Nelson Mandela: Master of Forgiveness

Nelson Mandela's life was symbolized as him being very forgiving of  his country that put him in jail for acting against segregated laws in South Africa. He negotiated peacefully with his government and abolished the laws that he fought against as a young man. In the political cartoon Mandela's footsteps form the word FORGIVENESS because he could have been very angry because of his country's actions, but he chose to be accepting and forgiving of his country's decisions. Mandela negotiated with his captors instead of retaliating at them and putting them in jail. I think he chose to do this because he wanted to be forgiving and show his country that he was "The better man" and that he wouldn't give in to his anger. President Obama said, “We will not likely see the likes of Nelson Mandela again.” I agree with this statement because Nelson Mandela was a very remarkable man, he protested what he believed in and faced the consequences of his actions. Once he was released he showed forgiveness, he did not retaliate. Many people might choose to retaliate and not be forgiving and as peaceful as a man Nelson Mandela was. I would be willing to spend so many years in prison for a cause. For example, I believe that farmers in the Ivory Coast shouldn't be using slave labor to produce cheap chocolate. Source:http://upfront.scholastic.com/News/Nelson-Mandela
Questions from:http://upfront.scholastic.com/top_news
This Is the Online version of upfront, this article isn't In the print version of upfront magazine.

Is the Arab Spring a Failure

       I think that the Arab Spring should be considered a failure. For example, in Egypt the military killed 600 and injured close to 4,000 protesters that believed that Morsi should stay in power. Another example, in Syria the revolution has turned into a civil war. 100,000 people have died since the start of this uprising and not much has changed, Assad is still in power and there had recently been a chemical weapons attack from the government on it's people. 1,400 dead in the recent Syrian chemical weapons attack. Lastly, In Libya, dictator Muammar el-Qaddafi was overthrown and killed in this civil war. During the uprising some people died because of airstrikes from the U.N that killed some innocent people that were in the battlefront that was targeted. The violence continued, last year there was a terrorist attack in Benghazi where the U.S ambassador to Syria was killed. In many countries the Arab Spring has just been sadness and death, there really hasn't been a positive affect on any of the countries. I think that parts of the the middle east can still achieve democratic success. I think eventually the region will become peaceful and democratic because the Arab Spring was the start of something big, in a decade Egypt and Libya and Syria have great potential to be peaceful and democratic.

This was posted on Thursday not Wednesday.

Source: Upfront Magazine-Has the Arab Spring Failed? by Mark Landler, Ben Hubbard, Rick Gladstone, David D. Kirkpatrick, and Alan Cowell of the New York Times.