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Lynchings in Congo as penis theft panic hits capital
Reuters ^ | April 22, 2008 | Joe Bavier

Posted on 04/22/2008 8:23:11 PM PDT by LonghornFreeper

KINSHASA (Reuters) - Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.

Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.

Rumours of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.

Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained by police, claimed that sorcerers simply touched them to make their genitals shrink or disappear, in what some residents said was an attempt to extort cash with the promise of a cure.

"You just have to be accused of that, and people come after you. We've had a number of attempted lynchings. ... You see them covered in marks after being beaten," Kinshasa's police chief, Jean-Dieudonne Oleko, told Reuters on Tuesday.

Police arrested the accused sorcerers and their victims in an effort to avoid the sort of bloodshed seen in Ghana a decade ago, when 12 suspected penis snatchers were beaten to death by angry mobs. The 27 men have since been released.

"I'm tempted to say it's one huge joke," Oleko said.

"But when you try to tell the victims that their penises are still there, they tell you that it's become tiny or that they've become impotent. To that I tell them, 'How do you know if you haven't gone home and tried it'," he said.

Some Kinshasa residents accuse a separatist sect from nearby Bas-Congo province of being behind the witchcraft in revenge for a recent government crackdown on its members.

"It's real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny," said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.

(For full Reuters Africa coverage and to have your say on the top issues, visit: http://africa.reuters.com/ )

(Editing by Nick Tattersall and Mary Gabriel)


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: africa; alcibiades; austinpowers; bellcurve; diversity; hermii; lorenabobbitt; magic; peloponnesianwar; penistheft; saywhat; shrinkage; sorcery; teenyweeny; witchcraft
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To: LonghornFreeper

Hillary’s revenge: Send Obama to Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo!!!!!


41 posted on 04/22/2008 8:57:58 PM PDT by blondee123 (NObama IN '08!!!!!!!!!!!)
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To: LonghornFreeper

Memo to self: Cancel trip to Congo.


42 posted on 04/22/2008 8:58:55 PM PDT by dmw (Aren't you glad you use common sense? Don't you wish everybody did?)
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To: batter

I should’a read yours first!


43 posted on 04/22/2008 8:59:25 PM PDT by bannie (clintons CHEAT! It's their only weapon.; & Barry/Barack has two faces.)
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To: LonghornFreeper
I don't even know where to start.

I do. I know Liberians who believe that Nigerian witches will curse money and leave it on the street so that if you pick it up, you'll turn into a dog or a cat. They also believe that some Nigerian witches in Philadelphia are making long-distance calls and, over the phone, killing the people who answer. The kids were told not to answer the house phone. The same stricture did not apply to the cell phone. Apparently a wire connection was needed to effect the magic.
44 posted on 04/22/2008 9:02:20 PM PDT by aruanan
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To: LonghornFreeper
Yep. It's a scam. First they shrink it and then they put your name in a master database of men with small penises and then they send you all this spam email with "enlarge" in the subject line...

Well, that's what happened to me, anyway.

45 posted on 04/22/2008 9:03:17 PM PDT by Billthedrill
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To: LonghornFreeper
Am I the only one who finds it odd that a place would have both call-in radio AND sorcery?

I mean we have Art Bell but...

46 posted on 04/22/2008 9:05:45 PM PDT by Dianna
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To: fieldmarshaldj

Nix the sorcery...if a picture of Helen Thomas can’t shrink it — nothing can!

LOL!


47 posted on 04/22/2008 9:06:05 PM PDT by STE=Q ("These are the times that try men's souls." -- Thomas Paine)
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To: LonghornFreeper
"It's real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny," said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.

Maybe he just found a cooter with teeth.

Biological RapeX

South African Technological Solution ... migrating north?


48 posted on 04/22/2008 9:06:32 PM PDT by Centurion2000 (Party ahead of principles; eventually you'll be selling out anything to anyone for the right price.)
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To: LonghornFreeper

Obviously a lesbian cabal of shamans...


49 posted on 04/22/2008 9:09:10 PM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: bannie
That was actually for sale around Christmas. I was tempted to buy one for my father as a gag gift but the price tag was a bit steep for what it was. Amazon has them for $9 now.

The product description was priceless: "stainless steel thighs" and "Through the whole nutcracking process, her smile doesn't change a bit."

LOL!

Maybe we should send one to Obama after tonight's results...

50 posted on 04/22/2008 9:09:30 PM PDT by batter (The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time. - Thomas Jefferson)
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To: LonghornFreeper

What’s the Congolese phrase for “Funny, it was here a minute ago”..?


51 posted on 04/22/2008 9:09:34 PM PDT by ArmstedFragg
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To: LonghornFreeper

Oh, here are a few others I’ve seen. The two year old was wearing a key around his neck. His mom was asked if that’s where she kept the spare house key. She said that it was to keep his throat open so he wouldn’t choke and stop breathing. A baby girl was born with a crease across the bridge of her nose. That was due, her mom claimed, to having worn a belt too tightly during pregnancy. I suggested she should have gotten rid of the other two belts if that was the case. The women have membership in a sisterhood which tells them how to do all sorts of magical things. One of them is to put a cowry and bead belt on a young girl (like 6 months old) that she’ll wear her whole life and which will protect her from getting fat and getting a crooked back and will enhance her sexual attractiveness. Funny, though, the longer they wear it into adulthood, the fatter and less sexually attractive they become. That’s probably due to the unseen presence of Nigerian witches.


52 posted on 04/22/2008 9:09:46 PM PDT by aruanan
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To: BGHater

“So, it was Black Magic that did it too me.”

Wouldn’t “black magic” make the penis bigger? You know what they say...


53 posted on 04/22/2008 9:16:49 PM PDT by RavenATB
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To: LonghornFreeper

Looks as though someone got a real cock(h)old. lol.


54 posted on 04/22/2008 9:17:36 PM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: LonghornFreeper

Whatever they do, don’t let them rub Crisco on it. Crisco is shortening.


55 posted on 04/22/2008 9:17:37 PM PDT by Mr Ramsbotham (Who's worried about the Bolsheviks? They couldn't be worse than the Tsar!)
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To: Lady Jag
"They still stealing those things? "

Big black market for them in SF....

56 posted on 04/22/2008 9:24:29 PM PDT by matthew fuller (Typical bitter, white American arsenal owner. Amen.)
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To: LonghornFreeper
..We saw. What was left was tiny...

There was a misunderstanding.
This was actually an Advertising campaign of a new local Adult Store promoting Penis Pumps.
The Marketing strategy was based on local tribal customs.

Proof: Pic of the Store
57 posted on 04/22/2008 9:26:38 PM PDT by modican
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To: Alia
13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises

They teach this major at Welsey. Hillary got an A+ and graduated Magnacumlaud in this study.

58 posted on 04/22/2008 9:31:02 PM PDT by cpdiii (roughneck, oilfield trash and proud of it, geologist, pilot, pharmacist, iconoclast.)
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To: glock rocks
There’s a song in here somewhere.

It's a band...Stealing Penises.

59 posted on 04/22/2008 9:34:37 PM PDT by eldoradude (Jimmy Carter, exiled former U.S. president, committed suicide this morning...)
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To: LonghornFreeper
Dag gum, Hillary trying to lock up everything in her testicle lock box.

Asama Obama better watch out, with Bills heart condition she may be in need of his services.

60 posted on 04/22/2008 9:37:10 PM PDT by OKIEDOC (Kalifornia, a red state wannabe. I don't take Ex Lax I just read the New York Times.)
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