Just a week ago a young white male was mercilessly beaten at the University of Johannesburg by other white males for standing with a black girl. In February, the same university had an incident of a black male forced into a cold shower for some four hours. Now another race driven incident repeats itself, in the same university and in the same campus. Something sinister is at play here!
The assault on this young white male further confirms the long held suspicion that the University of Pretoria, the University of Stellenbosch, the University of Free State and the University of Johannesburg Kingsway (Former RAU) campus have appointed themselves as the defenders of racial chauvinism. This is found in their residence placement policies that promote segregation and humiliation far surpassing the plans of the Boeremag itself!
These universities have provided a safe heaven for racism and have acted as liberated zones for Afrikaner chauvinism right under the dusty noses of the Department of Education and its minister, Naledi Pandor. Of course, not all Afrikaners are in agreement with the tendencies of these groupings in the universities who have the support of the Freedom Front Plus. Most White South Africans, including Afrikaners, profess non–racialism; therefore several questions need to be asked.
Why is it that many white, but particularly Afrikaner, students in universities are notorious for racist attitudes and practices despite the defeat and collapse of apartheid? Why is it that these students have not grown oblivious of racial chauvinism and still persist in the manner their parents treated us blacks, in the past? Some might be tempted to say David Bullard’s articles did the trick, I think not. I am convinced the answers lie elsewhere. This is not to deny that David Bullard’s articles might have played a role, however…
The National Party, since 1948, won back to back elections until 1989 without any accusations of vote rigging. The voters of the racist National Party are still alive and well. Most have deflected to the Democratic Alliance. Some are hiding behind the woodwork of the Freedom Front Plus. Many of the National Party voters supported the NP as a result of its segregationist and racist policies. There is no way that they have repented and become born again and suddenly become non–racist. They are still racist as ever!
Despite the fact that many university students were born between 1983 and 1989 and may have no personal experience of apartheid, and are supposed to act in a non–racist manner, this is not the case. Their parents do not accord them that opportunity. They do their best to impart on their children what they suppose should be the status quo. They teach them the most hideous of racist rituals so as to ensure that they fix it firmly in the young white child that he is superior to blacks, despite the teachings of society to the contrary. The blame lies squarely with the parents and the untransformed grannies and daddies of the old apartheid order, not with the kids!
Wolves of the apartheid order are lecturing in the universities. They have found safe heavens within the woodwork of the UOFS, UJ, UP and Stellenbosch. They continue to lodge and hide behind the curtains of our universities, imparting racism to every Afrikaner child that sets foot there. Institutional autonomy remains their strongest shield against the advances of the democratic government, which is often too weak and toothless to take on these organized factions.
Racist incidents in these universities are so constant that they could even result in vigilante type responses that could lead to injuries of innocent black and white kids who may find themselves crossing paths with angry mobs who seek to impose justice on their own terms and methods. At the same time, the Department of Education shall continue to send commission after commission and when it’s too late they will wish they acted earlier.
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220 Responses to “Don’t blame racist students — blame their parents”
If you only blame people’s parents they will never change, let alone rebel against their parents.
And read your own blog again, or didn’t you notie the bit about a WHITE student got attacked by racists for standing next to a black girl.
You might start noticing, and then listening, and discovering how many White people suffer for being “nigger lovers” let alone how many of them also get attacked by black racists for being White.
As well as Black people being attacked by other Black people for being “Sellouts” and then harrasssed by Whioes for being Black.
Then you can start listening to the “Cape Coloureds” Asians, Orientals and Hispanic of what they get from both sides and from totally unnconnected groups, such as Greek and Turkish Cypriots who had a civil war, despite being almost genetically identical.
Then you might understand, and also learn why anyone in a Multicultural society notices very Quickly that you are writing Racist Stereotypes of White People, claiming their parents teach them racist rituals, as apparently you are ignorant of what colour Donald Woods was.
Proportionally a white person is far more likely to be the victim of violent acts committed by a racially motivated black person, than the other way round, and the violence is usually far far worse.
At least white commentators usually try to get some balance in their reporting. When did i last hear a black commentator condemning black racist violence against whites?
Everyone is busy trying to pretend it does not exist.
Any act of violence is not acceptable. A racial motive makes it even worse, whatever the colour.
I will repeat, ad nauseum, until someone takes notice.
If black people were not willing to accept racism from the white government, why do black people think white people will feel any different when the black government enacts racist policies against the whites?
This generation doesn’t need to learn anything from their parents, they are the victims of government sanctioned racial discrimination themselves. How do you expect them to act? How did black students act when they were in a similar boat? Did they need to be taught to hate apartheid by their parents?
Get rid of racial classifications, get rid or racially discriminatory policies, and as ‘Eagle’ so poetically put it, ‘Racism will evaporate like mist in the sun’.
Doing something about the endless slaughter of whites in their homes would also help. I know black as more likely to be the victims of crime, but they are not more likely to murdered in a race crime.
Lazola your presumptions here are hardly grond breaking, well though through, enlightening, conclusive or complete.
As you mention - most of these students never lived during apartheid; they were definitely all too young to have any influence in the matter, now you give their parents the sole fault for keeping racism alive in their minds.
Undoubtedly there are still alot of huseholds within all ethninc groups which harbours racial hatred towards others outside of their group - this is not an uniquely South African problem, it is unfortunately universal that you find people like this in all multi cultural societys. Granted it is more prevelant in SA - but I am sure the matter is a bit more complicated than it seems.
Do you not think that obvious and well documented govermental and economical mismanagement and corruption, astronomical crime figures where the majority of the criminals are black, the unthoughtfull process of renaming, the idiotic way that AA and BEE is being implemented and ofcourse the the exagerated media coverage of all and any white on black incident is making these white afrikaans people feeling just a little bit marginalised? and what do people do when they are marginalised or opressed in SA? Thats right - they act out.
Now do not get me wrong I am not saying that the life of a white afrikaans male is the same of that as a black male during apartheid, but this is also why the incidents are in general not as violent or as frequent as they were during apartheid. Mark my words - if these people are going to feel that they are being targeted more, you will notice stronger reactions. Who knows - perhaps in a decade we will see necklasing in the suburbs and bombs being planted shebeens.
why_not_stop_the_blaming? on May 5th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Lazola, I can rewrite your article with just as much bias and disregard for the complexity of the situation as you have shown, and I’d even wager that mine would be better (not in a factual, argumentary or informative way, where both our articles would fall flat, but mine will be more entertaining). So, without further ado, here goes:
Don’t blame racist students - blame the government
Just a few weeks ago two white pupils were seriously injured after they were attacked by three coloured pupils and stabbed with a knife as they were leaving school. The incident occurred at Hoërskool Akasia and has since died a quiet death. Shortly thereafter Zubz gained mainstream attention with his song entitled ‘Get Out’ in which he describes how he intends to kill white people. All of this occurred against a back drop of racist farm murders which have largely been ignored.
The complacency and unwillingness of the government to act confirms the long held suspicion that the government is only interested if coloured people are the victims, and that they rate white people as second class citizens. Through a systematic process the goverment is attempting to destroy white’s sens e of self-worth and feeling of belonging in this country.
Wolves of the new South African order are firmly entrenched in the government, from where they can effect great hardships upon white South Africans. They lodge and hide behind the curtains of transformation, apartheid and the dictatorship of many.
Whereto then for the current white South African student? Bombarded with the inherit racism present in the new South African, much as coloured students where in the past, their minds become twisted until the racism springs forth from them as well.
The white student of today knows only racism from the government - how can it be expected from them to show anything else in return?
The Afrikaans universities need to be totally broken down and doen away with. They always were centres of rascism. There the academics of apartheid refined the philosophy and developed the technical support for the system. To keep Afrikaans as a langauage of instruction is an insult to all those who died in 1976. They said to hell with Afrikaans then. Why is it always the same universities taht keep on with this. Bloemfontein, Stellenbsoch and Pretoria. RAU used to have a giant statue of Verwoed on campus. His sprit is still there.
What a load of bull! Must we now blame the parents of black students for thrashing the campus when they have been told to pay a little more for the privilege of a tertiary education? Try the other one. Students have passed matric and some years in a further education. They are capable of making their own decisions, both black and white! Try to link the behaviour to a growing resistance against being marginalised in the job market, against poor government, against crumbling infrastructures…followed by weak excuses and denials. The students themselves might associate these “observations” with “a black government”. Can you blame them? They don’t need their parents to drive them.
I think you’re absolutely spot on about the parents being to blame. Even the most liberal minded child, retreats back to their family at the end of the days schooling/varsity, and there, the families collective attitudes prevail. How this is solved, I guess is a matter of opinion, but in my humble opinion, I’d say that time is the solution. Not very dynamic, but in years to come, these oldies with their poor ability to adjust, will pass on, and the effects of indoctrination will lessen generation by generation. That’s probably the likelihood going forward……….
I’d like to point out though, that it’s unfair to tar the DA with the ‘Nat’s brush. One has only to look into their policies, and politicians, to see that they are a real genuine opposition, with a njon-racial agenda. In fact, some of their ideas on Zim, crime, and defending the constitution, have been a saving grace for us in the midst of an ANC juggernaught. If some Nats defected back in the day, surely they were the ones interested in transformation? I’d suggest that the die hards, would have felt as unwelcome in the DA, as they would in the ANC……
One day, we’ll vote on policy only Good read though! thanks!
Very one-sided. There is of course no Black racism at all, blacks may do as they like to whites (and most of them know they can do as they like and get a way with it) and nothing is said.
Lazola, don’t worry for too long about it, the new generation are all sending their kids overseas to study…just be patient my firend.
Well – isn’t that a fine example of the pot calling the kettle black.
If I wanted to be really uppity about it, I could point out your own racist sentiments above – its obvious you hate the Afrikaner with some passion.
But suffice to say that as a white professional, the worst racism I’ve ever seen and experienced was directed towards me and my white colleagues by highly educated, well—paid black professionals who don’t even bother to hide the fact that they think we are ignorant, dumb, and not worth a space to breathe in. and then they deny they are racist, because black-on-white racism doesn’t exist.
Wake up and smell the coffee, comrade – racism is the sole domain of the Afrikaner, not even the sole domain of the whitey. Black white, Indian, in SA – and if you go outside our borders, its freaking everywhere. Stop generalising and accept that as long as there is race, there will be issues of racism across all colours from lily-white to shoe-polish-black and all shades of milk, honey and rose petals in between. And it’s all our own fault for perpetuating the stereotypes that give rise to those issues. As you and I have beautifully demonstrated in blog-and-reply. (There goes me playing the man and not the ball – mea culpa!)
Go in peace.
The white SOuth Africans are so hard doen by. It sounds as if they were the victims of apartheid not the benficiaries. The way you carry on one really wonders. To deny white rascism well that just defies the imagination. Very soon whites will have collectively erased apartheid from their memory and rewritten history to make it sound that they were the victims. Thnak goodness for the TRC.
Amused Reader,
Can you please provide 5 examples that you know of a black person attacking a white person where the motivation was solely racism and not robbery?
Lazola,
you are a brave man.
Watch as the laager mentality kicks in, starting with Amused Reader and Gerry. Suddenly, they unearth stories of their black colleagues that are racist.
I wonder they do not report to the police, or is this simply another excuse.
The truth is that there is racism in this country. White South Africans, especially Afrikaners, are seen as the enemy. There is NO movement towards acknowledging the worth of this section of the population. Seeing the worth of one section of the population does not demerit another section at all. But this is what is being done. In redressing the imbalances of the past, current imbalances are being created. But as the white population is the minority, their voices are snuffed out in the “liberation struggle.” What a crock!
Regarding using Afrikaans as a medium of education, I say at least Afrikaners are still using their language. There are eleven official languages, but I have not seen growth in ANY one of them over the past 14 years! Why must Afrikaans be axed when all languages are recognized?
Let us have a Bullard moment here and say that if it wasn’t Afrikaans they rebelled against in 1976, it probably would have been English. Now that everyone can use any language they choose, everyone uses English. Why? Where is your African Pride?
Whites in this country is such an easy target and the black racists are shooting away. Did any one see the insert on Carte Blanche where students were overrun, assaulted and the females sexually harassed by police officials? That is black on white violence, but that is OK.
Eventually all whites will leave South Africa and then only the black, uneducated mass will remain with the educated elite oppressing them. That is the story of Africa : enlightenment of the few at the cost of the many. VIVA LIBERATION! VIVA ELITEST OPPRESSION! VIVA!
I am afraid you lack the ability to learn from debate.
How many hours of my life have I wasted debating on your articles that racism exist everywhere even between black people. Please open your eyes or stop writing. Black Africans have killed more black Africans from different tribes than white people ever have. Rwanda, South Africa (Xhosa/ Zulu), Congo etc etc. Go read up and stop talking nonsense. Some of us actually have to work in this evil capatilistic world created by our evil white ancestors to support your brothers and sisters while they continue to not uplift themselves.
Ndamase, one only needs to look at your profile above, to realize why you’d be gushing such drivel. It’s reminiscent of the “Young Lions” of ANCYL - all balls and no brains. Truth and opinion can never, ever be bedfellows - do you understand that? Get a grip. The country needs people who can think fast and clearly, beyond their propaganda-saturated little worlds. We’re in deep enough trouble as it is, without someone like you self-gratifyingly helping to stoke the fires of hell.
People of different cultures look and act different from one another for a reason - deal with it.
Do you seriously not notice how your promotion of linguicide is very much reminicent of the worst policies that the NATS ever came up with? Your comments are short and hatefull without much substance. I hardly think that anybody in SA would deny white racism, but to try and present this as the only form of racism in SA is stupid and folly - much like you yourself.
why_not_stop_the_blaming? on May 6th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
@Lazola
I agree that parents do play a role in the upbringing of thier childern and are partly to blame, however at the end of the day it is still up to that individual to commit acts of racism
I would also like to point out the fact that generalisation on this topic is quite dangerouse and inconsiderate. It only takes a couple of stupid afrikaaners to make the rest of the white population look bad, the univercity of bloemfontein is a clear example of this, so please in future put the blame where it is due and not in every whites face.
As an alumnus of the RAU (1975-1979), now part of UJ, I am saddened by this post and the events that triggered it.
I think that all humans distinguish between races, cultures, languages, religions, etc. This is sometimes funny and frequently embarrassing.
But real racism, in its discriminatory sense, surely must be pushed out of our lives, and universities SHOULD be ideal places for this to happen.
Now in the days that I was studying there, my parents were no longer influencing my own political or social beliefs, that had been done long before. And I’m glad that I learned that all men (and even women, hehheh) are equal and deserve equal respect.
In my university days and even my army days (1980-1981) and my working days after that, I personally never noticed any racist incidents. My black colleagues in the army and at work were limited in number, though. Now I live and work in Ghana and the shoe is on the other foot. And it fits me well.
Are these incidents a sign of university integration going too fast for some people? I hope not. I hope parents are not to blame, because that would imply a long time to turn the situation around.
Your mind is poisoned, and it is hard to reason with someone who would not acknowledge the truth if it was slapping your around the face with a wet fish!
You know fine well that there is a fundamental difference between breaking into someone’s house, tying them up if necessary, and stealing there goods, and breaking into someones house torturing them for hours, usually accompanied by racist speech, raping and them, often whilst having made other members of the family watch to increase the mental suffering, and then murdering the helpless, defenseless victims before leaving with a coupe of days pay.
You don’t need me to provide links, just go and buy todays paper, or yesterdays, or tomorrows!
If the motive was robbery, they would just take the goods and go. Most victims plead with their attackers to do just that, take my car, take my, money……
These are racist attacks, do not disgrace yourself by pretending they are not.
Fate has a funny way of humbling us all. Be very careful with your glib dismissal of the horrendous hate filled crimes that white people suffer on a daily basis, some higher authority than i may just decide that one day you need to be taught a lesson.
Racism will continue to be perpetuated in SA until such time as the government moves away from racial discrimination of any type. Those same white students are full of agro as they know only too well that once their student days are over, they will not get the jobs their fellow black students will be awarded. This harbours huge resentment. Personally i do not agree with Lazola that the parents are passing racism on via their children. I know of one or two such parents and their children are clearly embarrassed by their parents attitude - these kids will never be racist.But when they go for a job interview, they might start to remember Dad’s racist gospel and think he was maybe right after all.
As a black student at the University of Stellenbosch, I can confirm that your opinions are rather delusional brother. There is a strong resistance against the institutinalisation of political parties role on our campus. We don’t sing the tune of the ANC, IFP, FF+, DA or any party for that matter.
So far my experience in the 5 years here have been great, the best years of my life. I have never been part or know of a racial incident. We have stood together as students against the fight of poverty, more recently against police brutality and against the situation in Zimbabwe, colour has not devided us. If there is any (white placebo)University that a black student will will feel the most comfortable in, this is probably it. I have spend 3 years in a residence, with the majority of housemates being white, however since day one nobody cared what race I am. We shower(community showers), eat, study, party, and have a great time together.
This is not just a place for cocunuts, its for everyone. If I could, I would do these last five years over and not change a single thing.
Lift you opinion, but don’t make retarded assumptions.
Lazola,
I must say that I feel sorry for any one who still thinks there is a place for racism on this planet. I would want to urge the white racists to seriously reflect and see what the future holds for them and their children, should they choose to pursue the superiority complex agenda. Look at countries like Zimbabwe to realise the effects of counter racism. I am of the view that there is enough space for all of us Africans, whether black or white, only if we can cohabit. I am not a prophet of doom, but something tells me that if racism continues at this pace, a time will come when black Africans will say Africa is for black Africans.
Oh, and i forgot to mention Lazola, that the DA never got into bed with the Nationalist Party. That was left to the ANC to absorb and you have all forgotten while you DA bash, that the old Nat Party became the New Nat Party and the new Nat Party merged with the ANC, not the DA. Kortbroek, their former leader was awarded a ministerial position when he became an ANC member. The ANC and the NP are one and the same. You would all do well to remember that when discussing racism.
Interesting article Lazola - I enjoyed reading it. It does worry me that so many of our universities seem… how to say it… stuck in the past. I agree with you that parents’ views form the basis for a large chunk of an individual’s beliefs and views – especially when young.
To my mind universities should be the places where people start to debate and explore both their own views and those of other people, a step on the road to deciding what beliefs/views to let go and what to hold on to. Ideally of course the individual would let go of the ‘you’re not like me I hate you’ views and replace them with ‘we’re all people let’s work together’, but I guess I’m being a little naïve… If someone’s been taught to hate and fear all of their lives will anyone that’s even slightly different ever get through to them?
Perhaps we need to start planting non-hating (extremely persuasive) students who could work on converting the rest…
you want to get rid of the afrikaans language at universities. why is that?
i’m coloured, and i really don’t care for any of these attacks any more than anyone else.
but the constant cry of “afrikaans is bad” is the thing that, i would suspect, is pushing a lot of these young white men into these messed-up acts, not just their parents.
the nearest university to my house has gone from being an afrikaans-medium university to an english-medium university. i, too, am not particularly thrilled about the attrocities visited upon me during apartheid, but i would like my children to go to a university that teaches in the same language that their grandparents speak.
that language is afrikaans.
it’s so funny, naledi pandor and all of the left-wingers scream and holler about the importance of home-language education — but if that language is afrikaans, it turns out to be a great big lie [viz ermelo].
i don’t see people screaming to ban english at universities. from a historical point of view, english was used as a hard stick far more than afrikaans was. however, since afrikaans was done in this matter in recent historical memory, it’s the one that gets the grief and problems these days.
of course you know that afrikaans was the slave language. i don’t know how they managed to teach around this fact at stellenbosch and pretoria and rau, but that’s the case. the first book in afrikaans was tuan guru’s rote writing of the koran when he was locked up on robben island. the arabic script in the old mosques in central cape town? while the script is arabic, the language is afrikaans.
sentiments like yours, paul, is the reason that widespread coloured support for the anc is not going to happen. proposing that the government take away the language of one group just because it so punishes another with a similar linguistic history… that’s rubbish.
first, white people come and rape our san and nguni ancestors, and bring in our malay and malagasy ancestors in on slave ships.
our native languages are largely lost, but we create a new one.
then the white people appropriate that language, give us some rights, take them back away, and keep us in limbo and try to split us depending on how white or how black we look.
then the blacks come to power and tell us, in deed, if not as much in words, that we’re not black enough for a lot of things in the “new” south africa.
and now you’re suggesting that they take away higher education in OUR language. the white people might have twisted and appropriated it, but afrikaans is OUR language. it was OUR language. sure, it’s based on the language of SOME of the white people that came and raped us, but let me tell you, you’re not going to go to france and find people with the last name of du plessis or du toit or terreblanche that speak dutch.
afrikaans is OUR language. the white man was so jealous of it that he co-opted it, as he is wont to co-opt everything he likes, but we are proud of OUR language.
and you want it to go away? sorry, mate. i don’t think so.
If these students where not around during apartheid, then what is making them racialistic?
In the book Mein Kampf written by Adolf Hitler , he attributed his hatred for the Jewish to a time when he went walking the streets of austria in search of work. Every shop had a “no vacancy” sign up and smiling Jewish workers behind the counters.
You cannot have discrimanatory laws against any population group - regardless of wether you call it justified discrimination or not, and be surprised by racial resentment from that group….haven’t we learned that lesson from our past?
White students are being discriminated against every day….they see there parents losing their lifelong jobs, losing business oppurtunities, and the various other Measures of suffering attributed to AA, BEE etc that these Childrens parents are going through. Because of their war crimes and racist guilt imposed by the “black racist agenda”
Don’t imagine that these kids are not affected by what is happening to their parents, and they don’t look for the cause, the reason’s.
I am sorry my friend, but it is your “black racist” society and white discrimination that is breeding the new generation of “white racists”
Can we blame the parents of all criminals who attack farmers, people (black and white) in the streets, in their homes, and cars…and violently slaughter them regardless of race.
I think that is too simplistic. White students are beginning to respond to a “black racist agenda” in similar fashion to the black response to our “white racist” past.
The end is for the police to move in and execute them en masse, because that problem is not going away until discrimination against whites in this country is outlawed.
White students becoming racist does not need to be blamed on parents. I have never used the K word in front of my children. My ex is very liberal and always invites black children to my children’s birthday parties (but not in my home) and always tries to make them mix with blacks (my children don’t invite them nor want them).
After this forced integration my children prefer not to be around blacks. The reason? The behaviour of black children in the forcibly integrated schools, not teh colour of their skin. By the time they reach 6, children already distinguish the difference in behaviour between white and black and choose their environment accordingly, as is their right.
Many children today are far more racist at a younger age than we ever were, becuase they are forced to deal with the anti-social behaviour at a younger age.
As Rudyard Kipling wrote in Beyond the Pale:
A MAN should, whatever happens, keep to his own caste, race and breed. Let the White go to the White and the Black to the Black. Then, whatever trouble falls is in the ordinary course of things- neither sudden, alien nor unexpected.
So lazola, stop trying to blame incidents at university on white racism when a person who is white objects to a type of behaviour that is offensive to their upbringing. Please allow our youth to express their Freedom of Association without your fear of ‘racism’ creeping in.
Of the former Nat voters, yes some of us support the VF+. Have we become more ‘racist’? If so you can pin the cause on the policies and accomplishments of the ANC.
Lazola you so spot on!!! and its so sad that the place where we suppose to expand our thinking and enhance our capabilities are now the place where we get in white afrikaans term “hulle ons op ons plek gaan sit”. The present governement can also be blamed for in some cases allowing and in some cases even sponsoring these platforms being created in the name of arts take for example KKK.
Racism is a matter of choice. Blame the students not their parents. I have seen many students who come from racist families becoming good fellows at college. These students need to be educated in school that racism is already aborted.
