By Suntosh Pillay
A short little booklet caught my attention recently. On its red cover, the bold title “Blacks can’t be racist” appeared. Curious by such an absurd claim, I parted with R20.
Indeed, it was a 23-page explication on why black people cannot be racist. CANNOT. This argument, written in July 2009, was put forward by one Andile Mngxitama in his self-published pamphlet “New Frank Talk”. Beyond the emotional drama of his tone, inappropriate profanities, really bad editing and confusing referencing, it’s worth considering his defence, which is very different from the one others on this website have made.
It’s a simple point — “conceptual fidelity”.
Andile reckons the definition of “racism” must include the ability of one group to subjugate another, and since black people have never had the social, economic or political power to subjugate white people, they cannot be racist, by definition. He sees racism as “discrimination by a group against another for the purpose of subjugation or maintaining subjugation” (Biko, I write what I like).
Does this mean black people cannot be racially prejudiced against whites? No. Does this mean black people do not utter racial slurs? No. Does this mean black people do not commit nasty acts of atrocity against other race groups? No. Black people are fully capable of doing unsavoury things to other race groups, but Andile maintains that we must call it something else, just don’t call it racism.
“Racism” is a concept that is historically rooted in the oppression of blacks by whites (slavery, colonialism, apartheid, imperialism etc.). Find another conceptual equivalent to “racism”, says Andile, but please don’t rob the term of its core meaning by extending it to the racial discrimination of white people — it just isn’t “racism”.
Properly conceived, Andile argues that racism “locates white power and privilege on the historical reality organised upon white on black violence … to make the concept of racism elastic, as to include whites as victims, is to render it useless, and more importantly, to make it susceptible to appropriation by the very beneficiaries of racism”.
Andile was responding to that 2008 incident where the Forum for Black Journalists (FBJ) stopped their white colleagues from attending a blacks-only meeting with Jacob Zuma. The SA Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) ruled it unconstitutional and the FBJ was branded racist.
Andile wrote in the Mail & Guardian: “Let the historical record reflect that the FBJ was the first black organisation to be disbanded by law in post-apartheid South Africa.” He also noted the irony of the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging being relaunched at the same time, without a scolding from the SAHRC.
Andile draws on radical Nigerian scholar Dr Chinweizu, who defends blacks-only groups by claiming “the right to racial privacy”. (Is this the same as Steve Biko’s notion of “black solidarity”?). It’s an interesting view. It does seem logical that in order to overcome a historically rooted oppression a group should therefore organise efforts on the basis of the very thing that marks them out for oppression — skin colour.
There is a small explosion of “whiteness” studies in South Africa following international trends of critically reflecting on the condition of being white and the privileges that accompany this lack of melanin. As Peggy McIntosh wrote in her essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the invisible Knapsack”: “I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets, which I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I remain oblivious.”
White privilege continues unabated largely because the “myth of sameness”, “non-racialism” and “the rainbow nation” has obscured the continuation of racial hierarchies in post-apartheid SA to the point of normalising black suffering and masking ill-gotten white benefits.
Andile says this is why the FBJ incident was so shocking for white journalists — their invisibility was made visible. They were “raced”. And whites can’t bear being raced, because being a privileged white has become such a normative state of (racial) being in SA and the world. Professor Melissa Steyn from UCT has done extensive work in this arena. As the title of her key work sympathetically, critically, and reflexively notes “Whiteness just isn’t what it used to be”.
But blackness also isn’t what it used to be. Though Andile elaborates at length the reasons why black subjugation is still a blatant psychological and material reality in SA, he fails to acknowledge that white privilege has considerably decreased in the political arena. Blacks now have the political power to subjugate.
The conspicuous consumption of wealth and tenders and big bonuses has placed an elite group of black bigwigs at the centre of social, economic and political power. And yes, they do not by any means represent the hungry, powerless, dirt-poor black people who have all but lost faith in the government’s promises. But they are black. And they are powerful. And they can subjugate. And if we use Julius Malema as the exemplar of this new black elite and use his public utterings as further exemplars of the potential for black racism, then some holes start forming in Andile’s thesis.
At the very least, “conceptual fidelity” and “the right to racial privacy” may refine the question of “black racism” to a more clearly defined problematic.
Suntosh Pillay is a clinical psychologist who writes independently on social issues.
“Andile reckons the definition of “racism” must include the ability of one group to subjugate another, and since black people have never had the social, economic or political power to subjugate white people, they cannot be racist, by definition.”
If one redefines the issue (“racism”) under discussion while the discussion is in progress, the debate becomes futile.
Ask the man to define “logic” and see what he comes up with.
‘Conceptual fidelity’ is another term for BS.
Hmm, so when Idi Amin expelled the Asians from Uganda he wasn’t being racist.
Hogwash.
Really interesting and well written blog. Thanks.
Too much to say about this one. Its all about attitude – your head creates your world.
Andile Mngxitama main argument is supported by his manufactured proposition that the word ‘racism’ be defined in a manner that suits him. While his argument may be convincing, he does not get to delegate the meaning of words and their connotations in the english language.
‘Subjugation’ is a fine word and should serve his purposes, while ‘racism’ is racism. Xenephobia is neo-racism.
Typically, he does not propose the word that should be used. Until then, Blacks can definately be racist.
Its fong kong.
