolves all racism in that direction in the 1st world.
3. I'm scared of visiting South Africa because of racism, but a black man scared of racism in Europe where the police are constantly called on him, that's no big deal and he shouldn't complain, which I'm doing right now.
2. I'm sorry I didn't fully get this (English is not my first language) but I'm also from a 3rd world country).
3. I'm guessing you are in the USA bubble (which always had and still have a racism problem on a different level) and don't know much about Europe. In Europe, racism would almost never result in any physical violence or not being allowed any rights.