Oh, c’mon L…How old are you anyway? Aren’t you an entitled individual who’s Born Free? Don’t you now live the life of freedom under the guvment YOU voted for? With all the bells and whistles? Or are you not even old enough for that? Why are you so intent on scratching in a past where you were still in Dad’s bag…?
Don’t you have better things to do with your time? Obviously not… you obviously have nothing to do, i.e. a job, where one actually works for an income, takes responsibility and does something to better oneself and life for your loved ones…
And, by the way - no one owes you anything, Not an education, not a hand-out, or a roof over your head…and if you think life owes you, you’re even more brainwashed and arrogant than I thought.
This is just another pathetic example of sensationalistic hate speech and propaganda to perpetuate the ‘victim’ mindset of: not my fault, all the Great White’s fault.
Try to be a Thought Leader, and stop being a whinger.
One of the greatest bands that ever lived and still rock on, the Eagles, wrote a song called “Get over it” - I’ll post you the lyrics to assist in your education, which you obviously believe is someone else’s job, while you doodle mindless rhetoric and inflammatory racism.
The first law of blogging says….”if you have nothing to say and want to get readers attention then write about racism”.
The second law of blogging says….”if you have writers block simply refer back to previous blogs on racism”
The third law of blogging says…..”when writing about racism there is no need to be original”
The effect is as predictable as a gathering of flies around a rotting corpse. And just as useful. If you say it often enough then all your readers will believe you. Such crushing boredom because you have all the same people saying all the same things, ad nauseam
I have read your posts, I will take my time to respond succinctly to all of them, both fact and fiction.
By the way, this is my fourth post on racism. To all those who claim I am racist. Start reading my views on BEE titled “Black Economic disempowerment”. Also read, was it racism or was I paranoid, and God save us from the racists, and see if you will not cut your own tongues in the end!
Yeah, Amused Reader makes a valid point. Maybe, just maybe, those parents of the white students are getting angry at the huge amount of violent crime commited by blacks against whites, and the children, are in turn beginning to absorb the same anger. In most instances the violence associated with the crime was not necessary. Racially motivated? No doubt. But those incidents are too often conveniently ignored by the government.
Len van der Merve, your question: when victums get raped, lengthy torture after and during a robbery (in one incident the robbers ransacked the farm at +- 0900 and waited until 1300 for the farmer and his wife to come back from church to kill him and brutally main her) that is racial hate not just robbery
Hey Lazola!
I notice that you call yourself a Marxist-Lininist. I hope you know that Lenin was a racist - he regarded blacks as, ‘considerably’ inferior.
Bearing this in mind, what’ll you call yourself now? Perhaps, a Marxist-Lininist-Racist, or a Racist-Marxist-Leninist, or Marxist-Leninist-Racist.I’m rather interested to hear.
Oh, by the way pal, the Berlin Wall…she came down some time ago - just in case you have’nt heard.
People are inveitably influenced by their parents’ outlook, and shout and kick all you like, white South Africans, Afrikaaners in particular, need to start taking a good long look at what they really believe, and whether this is acceptable in the modern world.
If there was NO ugly white-on black racism anymore, the arguments against Lazola would sound valid, but as it is they are just hollow.
We should all be agreeing vehemently and saying “yes, we need to get rid of racism completely” rather than defending your corner of it.
The denial that is reflected in these responses makes me loose any little hope that I had that we will overcome racism. It seems we have another group that is emerging, it could be called “racism denialists”. But as we know denialism has a short life span as it is soon gets overtaken by facts. The only thing that denialists do is to deflect attention from the real issues and thus delaying us from dealing with the issues.
Lazola
DOn’t back down. The cacophany of rascism is all over this blog. You would think it was the whites who suffered under apartheid. WHy in 2008 is it still blacks who suffer most from poverty, why is still blacks who die earlier and seek treatment late. Teh economy is skewed in favour of the whites. They are only happy if the natives are not uppity. A good native must know his place and then his white master is happy. Remeber Steven Biko, sometimes I wish that we had more BC and less Freedom Charter
You can blame white Afrikaner parents or not, what about Coloureds who suck on these ruthless people’s deeds… believing that they are also superior over Africans. People can be furious about it but it’s a plain fact. They dismiss quota systems on sport more than their counter-parts (Whites). I used to be agitated trying to explain the use of such system in our sport, but it was just like pouring a pinch of salt in a stream. They would attack me saying, “What blacks know about this and that”? …I should also mention that not all coloured people are like that, it’s mainly Cape Townians that behave like that, but also not all of them…Whoever is behind racism must just stop the damn thing, when are gonna live together in harmony without undermining ourselves?
Everytime I see the name Len van der Merwe my
blood starts to boil,because his outlook is so warped,that I am sure he lives in another dimension
a sort of parallel universe so to speak.
Racism or tribalism is so entrenched in mankind
that even in so called ‘homogeneous’tribes rivalry
between clans was and is so intense that even today
rival soccer clubs supporters take delight in
bassing each others heads in.
In large cities there are parts you dont want
to be caught in late at night because they will
f.. you up irrespective of your colour.
The problem is that once you are starting to mix
people of different culture,language, backgrounds tribal associations there is always going to be friction because certain groups (even in animals) dont tolerate on what they regard as intrusion on their turf.
Just think back to your school days and you could
clearly see diffrent groups forming and some
regarded themselves so exclusive that only
by special introduction or achievement you could
join them.
This happens even in the most civilised families
certain members are well let me say just not of
the same class and standing in society and best
not seen with in public.
Just as there is no rainbow that contains black
South Africa will see a united nation, unless
they all become one colour and then they will
still donner each other, ask the coloureds if
you dont believe me.
So believe me people, get hold of yourself and
dont let isolated incidents rule your life, better
spend your time to bring criminals to book
and see and insist that they land in jail for a long time because that is there they belong and just be nice to one another without the necessity of holding hands,I hate sweaty palms.
@Lazola
Mate, I agree this issue is strictly to be taken on the parents’ responsibility. In fact, in a society that’s aiming to achieve a multiracial status, and where every student has had over and over the opportunity to hear about democracy, equal opportunities, rainbow society, etc., these students have had all the chances to become informed on the civic standards that rule SA. Why do they keep being pariahs? Because something is insistently being kept out of these guys’ formation programme. And the only aspect that has been left out of social management is… the private sphere. Yes, the familiar formation, which stands on the parental’s responsibility.
Somewhere in mid-primary school, my kid asked me permission to fight back if bullied. I said yes, but not before making sure he understood what the main principle was: Respect. Respect on the others’ point of views, and on their right to put them out in a civilised manner. Respect for the weak, on their right to be among the stronger, and on the other way around too. Respect for people to get along with living, in a peaceful way. This includes black & white considerations, and mixing of these, too.
These basic principles, being put forward by a father – or by someone on his behalf – seemed to me as crucial for the kid’s character formation, and I think it’s been working so far, being him halfway on his university graduation. In fact, I’m proud it has worked so well, and I believe it was a direct result of that parental guidance which I’ve just described, even if there was a lot of his own common sense and self-respect.
So, I think this is what I think is missing in many kids nowadays. By the way, it was already also missing a lot, back in my Pietersburg high school times in 73-75, and afterwards at university.
So, I agree with you: it’s the parents’ responsibility.
I can only speak for my self, but certainly was not insinuating that you are racist. What i was saying is that you must balance your views. If you are going to attack racially motivated violence, which after all is a worthy cause indeed, then have the honesty to recognise that blacks are just as likely to be the perpetrators as the victims.
@ Zola
I am really glad that your experience has been such a good one. With so much focus on the bad, it is great to hear about the good to keep a sense of perspective.
@ Munya
I think that the majority of blacks, coloureds, Indians and whites agree that there should be no place for racism in SA. White supremacists are in the minority, within the white community, as i hope are blacks who believe whites do not belong in Africa.
I think you confuse the issue. In general terms white people have 2 issues.
The first is that the government is not doing a very good job. That they are a black government is NOT the issue. Sometimes we whites can become confused on this issue because in general white governments have performed better, so it is easy to lose focus that it is the incompetence that is the problem. not the colour. That is our fault, but we ARE entitled to demand a competent government.
The second issue is racial discrimination. We think that the black government, and many black people (just read thought leader) are hypocrites. You, quite rightly, were unwilling to accept racial discrimination against you, but no sooner are you in power, and you are practicing it. Your motives are no more pure or acceptable than the previous regimes, and how you hope to combat racial discrimination with more racial discrimination i have no idea. For people to then winge because whites don’t just lie there and take it does take the biscuit a little.
Lastly, i hope that last part of your post was not a veiled threat. We have the right to freedom of speech, we can criticise the government. SA is not Zimbabwe. 4m whites is not the same as 100,000. I hope for all our sakes that no one tries to force white people out, it wouldn’t be pretty and we would all be losers.
The country’s infrastructure is disintegrating. Millions are dying of aids. 20000 people dying in murders annually. 55000 women raped. But we’re worrying about so-called “white racism”.
What about blaming blacks parents for not preventing their children from becoming murderers and rapists?
*Yawn* Another diatribe about racism. It’s getting a bit boring now as nearly every “Thought Leader” has covered the subject. Can we build a bridge and GET OVER IT already!!!
None of the people who have covered the touchy subject have actually said anything useful, meaningful or in the slightest bit interesting. It’s the same old, same old. Blogging is truly the cancer of the Internet.
Maybe the “Thought Leaders” can go with something more positive, more inspiring next time. I know it won’t generate as many responses (maybe it’s a competition amongst yourselves, who knows?) but at least you get to sleep better at night knowing you’ve done some good in the world.
Well Ou Kaapse Taal no -one is saying you cannot speak Afrikaans at home. But do you really want your children to be educated in a local langauge with no international reach. English is a world langauage and shoyuld be the langauge for all tertiary institutes. Mother tongue education was a deliberate Ntaionalist ploy to prevent black people achieving academically,. Now Afrikaans is being used as an excuse to keep black people out of SOuth African univeristies. These are not AFRIKAANS univeristies, they belong to the whole country and as such should be accessible to all Langauge specific univerisities simply promote insular nationalism and tribalism
Do you seriously not notice how your promotion of linguicide is very much reminicent of the worst policies that the NATS ever came up with? Your comments are short and hatefull without much substance. I hardly think that anybody in SA would deny white racism, but to try and present this as the only form of racism in SA is stupid and folly - much like you yourself.
Teh Nats if I remember correctly promoted Afrikaans extensively by forcing adverts to be in both laguages and by dubbing English programs into Afrikaans. If a langauge needs so much artificial support you have to wonder. Mother tongue education was designed to divide people and keep blacks tribalized. By having one langauge of instruction we do away with these divisions and promote a single nationality. If people are concerned about preserving Afrikaans there is nothing to stop them forming a cultural orgaization, Just don;t ask me to subsidize it with ta money.
You cannot have discrimanatory laws against any population group - regardless of wether you call it justified discrimination or not, and be surprised by racial resentment from that group….haven’t we learned that lesson from our past?
White students are being discriminated against every day….they see there parents losing their lifelong jobs, losing business oppurtunities, and the various other Measures of suffering attributed to AA, BEE etc that these Childrens parents are going through. Because of their war crimes and racist guilt imposed by the “black racist agenda”
Don’t imagine that these kids are not affected by what is happening to their parents, and they don’t look for the cause, the reason’s.
This is too sad. I bet you never had much to say when black people were excluded form jobs or education or sports teams in teh past.
Len van der Merwe, you issue a demand to Amused Reader:
“Amused Reader,
Can you please provide 5 examples that you know of a black person attacking a white person where the motivation was solely racism and not robbery?”
How depraved has our country become if robbery is now an act of sanctification. As long as the attacker does not merely kill, maim, rape and vandalize but bears in mind to steal something, then he is merely guilty of murder and robbery but at least he is innocent of the much more heinous crime of recognizing differences between races?
What if he kills, maims, rapes etc. but it slips his mind to steal something? Will he then be a racist?
What a warped vision of the world you have!
In a later post you ask, can we just get along.
The answer is of course, no, we can’t. Not while we with all our different cultures share the same space.
The only solution for lasting peace in this country is to remove us, the racist bastard Afrikaners, give us our own part of the country and let each rule himself according to his own traditions.
Well, well, a black person “whingeing” …! I don’t know why, though. Just hang in there a bit longer, Lazola - whites are being targeted in South Africa and will eventually all be gone, be it through murder or emigration.
One of the greatest bands that ever lived and still rock on, the Eagles, wrote a song called “Get over it” - I’ll post you the lyrics to assist in your education, which you obviously believe is someone else’s job, while you doodle mindless rhetoric and inflammatory racism.
I mean calling the Eagles one of the greatest rock bands ever is a bit much. Middle of the road radio friendly is more like it. At least ABBA fans don’t get pretentious.
Well all the chest beating and wringing of hands from whites is a bit much. I mean how terrible the suffering is. Apartheid distorted everything. it disadvantaged whole generations of blacks. Being birn free doesn’t mean you are suddenly on an equal footing. If your parenst did not finish high school and are uneducated then it is unlikely that you are going to be able to go to university and become a professional. You will probably end up as a casual laborer and the cycle will continue. We need to break the cycle and this require intervention. The poor white problem was only addressed by massive state intervention. Even today it appears as some whites are in danger of slippingh back into poverty. So we need to intervene to address imbalance. Mayeb AA is a blunt instrument but it is designed to try and redress imbalance. Claiming that ot is morally wrong is hypocritical when you are sitting with amassed advantages from previous generations. I wish white South Africans would just stop whingeing about how hard done by they are
The fact of the matter is that, most students at Tertiary, both black and white come from families. These students embody in themselves, both the positive and negative aspects of family teachings.
Indeed, both blacks and whites are racist from time to time. But tell me please, where have the voters of the NP gone to? Where have the supporters of apartheid gone to? Are they dead? Or are they born again? If they no longer exist, please tell me where these kids at Tertiary get the temerity to shout “Viva AWB!” in a university anti racism campaign?
Where do they get the information that they must beat a white student if they see him/her associating with people of what they see as inferior race? Maybe I am mad, but until proven otherwise I still remain convinced that the mothers and fathers of these kids are to blame for what they imparted on an innocent child from breastfeeding to tertiary!
@ Amused Reader
I agree with you, that blacks are racist in South Africa. Please tell me, are you convinced that these “******” are more racist than those that viewed them as half human?
You know very well, that white people, as a result of apartheid are viewed as rich or most likely to be rich therefore making them targets for Tsotsi’s seeking money. This is not to say none of the robbery incidents are driven by racism, but most of them are committed by Tsotsi’s seeking money.
Please tell me, do you know of any black person whose life was spared by Tsotsi’s on the basis of colour? If there are none, this must tell both you and me that crime is crime irrespective of who is robbed? Racism is racism, irrespective of who it affects.
@ Why not stop the blaming
Of course, Afrikaners do feel marginalized in the new South Africa and indeed they are marginalized. Who says I do not sympathize with them? I have mentioned it in many of my writings on thoughtleader that our Afrikaner (and English) natives deserve better.
If you read my blog “black economic disempowerment” I said I have a problem with BEE since it seems to give blacks a permanent economic privilege over whites. I say the same of affirmative action. I even go to the extent of saying that to me, affirmative action should be on the basis of class and not race.
Where are these decisions taken, in the DA or the FF? Unfortunately in the ANC. Maybe people should have listened to Marthinus Van Schalkwyk when he urged them to join the ANC. An example of this is floor crossing. Floor crossing was passed by the ANC and is now to be abolished by the ANC. I have never liked floor crossing, but shouting from the streets has not ended it but work amongst the ANC rank and file.
Many ANC members, myself included are fed up with BEE. Would your presence in the ANC add more numbers to the anti-BEE choir? Think of what is best for SA and ensure that you positively participate.
@ JP Smith
I agree with you JP, should I not invite you as a fellow writer here, writing side by side with me. That would be such a unity of the opposites. Unity and struggle would be the basis of the relationship. Marx would call it a dialectical unity.
Please read “Black economic disempowerment”, maybe you will realize that I long make similar accusations to our government. But this paper was specifically about the origins of racism from school children.
@ Paul
The use of language is to communicate nothing more, nothing less. However, in South Africa, language has been used as an instrument to dominate and asset one’s belonging. Should this continue? Imagine, the suggestions that everyone must be taught in their mother tongue.
We have some 10 bloody African Languages and I include Afrikaans. Now tell me, after everyone is taught in their own language, who will speak to who is whose language in the years to come. Both for economic and practical reasons, English must be allowed to permeate society; it has already done so, though it was through colonization.
Why can’t most Afrikaners accept that language is for communication nothing more nothing less? Maybe our fellow natives are still bitter about the Anglo-Boer war that located the Briton as the supreme ruler over Africans not the descendants of the employees of the Dutch East India Company!
@ Benzo L
You raise an important point, about fee increment. Should we not blame the University for provoking students by threatening them with lack of education? Maybe you want me to take it further.
Maybe you will tell me that we must blame the University for provoking white students by integrating residences. Look at the difference. We suffer this humiliation on a daily basis. Please don’t tell me to retaliate so that I can stop blaming and be blamed as well.
@ Scarface
Ah Scarface! I never said such a thing. But for the record, blacks are at times racist too. But apartheid was not a government of blacks was it. Blacks were not the one’s voting for the apartheid government to maintain its policies election after election.
@ Gerry
I have mentioned no such thing about hating the Afrikaner native, but you decide to ascribe it to me nevertheless without lifting even a single sentence to prove your point. He/she who alleges must prove.
Face it, most students who have been involved in racist incidents here at the former RAU are Afrikaners not English speaking whites. Therefore I am supposed to mention where they come from. In fact let me go further, all these students that have been involved in racist incidents here at school come from the farms.
None of the town-bred Afrikaner students have been found in any of these incidents. Can you complete the analysis for me, on the role of farmers in the sustenance of the apartheid regime. In fact so significant was this role such that Umkhonto Wesizwe (MK) resolved that farmers form a part of the apartheid defence force.
@ Van der Merve
Thank you, your question covers me. By the way, are you related to that comrade who declared the man with the shower as not guilty, if you are, join politics, you would win elections back to back.
@ Hlakile
I believe you are African, why did you not write you piece in your mother tongue so as to show your African pride. Is it because you wanted to communicate? If so, why do you want to encourage lack of communication from others?
Lest take a la Bullard, and suppose we were all proud, and speaking in our own languages. Since I am Pondo I would writing in my unrecognized Pondo language do you expect Sotho’s, Pedi’s, Venda’s and even Afrikaners to understand what the hell I wrote here?
@ Du Toit
Oh Du Toit, I apologise for wasting your time. But I believe that if we all agree that both blacks and whites are racist therefore quit trying to convince me, we already agree. Maybe the difference, is that I will write my own experiences, which are that of a black man, surely you will write your own which will be that of a white man. Therefore there are no problems.
But tell me what is meant by the sentence “Some of us actually have to work in this evil capatilistic world created by our evil white ancestors to support your brothers and sisters while they continue to not uplift themselves.” Does this mean we cannot work to support ourselves? That is unfortunate as a statement but I accept it, it is what you really feel. Should we blame Bullard for this, some will say so but I think not.
@ Yo Aunti
Maybe I should make as if I see nothing when I walk on campus and a young boy is pushed aside the street so as his masters can pass. Is that what you are suggesting? I will not keep quiet when these things happen in front of me. If only you knew how tedious it is to write about these things, but their existence forces me to tell them.
If these incidents were not occurring, I would have enough time to talk about the fumbling of the man with the pipe (Thabo Mbeki) and the hilarious statements by Susan Shabangu.
@ Lukec
Only a fool can blame the rest of white South Africans just because of actions by a few racist morons. I think, South Africans as well, should refuse to take blame for actions of people from their own ethnic or race group.
I refuse to take blame for the tribalist manner some Xhosa’s approach ANC matters. Zulu’s should equally refuse to take blame for the tribalist tendencies of the IFP and Mangosuthu.
@ Ant K
Come now Ant K, you know very well that many NP and NNP supporters did not join the ANC, but defected to the DA, the FF and the AWB. Marthinus joined the ANC as acceptance of its historical correctness. If he joined it to be minister he would be stupid. There is no guarantee that the man with the shower will give him the job, so there are no guarantees. You know very well that patronage is Thabo’s favourite cousin.
@ Lauren
Amongst the victims is Mathew a good friend of mine. He was bashed for standing with a black girl. Imagine such violence against a man for being human.
@ Consulting Engineer
Welcome back. We’ve had this conversation before. All my responses to others count as one response to you.
@ Walt
Do you have any evidence about Lenin’s racism. Any revolutionary must be judged according to his work, can you provide any proof in order to judge Lenin. I cannot judge Lenin on the basis of rumours.
Lazola
It is difficult for me, a 30-year old Afrikaans lecturer at UP, to decide how to engage with you in a dialogue. I am not a racist, yet according to your categories I am - even though you never even met me. So how can I enter into a conversation with you when you have already categorized me by virtue of my skin-colour, my language, my age and my job, as one of the “Wolves of the apartheid order (that) are lecturing in the universities”?
To be honest, I am not sure that your approach is of much help if we really want to build a respectful and integrated society.
Jean Cooper
You are quite right about the parents being to blame, although they only deserve part of the blame. My worry thou, is that all these comedians who keep sending you jokes in the name of replies do not realise that apartheid was not some form of revolution, reaction yes, but it was more of an attack than defense reaction mechanisn.
Amused reader, JP Smith and their team of wishful and (suprisingly) defensive blogging comrades all seem to think that apartheid ended with the ballot casting of 1994. Let me tell you what happened in 1994. In 1994 we changed the governance of the Republic of South Africa. In 1994 we removed a national party government that created, nourished and protected apartheid for many many years.
What we never did in 1994 was to remove the racist attitudes, bahaviours and thinking that was so prevailant pre-1994, hence we still, and will continue to see racist motivated ill-bahaviours of the South African society today.
What is foolish is to think that since the fire has died, the wood will be fresh and repaired again to become a tree, and all this must happen so quickly that nobody realises that we need rain to water the burnt tree.
What I have noticed personally is that there are a lot of people who miss their previously previleged positions in society. For them, blacks must sweat for the same privileges that they got for free unfairly from the system of apartheid. This, unfortunately, includes the parents of all these troubled kids going around trying to relive the heydays of “good neighbourliness”
Also, the previously advantaged need to realise that until that which was taken from the previously disadvantaged during colonialism and the system of “good neighbourliness” needs to be given back, the whole of it. The ground needs to be level before we can even start thinking of a non-racial society.
Until then, you guys can continue to dream while some of us maneuver to get back what is rightfully ours, in all ways possible…AA, BEE and all.
Mr Ndamase a leader? Yes, well, I suppose they come in all shapes. But a THOUGHT leader? You must be joking! Reading Ndamase’s article, I think English needs a new word to describe his attitue: “Balunguphobia”.
I am so glad I left that crap country with its daily boredom of racist talks and crime. Man the rest of the world has so much more to offer. Lets face it, SA is going down. Apartheid just delayed things. Africa works in its own special way. My only question is why did God waste so much bounty on such a bunch of blood losers?
Yes, why is it ALWAYS racist based!? it is SO negative coming here..finding just ANOTHER article based on racism… start writing positive articles.. we are fed-up with being classified as racists… racists are ALL over the world..even here in Europe where i work.. even my Amercan friends tell me about racism in the US! it’s not “new” … get used to it.. it’s like somebody say to you..oh, you’re ugly (bullying) and you say..oh your mum’s…whatever and so on… too much stress on RACISM…everthing in SA is just RACISM..get a life… write about the beauty of the country…write about those friends of mine having a soup kitchen for blacks in various areas of Acasia in Pretoria… write about the PEOPLE and the POSITIVE side of living in the country!!! in that way..GET RID OF RACISM…by writing about it..you keep it LIVE!!
So, only whites are racists and that’s because their parents made them that way?
What then if I aver, equivalently, that only blacks are car-hijackers and that’s because their parents made them that way?
While the white racists do little more than call you a few names and those at the higher end of the offending scale rough you up a little with their bare hands, the common-or-garden hijacker points a loaded gun to your head and, at the upper end, pulls the trigger.
Which is the more morally-deplorable: the roughneck racist or the murderous highjacker?
Confirmed. Amuzed Reader (twice), Brandon, Consulting Engineer and Brent have all correctly confirmed (with facts) that the majority of black-on-white crime is racially motivated.
So, to those of you that continue to harp on about supposed racist white people…understanf for once and for all what the root causes of that racism may be.
Until the government acknowledges these racially-motivated crimes, and acts against them, just accept that whites have reason to have some form of racism. Deal with the causes and this racism may go away.
Ja Ouboet,
I am saving this blog as another example of the new SA thought leaders who are stereotyping Afrikaners. (A form of racism.)
When I was hi-jacked and shot at the one black hi-jacker called me a f*kken Boer. (A derogative name for Afrikaners)
He was black.
I am white.
Now, it is clear race played a role here because he coud have taken my car without shooting at me and without swearing at me. He shot me because I was white and he clearly hated “Boere”.
He was black. (I said it before)
Now, if I am also guilty of stereotyping, I would ask:
“Some might be tempted to say Peter Mokaba’s statements did the trick, I think not. I am convinced the answers lie elsewhere. This is not to deny that Peter Mokaba’s statements might have played a role, however…”
(I replaced your words “David Bullard’s articles” with Peter Mokaba’s Statments” - Kill the Boer Kill the Farmer!”)
Let me continue a la Lazola:
“Despite the fact that many hi-jackers were born between 1983 and 1989 and may have no personal experience of apartheid… Their parents do not accord them that opportunity. They do their best to impart on their children what they suppose should be the status quo. They teach them the most hideous of racist rituals so as to ensure that they fix it firmly in the young white child that he is superior to blacks, despite the teachings of society to the contrary. The blame lies squarely with the parents and the untransformed grannies and daddies of the old apartheid order, not with the kids.” Slogans such as “Kill the Boer Kill the Farmer” were rife during Apartheid.
Most of those who shouted these slogans are not in the DA but in the ANC. “There is no way that they have repented and become born again and suddenly become non–racist. They are still racist as ever!”
Let me go on a la Lazola:
“Most Black South Africans, including Xhosas, profess non–racialism; therefore several questions need to be asked.”
That question is:
WHY DO SO MANY BLACK COMMENTATORS TEND TO STEREOTYPE AFRIKANERS?
Is that not a form of racial prejudice?
Ouboet, but rest assured, unlike you, I do not stereotype black people because I was hi-jacked by a black man who insulted my race in the process.
Try to do the same. Your article hurt me as much as Bullard may have hurt you. We are all equal. Really. You have no more right to insult other races than Bullard.
Brent,
The presumption is that only white victims suffer this fate. I presume you would consider it racism that a 3 year old black child is raped and killed by someone who believes they will be free of HIV. What of revenge? It obviously seems the case you mention might be revenge based on how the farmers have treated some of their workers, one would not be surprised.
You list only one particular case, and yet your conclusions seem to imply a much wider issue. Hate is obviously in the event you mention, but you cannot claim that it is motivated solely by race because then it would happen regularly and to random individuals rather than farmers.
Rightly or wrongly, the issue seems unrelated to race and related more to hatred of the farm owner. It does seem to an intelligent human being that tis person has an axe to grind and this event was targetted at one FAMILY, onlike the Skiliek killer who targetted a larger group of random individuals
Lazola, I agree that parents impact on the way their children think and behave BUT if they have the intellect to qualify for university surely they have the adult capacity to make decisions and judgements for themselves? At what age should we take responsibility for our own actions?
I’m also anxious by your very sweeping statements - in an otherwise good piece - suggesting that racism persistently happens in a few institutions. I think that most kids get on. They choose to mix or don’t mix, either way it does not matter as long as they are peaceable and respectful toward each other. I think that most acts of prejudice are subtle and go unreported and I think it happens everywhere. I believe that people are entitled to their individual beliefs & I regret that people will always find a mechanism, especially the insecure to try and make themselves appear superior to someone else - if it’s not race, it’s religion, age, sexual preference … But anything that causes harm to another has to be condemned & with excessive rates of violence in this country and a lack of action opposing it from the top, should we be surprised that so many vile acts persist?
Gustav,
Swallow a chill bru.
I am not the one that made claims, I simply asked the person who made a claim to prove it. Really, your post is senseless to the point of inane.
Ndamase,
I have to admit that I have no clue what you refer to regarding the man with the shower cap.
Amused Reader,
“Your mind is poisoned, and it is hard to reason with someone who would not acknowledge the truth if it was slapping your around the face with a wet fish!”
You made a claim and I asked for proof. One would think this was something simple if your claims were based on fact. It does seem that they are not based on fact, as you failed to provide even one example, and so you rely on what idiots often find comforting i.e. personal attacks.
Believe you me, getting insults from the likes you does very little to affect my day. In fact, it makes me fel better than I am hated by a racist who cannot even scrample two facts together to support their statements.
“You know fine well that there is a fundamental difference between breaking into someone’s house, tying them up if necessary, and stealing there goods, and breaking into someones house torturing them for hours, usually accompanied by racist speech, raping and them, often whilst having made other members of the family watch to increase the mental suffering, and then murdering the helpless, defenseless victims before leaving with a coupe of days pay.”
again, you provide little much in the category of facts, other than accusations. Please provide examples of this scenario which makes it, as you put it “Proportionally a white person is far more likely to be the victim of violent acts committed by a racially motivated black person, than the other way round, and the violence is usually far far worse.”
Your statement implies that there are more cases of racially motivated attacks by black people on white people. I can mention five attacks by white people on black people that are, on the surface, racist. I merely ask you for 5 to then help understand your conclusion.
You seem even incapable of supporting your own statements and so I find this whole exercise rather silly.
“You don’t need me to provide links, just go and buy todays paper, or yesterdays, or tomorrows!”
I read today, yesterday’s papers and did not find what you are on about. Have not read tomorrow’s paper but I suspect that you have not read either yourself and so cannot use those to arrive at a conclusion.
however, feel free to provide references. You do not need to tell me the newspaper or the source (though useful) rather the story line and why you believe they reflect racism than revenge or robbery.
“If the motive was robbery, they would just take the goods and go. Most victims plead with their attackers to do just that, take my car, take my, money……”
Black people have been murdered in robberies even after pleading with their attackers. Unfortunately, it happen often.
There is something called REVENGE or even other motives than race. One would be daft to simply infer that if someone was tortured and killed, it could only be racial, as that would imply the cases of 16000 murders in the country a year would be racist.
“These are racist attacks, do not disgrace yourself by pretending they are not.”
I think disgracing myself after that weak argument would be impossible. But again, you do not seem to understand logic. If it is not robbery, amused reader believes it is racist.
There are gang hits, there are mistaken identities, there is revenge, there is murder to hide another crime, there is intimidation.
But no, Mr Amused Reader believes that if it not robbery, then it is racism.
Criminals kill people because they fear being identified or simply due to hatred.
Most victims of crime in South Africa are black as are perpetrators of such violence.
Research after research found the crimes against farmers was mostly robbery, but there are cases where people who believe were mistreated by farmers cme back for revenge. Obviously, this does not make this any palatable, but it is a fact.
Farmers have been known to abuse those that work for them and there has been a case of a Zimbabwean worker killing his boss who refused to pay him and instead threatened to send him to the police.
Happy to provide the facts, something you have failed to do so far.
“Fate has a funny way of humbling us all. Be very careful with your glib dismissal of the horrendous hate filled crimes that white people suffer on a daily basis, some higher authority than i may just decide that one day you need to be taught a lesson.”
This is pathetic even for a loser like you.
I have been a victim of crime, but I saw that as robbery rather than a hate crime.
I suppose if you stub your toe, you will accuse the ANC of making it happen.
Get a life, boet otherwise you sound like a joke.
I am wondering if you had any interesting thing in mind or just a loo-ly thought. You could have done well by challenging the thoughts invisiaged in the article.
Laz
I have been at UP myself and I just want to confirm to you that the culture upheld by that institution is way away from the new dispensation. I have seen how many of the black students get frustrated with “singing for the houses” and worshiping the caretakers who are mainly white at their reses.
Luckily I was not subjected to such black humuliating afrikaner practises. How could I a comrade of my calibre would certainly confuse the Tukkies management until they gave up.
The student leaders like you need to challenge this Universities to try and defend these mad practices particularly regarding black students. If we are a diversified nation we should be very weary of thrusting sick and overseas cultures to black students simply because thier studies are paid for by the government.
Quote “This is too sad. I bet you never had much to say when black people were excluded form jobs or education or sports teams in the past.”
At least you are honest - so we can’t call you hypocritical!
Because Blacks where discriminated against, white Children should now be discriminated against. That is the gist of your response. because it was the case….this legitimizes current exclusionary and discriminatory practices.
Well just as I said Mr Sam……black people resisted violently when they where discriminated against, do you expect the white kids to react any differently?
And secondly — your ilk are fond of going about making judgment on what white people - who you don’t even know, did or said or felt during the apartheid years. Do you know that hundreds of white people where jailed for up to six years for refusing to submit to military service, are you aware of many thousands of other similar acts of resistance by white people which led to their actual suffering during the apartheid years? Of course many whites approved of the racialistic policies, many resented it silently and passively resisted, for fear of their well being, and others actively resisted it.
Now Mr. Sam i submit to you that many black people did less to overcome apartheid than some white people in this country did.
Which group are you from Sammy? I bet the silent passive resistor who now shouts off their mouth, claiming glory for the efforts of others.
Of course I could be wrong….but that would just illustrate how naive it would be to bet on something for which you have actually no basis of determination…..
Oh come on… why are white people being so defensive? You’ve all been at braai’s, parties, family gatherings when Oom Piet scarily dominates the entire afternoon talking about how dom die swartes is. WHO do you think you are kidding by pretending that the majority of young Afrikaaners have any say in how they think, act or live their lives? The majority of young Afrikaaners are brainwashed by not only their parents, but their brothers, sisters, friends, teachers, principals, cousins and any other Afrikaaner they come across to believe that Black people are inferior. True, their is the odd intelligent rebel who chooses to go against this thinking - but they will tell you themselves that they are unusual, unique and probably have to hou hulle se bek at kerfees so that they don’t get thrown out of the family. THAT is still the case today in the majority of Afrikaaner homes in South Africa and if you pretend any other way you are just fooling yourselves. This does not mean that every other Afrikaaner is a bad or immoral person, it’s just the WAY of the volk. Living from a place of fear means the only way up is to pretend that you’re better than other people. Until Afrikaaners realise that they are just as human, vulnerable and equal as all other South Africans, racism in these institutions will continue. I know many English white South Africans that are just as racist. Well done for exposing this topic. More communication is required to challenge people on their preconceptions and lack of integrity.
At least you are honest - so we can’t call you hypocritical!
Because Blacks where discriminated against, white Children should now be discriminated against. That is the gist of your response. because it was the case….this legitimizes current exclusionary and discriminatory practices.
Well just as I said Mr Sam……black people resisted violently when they where discriminated against, do you expect the white kids to react any differently?
And secondly — your ilk are fond of going about making judgment on what white people - who you don’t even know, did or said or felt during the apartheid years. Do you know that hundreds of white people where jailed for up to six years for refusing to submit to military service, are you aware of many thousands of other similar acts of resistance by white people which led to their actual suffering during the apartheid years? Of course many whites approved of the racialistic policies, many resented it silently and passively resisted, for fear of their well being, and others actively resisted it.
Now Mr. Sam i submit to you that many black people did less to overcome apartheid than some white people in this country did.
Which group are you from Sammy? I bet the silent passive resistor who now shouts off their mouth, claiming glory for the efforts of others.
Of course I could be wrong….but that would just illustrate how naive it would be to bet on something for which you have actually no basis
Now Brandon
Why do you assume I am black?
Hundreds were not imprisoned a handful of principles people like David Bruce, Ivan Toms were imprisoned. True many white like myself were part of some sort of opposition to apartheid. What I am objecting to is the rose tinted nostalgia for teh good old days that many bloggers try and create here. I agree discrimination is wrong but you cannot just say well teh past is over let us carry onas if nothing happened. How do you address the deficit of Bantu Education denial of property rights, systematic impoverishement. If your parents live in a shack it is unlikely that you are going to go the school and then onto UCT to become a high income actuary. You can debate the most effective way of affirmative action but not the principle I am afraid. Yes crime is terrible and we need to do something about that. What it seems like a lot of people want is to go back to aparteid. If your biccyle was stolen by a black person during apartheid the police took that seriously. They would go through tehlocal township and find it. If your gardern boy was murdered whilst he was on holiday at the “farm” then no-one really cared.
Sam …”The majority of young Afrikaaners are brainwashed by not only their parents, but their brothers, sisters, friends, teachers, principals, cousins and any other Afrikaaner they come across to believe that Black people are inferior.”
The majority.
Not just some, or a few, or a mere handful.
The majority.
Now that’s as steretypically racist as it’s wrong.
Until blacks realise that they’re wrong, their Afrikaner/white-hating racism will not abate. The ball’s in their court.
i think it is clear that parents should also be blamed. but you can’t disciplin a person if his or her psarents failed to discplin them. in xitsonga we says,” mhala yi tekela n’wana wa lendzeni” meaning that a child learn the life of his parents. in shoprt parents aslo should be blamed 4 failing to teach their children.
Now the Waterkloof 4 are a great bunch. They didn’t mean to kill theman they kicked, punched and stabbed. Too bad they will be going to the tjoekie. Maybe they can team up with some of those torturing farm murderes that amused reader knows such a lot about
@Lazola and other multicults and anti-segregationists
I am interested to know what you would make of the CVO schools, which provide a Christian education adn afrikaner values.
I guess the parents are also to blame for the 100% matric pass rate?
How do you think they find time to learn and succeed academically given that the ciricullum must be filled with the racist rantings of their parents as you imply?
Do you ever hear of violence in these schools? Why do you think there isn’t any?
In 2007 the MEC for Education in Gauteng, Angie Motshekga, said black pupils are always involved in school violence. The ANC later rebuked her.
What is really happening in schools? Since 1994 race quotas were feverishly enforced, at times by legislation. The Minister of Education, Naledi Pandor, said people opposing these quotas are enemies of transformation and democracy. In 2002 the ANC Youth League took position at schools to “force” them to admit black pupils.
The traditional white schools had to admit black pupils but the forced integration led to racial tensions and violence. It also strengthened the perception that the sudden interest in white schools had a hidden agenda.
First they infiltrated schools, then started to demand things and finally the violent takeovers took place. The white schools had a long tradition of discipline and civilization but after the forced integration this changed to chaos, violence and unruly behaviour.
Classrooms became the focal point for the disrespect between the different classes of society. Newspapers report almost daily about the numerous knife attacks, violence, dishonesty and even rape cases at schools. The MEC was correct to address the problem by its name.
Someone has to point out the role black aggressors’ play in the violence. If they cannot have their way, they accuse principals and white pupils of racism. The ANC went ahead with their forced policies despite the spiral of violence. Some principals preferred to call it differences in personality and said these cases were isolated. Newspapers were also reluctant to bring the colour issue into the picture. The many cases of school violence, however, became too much to ignore the fact that black pupils are mostly to blame.
It is time to admit the truth and to start exploring other ways to remove the problem.
The CVO schools are well supported and they fall outside the ANC’S influence sphere. There is still an island where ‘racist’ parents can ensure their children get a violence free academically sound education.
According to City Press, Motshekga made the statement at the funeral of the slain King Edward VII school pupil Mfundo Ntshangase in Soweto:“It is now three years since I have been in the Gauteng department of education and I have since discovered that every time there is an incident of violence at a school, it always involves African kids. As a country we need to face up to the problem, especially as a black nation.”
Now lazola, how will you pin this on racist white parents?
Why don’t you take Motshekga’s advice and face up to the problem? The truth will set you free.
School violence is not only in SA so cannot be blamed on racist white students or parents, apartheid and the usual scape goats used by liberals. It is certainly not an afrikaner problem.
In the UK Tony Blair claimed the spate of knife and gun murders in London was not being caused by poverty, but a distinctive black culture.
Black community leaders reacted after Mr Blair said the recent violence should not be treated as part of a general crime wave, but as specific to black youth. He said people had to drop their political correctness and recognise that the violence would not be stopped “by pretending it is not young black kids doing it”.
Mr Blair said he had been moved to make his controversial remarks after speaking to a black pastor of a London church at a Downing Street knife crime summit, who said: “When are we going to start saying this is a problem amongst a section of the black community and not, for reasons of political correctness, pretend that this is nothing to do with it?”
What was the response of Black community leaders? Rather than address the problem of violence amongst black youth they chose to rather attack Prime Minister Blair:
The Rev Nims Obunge, chief executive of the Peace Alliance, one of the main organisations working against gang crime, denounced the prime minister.
Mr Blair said: “I think that is to do with the fact that particular youngsters are being brought up in a setting that has no rules, no discipline, no proper framework around them.”
The Commission for Racial Equality broadly backed Mr Blair, saying people “shouldn’t be afraid to talk about this issue for fear of sounding prejudiced”.
If you wish to debate in such lengthy term - at least read the alternative views. I NEVER assumed you where black! In fact I classed you as a silent, passive, white resistance type.
Secondly - your attempt at making white sacrifice so superficial, as to laud the efforts of the “handful” which include yourself of course is purely distasteful. The next time you receive one of those unwelcome visitors at your door, from the Jehovah’s Witness Sect - Please ask them how many of their membership where incarcerated in military detention camps or sentenced to lengthy periods of community service in remote locations for refusing to serve in the military, and while you are at it, also ask them about their activities during the apartheid years. Now this is just one small segment of our population, and those incarcerated, already number far more than the little “handful” you claim as such prestigous and laudible peers. There are numerous others, and I myself spent 5 days incarcerated, and beaten in a jail cell - but I will still claim to have been a passive, non active resenter and not an activist as those circumstances resulted from passive actions rather than active.
Your objections may well have been suited to a broader debate on apartheid - the subject under discussion here is why white students who where not architects of apartheid, are starting to display racial behaviour.
There is nothing more pathetic than a black person painting all whites with the same brush and trying to legitimize institutional discrimination against innocent children - well actually there is, non-black beneficiaries of apartheid trying to do the same!
The difference is that white people are routinely tortured and even executed in the course of robberies.
Insofar as black people are victims of robbery, they seem much less likely to be tortured or executed; insofar as they are murder victims, it is more likely to be the result of domestic disturbances, drunken brawls or muti killings, rather than robbery. (Our domestic was recently almost a victim of a muti gang that kills people at a rate of almost one person a week in the rural township where her mother lives.) What points to racism is the fact that whites are disproportionately more likely to be killed by random strangers and in the course of robberies than are blacks.
That being said, hatred as a motive would be more acceptable than the animal-like indifference to human life on behalf of black criminals that you seem to posit. Such cold indifference would indeed suggest a very fundamental difference between the races, such as would justify the most extreme form of white racism.
Paul, you really are a dyed-in-the-wool English supremacist. (Not without justification, though. Even Hitler greatly admired and was inspired by the Germanic tribe of Anglo-Saxons who managed to establish a worldwide empire.) The problem is that you seem to be unaware of the very real disadvantages that children suffer when they are not educated in their mother tongue. The scientific literature overwhelmingly supports mother tongue education for its unquestionable pedagogic benefits. The education department has also recently come around to the view that English only education is the main reason for the fact that the quality of black matriculants is now worse than under apartheid.
You are also mistaken if you think that English is a prerequisite for economic success. Some of the most affluent countries are non-English speaking.
As for taxes as an argument, since Afrikaners still contribute the most to the fiscus, doesn’t it follow that Afrikaans should rather be the sole official language?
People like Rohan find it sad that kids themselves grow up to be racist based on their experiences?
Parents don’t teach children intolerance. Kids learn it by themselves when they see the behaviour of others. Nobody is born a racist.
Lazola and others see it as an afrikaner problem. These children are brought up in an afrikaans medium education. They are bullied into submission into english medium so that Black students can attend when there are already historically black and even english medium schools they can attend.
Do you wonder that there is resentment and is it not normal to feel resentment at this invasion?
The more the ANC and its supporters use bully tactics the more resentment will grow as sure as day turns into night.
The only sad thing is that people can’t see this obvious fact.
Many white parents take pride in their childrens’ schools. They have raffles sell pannekoeke, volunteer, help collect money on their own time. In the end a bunch of outsiders are bussed in bringing township culture, often don’t pay school fees, violence and racial friction and social problems become rife etc. Is anyone surprised that resentment is building up?
There’s no need for parents to teach their kids to become racially intolerant. There are Maths competitions for blacks only, Afrikaans schools forced to use english, racist legislation so that white students can’t get bursaries to university even on merit, Black pupils who have not been taught about littering, etc.
Why havent they built up their own schools? Surely now with political power they should be able to accomplish this? What is sad is that they won’t do it.
Len,
You are always asking people for references when they make a point. You obviously do not read daily news websites to understand exactly what Amuzed Reader is trying to say and substantiate. It is a simple question - why is violence always used. your argument of “hatred” and “revenge” is absolute nonsense and flimsy at the least.
Len, your turn to provide some references now - refer us all to an incident (or more) where a white person has taken the life of a black person in a crime.
Please also excuse the fact that I may sound angry; but there are millions of us that are, even you.
No 1: This is how a coconut writes blogs. Notice how he tries really hard to get whites to see that he isn’t like the other blacks?
Anyways, it embarresing to note that 85% of the population is allowing less than 10% of the population to push them around. I’d burn down houses if some white kids tried to screw with me. It’s this whole Goddamn reconciliation that has turned us into spineless wimps.
You can read about brutality for as long as you can stomach it.
You may also want to read the following article in which a senior criminologist explains that poverty cannot explain the violence found in South African crime, and compares it to crime in India, which has just as much poverty, but without the violent RACIST crime :
What hope have we of solving our problems, when idiots like you want to deny the problem even exists?
Now, do tell me how you consider that i am a racist? I have equally condemned violence by all colours, i have equally condemned racial discrimination by all colours, i have asserted the right of all South Africans whatever there colour to be a part of our society. I have pleaded that racial classification be removed from our society, and asked that policies to uplift the poor be based on need rather than skin colour.
Racist is an easy word to throw out, your big on proof, come on then, lets have it?
Similarly you finish with ‘loser like me’. We have never met, you don’t even know my name or much of my background. Sounds a little more like emotion than fact to me, but i am sure you can provide the necessary proof.
You are of course correct on one thing. It is very easy to find examples of white on black racism. Pissing in someones dinner (which is totally unacceptable) makes international news, gets every politician up in arms, and heaven knows what else. Gang raping a 76 year old woman, or beating an 81 year old man to death with a golf club (see the above link for the story), doesn’t even make the front page in South Africa, when the perpetrators are black and the victims are white, which is exactly my gripe with this article. All crimes and all racism is unacceptable. Go back and check, when people were trying to claim Skeilik was not a racist attack, go read what i said.
Two thing you never find in South Africa. A black man committing racism against a white person, and someone actually dying of aids.
Given that we have +/- 12.5m aids victims, and there is no cure the second is utter b*llocks. The same can be said for the first.
Wants proof of 5 attacks that are racist orientated.No Len that is really a stupid and
dumb question to ask.
In my own family I can mention
quite a few, like a youngster returning, from
London to find a job here,got robbed in Hatfield
on the day of his return and told to -f-off,
because he did not belong here.
On a return trip from Johannesburg I was reminded
by a so called high official that he had the right
of way and that I should know who he was.
He singled me out although there were plenty
black drivers around me who for similar reasons
refused him entry.
My daughter and her friend were singled out in
a crowd, surrounded by black thugs and relieved
of her possessions. She was in a crowd with
far better dressed black ladies then she was.
So you see it took me exactly two minutes to put
three together and if I took my time I most
probably could give you more than five.
Len I feel sorry for you live in a dream world
so keep on dreaming. By the way have completed
the casualty count and decided who whipped who.
Has anyone in SA ever heard the british pop band “Madness”’s song about what happened when one of the band member’s sister gave birth to a mixed race baby?
Story is that they were racist until they saw the cute little baby and then got over it and now accept her.
That’s the way it works here in a Multi cultural society, with your parents or otherwise.
Ah Scarface! I never said such a thing. But for the record, blacks are at times racist too. But apartheid was not a government of blacks was it. Blacks were not the one’s voting for the apartheid government to maintain its policies election after election.
I never said you said it - it’s my opinion. Some of my black friends have confirmed the “racism” between Xhosa and Zulus. Class is another topic!
By the way, you know well that anyone at varsity now could never have voted for anyone except the parties around now.
And if a person not wishing to associate with other cultures that have different values and standards makes him/her a racist, then I am a racist. I don’t mind admitting it at all. I have the right to associate with anyone I want. I do find it funny that as long as this ANC Govt passes laws that makes my fellow Afrikaners 2nd class citizens, anywhere else in the world it would be seen as racist laws. Here, we are getting even for the past legally. And I can see that Apartheid Government is your cane…shame, what will happen when you mislay it and have to face what’s going on in Southern Africa without being able to blame Apartheid?
It’s time we let race go and see everyone as equal - it applies to both side. Every action has an equal opposite reaction, so until we call it square, there will always be a group feeling aggrieved.
On the positive side for the natives, so many skilled Afrikaners that can leave will. Look out for Pretoria in Australia!
Brandon
I must confess to not quite getting your point. You initailly implied that it is BEE and AA that is making young whites like the Waterkloof 4 go on a rampage. You then use this as a reason to knock all attempts to level the playing field. If you do not intervene to try and correct the imbalanaces of the past then the imbalances will persist. The total number of whites who activelty opposed apartheid was small although significant. I don’t get the impresssion that a lot of those posting here are in that categgory. CE Eagle, Willem AMused and that lot seem to be positvley starry eyed when they remember the good old days when a balck man knew his place. Spreading posinoous allegations about how wonderful it was under apartheid is a bit like denying the holocaust. I fully accept that we have problems today. These problesm are alegacy of a grossly evil system that was apartheid. For young white’s who have had every advantage to behave like the Waterkloof 4 is disturbing. Some of the posters here feel that they are folk heroes.
Once Consulting Engineer has acquired a superstition nothing short of death is ever likely to remove it.
Let’s pray that the human race never escapes from Earth to spread its iniquity elsewhere. Our greatest strength as a human race is our ability to acknowledge our differences, our greatest weakness is our failure to embrace them.
As Mark Twain once put it… “Such is the human race, often it seems a pity that Noah… didn’t miss the boat.”
The only solution for lasting peace in this country is to remove us, the racist bastard Afrikaners, give us our own part of the country and let each rule himself according to his own traditions.
Once again more denial. Under apartheid the whites could not live without the blacks. you needed them to work in your mines and your gardens and farms. You needed maids to raise your children and clean up after you. No way a poor white was going to do K … work. Too proud for that. SO you put balcks in Batustans so you could still have them around when youe needed them but send them home when they got too old. At least those guys in Orania are actually trying to be self sufficient. The avergae white South African family needs about three blacks to support it.
“Until then, you guys can continue to dream while some of us maneuver to get back what is rightfully ours, in all ways possible…AA, BEE and all.”
I ASK
What is it exactly that you believe to be rightfully yours?
Amused I have read many of your sanctimonious and self satisfied post. You love to position yourslef as the voice of dispassionate reason. Unfortunately it seems you aquired your knowledge of history from GA Henty and the Hotspur book for boys. Colonialism and apartheid systematically plundered indigenous populations. The Glen Grey act the poll tax in Natal were all designed to impoverish teh native and make him go and work on teh minces . The 1913 Land Act confinde 80% of tehpopulation to 13% of the land. Apartheid disrupted teh mission schools which had produced many fine intellects such as Mandela, Pixley Seme, Govan Mbeki. Apartheid sought to de-educate blacks. So for you to come over here and simply say get over it chaps is disingenious to say the least. You have to intervene to address the imbalances. Now you can argue the toss about how it is implemented but you have to accept the necessity for some kind of direct intervention, Despit the self adulatory tone of many Nationalist posters on these blogs one has to accept that the Afrkaner only emerged from his poor whit roots due to massive and sustained support from governement. The poor white problem was a major concern not just of teh Nats but also of the SAP and Pact governments. As to your claims that there are racially motivated robberies what does that prove. We are discussing why affluent young whites who have the world at their feet resort to beating up a sleeping balck hobo and then saying they didn’t mean to kill him. The whole white community gathers round to defend these holigans one of whonm is even chosen to play in a provincial rugby team. When that gang raped that girl down teh South Coast last year they were arrested. You didn’t hear prominet blacks standing up and saying thisng like give thema chance, they will be ruined in jail. As for your allegations that the governement is useless wll that is apoint for debate. I would suggest to you that the current goevrnemnt is overtly business firendly and that is half teh problem. Rampant free market capitalsim will not address the systematci poverty. Read Sampie Terrblanche’s A history of inequality in SA. It was a great English economist Manyard Keynes who understood that you need intervention to address strutural imbalances.
Sam, I believe you have hit the nail on the head here and you have pointed to the ELEPHANT in the room - therefore the silence on this particular point. The extent to which active, dissenting, activist white Afrikaners were ostracised and
undermined during Apartheid remains for the time being an inconvenient and underexposed fact. Yes we hear a lot about quiet dissenters and I mean no
disrespect to them, but the reason why they remained “quiet” or resisted “passively” is because they knew full well what their families and friends would/could do to them if they became too OPENLY liberal. Yes. that’s right their OWN families/friends would: disown them/reject them/ostracise them from their community, from their family - the worst possible thing that could
happen to a human being - to be rejected by his own kin - to the extent where he/she has to leave his own home or country. If that hangs above your head you will think twice about becoming an activist. AND IT HAPPENED. It did happen. Under Apartheid, if you were Afrikaans everybody kept an eye on everybody else to make sure they were still “onboard” and people were aggressively brow beaten or verbally reprimanded (or worse) to keep them in line. Now here’s the thing - for an individual to have been prepared to be an activist regardless, and to have shown solidarity with the cause of the oppressed in line with his own ethics and humanitarian values, at the possible cost of losing EVERYTHING, showed extraordinary bravery which hopefully will one day be recognised for what it was. (it was viewed as treason amongst Afrikaners) Now, as Sam rightly points out - it seems that today we still have the ” you are either with, us or against us” mentality prevailing in some white communities - so its not just a matter of parenting, but in fact a case of broad collaboration amongst many members of
communities to keep other members in check, in subtle and powerful ways - the question is: how much of that is still going on? To what extent are young people allowed to develop and think naturally and freely today, in a New South Africa without (subtle or other)indoctrination and coercion.
There seems to be no editorial policy at Thoughtleader. No articles on education, health, fuel prices, food prices, globalisation, unemployment, poverty etc etc - no attempt to find solutions to real problems. This is not leading any thought at all - just leading prejudice. Would you, and others, like to start a blogsite which tackles important issues?
These days it seems you are labelled as racist more often than eagle, cool down or I.
Maybe we need to step down as ‘ring leaders’ of the ‘racists’ and let you be in front for a while!
I have been watching with great interest while commentors here metamorphose you from a realist into a racist.
Its like once someone points out the glaringly obvious but not PC facts, the racist mantra is placed on them and no evidence to the contrary matters.
Have you ever read the theory about the Big Lie? the PC libbers practice it.
“in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying. These people know only too well how to use falsehood for the basest purposes. … “
The point is that every and any so called attempt to level the playing field, will achieve the opposite.
Apartheid was an intervention to level the playing field of numbers. The architects of that system where outnumbered 10:1
Now the 10 is using the exact same reverse interventions, except the magnification factor is no longer 10:1, but 1:10….it doesn’t take a genius to realize that the result will never be a level playing field, as much as you intervene — you skew the field.
The most level playing field is one without players.
Lets take it a bit further. Team A with 100 players takes on Team B with 10 players. The rules of contest are that Team A cannot tackle the opposition. let’s turn it around because of course Team A has been disadvantaged.
Now Team B cannot tackle the opposition, just so that we are levelling the field……..
Paul, it is true that South African mines are generally so marginal that they probably wouldn’t have existed without an abundant supply of cheap labour. But the mines didn’t belong to Afrikaners, did they? White people everywhere else seem to get by without black labour for their farms and gardens - why do you suppose that Afrikaners couldn’t if they wanted to?
The reason the apartheid govt allowed the continued use of black labour is that blacks would have been completely destitute if they were to have been simply deported to the Bantustans, in the same manner in which Muslims were chased from India to Pakistan. Unfortunately the government planners didn’t foresee that by improving black living standards, they would be unleashing a population explosion. The English saying about the road to hell comes to mind.
JPM
Mark Twain is respectfully wrong, the greatest
tragedy is not that Noah built the ark, but that he
did not kick those of it who later disrespected
him.
Paul
What are you trying to say.Whites did not do
the kak work.Your lack of historical knowledge
is so perplexing that I am not even going to
waste my time to try and educate you.
I was very lucky to have intelligent parents who taught me that all people are people just like me and that I should respect ALL people that I come across in my life. They taught me that while some people may speak a different language, eat different food, choose a different lifestyle and walk at a different pace, every person goes to sleep at night and wakes up in the morning and wonders what the day will hold. In other words, I am no better than any other person and they are no better than me, we just live our lives differently. They also taught me to have empathy and understanding - another two assets that have brought me great value in my life. I have empathy for ALL people who have suffered (and I mean real suffering here, not the price of petrol going up) under any other group of people that believe that they are superior to them. I try to understand how they must feel and I try to put myself in their shoes. Empathy and understanding was a simple but powerful lesson. But probably the most powerful for me was the lesson of RESPECT - to respect all human beings, no matter whether it’s the drug addict (who had an uncle who abused him from the age of 4) or the Blinging businessman in his flashy car and overpowering perfume(who always dreamt that money and the big life would make him happy and bring him respect - doh!) or the student that has no friends as he can’t speak the same language. R E S P E C T. These excruciatingly simple lessons have made my life so much easier. But that’s what parents with wisdom and integrity do for you. My parents are wise, they have a world view on life and are not small minded fools who really believe that the colour of our skin or the religion we practice has anything to do with who we are as human beings.
This has meant, thanks to my visionary, intelligent parents (who by the way are very middle class) someone who NEVER uses racist language, NEVER blames any other group, ALWAYS respects people of all races and religions and cultures, do you know how much easier my life is? It’s a breeze. And funny enough, doors are always open for me, because of the way in which I treat everyone as my equal. I consider myself a world citizen first and foremost and then, a South African citizen, but essentially, I am just a little blob of flesh and blood who has about 70 years to live a life. I want that life to be as happy and content as possible, and I choose to take responsibility for myself, for my thoughts, my opinions and my behaviour.
Now I know parents who are just as wise as mine, who have been through the most horrific or times and situations, but who are all still able to teach their children to respect and love all people.
So if you ask me what’s lacking here? Wisdom, Intelligence, Integrity, Respect and Empathy.
You should give it a try all you stubborn posters who push your ignorant rantings and anger and blame onto others.
You’ll be amazed at how much HAPPIER your life can be.
I see i have an uncanny knack or irritating liberals such as yourself. You chose to launch your attack on the fact that i chose a position of ‘dispassionate reason’, as if someone applying reason to a problem is a disgraceful or unhelpful thing to do.
Having never set foot in Apartheid South Africa, i have in no way whatsoever benefited from its’ legacy. Having been raised in a comparatively non-racial society, and having seen how various races can be relatively successfully integrated into one society, perhaps i have a perspective that differs from most contributors. I suggest that is healthy. Maybe you feel i should argue with a passionate lack of reason?
Why on earth is imploring people to get over the past and invest in the future disingenuous? It must be clear to you that there are two sides to every argument, and that history is very subjective. I think that lifting people out of poverty and creating an equal society is more important that arguing about who’s fault the inequality and poverty was, with all the associated demands that go hand in hand with it.
Poverty has no colour. If we create policies to uplift the poor, then the poor will be uplifted. If the poor are mainly black, then they will be the main beneficiaries. What is unjust with that?
I do not deny the need for intervention, i think it is vital. I do object to interventions based on racial discrimination given that these are unjust, divisive and perhaps most importantly of all, have no chance of succeeding. Has AA and BEE helped or hindered? Why do we have 1m less jobs than in ‘94?
We need policies to grow our economy, which will create work, which will do more for poverty relief than any other intervention you could possibly suggest.
We also need sound, accountable governance, so that we can support and develop an infrastructure that supports our key goals of poverty alleviation, with Education being the most important. Race need have no part in these goals,and will only hinder our progress.
I do not need to know who’s great great great grandfather stole what from whoever(and i realise that whatever was taken from that person was probably in turn stolen from someone else in any case) to be able to work out a plan to ensure that the wealth of this land is distributed as equitably as possible.
As to your point about what has racially motivated crime to do with the article we were discussing, the waterkloof 4. Go back and re-read the article. We were actually talking about white on black racism in universities, and whether this was a problem that stemmed from their parents views. I merely highlighted that racism is problem with us all in South Africa, that white students didn’t need to learn about racism from their parents when they themselves are discriminated against, and that we must have a balanced view of the problem.
In your passion you seem to have neglected reason. Who has made the greater error?
I have sent in an article about how we could alleviate poverty and grow the nation. Due to keeping the article short it was pretty basic, but it has not been printed.
I still think we would end up deviating to the same topics in any case. The key to almost every problem we have will be getting highly skilled individuals into place, and empowering them to provide the necessary management to turn around our under-performing departments and organisations.
Can you image turning around the health department with Manto in charge? When we finally get a shining light like Routledge they are snuffed out.
Unfortunately the government mindset needs to change before we can start making a difference, and that is why race is so central to most debates, given the ANC’s obsession with race.
I don’t think many of our problems are actually that hard to solve, we just need to decide that we are going to do what it takes to solve them, and at the moment we are no where near that point.
I had parents who taught me that people are NOT equal. It is not the colour of your skin that makes you a better man, but your character, values, hardwork and achievements. Basically it is up to you to make yourself a better person and earn respect.
Basically someone who sits under a tree all day, steals, rapes, or whatever is NOT equal to me, nor will he gain my respect. The only ones that want equality are those are down below in the first place as equality is a promotion.
Respect is not guaranteed and no one owes it to you. It is something you earn by your character and actions.
Simply put, you salute the rank but respect the man. There is a big difference between the to. Just because you walk upright on 2 legs doesnt automatically earn you respect.
Irritating liberals is easy. Just dont agree with them or bring up facts that dont agree with their emotions and they get all upset. They are a high strung emotional bunch. Who cares?
When they call you racist, nazi, white supremacist, bigot, idiot etc then you know you have really riled them and they can’t counter what you say. They don’t even have the sense to know that any name they choose to call you is of absolutely no consequence.
Amused
I am not sure what your point is to be honest. Once again you succeed in waffling on in a superciliuos manner. The great white bawana bringing wisdom to the poor heathen. How do yo propose alleviating poverty after 300 years of systematic underdevelopment. As Ihave said we can argue the nuts and bolts of teh intervention but the need for it I am afraid is glaringly obvious. You seem to have aquired quite a following amongst the starry eyed nostalgia brigade for teh good old days. Now I suppose this is the same as if you are walking with your wife down the mainstreet and a lady of ill repute calls you by your name. What are we to make of you. I realize that Eagle and CE have points of view of their ownbut you all seem particularly cosy to me. SO it makes me wonder. It is not my intention to defend the actions of teh presnet government but to correct the untruths that are being built up by people like yourself, wittingly or unwittingly about what a great place the old South Africa was. You seem to have a fondness for Ian Smith and apartheid South AFrica. That I am afraid is like supporting the Nazis and denying the holocaust. Poor old simple CE and Eagle both seem to be rather fond of Hitler judging by thier posts. Now it is well known tat Hitler rejuvenated te German economy and tried to ban smoking. This does not make teh fact that he murdered 6 million OK. One unfortunatley has to judge a man by the company he keeps. I am sorry but I won’t be meeting you or any of the other posters here for a cosy self adu,latory beer at the pub in Bainskloof. I don’t think I could stand teh smugness.
Paul
What are you trying to say.Whites did not do
the kak work.Your lack of historical knowledge
is so perplexing that I am not even going to
waste my time to try and educate you.
I am not sure where you read your history Cool Down but I seem to remember a general strike in 1922 over the fact that a black man may be allowed to do more than just the hard work. Remeber the site of 10 men from the municipality digging a ditch whilst the fat white supervisor sat on a chair and drank tea from hsi flask. Job preservation tried to make sure that whites were always in command of blacks. Poor whites did not wnat to dig dtitches or tar roads. They had to be employed as supervisors. But hey don’t ;let historical facts get in the way of your view of the world.
What I find amazing is that for a country obsessed with racism very little of you know how to spell it.
Also it’s pretty weird for somebody not in S.A. to observe some black peoples determination to eradicate anything white. Lazlo included. he may protest but it’s quite obvious that the tactic is to link an institution to the ‘wolves of apartheid’ and let it go from there.
As I have said before, If we whites in Europe treated an ethnic minority in such a fashion we would be (rightly) imprisoned.
Time to grow up and get over the chip perhaps?
Len still holds the prize for most irritating blogger in the world. Nice one Len.
@amused reader and paul (and all your comrades)
Thank you Paul for all the information, I so hope that some day you realize that an unattended would is an open invitation to infections (Check what happened to ou’ Zim up north).
But then again, I hope that some day you realize that black people suffered a lot of indignity during the apartheid years, a lot. White people, on the other hand, enjoyed a lot of dignity during the apartheid years, and unfortunately, this situation still prevails, amid all the yaada yaada about racism dying with the vote of 1994.
For the fact that “one has to accept that the Afrikaner only emerged from his poor whit roots due to massive and sustained support from government.”, one also has to accept that the same support (this time legitimate) is needed by the “poor” blacks to rise up to the privileged position that the AFRIKANER is desperately trying to hold on to.
So if there is anything that the system of apartheid, the racist white people of the then and now, and the defenders of silly racist ill-behaviors of the new South Africa like you guys owe me, one thing that is purely and rightfully mine, IT IS MY DIGNITY!!! Give me that, and I promise you, I will overcome your feeble ideas of superiority and the resultant poverty and disease that it has brought me.
Apartheid was WRONG, and someone needs to apologize for it, not via the TRC, but via land redistribution, affirmative action, black economic empowerment, reconstruction and development, should I go on?
NB: If self-respect can be instilled in a child upon growing up, why won’t racism?
Thank you Paul for all the information, I so hope that some day you realize that an unattended would is an open invitation to infections (Check what happened to ou’ Zim up north).
But then again, I hope that some day you realize that black people suffered a lot of indignity during the apartheid years, a lot. White people, on the other hand, enjoyed a lot of dignity during the apartheid years, and unfortunately, this situation still prevails, amid all the yaada yaada about racism dying with the vote of 1994.
For the fact that “one has to accept that the Afrikaner only emerged from his poor whit roots due to massive and sustained support from government.”, one also has to accept that the same support (this time legitimate) is needed by the “poor” blacks to rise up to the privileged position that the AFRIKANER is desperately trying to hold on to.
So if there is anything that the system of apartheid, the racist white people of the then and now, and the defenders of silly racist ill-behaviors of the new South Africa like you guys owe me, one thing that is purely and rightfully mine, IT IS MY DIGNITY!!! Give me that, and I promise you, I will overcome your feeble ideas of superiority and the resultant poverty and disease that it has brought me.
Apartheid was WRONG, and someone needs to apologize for it, not via the TRC, but via land redistribution, affirmative action, black economic empowerment, reconstruction and development, should I go on?
NB: If self-respect can be instilled in a child upon growing up, why won’t racism?
According to a recent informative article posted on CNN, there are currently 80% of Americans who have racist feelings that they may not even recognize. Often, these feelings are exhibited upon certain situations and can be the cause of ugly conflict.
A University of Connecticut professor, Jack Dovidio has been researching racism for the past 30 years. He has found that racism has certainly changed in the past generation, though it has not by any means become extinct.
Current Racism is often not depicted in as obvious ways as it has in the past. For example, rather than open feelings of hatred and dislike, racism has reared its head in a mutated and possibly more subtle form.
Look as well at the increasing anti-muslim sentiment in europe.
The more the liberals and multicults force integration upon us, the more they fuel racism. This is exactly what we see in SA universities. Many students prefer to live in hostels with their own race. Force them to integrate and you will only make race a bigger issue.
The sentiments that give rise to racism and tribalism are as old as the human race itself. they will not go away because liberals wish it so.
If you want to stop racial friction then ensure white stay with white and black with black.
There is nothing wrong with sticking with your own kind. Only liberals have a problem with it. Rather we should all have a problem with the liberals and their naive policies.
“I’d burn down houses if some white kids tried to screw with me. It’s this whole Goddamn reconciliation that has turned us into spineless wimps.”
I SAY
Reconciliation was a part of the package. I know it seems the fashion to forget that there was a negotiated settlement, which was supposed to be binding on all sides.
The irony with people like you, it that you are what you profess to hate.
The Afrikaner’s roots are definitely not poor white. Our roots are a tiny band of pioneers that settled a vast wilderness against overwhelming odds. The ZAR and Free State republics were rather prosperous, the latter earning admiration from outsiders as one of the most progressive and dynamic states in the world. This tiny nation struck the first blow that would eventually bring down the mightiest empire the world has ever seen.
The poor white problem was a consequence of us having lost that war. It wasn’t the state that solved the poor white problem, but the poor whites who built up the state and the country into the mightiest and most prosperous on the entire continent. If merely controlling the state was the answer, the rest of Africa should have been richer than Switzerland by now.
If you are saying what is rightfully yours is dignity, then i agree with you wholeheartedly and unreservedly. I also completely accept that one of the byproducts of apartheid was to rob people of their dignity. I cannot personally apologise, i was not here, and it had nothing to do with me, i first set foot in South Africa in 2004, but i sympathise with you.
Where we most definitely differ is in what you have lost, what you should therefore be entitled to, and how we can go about creating the equal society, that i am sure we could both agree South Africa deserves and is entitled to.
You are entitled to the opportunity to make something of your life, to be who you want to be, and to achieve all that you are capable of, without being discriminated against because of your skin colour, religion or race. Apartheid robbed you of this equality of opportunity,and that was unjust and unfair.
I would happily pay an additional tax to be spend purely on improving educational standards within the poor (predominately black) communities, provided this was spend efficiently and could deliver real improvement in education standards.
It is when people go past this and start making emotional claims, that have no basis in fact, and claiming entitlements that are completely unreasonable that i object.
You say that Apartheid and white superiority brought you disease and poverty, and therefore want compensation. The trouble is that apartheid and minority white rule actually brought you the very opposite. You had the highest standard of living, best health care, and longest life expectancy of any country in Africa. Just look at how the black population has grown in that era. Your assertion just isn’t true. You want compensation for something that never happened.
Likewise you want land distribution. You have it. There is a process in place that is being carried out, and for the most part it is the government that is dragging its’ heels. If the land was taken off you in the last 95 years you get to have it back. Seems fair to me. I cant believe you are older than 95, and where else on earth do you start trying to unwind history, undo wars, and workout who owned what and when? Where does it end? Once one person gets it back, must they then give it to whoever had it before them? Or are you one of these people that believe land in Africa can only belong to black people.
AA and BEE aren’t creating the equal society you claim to want. We have less work and more poverty than in ‘94. They are making the situation worse not better.
We need to work together to create a society that gives each citizen a chance to be what they want to be, without being prejudiced against unfairly. That is what our constitution prescribes after all. What people do with that chance is then up to them. we will never have actual equality, it does not exist anywhere on earth. Some will always make more of their talent and opportunities than others. I do not mean some races, i mean some individuals, but undoubtedly some cultures have been palpably more successful than others, and when you look closely there is a clear reason why, which has nothing to do with genetics or superiority. Ultimately we will then replace our racially divided society with a society divided by class, just like pretty much everyone else.
@Paul, len and the white liberals who like to bash racists
People becoming racist is as naturally instinctive as a monkey going for a banana. Your solution to the situation reminds me of the following analogy:
Start with a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage, hang a banana on a string and place a set of stairs under it. Before long, a monkey will go to the stairs and start to climb towards the banana. As soon as he touches the stairs, spray all of the other monkeys with cold water.
After a while, another monkey makes an attempt with the same result all the other monkeys are sprayed with cold water. Pretty soon, when another monkey tries to climb the stairs, the other monkeys will try to prevent it.
Now, put away the cold water. Remove one monkey from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new monkey sees the banana and wants to climb the stairs. To his surprise and horror, all of the other monkeys attack him. After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs, he will be assaulted.
Next, remove another of the original five monkeys and replace it with a new one.
The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked. The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm ! Likewise, replace a third original monkey with a new one, then a fourth, then the fifth. Every time the newest monkey takes to the stairs, he is attacked.
Most of the monkeys that are beating him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs or why they are participating in the beating of the newest monkey. After replacing all the original monkeys, none of the remaining monkeys have ever been sprayed with cold water.
Nevertheless, no monkey ever again approaches the stairs to try for the banana. Why not ? Because as far as they know that’s the way it’s always been done around here.
Liberals are like those new monkeys who prevent otehrs from follwoing their instincts but dont really know why it is wrong and cant make a concise arguement.
I had parents who taught me that people are NOT equal. It is not the colour of your skin that makes you a better man, but your character, values, hardwork and achievements. Basically it is up to you to make yourself a better person and earn respect.
Basically someone who sits under a tree all day, steals, rapes, or whatever is NOT equal to me, nor will he gain my respect. The only ones that want equality are those are down below in the first place as equality is a promotion.
Respect is not guaranteed and no one owes it to you. It is something you earn by your character and actions.
Simply put, you salute the rank but respect the man. There is a big difference between the to. Just because you walk upright on 2 legs doesnt automatically earn you respect.
”
Wow! For the first time I see you scribble some sense Consulting Engineer. So all is not lost I guess…hehehe!!! Keep it up brother.
Reconciliation was a part of the package. I know it seems the fashion to forget that there was a negotiated settlement, which was supposed to be binding on all sides.
Amused
You idea of reconciliation is this
I ma sorry old boy, we seem to have done you a bit of a disservice over the last 300 years. Well it’s one of those things. Take it on the chin and put it behind you now. There’s a good fellow
I am afraid it is a bit more complicated than that.
Why do Lazola and others, both Black and White, continually try to bash racists? Becuase they are Leftists.
Leftists are always against the status quo, no matter what. The bedrock of Leftism is a strong desire or even a need for political change, often extreme change. That permanent and corrosive dissatisfaction with the world they live in is what makes people Leftists.
One thing that Leftists will not allow themselves to be seen as is racist. Leftists cannot admit any significance for race. If they do, they are immediately relabeled as Rightist. Being racist is enough in the Left lexicon to make you Rightist regardless of anything else you might believe or advocate. They even managed to ignore the huge example of Hitler’s extreme leftist socialism (income leveling, worker advocacy, heavy government control of industry and everything else) and call him Rightist. He was a Nationalist (that can be allowed) but he was a racist (not allowed). Left-wing racism does not exist only because it is defined out of existence.
It might be argued that, whatever their motivations, Leftists do some good by their vocal condemnation of “racism”. However, Leftists can characterize as racist almost anyone who is honest about his feelings of group identity, however harmless and non-malevolent those feelings may be.
In other words, Leftists too often carry their condemnation of racism to a ridiculous and unfair degree. They do so because it is in fact just a ploy for them, a ploy to obtain kudos. The reality that we all like our own kind best is simply of no interest to them.
There is one form of racism that Leftists do allow themselves: “affirmative action” ,which normally translates into deliberate discrimination against whites. The policy is normally justified as needed in order to restore “balance” and reverse the discrimination of the past. Needless to say, no affirmative action policy leading to the preferential hiring of conservatives or whites exists.
Clearly, then, affirmative action is a claim of righteousness and moral superiority for Leftists, nothing more. A Leftist will happily be racist if it enables him to make that claim.
Another perhaps amusing exception for the poor old Leftist is that one of the many hatreds he is allowed is almost racist: He is allowed to be anti-white.
The reason behind Leftist anti-white sentiment is that whites sit at the pinnacle of the existing world power structure and a desire to tear down existing power structures, for whatever reason, is indisputably at the core of what Leftism is about.
Even a Leftist realises that it is pretty vacant simply to be against the status quo. He has to have something a bit more substantial to say. His best attempt at finding something substantial to say is still pretty pathetic. What he says is: “All men are equal” and “The government should fix it”.
But all men are not equal so unfair policies are required. Nonetheless, “Equality” is the Leftist’s claimed ideal and government action is the way he proposes to bring it about.
So given his slender intellectual and rhetorical resources, the Leftist has to make up for their emptiness by advocating them both blindly, emotionally and vigorously. If all men are equal, then all races must be equal too, mustn’t they? So the Leftist cannot allow any form of race awareness unless he gives up one of the two slender straws that he clutches at in order to give himself something to say.
Why do Leftists rely so heavily on their two particular vacuous slogans? It is because they are not really interested in solving any problems at all. They are only interested in stirring up change. Really solving social and economic problems in our complex society requires thought, detailed enquiry, in-depth understanding of the problem, creative thinking and patience, and the typical Leftist is simply not interested in all that. All he or she wants is change. “Get the government to pass a law” is the Leftist’s simplistic “solution.”
Their favoured tactic is coercion, like with BEE: threaten anyone who doesnt comply. Coercion of any sort or degree, whether by governments or anybody else, is generally a poor and ineffective way of doing things.
And “all men are equal” is perhaps even more vacant an idea than the idea of relying on government, since almost our entire social arrangements are predicated on all men (and women) not being equal. We don’t regard criminals and honest people as the same, men and women as the same, sane people and mentally ill people as the same, scientists and roadworkers as the same etc., etc. And there is no doubt that tall men and busty women have an easier time with the opposite sex. There is fierce discrimination rather than equality in the mating game. So why are Leftists so enamoured of their absurd “equality” idea?
Because if the Leftist is right and all men (and women) are really equal then everything in our society is wrong and in need of change. It is a way for the Leftist to say (paradoxically) to others: “You are all wrong and I am better and wiser and kinder than you”.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, most Leftists have had to find new directions for agitation in recent years. Criticizing capitalist society has become much less plausible now that capitalism seems to be the only show in town.
There have therefore arisen various new directions to agitate: One of these is the “political correctness”, which is an attempt to move the focus of agitation away from economic reform towards social reform. This movement attempts to change the way we think about less fortunate groups in the world by altering the words we use to describe them, and, in good Nazi book-burning fashion, it also attempts simply to suppress knowledge and debate. For example, it suppresses mention of any proposition that offers explanations of why some groups are less fortunate and are likely to remain so regardless of any amount of Leftist agitation.
There is obviously no way that Leftists/liberals believe in such “bourgeois” ideals as freedom of speech when it undermines there ‘we are all equal’ ploy.
The Leftist’s enthusiasm for equality tends to create the impression that the Leftists will manage to give poorer or working class people a bigger slice of the national cake, and poorer people must obviously find that at least initially appealing. However, leftists never create wealth, they redistribute it.
What makes someone “voluntarily” a Leftist? It is a pressing need for self-inflation and ego-boosting, and ultimately for power, the greatest ego boost of all. They need public attention; they need to demonstrate outrage; they need to feel wiser and kinder and more righteous than most of their fellow man. They need to show that they are in the small club of the virtuous and the wise so that they can nobly instruct and order about their less wise and less virtuous fellow-citizens. Their need is a pressing need for attention, for self-advertisement and self-promotion, generally in the absence of any real claims in that direction.
One is tempted to hypothesize that, when they were children, their mothers didn’t look when they said, “Ma, look at me”.
This means that the “warm inner glow” that they obtain from their advocacy and agitation is greatly prized. So it is no wonder that anything which threatens to disturb it, such as mere facts,- is determinedly ignored. ‘Racist’ findings are greeted primarily by abuse rather than by any serious attempt at refutation.
Recalling Apartheid has nothing to do with when the Black man knew his place. How about:
When I didnt have to live behind walls and armed response
When i didnt have to worry about hijacking, robbery, or rape and murder of my family and the SAP tried to keep the same law and order in the townships
When children could play on the street
When our Rand was worth something
When security issues meant doing your National Service and Camps, not making sure you can track family members at all times
I have no gripe with whites who chose prison instead of National Service, or those COs who chose the medical services, Catering Corps etc. They followed their principles but still paid their debt to the society that nurtured them. But ECC types or those that took what SA had to offer then ran off are a different breed. Their self interest came first.
If you are going to be so determined to butt heads with me, then at least read the posts before you pick the fight, that way you embarrass yourself.
I SAY
“I do not deny the need for intervention, i think it is vital”
YOU SAY
“As Ihave said we can argue the nuts and bolts of teh intervention but the need for it I am afraid is glaringly obvious”
err…..
Now we can argue all day, but at some point, you are going to have to explain why you think AA & BEE are going to work, since they haven’t so far, have shown no evidence of doing so, and similar policies have not been successful in other countries either.
Surely policies that actually work are required? It really isn’t enough if it ‘feels all warm and cuddly’ but doesn’t produce the goods, or would you rather have some pyrrhic victory that you can worship on the alter of liberal achievement?
Yes, it’s all very interesting. We understand exactly what you mean - problem is that the cage have been replaced with a new one, around 14 years ago. So have the rules. Your post just exposes the depth of denial of a person who cannot accept living in a new cage and keeps on blabbering on about his old comfy, safe and special little cage which “was taken away from him” boo-hoo! (which the majority of his other monkey friends willingly gave up) - aahhhhhh the nostalgia of it all ;-). It seems to be taking quite a bit of time for reality to sink in for some posters around here. You would think this is 1998 and not 2008. So CE, you may as well immigrate if you hate it so much here, but let me warn you - the tolerance levels for apartheid-sympathising South Africans like
you, are much lower abroad (UK, Canada, Aus) than what you think. But don’t let me spoil the surpise for you…
Another thing: You can try and equate racism in South Africa with racism in the UK, but anyone who has lived in the UK knows that you’re talking absolute b****cks, because racism in these two
countries are just not in the same league. What they call racism over there, hardly features here or would be considered “racism-light”.
(Regarding your quote by TB: Who in their right mind/s would take Tony BLI-AR seriously anyway…?? ). You’ve just quoted one of the most discredited British politicians in history.
@ amused reader: (first this)
“You say that Apartheid and white superiority brought you disease and poverty, and therefore want compensation. The trouble is that apartheid and minority white rule actually brought you the very opposite. You had the highest standard of living, best health care, and longest life expectancy of any country in Africa. Just look at how the black population has grown in that era. Your assertion just isn’t true. You want compensation for something that never happened.”
J. - You haven’t got a clue, have you?
@ amused reader (Then this:)
“I cannot personally apologise, i was not here, and it had nothing to do with me, i first set foot in South Africa in 2004, but i sympathise with you.”
J. -I don’t think you sympathise at all and you have a lot to say for a guy who has only been here for 4 years… - if you haven’t been here under apartheid as a white or a black person, where are your reference points or the context you are debating from? Why should anybody take your opinions seriously?
But let’s get back to Lazola’s Topic. The silence is DEAFENING on my earlier post at 11:33pm (7 May) and Sam’s post at 12:56pm (7 May). The question remains: How much of THAT is still going on??
(Coercion tactics by the “old guard” to manipulate and groom young white people into racist attitudes and keeping them that way - this is what this whole debate is about right?)
Amused
I don’t really consider this butting heads. I just find it very interesting that after 4 years here you have the timerity to pontificate to us. How do you propse addressing teh imbalances. Personally I believe we need a Keynsian apporach with massive state intervention in education and infrastructure. I also believe that the rush to liberalization of trade was a mistake. Teh Asian Tigers developed behind closed door protectionism.
My gripe with you is when you make statements about how wonderful it was under apartheid. It was not. Crime was rampant in the townships, poverty was oppressive and life for blacks was nasty brutish and short. It was declared a crim against humanity and teh whole world found it abhorrent. Now a lot of posters here who seem to be getting on really well with you are trying to say that apartheid was wonderful. If you try and rewrite the past then you are deliberatley poisoning the future. Whites did benefit and whites need to acknowledge that. As I have said teh nuts and bolts are opne to discussion but we cannot move on as if nothing has happened.
The Afrikaner’s roots are definitely not poor white. Our roots are a tiny band of pioneers that settled a vast wilderness against overwhelming odds. The ZAR and Free State republics were rather prosperous, the latter earning admiration from outsiders as one of the most progressive and dynamic states in the world. This tiny nation struck the first blow that would eventually bring down the mightiest empire the world has ever seen.
The poor white problem was a consequence of us having lost that war. It wasn’t the state that solved the poor white problem, but the poor whites who built up the state and the country into the mightiest and most prosperous on the entire continent. If merely controlling the state was the answer, the rest of Africa should have been richer than Switzerland by now.
Once again this is highly selective. The ZAR was bankrupt and corrupt. Prior to teh discovery of gold there was no government reserves at all. The boers could not raise an army to defend themsleves and indigenous tribes managed to hold them off with relative ease. There were no institution so fhigher learning and little to noeconomic development. When gold was discovered it catapulted a backward feudal state into an econominc powerhosue. How did Kruger respod but with corruption and favoritism. The use of monoploies which had to be paid for. The people who developed the goldfields were teh uitlanders. Both the capitalists and the workers came from Britain and Australia. The Afrikaans worker was pretty unskilled when he arrived in Johannesburg. There was a massive concner about uplifting him. The Varnegie Commission in teh 1930’s highlighted the issue. The creation of YSKOR and the expansion of the railways were used to help the poor whites. Job reservation protected these poor whites from competition with africans or Indians. Preserving this job reservation was a central tennet of the Labour and Nationalist Parties when they formed the PACT governemnt in 1924. As you have pointed out Willem by the end of apartheid English speakers were still better off than AFriknaers although the gap had narrowed considerably. SO it took 100 years and even then there are still deficits. And you guys now complain about BEE.
Get real
Paul
Now that is talk by a City Boy,who never had
a spade or any other tool in his hands.So you
saw fat supervisors and came to the conclusion
that that presented everyone.
Don’t came and display your ignorance.
You my friend are the ignorant one.Trying to portarty rural SA as some sort of bucolic feudal system. Get real the way farm laborers were treated by farmers was ad isgrace. Look at the infamous Tot system that sustained the Cape wine industry. The behavoior of farmers now when they try and evict thousands of workers who have been living on their farms for years is what has precipitated some of these vicious attacks. Teh Farmers Unions are aware of the terrible way they have treated farm workers but in all thier submissions they try and assume bewildered innocence. Why is this happening to us. The myth of a blissful pre lapserian existence before teh AFriknaner urbanized is a staple of Afrikaans nationalism. There is little basis in fact for it.
I’m sure there must be a place somewhere for your level of intelligence consulting engineer. Perhaps Orania where people really want to hear your kind of ‘enlightened thinking’ cough cough… laugh… Tell us a bit more about your parents, I detect a deep level of anger and blame, a real frustration and hatred of other people. Were they as full of fear as you? Maybe we can help you. Why don’t you share some more with us? Or maybe you can get some consulting work and go and bore other people with your whining that does not fit in with the world in which we live today.
I was just thinking about your post Cool Down.
I suppose you are a noble yeoman farmer with your skin burnt and your hands rough from years in teh AFrican sun. Honest but rough round thee edges drinking your coffee surrounded by your faithful balck reatiners and hunting dogs.
Too bad the reality is somewhat different. I seem to remember a novel called Triomf. I only read it when it had been translated into English. Those Affrikaners were not exactly noble farming types. Makes you think
The Afrikaner’s roots are definitely not poor white. Our roots are a tiny band of pioneers that settled a vast wilderness against overwhelming odds
Well Willem
You ceratinly are ture to form. The myth of teh Great Trek all over again. Remember how that was shoved down our throats at high school over and over again. Why don’t you read a more modern version like Norman Etherington’s Great Treks. The Trek was disorganized and it was not noble pioneers but teh marginalized in Cape Society who without any plan or goal moved onwards. They met Arican resistance on the way whohc they tried thier best to subvert and were often unsuccessful mostly because they were so disorganized. There is a great deal of doubt as to whether there ever was any Vow at all. Seems to be more an invention of latter day nationalists. Why don’t you read Stuart Cloete’s Turning Wheels it is fiction but it is probably more accurtae than all those school text books written by aparyheid idealogues
If you want to argue against my viewpoint, go right ahead, but don’t be so ignorant as to dismiss it because i have only lived here for 4 years. Your own experiences represent but a dot of what happened, and if you lived in SA during apartheid, you would both have been fed endless propaganda by both sides.
My viewpoint may be different from yours, but it is not automatically less valid. If anything i have said is true, the please point it out. If it is just because i differ from your view then you are being dishonest.
It maybe that you can no longer see the wood from the trees, and, as someone who came to South Africa with few pre-conceptions, perhaps i can be more objective in my reasoning.
You both suggest that i am denying apartheid, or even glorifying it, but don’t think i have ever done either.
@ Paul
After i have watched the stormers i will come back to you on your questions.
I do not inherently disagree with what you prescribe, ie. state intervention in education and infrastructure. I suspect the devil is in the detail.
The state is hardly making a stunning example of running the various functions within its’ control, what makes you think they can suddenly produce some magic going forward? Before the interventions you prescribe can happen, the government needs to get its house in order, and here, to be honest, i think you are away with the fairies.
The government has screwed up health so badly that they are desperately trying to make private health more accessible, and huge admission of defeat if ever there was one.
Home affairs, as i know all to well, is an absolute joke, and don’t count on too much outside investment, it currently takes 4 years to get a business permit, and you must reside outside the country while you wait.
Education is falling to pieces. This government inherited a very skewed system, but they have managed to lower standards in white schools whilst not increasing them in black schools.
The interventions you prescribe require skilled management and skilled labour.
Skilled labour is leaving the country in droves, due the combination of AA and crime, whilst management had become diluted with political appointees and over promoted, and under skilled AA appointments, causing the long list of problems listed above.
Which brings us back full circle to the question you have avoided 3 times.
Why do you think AA and BEE are going to work, when they aren’t at the moment, show no sign of doing so, and haven’t worked anywhere else?
You want to have your cake and eat it. You want retribution for the past, and full speed ahead sir, don’t spare the horses. You are clearly not stupid, so you must know you can’t have both, which means you must decide which will serve the people of South Africa the best?
So the answer to your rather mocking question, ‘Should you just take it on the chin and put it behind you?’ i would suggest is Yes, you should, if you really have the interests of the people of South Africa at heart.
That is why the likes of Mandela and Tutu agreed to do just that, because they had the sense to realise what the alternative was.
Most South Africans haven’t had your education, another legacy of the past. They will have no idea who Keynes was, so it is inherent upon those that can understand the consequences of economic cause and effect lead them towards a solution that will serve them best.
Let us examine how well thought and intelligent
Pauls replies are and see if they hold any water.
Let me begin to say there are still people alive
in South Africa who were born in 1933 who
will testfy to the fact that they as youngster
got up at 4.00 am at the tender age of lit
coal stoves,made coffee and then headed out to
the fields to lead a team of oxen while the fields
the corn field were ploughed by their father,no
as owner but bywoners.
My father in law was born in 1909 and my da in
1907.Neither of them passed standard 6 (grade 8).
My father in law was huge man and worked for many years as a stoker on the railway so they were labourers and did the manual labour.
@ amused reader: (first this)
“You say that Apartheid and white superiority brought you disease and poverty, and therefore want compensation. The trouble is that apartheid and minority white rule actually brought you the very opposite. You had the highest standard of living, best health care, and longest life expectancy of any country in Africa. Just look at how the black population has grown in that era. Your assertion just isn’t true. You want compensation for something that never happened.”
WOw AMused. I think this quote really says it all. Apartheid never happened. You are making it up. The group areas act, teh mixed marriages act, the homelands the forced removals, District Six, Sophiatown, Stev Biko Sharpeville. It all never happened. You were actually all enjoying yourselves.
If I were you I would seriously think about what you just said before sprouting forth anymore advice for us
Like all true communist liberals your posts are all anti-white racist insults and unsubstantiated allegations. Not one allegation substantiated and not one acknowledgement of a statement proven by another poster. I do not even know why other posters bother to respond to you. For example:
You say:
“The group areas act, teh mixed marriages act, the homelands the forced removals, District Six, Sophiatown, Stev Biko Sharpeville.”
What are all these propaganda buzzwords that you sling around supposed to mean and what is it supposed to proof? Do you have clue of what you are talking about?
You are having to sink lower and lower each time. Gone is the semblance of respectability, now you are having to resort to cheap insults, and deliberately misrepresenting what i said.
YOU QUOTE ME AS SAYING
“You say that Apartheid and white superiority brought you disease and poverty, and therefore want compensation. The trouble is that apartheid and minority white rule actually brought you the very opposite. You had the highest standard of living, best health care, and longest life expectancy of any country in Africa. Just look at how the black population has grown in that era. Your assertion just isn’t true. You want compensation for something that never happened.”
YOU THEN SAY
“I think this quote really says it all. Apartheid never happened. You are making it up”
ERR……
No Paul, read before you write, and as i said last time, then you wont have to embarrass yourself. Read it again, slowly.
I did not say Apartheid did not exist, i said that Apartheid did not bring disease and poverty, quite a fundamental difference i would say. Are you always this bad at understanding written text?
Life expectancy for black South Africans in 1940 was estimated to be between 38.1 and 40 years. It peaked in 1992 at 62.9 years (see link below), so Paul, do you think it is fair to say Apartheid brought you disease and you should be compensated (for living on average an extra 23 years+)?
I haven’t looked up the GDP per capita, but guess what, it will be massively higher.
I have not defended Apartheid, i have already challenged you to show just once where i have (and if this is the best you have, well…), i just challenged Sbu when he said that ‘apartheid brought disease and poverty and that you were therefore entitled to compensation for it’.
I have agreed with sbu about some of the legacies of apartheid, and if you were worth the effort, i would direct you to one of the several posts where i have criticised apartheid.
My point, as i have already outlined, is that history has many perspectives, and there will always be debate about the past. The most important thing is that we take care of the future of South Africans of all colour, and where poverty alleviation should be our top priority.
It is because i am so focused on this as the single most important goal, that i wont allow the likes of you to muddy the waters so that you can extract some kind or racial retribution, whilst the people you purport to represent languish without any hope of meaningful change.
PS. Any further with your reasons why AA or BEE will work?
Check the reply by “consulting engineer” to “@Paul, len and the white liberals who like to bash racists”, you should pick up a few insights there about the whole “good neighborliness” practice and its after-effects.
Again, you seem to be denying the extent of the damage of the racist apartheid system on the black community.
Firstly, I do not need your sympathy, thank you, but it will not bring back the lives of fellow black people (Steve Biko for one) killed by the apartheid government (with the support of white society) during the 70s and the 80s. Nor will it bring back the opportunities that our fathers and mothers were supposed to have, which might have led to better lives for us young and New-South-African minded blacks, and would have led to a situation were the was no need for any AA, BEE, and the likes.
Secondly, on the compensation issue, you are not paying back what you (assuming that you are white and of South African background) took from me personally, the historical, cultural, psychological and material re-imbursement goes far beyond the times of your birth and upbringing. Not only do you owe me a personal apology, you owe it to me to personally make right what your oupa and ouma did wrong!
If I am entitled to a fair opportunity to make something of my life, you know very well that my father, my grandfather, and every black person during the reigning terror of apartheid were entitled to that too. As for the good education that you suggest, it is not enough. Good education will not equal success if there are external forces meddling with the mind of those who are learning (low self-esteem for one).
I have a bad history of poverty, a broken family, no sense of belonging, been through a bad education aimed at creating a monkey out of me. My mind has been poisoned by the fear of the white baas, how do I, then Mr. Amused Reader, not make emotional claims from you, how? I think you have very little understanding of South African history in totality, as the less work and more poverty you talk of only applies to those who had, criminally so, more work and less poverty pre-1994…and this my friend, is NECESSARY!
If you call being cramped up in a two room shack, shared with a family of 15 people supported by a domestic worker who works a 10 hour day trying to ensure a “better” life of the baas and madam, then, Chief, you are dom! Best health care, highest life expectancy in Africa, I see you are full of jokes as well! The main reason that the previous (pre-1994) government agreed to land redistribution, and this was the case in Zimbabwe in 1980 as well, was that those crooks knew who exactly the rightful owner of the land was. As for AA and BEE not creating an equal society, you seem to be reading only the front-pages of THE CITIZEN and DIE BEELD, try reading the whole newspaper Chief. I for one, got my first job precisely because of AA, I can’t imagine what would have happened with my family, all unemployed at time, had I not gotten that job, after I did not get a bursary to study at varsity because of my poor English proficiency and lack of vision (and this is a direct result of the high education standards that you recall we had under Pik and them).
I do not care what our western influenced constitution prescribes, I was wronged, culturally, religious and materially. Admit it and pay back, if you are honest enough, and then we’ll talk reconciliation, and any other illusionary ideas that you suggest to remedy the situation. In the meantime, I continue to hold your parents responsible for your reconciliation-hampering and equality-depriving racist behavior (in support of Lazola). You can blame my parents also if you want, but know that they died (religiously, culturally and otherwise) back when Pik was shouting at journalists for laughing at his deliberate jokes.
I hear your point about Afrikaners very well, but, try reading the posts from top to bottom next time, as by doing that your valuable points will be better appreciated. Tell your Afrikaner “history” to Paul, as he is the one who made the point you are trying to correct with me.
Amused
Your lack of knowledge is staggering. I expect nothing less form Eagle. Under apartheid teh Bantustans were disease ridden hell holes. Teh gformer TB had one of the highest incidence of TB anywhere in the world. Malnutriton and kwashiorkor had an incidenc of 50% in the Transkei. read Porf Coovadia’s textbook on paediatrucs. Health care was abysmal at hospitals like Bara and KE VIII patienst were simpkly place on floorbeds whilst the JHB Gen had empty wards. You my dear chap have nailed your colors to the mast. You have abosolutley no evidence that life for blacks was better under apartheid. To suggest that it was is a compelte distortion. I really find it quite amazing that you after 4 years of running a BB or whatever it us you do that is sojolly importnat come here and tell us about SA history. Why don’t you get hold of Smapie Terreblanches’ A History of Inequality in SA or Uprooting Poverty or Cosma Demsmond’s classic Surplus People. I will never allow vicious rascist like yourslef to poison the new SA.
Let me enlighten you. Sophiatown was a free settlement outside JHB it was bulldozed into the ground and the poor white suburb of Triomf built there.
District Six was a coloured area in CApe Town. It too was bulldozed into the ground and the poulation moved to the Cape Flats.
Steve Biko was the leader of teh black consciousness movement. He was arrested and beatedn by six afrikaans security policemen into a coma then placed naked on teh back of a landrover and drive to Pretoria where he died.
Let us examine how well thought and intelligent
Pauls replies are and see if they hold any water.
Let me begin to say there are still people alive
in South Africa who were born in 1933 who
will testfy to the fact that they as youngster
got up at 4.00 am at the tender age of lit
coal stoves,made coffee and then headed out to
the fields to lead a team of oxen while the fields
the corn field were ploughed by their father,no
as owner but bywoners.
My father in law was born in 1909 and my da in
1907.Neither of them passed standard 6 (grade 8).
My father in law was huge man and worked for many years as a stoker on the railway so they were labourers and did the manual labour.
Cool down
You are kidding me right. Where did you pinch this form Mobty Python. Did you father kill you dance on your grave make you work 25 hours a day 8 days a week. And if you tell teh young people about this they won’t believe a word you say. Did your father the stoker not have aboy to cary his tool box and pass him the bobbejaan spanner
To get back to the original blog I have heard much anguish here about the alleged farm killings that are going on. It must come as little surpirse to farmers to realize how hated they really are. For years they enjoyed access to cheap labor and massive govenrment subsidies. They treated their laborers very badly. Piad them in Tot’s of alcohol. You don’t seem to go a weak without some rascist farmer tying a laborer to a tree and beating him or throwing him alive into a lion enclosure. Funny how Eagle and CE never mention these sort of incidents
“You say that Apartheid and white superiority brought you disease and poverty, and therefore want compensation. The trouble is that apartheid and minority white rule actually brought you the very opposite. You had the highest standard of living, best health care, and longest life expectancy of any country in Africa. Just look at how the black population has grown in that era. Your assertion just isn’t true. You want compensation for something that never happened.”
Dear amused
You protest too much.
You did write that did you not.
You did sya you want compensation for something that never happened.
What never happened then apartheid.
Please clarify for me I am a little uncertain of what you mean. I presume your thought is so subtle that I am missing something
Let me try and turn this around. What is the purpose of rascism. Well it is essentially an attempt to put distance between yourslef and another human being. Once this distance is in place it reduces your moral cuplability. That is why armies alwys racialize their opponents. The Japanese in world war II were referred to as yellow monkeys. The Germans as Huns and Krauts. In Vietam the locals were Charlies Gooks Dinks and slpoes. On the border they were called PB’s Plaaslike Bevolking. It make sit easier for you to inflcit pain and suffering on someone who is only partly human. Look at how we had so many anti-Irish jokes during the republican struggle in teh occupied counties of teh North. It made it easier for teh British to demonize teh Irish. All this whilst MI5 lead a viciosu campaign to undermien teh republicna movememt. Note when the Shnakhill Butcher boys and Protestant paramilitary units all funded and supported by MI5 massacared Catholics it was always downplayed by the BBC. When the Provisionla IRA fought back in an entirley justified campaign of self defence they were vilified. It always amused me that a few dead horses in Hyde Park got more sympathy than all the republicans brutally tortured by teh Britsih occupation forces in the occupied six counties
Amused reader - in one of your posts you mention gang rape of a 76 year old and golf club beating of 81 year old - what exactly are you talking about there and how does that mean that media should not focus on blatant racism evident at UFS? And in order to overcome extreme inequities apartheid caused, SA does need AA/BEE for many years to come, and this is coming to you from a white man, but one who accepts all humans as members of human race, which is something many, not all, but many white South Africans seem to find hard to do. I just wish that they would implement AA/BEE in a way to benefit masses of poor blacks and not just middle class, that would go a long way to start reducing the crime.
Lazola, perhaps you have personal experience of being poorly treated by some white fellow students and this compels you to formulate some sweeping generalised opinions about why all — or at least most — whites behave badly in this way.
Perhaps those “racists” also have personal experiences of being poorly treated by blacks and they too have formulated opinions why all — or at least most — blacks behave badly in this way.
What makes your black man’s generalisation any more valid and less “racist” than their white man’s generalisations?
I admire your dedication and persistence. You are posting at 02:50. Don’t you sleep? Its interesting debating with you, but can we do it without insults or your telling us what you think we are saying?
@sbu
Interesting point. Do you plan on issueing an apology to the San people for their genocide by your ancestors as they migrated south?
In your own words, you seem to be denying the extent of the damage of the racist Bantu system on the San community.
Firstly, they do not need your sympathy, thank you, it will not bring back the lives of the San and fellow black people killed by the Mfecane.Nor will it bring back the opportunities that their fathers and mothers were supposed to have, which might have led to better lives.
Secondly, on the compensation issue, you are not paying back what you (assuming that you are Black and of South African background) took from the San personally, the historical, cultural, psychological and material re-imbursement goes far beyond the times of your birth and upbringing. Not only do you owe them a personal apology, you owe it to them personally make right what your Grandpa and Gogo did wrong!
Get the point? Bed careful pointing a finger when 4 are pointing back at you. Its an afrikaans saying.
I have been thinking about Sbu’s post. It is really superb because it sums up exactly what this is all about. What we have on this blog is a whole lot of people of privildge trying to rewrite history to exonerate themselves from it. Eagle and Ce deliberatley try and undermine the facts. Sharpeville etc are well documented and really require little in the way of cross references. The atrocious nature of Bantu education is similarly well documented. Apartheid deliberatley uneducated Africans it is no wonder we now have a skills shortage. Mandela is about reconciliation as we like it or not are all here and need to wrok together if we are not going to become a Yougoslavia. However this does not mean that white priviledge can continue as if it is business as usual. To correct what was a deliberate policy of impoverishing people needs a deliberate and sustained policy of intervention. As Christi and Patrick Bond pointed out the elite settlement at Kempton Park ensured that neo-libarlsim prevailed. This needs to be addressed urgently. It is ridiculous that we have a budget surplus but we do not have more comprehenisve poverty allevaition programs. The governement needs to take money from the rich and directly injuect it into poor communities. Water and lights should be free or heavily subsidized.
Thanks Sbu for injecting a personal perspective into this debate. I freely admit that I discuss this from an academic point of view whereas people like you actually felt the business end of apartheid oppression. And it was not pleasant
No i am not of South African background, and my ‘oupa’ was sentenced to death for refusing to fight in the first world war, since he refused to kill another man,and was shipped to France for his execution. He was eventually spared, although imprisoned for 4 years, and then became a part time preacher, part time dock worker. My father was brought up sharing 1 bed with his 6 sisters, sleeping top to toe in a house rented from the government. So go recalculate exactly what i owe you! My family dragged itself out of poverty, hand over hand, and in a country where no black man existed.
Like many before you, you deny exactly what you had before colonisation and apartheid. The white man didn’t deprive you of an education or health care, you never had either before he arrived. What you actually mean is he gave himself a better education that the one he gave you, this may be unjust, but is is hardly the same thing.
Since the white man was paying for your education, and you were not, it can be argued that he was entitled to do so, but that is another issue, and one upon which i have not fully considered. Also remember that you were burning the schools he was building, hardly an incentive to build better ones!
I think the great injustice of apartheid was that no matter how talented you were, you could not rise above a certain position in society, and i think that was very wrong.
However you must remember that when the whites settled South Africa their civilisation was vastly more advanced than yours, and some degree of separation, for practical reasons, was inevitable.
I completely disagree with you over whom the rightful owner of the land was. The reason land distribution is required, and i agree that it is required, has nothing to do with who owned the land, the title deed will tell you that.. It has to do with the inequitable ownership of the land along racial lines. This is the reason, that where land is redistributed, the owner is compensated, do not confuse the two.
Finally, Sbu, it doesn’t matter whether you like ‘what the constitution prescribes’ or not. It is the law of our land, it was the terms by which power was handed over to majority rule, so you will just have to get used to it.
I am not against reconciliation, i am happy to abide by our constitution, the very basis for our reconciliation. It is actually you and your warped sense of history, entitlement and dismissal of the values of the constitution that threaten reconciliation.
You are a very sharp opportunist! As a result of your rush to respond, you have lost the gist of what the blog was all about. Shame! It is because you are busy reading the times at which these replies were posted instead of reading what was posted. Focus Chief, focus!
Better yet, ask Lazola (Or do it yourself) to write a “Don’t blame bullish Mfecane - blame his parents”, then we’ll take about the Sans and Mfecane. But I fear, that that discussion will not go anywhere because the current programs that are in place to cater for the inequalities of the past involve and include the Sans,i.e land redistribution and all.
From valued contributor to a lost blogger, shame! Maybe you should do more consulting work…
I do not claim a detailed historical knowledge of South Africa, and usually sit out of the debates on specific aspects of South African history. The bigger picture is easier observe given the multitude of evidence left behind.
What i do know is, that, without denying about hospital conditions about which i know nothing, life expectancy rose from 38.1 years to 62.9 years during the apartheid years, so health conditions can hardly have got worse can they? The facts do not bear out your claims.
I have replied to you twice about not denying apartheid, if you chose to misread my reply again then so be it. If you are too stupid to read it, then repeating it will not help.
Talking of history, your assessment of the troubles in Northern Ireland are as laughable as they are ignorant. My cousin, an unarmed female civilian, was shot dead by the IRA whilst collecting census papers. My mother is Northern Irish. The Hyde park bomb killed 4 people, and injured 50. If you can only remember the horses but forget the people, you had best not lecture me on morality.
If you really think your view is from an academic viewpoint i would like to know where you were educated?
Hey Amused I am not educated. Why do you want to know. If you really believe your stat about life expectancy which you have not verified anyway then I really have to give up. Every other stat about apartheid points to things getting worse and worse for black people. As I have said Sampie Terrblanche’s book Inequality in SA will give you a good overview with lots of figures.
As for Northern Ireland the best book is Tim Pat Coogan’s The Troubles. Basically NI was an apartheid state where teh Protestant’s lorded it over the Catholics until the Civil Rights Marches. Teh outraged Protestnat mob attacked Cathoics everywhere and the Provisional IRA was borbn to defend Catholic areas. The army was initially seen as a neutral force but rapidly sided with the RUC and Protestant’s and 30 years of bloodshed ensured. Until Tony Blair decided that the IRS were not terrorists but people with a point of view. MI 5’s dorty war tactics are well documented as well.
I completely disagree with you over whom the rightful owner of the land was. The reason land distribution is required, and i agree that it is required, has nothing to do with who owned the land, the title deed will tell you that.. It has to do with the inequitable ownership of the land along racial lines. This is the reason, that where land is redistributed, the owner is compensated, do not confuse the two.
No=one compenstaed Indian’s who owned land in Greyville when they were forced to move to Chatsworth. There was no hullabloo about prperty righst when distric 6 was being torn down
@ Amused.
Why was he sentenced to death fro refusing to fight? Conscription only came in in 1916 after the Battle of the SOmme. Conscientous Objectors were accomadated into alternate services by teh British army. Those executed were deseters about 200 were shot. The book to read is Blindfolded and Alone.
In your airbrushing of apartheid you omit to mention that mission schools were closed down by teh government. So even schools for which the long suffering whites were not paying were closed down. Black people paid many times oover for apartheid. It was not the whites altruistically paying for blacks. The Durban system involved a municipal monopoly on brewing African beer and then selling it at municipal beerhalls. The funds generated wwre used to pay for townships and Bantu administration. SO in effect blacks paid for thier own oppression. The monopoly was why the Durban municipality was so determined to find and destroy illegal breweries in Cato Manor. Thsi sparked off teh 1960 Cato Manor Riots. If you go to the Local history Museum in Durban there is an excellet photpgraphic record of teh whole of Cato Manor. Some of the photos of abject povert will dispel you notions of happy blissful natives.
“The reason land distribution is required, and i agree that it is required, has nothing to do with who owned the land, the title deed will tell you that.. It has to do with the inequitable ownership of the land along racial lines.”
“Don’t blame racist students - blame the parents”
An interesting idea. But I could just as well write a blog:
“Don’t blame the murderers - blame the parents”
OR
“Don’t blame the rapists - blame the parents”
In which case, like it or not, black parents would loose hands down on the stats.
Brandon
Hitler went for the Jews because of “No vacancy” signs on Jewish shops in Austria. Where on earth did you read that? Reference please. I have heard a theory that Hitler was spurned by a Jewish girl in Austria which made him anti Jewish. I wonder what made Mbeki anti white?
Willem
“The Afrikaner’s roots are definately not poor white. Our roots are a tiny band of pioneers”
Sorry - those pioneers were trekking to find land because they WERE poor whites and had no land in the Cape Colony.
“bring down the mightiest empire the world has ever seen”
How and when? That empire still exists, by the way, only now it is called “the Commonwealth”.
“the poor whites problem was a consequence of us having lost that war”
That is true. More a result of the Brits having destroyed the farms and their livelihoods.
“built up the state into the mightiest and most prosperous on the entire continent”
That is true - provided you discount all the oil rich states.
Consulting Engineer
Plato said “when you speak with me define your terms”
You keep speaking about “Liberals” or “Leftists”
Define what those terms mean to you. They may not mean the same to the rest of us.
Define your terms.
It is not about all men being equal in the way you mean. It is about all men being given equal opportunities. After that it is up to them.
Amused Leader
If your article was deleted on alieviating poverty and growing the nation - check it out, remove what could be offensive, and re-submit. I do that, and I freely admit that I write much more carelessly than I would if I was not being edited. We do have laws of defamation.
SBU
You don’t have to uplift a majority - it uplifts itself. AA has only been used in the rest of the world to uplift minorities.
I think you do yourself down when you say you got your first job because of AA. You were still competing against other blacks were you not? I think you got it on merit.
Paul
“to keep Afrikaans as a language is an insult”
To whom? The browns ? They developed the language. Read my blog.
“the great white bawana bringing wisdom to the poor heathen”
I could tell you stories about when the indabas produced better wisdom than my ancestors, who were educated at Cambridge and Harvard. No space here. Maybe I will blog them some time.
“Great deal of doubt whether there was any vow at all”
There definately was. One of my ancestors was the first minister of the Church of the Vow. He was a missionary to Moshesh and his people when they clashed with the boers. Moshesh and his people fled north in the night, leaving the missionaries behind. The Trekkers were thrilled to have them. They had had no ordained minister to baptise or to marry them. However, once in Natal, his main congregation was Zulu.
“the government needs to take money from the rich and directly inject it into the poor communities”
They take the money all right. It is called taxes. They just prefer to buy arms or pay themselves massive salaries with it, rather than inject it into the poor communities.
“It may sit easier for you to inflict pain and suffering on someone who is only partly human”
That is a universal phenonomen not a black/white issue. It is how all armies are trained. You identified some of them yourself : Germans(huns), Vietnamese (gooks) etc etc
The best analysis of this has been given by the writer and phychiatrist Scott M Peck in his books “The Road Less Travelled” and “People of the Lie”
The Americans were horrified when the atrocities of Mai Lai in the Vietnam War surfaced and he, as a psychiatrist and serving soldier, was sent to do an analysis. The generals did not like his analysis and buried it, because it said that American soldiers were no different to German Nazi soldiers. He only published many years later. He calls it the “WE -THEY” phenonomen. Read the books.
Tim Pat Coogan is an Irish nationalist you idiot. That is like me telling you to read the history of South Africa by Verwoed!
Northern Ireland was not a Apartheid state. After the Anglo-Irish war, Ireland was partitioned, into North and South as the terms of peace.
The north had a protestant majority and wished to remain British, the South was predominantly catholic and wished to be Irish.
The British position was that the will of the majority must be accepted, and as the majority of Northern Irish residents wished to remain British that was the case.
Some of the catholic minority, were not willing to live by the wishes of the majority, and engaged in a terrorist war against the rule of majority. Hardly apartheid is it?
The British army went in to protect the catholics against the protestants, because there was an upsurge in sectarian violence, and the catholics were outnumbered. They were initially welcomed, but soon became political targets.
You refer to Bloody Sunday, when terrorists in the crown opened fire on the army first.
Protestant paramilitaries killed 1020 people, the British army and Northern Irish police legally killed 362 people, whilst the republican terrorists killed 2056.
You just expose the shallowness of your research, and your ridiculous bias.
Do you really believe, after all you have said about SA that the minority have more rights than the majority, and if they don’t like it they can start killing and torturing people?
you wrote: “Since the white man was paying for your education, and you were not, it can be argued that he was entitled to do so, but that is another issue, and one upon which i have not fully considered. ”
Because of exploitation of blacks, it could be argued by many that blacks paid for the education of whites!
Black miners doing more of less the same work as white miners (and here I’m not referring to geologists, mining engineers etc who in any case constituted only a tiny percentage of the mining workforce), got paid a small fraction of what whites got.
“The cash-wage gap between White and Black miners had, therefore, widened from 11.7:1 in 1911 to 17.6:1 in 1966.”
Had there been “equal pay for equal work” blacks would have been in a position to pay high taxes.
Likewise, blacks in industry earned a fraction of whites.
“Although African earnings in secondary industry are considerably higher, and the wage gap between White and Black correspondingly lower (approximately 5 to 1), nevertheless the same tendency is apparent there. In his book South African Predicament, the economist F.P. Spooner states that between 1949 and 1954 there was a decline in the real income of Africans, in all sectors of the economy, of 6 5 percent. In the same period, the real income of Whites rose by 46 percent.
Figures quoted by Professor Houghton in The South African Economy show that in 1936 the average African wage in industry was about 18,5 percent of the average White wage, rising to about 25 percent in 1945 but declining to about 19 percent again by 1961.
Comparing the increase in African wages with the rise in the cost of living, the report said that since 1930 the latter had doubled over each twenty-year period. ‘Bantu wages barely keep pace with the rising cost of living and are a matter for extreme concern. The general mass of Bantu have not really improved their positions financially in the two decades 1946-66.’ Because of this, the report said, few Africans could afford to give their children much education. ‘Poor families, once they have paid for their housing, food and traveling, have virtually nothing left over for clothing, household goods or other amenities (Rand Daily Mail, 29 March 1967).
Despite the meagre wages that most blacks earned in the 1950s and 1960s, many whites at the time complained that the govt was spending too much on blacks.
In May 1968, the information officer of the Nationalist Party, Dr C.P. Mulder, M.P. for Randfontein, replying to ‘certain Nationalists who complained that the Government spent too much money on Africans’, said: ‘But do these people realise that the Government spends as much money on pensions for the Whites as it spends on the Africans as a whole?’ (Rand Daily Mail, 6 May 1968).
you wrote: “The white man didn’t deprive you of an education or health care, you never had either”
As can be inferred from my previous post, discriminatory wages reduced educational opportunities for the disenfranchised in SA, as children had to leave school before matric to work - a situation that only changed significantly through the 1970s and continuing thereafter. Around 300 blacks and 300 coloureds wrote matric in 1950, and this no. increased to around 3000 each, by the beginning of the 1970s.
Teachers salaries were discriminatory too.
The following are from a few parts of Chapter 11: Indoctrinating the Young from The Rise of the South African Reich. www.anc.org.za/books/reich11.html
New salary scales were introduced in the same period (1963) for White, Coloured and Indian teachers as well, but it was calculated at the time that the ratios in the top notches of the new scales, for male teachers in secondary schools who had a degree and a professional certificate, were:
White 100
Coloured (Cape) 65.5
Married African 53.2
Single African 34
(Muriel Horrell, Survey of Race Relations, 1963)
[ Oldfox: So it did not matter if an African child was the son a medical doctor (and thus a tax payer) he was taught by a teacher who earned between half and a third of a white teacher. ]
The tribal colleges today are staffed largely by Whites, most of them Afrikaners, who are known to be firm supporters of apartheid. At Fort Hare, Turfloop, and Ngoya there were in 1967 only five African professors and forty-two African lecturers as against fifty-three White professors and 147 White lecturers (Deputy Minister of Bantu Education, Assembly, 8 March 1968). The staff is divided into two clearly marked categories according to race. White members of staff are Council employees, but African members are civil servants and subject to oppressive restrictions. There are substantial differences in pay between White and Black. The maximum salary for an African male professor at Fort Hare is less than the minimum salary for a White female professor. Similar discrimination is applied to the lecturing staff. In all categories the salaries paid to the White personnel are much higher than those received by their non-White colleagues.
And seven applicants who wished to study engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand [ this is for the year 1960 ] had been refused permission because, in the Minister’s opinion, there were as yet ‘no prospects of employment for qualified Bantu engineers’. For them there were no alternative facilities. They were simply informed that they might not study engineering.
In her book A Decade of Bantu Education, Muriel Horrell calculated that, in direct taxation and voluntary contributions, African parents contributed proportionately more to the education of their children than did any other section of the population. African parents pay voluntary levies towards the erection of schools and the payment of teachers, while African children pay for items which are supplied free to White children. A survey conducted by the Natal region of the Institute of Race Relations, quoted in the Rand Daily Mail of 6 January 1966, showed that the total cost of sending one African child through to matriculation was £140. And this sum did not include the cost of school uniforms, sports equipment, satchels, suitcases, sports funds, medical funds, bus and train fares, or maintenance during holidays. Proportional to White income, the Rand Daily Mail special correspondent calculated, the £140 was equivalent to £560.
‘How many White children could you afford to matriculate at that cost?’ he asked, stating that this is one aspect of life in South Africa which should make those claiming to be proud of what their government does for race relations ‘grovel with shame and self-hate’.
Discriminatory pay and other conditions resulting from Bantu education caused great resentment among black teachers. Some black educators, like renowned maths teacher Tamsanqa Kambule did a superb job under the circumstances. But many were disillusioned with the system, and left teaching (some emigrated) or were unable to do their best, and black education suffered.
Similarly education of coloureds were hampered from around the 1960s onwards. Thousands of coloured teachers emigrated to Canada and Australia during the 1960s.
Your post of May 11th, 2008 at 11:11 pm refers.
While many white farmers did ill treat farm workers in the past and a few still do, you should not generalize the way you do in the above post.
What percentage of white farmers ill treat workers? Its probably very small.
Many of the farmers mentoring emerging black commercial farmers, are white Afrikaners. Funding and support for such training/mentoring is often provided by the mostly white agricultural unions and co-ops. This is right across SA, including in the Free State. South African farmers are invited to farm in African countries from Mozambique to Nigeria, and they are renowned for being innovative and very adaptable.
Some of the farmers who were killed/attacked are farmers who bought farms post 1994. One of the female farmers who was raped was single - hardly the kind of person who physically abuses farm workers.
It costs R9 million to set up a viable diary farm. The machinery for such a farm is very high tech. You can’t get farm workers working with computes to be more productive by whipping them.
White farmers declined from 132 000 earlier in the last century to around 60 000 in 2002. The number rapidly declined to around 45 000 today, partly but not entirely due to farm attacks.
We need every experienced farmer we have, and, unless we get farmers from e.g. China to train emerging farmers in SA (unlikely, because of language problems), we are dependent upon mostly white farmers to transfer expertise in farming and farm management to the new black commercial farmers.
My point is not that an equal education was provided to all, i have explicitly accepted that black and white education was not equal.
My point is education and health care as we now know them were both products of the European settlement (yes i know china had modern medicines years ago, but the africans didn’t).
Therefore it is factually incorrect to say that black Africans were denied an education, they were provided with something they did not previously have. (and Paul who create the mission schools, were they not also europeans?)
This is what i actually said
“The white man didn’t deprive you of an education or health care, you never had either before he arrived. What you actually mean is he gave himself a better education that the one he gave you, this may be unjust, but is is hardly the same thing.”
You have just provided proof of what i have already acknowledged.
It was not a post on poverty alleviation, is was an article is submitted for consideration as a readers blog.
I find it hard to believe that there was anything remotely offensive, but there was no obligation upon TL to print it, it was not a response. I wasn’t entirely happy with it in any case, because i had to be quite generalist given the need to keep the number of words down.
You really are too much. I went to your link. You know Wikipaedia the tool fo teh intellectually bereft and anyway happened upon this little tit bit. Seems to substantiate most of what I believe
Much of the hostile loyalist reaction to the Civil Rights Movement was linked to the ability of leaders to provoke fear within the Unionist populace that the IRA was not only behind the NICRA, but was also planning a renewed armed campaign. In fact, the IRA was moribund, had few weapons, fewer members, negligible support, and was increasingly committed (out of necessity) to non-violent politics. The first bombing campaign of the Troubles (largely directed against power stations and other infrastructure) was staged by the Loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force in 1969 to try and implicate the IRA.
You know amused I have never been to NI but somehow I feel that I should use your own eloquent words to describe why I am better placed to make an asessment than you.
“My viewpoint may be different from yours, but it is not automatically less valid. If anything i have said is true, the please point it out. If it is just because i differ from your view then you are being dishonest.
It maybe that you can no longer see the wood from the trees, and, as someone who came to South Africa with few pre-conceptions, perhaps i can be more objective in my reasoning.”
Juts cahnge SA to NI and there you have it. A perfectl;y reasoned answer. I mean what IRA violence. Can you substantiate your claim. What violent street protests are you referring to.
Lyndall
The Americans were horrified when the atrocities of Mai Lai in the Vietnam War surfaced and he, as a psychiatrist and serving soldier, was sent to do an analysis. The generals did not like his analysis and buried it, because it said that American soldiers were no different to German Nazi soldiers. He only published many years later. He calls it the “WE -THEY” phenonomen. Read the books.
I have read severla books on this topic. I would recommed a book bh Jonathan Glover called Humanity: A moral history of the twentieth century.
My Lai is discussed in depth
Paul
“It must come as little surprise to farmers to realise how hated they really are”
And you still wonder why food prices are soaring? Do you want to farm or do you just want to own land?
“paid them in tots of alcohol”
All farmers on all farms gave part of the produce to the workers. On a sheep farm it would be a sheep. On a wine farm it would be wine. On most farms in the Western Cape the system was abandoned generations ago. However, you can’t take away rights. My grandfather offered his workers an increase in wages in replacement for the “dop” far in excess of the value of the wine. As he exspected most took the money - probably urged on by the wives. One, however, refused - an he was one of the senior foremen, Outa Manus, who had full responsibility for the small herd of Jersey cattle. Why did he refuse? Nothing to do with the money or the wine. Every evening my uncle would have to come up to Die Kelder, open it up, and pour him his dop, which he would very slowly drink. He got almost an hour a day to talk to his boss about the work of the day and the planning of the next. His wife was one of my grandmothers two maids, who were with her till she went into the old age home after my grandfather died. The three of them kept everyone alive in the flu eperdemic. None of their children became farm workers - but doctors, teachers and nurses. Eventually my uncle had to make a rule that at least ONE of the people living in a house had to work on the farm.
The dop was only given in the evening. Do you think any farmer would let anyone drive a tractor drunk? Do you know ANYTHING about farming. Pruning vines is a job which requires skill and intelligence. Vines only produce on second yesr wood. If you prune wrong you will have no crop and go bankrupt.
“mission schools for which the long suffering whites were not paying”
The whites, from Europe and America, paid for both the missionaries and the schools.
Redistribution of land or money can only happen once. It does not make everyone rich, except temporarily. It makes everyone poor. They did it in Haiti and Zimbabwe - and look at the results.
You are doing land reform for the San are you? Really? How - when most of them were exterminated in a genocide by the blacks, just like the aboriginees in Australia? Why do you think they happily assisted the SADF in the Angolan war as trackers? They hated you lot for their persecution over centuries.
Oldfox
Everything you say is correct. Just some points.
Fort Hare in 1967 might have been all you say. Pre 1948, however, it was a center of black learning with brilliant black lecturers where very many of Africa’s leaders were educated.
“Few Africans could afford to give their their children much education”
Very true - but there were exceptions. Many white women paid for the education of the children of their maids - like that recent tragic case of the brilliant student who died in a botched circumcision.
Also teachers, white brown and black, set up free schools after hours in places like church halls, to try and keep education going. Sadly “Liberation before Education” became too strong a slogan to resist and the government traced these schools and persecuted them.
Amused Reader
My husband is of Irish extraction. He has only been able to afford to go to Ireland once - he LOVED it. For years, and years, and years, he has wished to trace his Irish roots - but the municipal records were burned in “the troubles”. For about the last 6 months he has been using the net and connecting with geneological sites. Yesterday he was contacted by a woman in Ireland who has traced records of Beddy’s in his home town, which she is posting to him. He is thrilled.
Some valid points you make. There are valid points on each side of the spectrum but I do believe that what some people are saying is that black people in South Africa are better off than most in Africa. That is declining under the ANC Government at the moment, just look at Education and all the ridiculous policies implemented since 1994.
I get the idea that Apartheid and Colonialism will forever be blamed in SA and anyone with a White skin should seriously reconsider their decision to stay here. No matter if you were left or right, you will be paying for Apartheid. This is the unfortunate truth, and if a despot like Mugabe could hide behind the “Struggle against the Colonial Powers” for so many years with the support of many African leaders, why would SA be any different?
On the topic of “Why would SA be any different”, I was shocked to see the Xenophobic attacks in Alexandra this week. I wonder who’s parents we can blame for that one? But the point is, Whiteskins should ask themselves why would any of these murdering criminals view a “privileged” white South African in any other light? Is that why a lot of murders on whites are so brutal? Attacks on farmers are often horrific and without any motive, nothing is stolen?
I believe that whites should leave and give the indigenous people the chance to rule and live in this country and make their own lives here. White people are simply missing the boat if they think they will not be paying for the past for at least the next 3 generations.
There will never be reconciliation or forgiveness for the past transgressions, which means that we will never have a normal society. Blame whoever you like but it won’t ever come right. That has been my conclusion and hence I am on the way to Perth to start over again, but at least I know my kids will grow up in a normal society. Anyway, people like Paul, Liansky and Lazola would be happy to see the back of my wife and I.
The brain drain will leave its mark on a 1st world economy for sure. Although Communism has failed all around the world, we are heading to Communism at a rapid rate after JZ takes over. It won’t work because Communism means everyone is equal and the tax base must be equal too!
After seeing the fighting at Polokwane and now Sun City within the ruling party, I hope the day never happens that the Tri-partheid Alliance splits with bad blood, we have seen all over Africa what happens.
Oldfox, one of the problems in this country too is the Farmers. Our farming sector is rapidly shrinking and the ANC is quite happy about this as it makes land redistribution easier. Fact is that Hunger is the biggest driver of any revolution. When people start starving, our mortality becomes something you look at in the mirror every day and your somehow realise that life is worth very little unless things change…and you are more likely to take up arms if you don’t agree with the powers that be…so these are real threats. But, like Paul’s sentiments about the Afrikaner farmers, I am sure (especially listening to Minister Lulu) they feel the same towards these white Afrikaner farmers. Why help them when Governments around the world subsidise their farmers - anyone here ever wondered why? Guess what, food security = peace. Look what’s happening in Egypt etc.
Ignorance and assumptions are the mother of all stuff ups.
I suggest you e-mail them and ask if they would consider publishing if you re-wrote. If they say no - then post it as a comment. At least you won’t have to keep the number of words down.
You are yet another blogger in a rush to respond without reading my comments, just like that other one.
Are you are saying that if I need fire I must not light the wood, it will light itself? Are you a stand-up comedian? Was apartheid used in the rest of world to oppress black people as well?
The firm I was working for was looking for the most skilled black person, hence I got the job dummy? Is that merit? Next time try and focus on what it is that you actually mean to write, are you and that confused, sorry, amused reader sitting across each other?
Did any government policy deprive your oupa of becoming a “part-time preacher, part-time dock worker”? Did your father share a 1 bed with 6 sisters in a house rented from the government as a result of any government policy formulated precisely to create such living conditions? I wonder? I am shocked at how you jumped at the opportunity to personalize your argument, with such distortion.
Your family dragged itself out of poverty, CONGRATULATIONS to the family of amused readers – some of us never had the opportunity to do that, hence we are not amused when we read your inanity. Education (the gradual process of acquiring knowledge) was not a white man’s phenomenon or invention, but western education was. And in a world that is so westernized, one needs western education (the gradual process of acquiring western knowledge), at least, in order to drag oneself out of poverty. This is what the system of “good neighborliness” deprived us of, get it?
The point of who paid for the education has been settled by Paul (thanks Paul), I think, try reading “The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest have Done So Much III and So Little Good” to understand the honest responsibility of past oppressors to the previously oppressed. When you say “However you must remember that when the whites settled South Africa their civilization was vastly more advanced than yours, and some degree of separation, for practical reasons, was inevitable”, you again fail to hide the David Bullard in you, are you saying apartheid was necessary? As to whether this “vastly more advanced” civilization was good or bad for us natives, history tells of a sad tale?
I am tired of your justifications of apartheid, Paul and Oldfox can now deal with you, seeing that they have more patience for your claptrap!
With regard to my grandfather, i see there is no such thing as too low for you?
Interesting how you seem to be able to even know more about my own family than me.
The following link is to a teachers handout pack, for visitors to Richmond Castle, an English Heritage site, where 16 conscientious objectors were locked up during world war one.
“The surviving graffiti on the walls of the cells, written and drawn by prisoners, includes graffiti by some of the 16 men imprisoned during the First World War who were taken to France, court-marshalled for refusing orders and sentenced to death. The Richmond Sixteen, as these men became known, were among the first in this country to defy conscription
on moral grounds.”
Once again Paul, apart from having just insulted the memory of my grandfather for no other purpose than pure spitefulness, you are just plain wrong.
Now, any progress on the AA / BEE question, or are we just to assume that you have opinions that you are incapable of backing up with reason?
When you are challenged (AA/BEE) you ignore the question.
When you are proved wrong (life expectancy, conscientious objectors etc) you just change the subject.
You ask Eagle to provide his own proof for your comments
and now you claim my link, having dismissed it, proves your point.
YOU SAID
When the Provisionla IRA fought back in an entirley justified campaign of self defence they were vilified. It always amused me that a few dead horses in Hyde Park got more sympathy than all the republicans brutally tortured by teh Britsih occupation forces in the occupied six counties.
Do point me to where that link confirmed or supported any of the things you said.
Not even the IRA claimed to be acting in self defence, they were fighting for a ‘united Ireland’. 4 people died in the Hyde park bomb, not just horses, and i can’t remember if the link discussed torture or not, but i assure you if you were to accuse one side of using torture, it would not be the British.
You seem to glibly dismiss that the majority of Northern Irish citizens have voted to be British. You even go so far as to say that the actions of the terrorist organisation, fighting against the will of the majority, and murdering innocent civilians, are in your words ‘Fully Justified’.
Well now we know exactly what you stand for. Best leave any moral superiority off any subsequent posts.
My dear Lyndall
Just to clarify things. I am not defending the actions ofd any current political group. I am simply trying to prevent people from deliberately trying to airbrush the past and pretend that the suffering of apartheid never happened or was not that bad.
I think the issue of labor relations on farms is a deeply troublesome one. I would suggest to you that it is not as bucolic as some of you are suggesting. There are severla NGO’s which have been involved with organizoing rural labor. Large agriculture was deliberately involved in influx control under apartheid so as to ensure that there was a permanent supply of cheap balck labor for farms. Unfortunately the rustig image of a happy feudal system on the farms is not true and teh Tot system was inequitous and has resulted in widespread alcohol addiction especially in the Western Cape.
Scarface
No one is happy to see you go. You must do what makes you happy. If you are going then go. Why the bitterness? If you really thgink everything is going to come to a grinding halt because you have left well I am afraid that will nopt be the case.
You have my comments out of context regarding the crime victims. Len VD Merwe had asked for examples of white people who had suffered as victims of black racist crime. I think i was quite clear in condemning all racist crime, and simply highlighted that it was not a one way street.
With regard to AA and BEE my main objection is not ethical, but practical. AA and BEE have not worked, show no sign of working, and have not worked elsewhere in the world.
The evidence suggests that they are actually making the problems of South Africa worse by increasing skills flight, and the subsequent loss of jobs, and by the incompetent and racist manner in which they are implemented, which has caused a massive decline in service delivery. Ultimately it is the weakest in society that have suffered most on both counts.
I have challenged Paul 5 times to suggest why he thinks AA and BEE will suddenly start working but he keeps avoiding the question. Maybe you have an answer?
I am all for creating an equal society, but believe this will be achieved much quicker and better through strong economic growth, increased employment, and a massive improvement in the education system.
I happen to approve of the priciple of Affirmative Action. However the priciple is not applied. It is supposed to be if 2 people are equally SKILLED the previously disadvantaged gets the job; not it gets given to an unskilled friend or family menber or ANC crony because he or she is black.
A word of advise to all those who try to reason
with Paul.Forget it the man is not from here
but outer space. Tell me how old are you Paul
that you can make such statements.Have
you ever experienced some of the things
you are so sour mouthed about?
To all those who are frothing at the mouth about me I thought I would post this so that you don’t get the totally wrong impression. I do think that Cool Down, CE Eagle and Amused as well as Lyndall are guilty of airbrushing the past. I know I am right on that one. Here is a report on what is wrong with SA today which I also disagree with.
It is not minebut I think ut is quite a good piece
Health MEC Peggy Nkonyeni’s attempts to portray Dr Mark> Blaylock as a racist threaten to undermine a well-functioning hospital> and also undermine the ANC’s principle of non-racialism>> It takes a long time to build a functioning health service, but a short> time to destroy it. Rob Ferreira Hospital in Mpumalanga was once a> hospital to be proud of. But an MEC, Sibongile Manana, believed that the> hospital’s leadership had undermined her authority by allowing a rape> support organisation that dispensed anti-retrovirals to operate from the> hospital.>> So she fired the hospital superintendent and another doctor for> insubordination. Eight doctors ended up leaving the hospital as a result> and, although this happened seven years ago, Rob Ferreira has never> recovered.>> Manguzi Hospital in the far north of KwaZulu-Natal is doing pretty> well. It has 18 doctors, and it offers a relatively good service> particularly for people with HIV, despite being in the fourth poorest> health district (out of 53) in the country.>> But Health MEC Peggy Nkonyeni has decided that the hospital is a hotbed> of racism and anarchy - mainly because one of the doctors, Dr Mark> Blaylock, put her photograph in a dustbin while another, Dr Colin Pfaff,> raised donor funds to buy extra ARVs for pregnant women.>> KwaZulu-Natal has the worst health indicators in the country - the> highest HIV and TB rates and the lowest life expectancy. There is a> worldwide shortage of doctors, and ours are courted by a variety of> countries. The health department can ill-afford to alienate overburdened> health workers over petty issues.>> Yet Nkonyeni used her Budget speech and a number of subsequent media> interviews to portray Blaylock as a racist.>> In an attempt to prove her claim, she has taken two prominent> professors, a surgeon, a pathologist and an urologist out of their> workplaces for 10 days to examine “racism, ill treatment of staff and> abuse of departmental facilities by Dr Blaylock and some doctors> operating at some of our rural facilities”.>> Blaylock should not have thrown Nkonyeni’s photograph in the bin. He> knows that and he has apologised.>> But his one mistake in the heat of the moment - sparked by the> MEC’s remark that rural doctors were motivated by profit not caring> — should be balanced against his many years’ service to the> country’s poorest patients.>> For over a decade, he has chosen to serve black patients at both> Manguzi and Edendale Hospitals. That’s hardly the profile of a> racist.>> Certainly, the incidents that Nkonyeni has publicised from Blaylock’s> private personnel file show that he can be volatile. He pushed a> radiographer who had reported drunk for work. He broke a pharmacy window> because the pharmacist had failed to order anaesthetic drugs and he had> a patient on the operating table requiring an emergency operation.>> But his triggers were the fact that his colleagues’ inefficiencies> were compromising patient care, not racism.>> If he had been a racist, he would not have cared that the black man on> the operating table died because he couldn’t get the operation he> needed; he wouldn’t have fought to get patients’ X-rays so he could> diagnose what ailed them.>> Ascribing racist motives to every action without evidence is in direct> contravention of our Constitution and out of step with the non-racial> legacy of the ANC.>> Crying racism without any evidence is the tactic of a weak leader who> cannot muster any other defence, so resorts to emotion.>> It is also a classic decoy strategy to draw attention away from one’s> own weaknesses. By attacking Blaylock in her Budget speech, Nkonyeni> managed to deflect attention from the fact that her department had> massively over-spent, thanks in large part to inadequate planning and> poor allocation policies.>> The ANC-inspired Freedom Charter recognised way back in 1955 that> “South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white”.> Our Constitution echoes this, saying that the country “belongs to all> who live in it, united in our diversity”.>> But something has happened to the ANC of Oliver Tambo and Nelson> Mandela. It is no longer an organisation that has non-racialism as a> core principle. At the same time, the cult of the individual has gripped> the organisation, particularly in the provinces where MECs’ images> emblazon buses, billboards and newspaper adverts.>> President Thabo Mbeki’s ANC effectively replaced non-racialism with> black African nationalism. Instead of seeking common ground between all> South Africans, Mbeki has frequently resorted to racial blame -> especially during election campaigns.>> We are fast approaching next year’s election, and Nkonyeni’s> growing assertiveness probably stems from the fact that she is firmly> ensconced in Jacob Zuma’s winning camp.>> But while Zuma is trying hard to show that he can reach beyond his> traditional Zulu nationalist base and offer a more humane, inclusive> approach to the development of South Africa, Nkonyeni’s attacks on> Manguzi doctors have sown racial polarisation.>> An until-now unknown organisation called Khanya Africa took the race> issue even further when it issued a press statement via the health> department.>> “Our people have stomached for a long time the behaviors of the so> called rural doctors or health care professionals who use the hunger for> health services by our people and in the process rob them of their> freedom and their rights,” proclaimed Dr Bongani Nxumalo on behalf of> Khanya.>> “Our colleagues may be doing an excellent job but it cannot be done> to the insult (sic) of our black people,” he continued.>> Yet when I called Nxumalo, who is employed in a government hospital, he> did not want to explain the statements attributed to him.>> His logic-defying assertion that putting an MEC’s photo in a bin is> an insult to all black people and thus robs them of their rights would> sit well in Zanu-PF but it should have no place in the ANC.>> Meanwhile, tensions at Manguzi itself are high and there is a risk that> it assumes a racial face. Many of the doctors feel betrayed by the> hospital manager, Sipho Vumase, who supplied the health department with> information about Blaylock. Vumase will be leaving soon to take up a job> at head office.>> But who is looking after the interests of the ordinary patients in> KwaZulu-Natal? Who will rein in Nkonyeni? So far, those who could are> silent. That’s not surprising. Ex-MEC Manana is sitting comfortably in> national Parliament while her province’s health system is in tatters.>> Yet if the ANC continues to let its leaders launch into ill-advised,> race-based attacks to the detriment of service delivery, we will never> have a country envisaged by Tambo, who said that in an apartheid-free> South Africa, young people “shall be taught to love their people of> all races, to defend the equality of the peoples, to honour creative> labour, to uphold the oneness of mankind and to hate untruth,> obscurantism, immorality and avarice”. -
Your sense of entitlement has warped your sense of reality. Somehow the world owes you a living, and no-one else ever suffered anything. You seriously need to take responsibility for your own destiny and get on with it. It is amazing what you can do with a bit of positive mental attitude.
It was you that brought my grandparents into the debate, thinking that you could score some cheap points, it just backfired, since your racial stereotyping was so far off the mark. He also took part in the Jarrow Marches to protest about the extreme poverty of the people of the North East of England. You don’t have a monopoly on poverty and deprivation, although to listen to you you would think so. The common people of almost every race have been through conditions similar to those African suffered. You had apartheid, some had it better, some had it much worse.
I did not agree with apartheid, i am glad it is gone, and i believe we need to work together to create equality of opportunity for all, and to uplift the poor. I will gladly play my part, but i owe nothing. What i do, i will do willingly and of my own free will.
I do not, and never will, agree with some racial crusade by people like you who wish to wear their victimhood on their sleeve, load and proud for all to see, and demand retribution and privilege because of it, no matter what the actual effect of that retribution on the common people you claim to be representing may be. Frankly, i think you lack self respect.
I only know a little about one farm,but I do listen to some of the spokespeople for the NGOs talk on the radio - one of them that deals with farms and tot system etc can NEVER answer questions put to them directly or give examples.
There are NGOs that do brilliant work - like Red Cross. There are also NGOs who have either convinced government or philanthropists to fund them , drive fancy cars, pay themselves fancy salaries, and HAVE to claim something is wrong to justify their existance. Remember - they have no shareholders to account to.
I had idyllic holidays on the farm as a child - but by that time my uncle was running it, and he was a brilliant farmer AND an astute businessman, who took a number of risks - he could have gone under. It was far from idyllic in my mother and my grandmother’s time. They were poor. In those days farmers were rather looked down upon by the “educated” (ie Lawyers, Doctors, Teachers). My grandmother had to cook and bake for the weekend markets to make ends meet and sell this produce to the “educated”. My mother and her siblings were only allowed to wear their shoes to church or to school. There were major problems on the farms after the First World War. BUT there was always enough food - for everyone, workers included. My grandmother was devestated for years when a part of the farm had to be sold to the farmer next door.
But from the little I know, their problem is to find any good farm labour. The people who worked there in my day - their kids are now professionals in the cities.
The alcohol problem I know about in the Cape exists in the slums around the cities. Also if the tot system causes alcoholism - what caused the alledged problems of Dr Manto, Tony Yengeni, MacBride etc etc etc?
Lyndall
Charles Van Oslene wrote a good book called “Theseed is mine” about the life of a bl;ack sharecropper in the old TVL in the 1890’s to 1930’s. These people also worked hard but were systematcially and deliberatley driven off the land to provide cheap labor for whit e farmers. Everyone seems to be very upset with me because I insist on not airbrushing the past. The 1913 Land Act confined 80% pf the population to 13% of the land. Now I ask you was that fair? If you say it was well then obvioulsy we have no common ground on which to discuss things. Eagle asks what deaths in the street, what relocations. That is like asking waht Sceond World War. I mean get real. Cool Down feels I am not old enough to have any insight or knoledge about apartheid. I am not sure how old you would have to be. Is he old enough to have lived through the Boer War? Yet he seems to know quite a biot about it. Amused as always tries to move the debate onto the current policies of teh ANC. I have never defended those policies or aas far as I kno0w even discussed them. My beef is with people trying to rewrite history. The biulldozing of District 6 caused a great deal of pain and the new suburbs on teh cape Flats are atrocious and are riddled with drugs and violence. A dorect result of apartheid twon planning and misadministration. Every reference I have mentioned has been ignored by some posters here because I am not saying that SA pre 1994 was a wonderful place with happy smily blacks. In 1971 Ian Smith said Rhodesia has the happiest blacks in the world. The same night the attack on Atlena farm heralded the beginning of teh Chimurenga war that would eventually sweep white Rhodesia into the history books. Now to look at the current mess in Zim and then use that to justify what was an inequitous systemn in Rhodesia is simply wrong I am afraid. I don’t really expect any of my sparring partners here to accept that. I expect more apoplectic posts. That is fine fire away. I will reply as necessary
The problem with Paul is,that he is too emotionally
involved in what his says and his arguments
therefore are founded in emotion.
There were farmers in my family,I grew up on
a small holding.Some had their land expropriated
to make way for Banty Homelands.They had to wait
for years to be compensated,so delayed compensation
is nothing new.
Some watch their irrigation equipment and pumps
wash down the Limpopo river unable to harvest
their crops and had to go out at night to try
and save some of their tobacco grop.Under
government rule nothing could be sold or salvaged
it was government property.
So they had to move and start all over again,
not an easy task if you are already in your
sixties.
Farms they managed to buy were sometimes
family farms negcleted by the younger generations
who preferred to make a living in town.
Homesteads had to be refurbished fences erected,
some camps cleared of rocks and bush.
It is amazing how quickly the veld takes over
if not looked after.
Now Paul on occasion I would lend a helping hand
and I would have loved to see you haul up let us
say 150 feet of borehole piping, working in the blazing sun standing on a platform or to go out and
pile drive by hand droppers into concrete hard
earth.
No Black hands Paul only white hands.Who do you
think Paul taught the Blacks all the trades
if White tradesmen did not possess those skills?
You know nothing about the hardships the Afrikaners
went through and you forget that after the Boers
conceded defeat, everyone became a British subject
irrespective of your colour.
Did you know that the Afrikaners were forbidden
to use their language in formal surroundings,
had a limited use of it in court rooms, were made
to wear donkey hats and had to stand in the classroom corners if they were caught speaking Afrikaans?Did you ever have to sing ‘God save
the Queen’ after you attended a bioscope performance?
So what happened in 1913 happened under British and
not Afrikaner rule.No tell me how many black
Townships and homelands did you visit?
I will not comment on your emotionally charged posts again, others if willing can waste their time.
Amused
I simply asked about the issue and there was not much insulting in that. Anyway it is an intersting story. They obvioulsy were principled men. I do note that the death sentence was not carried out but was converted to 10 years hard labor by PM Asquith.
To answer your question about what I want to see.
Well there it seems to me that all balance has gone in the economic system. Obvioulsy communist style central palnning is a disaster which needs to be avoided. However rampant free market type appproaches where there are no artificial trade barriers and no preferntial areas are not working. The economic Tigers of Korea and even Japan devloped behind a close dtrade door. Look at teh disatser with teh clothing industry in teh western Cape. By imposing GATT it allowed cheap Chinese goods to pour into SA and wiped out our local clothing industry. Os some sort of protectionism is a must. Then we need to increase government spending on infrastruture like powerstations roads dams etc. A bit like old style Roosevelt new Deal. Belive it or not I agree with you about importing skills. We shpould buy teh skills we need. If we imported nurses from the Phillippines, teachers from india and engineers from China we could jump start the local manufcaturing economy. So in essence a typical social democratic apporach. I am not a member of teh ruling party and I do not agree with everything they have implememted or put in place. I am simply not going to look back on the past with rose tinted glasses.
Cancer follows smoking even if you stopped fourteen years ago. Consequences of apartheid follows it although apartheid was abolished fourteen years ago. As the Bible says, as you sow, so shall you reap!
South Africa holds the world record for highest incidence of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome in certain communities.
Average in developed world
0.97 per 1000
South Africa: one study:-
Method: Active case ascertainment, two-tier screening, and Institute of Medicine assessment methodology were employed among 857 first grade pupils, most born in 1993.
results: 65.2-74.2 per 1,000 children
These rates are 33-148 times greater than U.S. estimates
In high-risk American Indian reservation communities in the United States, the rate of FAS derived from active case ascertainment methods seldom exceeds 10
In African Americans of low socioeconomic status (SES) from a few inner-city areas is 2.29 per 1000
The Tot/Dop system was only finally eliminated in the W. Cape a few years ago (according to the article at www.wineland.co.za/0403dop.php3 ), and only due to concerted efforts by associations such as Dopstop and other NGOs.
The practice may be continuing in the Northern Cape.
Another article said the tot system is still practiced on 1.4% of wine farms
The tot system is blamed for the extremely high incidence of FAS in many coloured communities. Fortunately farmers are co-operating with the NGOs to reduce alcohol abuse (i.e. where tot system no longer used, but workers continue with the patterns of alcohol abuse). Unfortunately FAS causes permanent brain damage, and the victims are a burden on society, and will not progress beyond primary school.
Paul (or must we now call you John, naughty naughty!)
Firstly, you were not just asking, we both know fine well what you were doing, but in the spirit of recent posts, lets just move forward.
I am no more keen to re-write history than you. One thing i have learned in South Africa is that history is neither exact nor linear, and the reality is that often, for example, Sbu and consulting engineer can both post 100% accurate posts that completely conflict with each other.
Sbu can say he had an inferior education, was disadvantaged by apartheid, may have had his family relocated, all of which would be correct. On the other side CE, could be also completely correct in saying the the black man had no education before the arrival of the white, that the land properly belonged to the whites who won it fair and square. I can claim that under white rule all the major indicators of the state of development in a country, ie Life expectancy, Literacy rate and GDP per capita, or people living below the $1 poverty line showed a massive improvement. We are all factually correct.
I really have never wished to deny apartheid or its consequences, it is just that it is but one piece in the puzzle and not the whole picture.
You mention in your post to Lyndall that 80% of the population was allocated 13% of the land. Did you know that in the UK that 1% of the population own 70% of the land, and that 90% of the people live on 10% of the land.
To allow one group, using their perspective of history, to claim privilege and advantage over other sections of our community, is highly divisive, unjust, creates a total destructive sense of entitlement, and frankly is neither helpful or necessary to solve the problems that we face.
We cannot turn back the clock, and since our past is so divisive, it makes no sense to dwell on it, when it is so easy to agree on our future (providing no group claims the right to special privilege).
We can focus on all the main issues, without having to go back in history and take sides.
Land reform (as opposed to land restitution) is about wealth and not land. If we have a more equal distribution of capital, we will automatically get more equal land distribution.
In many ways i agree with you economic assessment. I know you have scoffed at my suggestion before, but it really is not hard to lift people out of poverty in SA. In world terms, and as a developed country the bar is so low, 4% growth is absolutely pathetic. The trouble is we simply do not have the fundamentals in place. and this is where we absolutely differ.
The reason we do not have the fundamentals in place is due to the political desire to be compensated for the past, above all else, whatever the cost. Sbu summed it up perfectly. You owe me, and when i didn’t then my Oupa did. How is that going to solve anything?
We have less skilled people, we have less jobs, we have an electricity crisis, we have declining standards in our education system. (Ignoring the indirect consequences of Crime and health.)
You have to look at what is causing the decline in the fundamental requirements to create growth. I was suggest that AA is the major factor behind at least three of the four and possibly all of them. How then does it serve the future of SA?
BEE is more complicated, but at very least, it means that our best and brightest black entrepreneurs are spending time focusing on the redistribution of wealth than creating new wealth. It would be more cost effective to give R10m to the top 100 black graduates from business school (not that i am advocating that as a policy).
Until we get these fundamentals in place we are destined for failure. You can’t bake a cake without half the ingredients.
This is the reason i wish to argue against the ‘you owe me brigade’, because they, unwittingly i am sure, are going to destroy SA if we let them.
Brilliant post. The BEE situation is actually worse as many of our black entrepreneurs are given contracts which they do not have the expertise to conclude successfully. They get allocated contracts purely on their skin colour.
The business world is riddled with instances of black entrepreneurs who have been paid millions and sometimes hundreds of millions, but have disappeared leaving uncompleted or even untouched contracts.
The reason we do not have the fundamentals in place is due to the political desire to be compensated for the past, above all else, whatever the cost. Sbu summed it up perfectly. You owe me, and when i didn’t then my Oupa did. How is that going to solve anything?
We have less skilled people, we have less jobs, we have an electricity crisis, we have declining standards in our education system. (Ignoring the indirect consequences of Crime and health.)
You have to look at what is causing the decline in the fundamental requirements to create growth. I was suggest that AA is the major factor behind at least three of the four and possibly all of them. How then does it serve the future of SA?
BEE is more complicated, but at very least, it means that our best and brightest black entrepreneurs are spending time focusing on the redistribution of wealth than creating new wealth. It would be more cost effective to give R10m to the top 100 black graduates from business school (not that i am advocating that as a policy).
Until we get these fundamentals in place we are destined for failure. You can’t bake a cake without half the ingredients.
This is the reason i wish to argue against the ‘you owe me brigade’, because they, unwittingly i am sure, are going to destroy SA if we let them.
Well amused
I hate to say it but I agree on the fundamentals of what needs to be done. As Ihave said my issue is on the airbrushing of history.
The current way BEE and AA are implemented are problematic. We do need to improve an dimport skills. A redistributive BEE is required. One where money and infrastructure are pushed into local communities not share options given to wealthy carpet baggers. Unfortunatley sicne teh 1990’s I would suggest that corporate profit has been placed before social responsibility and that is a major problem. Look how GM moves its factories to Mexico in search of profit and destroys teh old heartland of the USA. Visiting Burnely and seeing idle smokestacks and unemployed people reminds one how teh industrial heart of the UK has died. A lot has to do with teh casion style of financial markets. Ever since Nixon floated the dollar back in 1973 he disprupted the fine balance created by Keynes with the Brettonwoods institutions. How does SA respond to that. Well in truth I don’t know but I don’t think allowing Anglo American to run off to London was a great idea
“My beef is with people trying to rewrite history”. So is mine. Both the Nats and the ANC dio it.
The destruction of District Six destroyed a vibrant community. IF they were moved to Mitchells Plain, as I remember, they are better off TODAY. IF they were moved to Bonteheuwel or Elsies River they are not. However I was very young - I might be remembering wrong. I have no book reference about where the population was moved to.
Oldfox
These are websites of NGOs like the ones I referred to. Do you have a government website with stats or any book reference? I have heard people such as representatives of Agriforum phone in and ask NGO represetatives for the names of farms where this is taking place - they can never give them.
Alcoholism and Feotal Alchol Syndrome is a massive problem in SA - but it is not confined to the farms. It is also a chicken and egg situation. Do the farmers employ drunks because no-one else is available, as any competant person can get a better job, or is it the other way around?
In all honesty, these exchanges are actually very positive, and to give PaulJohnBilly??? credit, at least he has stuck around and fought his corner, which is better than the usual ‘liberal’ brigade, who run for cover once the facts start flying.
Once you have a continued engagement you usually can end up working towards common ground without having to give up your position, since i really do think ultimately we (South Africans in general) want to achieve much the same thing, it is the how that is troublesome, and ultimately it becomes a personal issue to us all.
I don’t think anyone would have much of an issue if BEE was focused on creating growth.
I do wonder if it isn’t completely back to front and instead of asking businesses to take on black shareholders under duress, maybe they should actually be incentivising businesses to transfer their skills to black (and coloured) individuals and entities.
How many highly skilled whites would be willing to start a business with a black partner, if they were afforded assess to government funding/capital? It would also mean that small and micro businesses would benefit from BEE not just big business.
I also agree with the infrastructure bit. Building housing always strikes me as the most ridiculous example.
The ANC government, when in power in cape Town, only managed to spend 50% of its’ housing budget. Why? There is a need, there is land, there is money, there are workers needing work? There are only 2 possibilities, ineptitude and a lack of skilled labour. It was probably both.
Now what if i wanted to establish a building firm, with the goal of erecting low cost housing. I am willing to run apprenticeship schemes and train my own labour. Lets us also say i am willing to give 49% (more providing i can keep management control) of the company to my workers. In return i want funding (soft loans, social grants for those under training..) and access to the contracts for the work.
I am now increasing the supply of skilled labour, i am reducing unemployment, I am creating genuine broad based empowerment, and i am dealing with the housing shortage. We know the funding is available, as the ANC couldn’t get to spend it.
Ah, but i am white, sorry, show is over, lets all go home. I didn’t suffer, i am not entitled, it doesn’t matter if i uplift 100 or 1000 people, i am just not entitled.
you wrote: “..He also took part in the Jarrow Marches to protest about the extreme poverty of the people of the North East of England. You don’t have a monopoly on poverty and deprivation,…”
I read the Jarrow March info. The poverty was not caused by deliberately holding people back, blocking opportunities or other such grossly unfair practices, it was a result of economic forces resulting from the Greet Depression.
The Great Depression affected people in all parts of the world that were integrated into the world economy at the time, including parts of SA. I knew a lady who at times, ate grass during the Great Depression, such was the shortage of food at the time - I think she lived in a small South African town then.
I have provided some references in previous TL posts of how SA governments from 1910 until the end of the rule of the Nationalist Govt. impeded economic development of blacks in particular, and also coloureds and “Indians”. (and discrimination certainly existed before then, but its harder to find reputable references pre 1910).
Blacks were not allowed to work as artisans in white areas. Indians were not permitted to get a Government Certificate of Competency during the 1970s (this exclusion applied only to them, not to other races), so Indians who qualified as engineers (few, as they battled to get vacation employment as students, which is essential in order to get the degree) were not able to get senior posts in mines or factories.
I know of several coloureds and Indians, who trained whites during the 1970s - 1980s , only to have these very same whites later become their managers.
It was govt policy that “non whites” should not become managers of whites.
Neither in SA nor in the UK were whites subjected to such economic discrimination.
“Education (the gradual process of acquiring knowledge) was not a white man’s phenomenon or invention, but western education was. And in a world that is so westernized, one needs western education…”
You are partly correct - agrarian and/or pre industrial societies including in Southern Africa had ways of teaching/educating youth, and this informal education goes back, for some societies, thousands of years.
Western education got ideas from other (non Western) areas too. And the subjects taught came from around the world - algebra and chemistry come from the Arabs in the middle ages.
India had a “university” 2400 years ago with some 10 000 attended by students from India as well as students from various countries in Europe, the Middle East, Persia and China.
First Universities in the world: If one refers to an institution of higher education and research which issues academic degrees at all levels (bachelor, master and doctorate) like in the modern sense of the word, then the medieval Madrasahs known as Jami’ah (”university” in Arabic) founded in the 9th century would be the first examples of such an institution.”
(source: wikipedia)
Western Education depends upon examinations. Both the examination system and the reason for such a system (to allow meritocracy) are from the Chinese. Some have claimed that the examination system+meritocracy constitutes the 5th gift of the Chinese to the world (the other 4 great inventions/”gifts” being paper, printing, gunpowder and the magnetic compass).
The Chinese Imperial examination system evolved over hundreds of years, and the system used during the Sui Dynasty (AD 581-618) remained unchanged until the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1911.
Each candidate was issued with an examination number (to eliminate favouritism, or class/ethnic group discrminination), and to avoid recognising candidates by their handwriting, each candidate’s exam scripts were rewritten by a scribe. See www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/e2008/e200802/p54.htm for more details (it also has a picture of an ancient miniature “crib note” book used by a cheat, with Chinese characters one eighth of the size of a grain of rice!)
China also had outstanding books for educating primary school children since ancient times, especially ones to teach morals and ethics. Three of the most famous primers date to the 6th, 7th and 13th centuries, and were used unchanged until the latter half of the 19th century, when modern education systems were put in place.
The most famous of this trio, San Zi Jing, was written by Wang Yinglin, the great 13th-century Confucian scholar and educator, for children in his clan. It is composed of three-character rhyming stanzas, four stanzas forming one sentence. San Zi Jing’s 1,415 characters capture succinctly the essence of the Chinese value system and code of ethics. This masterpiece has always been generally regarded as a humanities encyclopedia for children, a systematic pedagogical aide for teachers and an indispensable reader for parents.
It was introduced to Japan and Korea centuries ago, translated into Russian in 1727 and later became available in English and French. UNESCO listed the book in its series on moral education for children in the autumn of 1990. It has since been promoted and published throughout the world. www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/e2007/e200712/p64.htm
I am not justifying deliberately keeping people in poverty, that is clearly not just.
People were also held back in the Uk, it was called the class system, but it was not along racial lines, and it probably was not as calculated and comprehensive. In those days England had 2 changing rooms for the cricket team, and the working class players were not allowed in the same dressing room as the upper class ones.
However, what difference does it make how your ancestors were put/kept in poverty? That is my point. The fundamentals for getting out of poverty are the same.
My point still stands. You have to take responsibility for your own destiny, you cannot sit and demand that everything be made right for you on account of your past, and Africans are not the only ones who have suffered. Most everyone else has already managed to save themselves. Most African countries are still less developed than at the end of colonialism, and still have their begging bowls out, sometimes 30, 40 or even 50 years later. Apparently we still owe them.
That is there fault, not ‘ours’, and they need to take responsibility for us. In 100 years are our great grand children still going to be arguing about what black people are owed because of apartheid?
Allowing this victim mentality rather than promoting self development, and the ability to ’save oneself’ is incredibly destructive.
Nothing can lesson the injustices of the past, but we can create a brighter future, and taking control of ones own destiny is not a weakness, it is a strength.
It’s fine to speak about your own experiences, but it shows the shallowness of your character to repeat the same old thing that is said in the media every single week.
How about you do something different and ask the question: why are all races racist?
Where does it come from?
Why does it exist in nature?
How were certain races also subjected to this before they subjected other races to this (Afrikaners, Jews, Hutus?
How about allowing yourself to be objective as I used to think journalists to be.
What a fascinating link about Chinese education. The advantage of a pictoral, non alphabetical language, is that they can read writings which are 2000 years old. No-one who speaks English, or any alphabetical language, can do so. I studied English at university - Old English and Middle English are like studying Latin - and further back is impossible.
Someone Else
If I remember correctly the Great Depression in America was because of 10% unemployment! We should be so lucky.
The other, far more important advantage of the pictoral language, is that it is understood by all 55 Chinese minorities (who possibly speak more than 55 different languages, and even the Han speak several languages).
90% of Chinese are literate. If two Chinese with mutually unintelligible home languages cannot speak the common Mandarin language (possibly some old, rural Chinese) they can communicate via the written Chinese language. So it fosters unity, in a country of diverse people and cultures.
This of course also fostered trade in ancient China (after the language was unified around 200BC) and the spread of ideas.
Oldfox
Yes - true. But the disadvantages are that to get all the characters on a computer needs one the size of a ping pong table, and nothing can be filed alphabetically. Also no scrabble, word games, dictionaries, encyclopedias etc. And when the boss’s secretary dies no-one can find a file.
That is why the Chinese are learning English.
Lazola
The violence in the townships this week - do we blame the parents?
Dictionary lookups are harder for Chinese and Japanese. Chinese have however had dictionaries for almost 2000 years. see e.g. www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/kanjindx.html
Those re very complicated dictionaries - and as soon as you go phonetic you go into one of the 500 different languages and dialects that use the same script.
Read “Mother Tongue” by Bill Bryason. He explains it better than I can.
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Lazola is back in JHB. This place is freezing cold. I will be going back to Pondoland very soon.
He is a Marxist-Leninist. He is also a member of the SACP, YCL, ANC and ANCYL.
My e-mail address is srcdbn@gmail.com
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Bayanda Mzoneli Comrade, friend, revolutionary blog champion. I learnt the usage of technology from this chap!
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Good read though! thanks!
If you only blame people’s parents they will never change, let alone rebel against their parents.
And read your own blog again, or didn’t you notie the bit about a WHITE student got attacked by racists for standing next to a black girl.
You might start noticing, and then listening, and discovering how many White people suffer for being “nigger lovers” let alone how many of them also get attacked by black racists for being White.
As well as Black people being attacked by other Black people for being “Sellouts” and then harrasssed by Whioes for being Black.
Then you can start listening to the “Cape Coloureds” Asians, Orientals and Hispanic of what they get from both sides and from totally unnconnected groups, such as Greek and Turkish Cypriots who had a civil war, despite being almost genetically identical.
Then you might understand, and also learn why anyone in a Multicultural society notices very Quickly that you are writing Racist Stereotypes of White People, claiming their parents teach them racist rituals, as apparently you are ignorant of what colour Donald Woods was.
Or who Ivan Toms was.
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