A tribe or race does not have to subjugate another
race or tribe to be defined as not a racist.
eg xenophobia,ethnic cleansing,BBEE,intimidation,
stereotyping,…etc
As I read these words: “Andile reckons the definition of “racism” must include the ability of one group to subjugate another, and since black people have never had the social, economic or political power to subjugate white people, they cannot be racist, by definition.” I became confused and would like to ask a few questions: Surely “racism” is not a convent that exists only between “black” and “white” alone? Weren’t similar theories of “racism’ applied by the Great European Empires to the natives of India, China, Mexico, Brazil and Australia? Also does such a definition of “whiteness” then not include Jews who suffered subjugation and discrimination for thousands of years? By “black” do we mean all peoples who are not “white”? If so then when “black” people subjugate others based on perceived generic difference (such as with the Tutsi and the Hutu) then we cannot call this racism? What can we call it? Moreover, are we saying that black are not racist because they simply lack the opportunity? Thus all races are equal but “whites” just had the proverbial gems, guns and steel and therefore had more opportunity to be racist than “blacks”? Are “blacks” “saved” from becoming racists by a mere accident of geography?
What a load of crock!
“Andile reckons the definition of “racism” must include the ability of one group to subjugate another, and since black people have never had the social, economic or political power to subjugate white people, they cannot be racist, by definition.”
The obvious: I thought the ANC was running the country … what’s that if not ‘political power’?
The curious: Since when is ‘ability of one group to subjugate another’ a definition of racism? Up until now it’s always been ‘discrimination based on race’.
Therefore, with the whole foundation of Andile’s argument being flawed, no further debate on his views is necessary.
At coneptual level it is indeed a truism that blacks cannot be racist. If we accept the elements of power relations as the basis for the concept racism we could blacks from the class of pepetrators. This power relations should not lilited to the South African context but be located within the world power relations. History is litered with the subjugation of peoples of the world by whites – a condition that still prevails in this day and age.
As Pillay observes this does not absolve blacks of dispicable behaviour – how can we forget Idi Amin and ‘Papa and Baby Docs’. The question is in the broad scheme of things can blacks subjugate white, the answer is NO. For they do not have the means to do so! Some amongst the current crops of ANCYL would love the opportunity (malema could sure cherish the opportunity – but to unfortunately they do not have the MEANS!!
The combination of the political, economic power enhanced by the language is a powerful tool for subjugation!
So by Andile Mngxitama’s thesis, no one in South Africa can be racist anymore, because (and this is what he believes) no group has the ability to subjugate another since 1994?
So he says that white people cannot be racist anymore and black people cannot ever be racist EVER?
Riiiiight. I want some of the stuff he’s smoking. Sounds premium.
It is a very interesting concept. Given the definition, though, examples can be given of black racism. Since ‘race’ is not color, a myriad of examples can be given, present and past, of races with black skins subjugating other races with black skins and even white skins, as has been the case in Zimbabwe just recently.
Good thoughtful article and an interesting idea that needs more reasoned debate.
My rebuttal reminds us that the word slave comes from the group Slav who were plundered and enslaved by the Northern Vikings (white) as well as the people of the Otterman Empire (black/brown) so Blacks can be racist oppressors.
A simpler example, Amy Biels was brutally killed by Blacks merely because she was White, surly a case of racist oppression.
Brent
this is all very easy to explain. if i am prejudiced against someone from another race / nationality / i am in effect a racist. it has nothing to do with “subjigating” anyone. if this Andile Mngxitama was in fact a literary giant why are his booklets selling for R20? who buys stuff like that anyway? i think i’ll become prejudiced to racists – what would that make me?
What a sad way to spend R20!
The entire book and its moronic premise come crashing down when you look at the Zimbabwean or South African paradigm where indeed black people are in a position to impose legislation, discrimination and ultimately oppression on white people. Unfortunately for your learned author, those are precisely the conditions required for black people to indeed be ‘racists’ by his conveniently lopsided and pathetically obvious self-emancipating definition.
The entire premise of racial equality demands that any people are capable of any previously demonstrated human action. People are people, irrespective of race. It means that black people, had they been more technologically advanced and in need of slave labour would have done precisely what the Arabs (lets not forget them here) and the Europeans did. They may yet do it in the future and actually have done it in the past with their own race.
You just can’t have it both ways. If we are equal then that is the truth of it. Blacks can be and are already as racist as any humans are liable to be. What makes them different? We are equal, the same.
As for trying to corner the market on the term ‘racism’ to propagate some kind of white guilt into perpetuity and absolve black people from a term that they have shown to be repulsive just as they too start to become obviously guilty of it…nice try but the world is not that stupid.
Zimbabwe springs to mind when one talks of black racism towards whites, as does Malema’s outbursts about boers, but then I would be ignoring Andile’s argument if I believed that.
Oh well I guess I will have to ignore Andile then.
I once had dinner with Andile Mngxitama at a great Durban restaurant in about 2006 where the price of our meals was around R100 per person with wine etc. He was clearly suffering then as he is now.
He has been developing his neo-racist ideas about whites for a long time and does so without ever interrogating his class position that is anything but victim. He just exists as another self-serving elitist/stalinist whose rants benefit himself and not the majority he speaks for. Why do people ever listen to him?
Firstly i want to thank Suntosh for what i consider a brilliant summary of my main agurments. would you be my copy editor dear Suntosh? i think the little critique you provides at the end doesnt not flatten my main proposition. thanks. then for those who have made some comments: i dont expect beneficiaries of racism to agree with my proposition. but i do expect them to at least read my piece before opening their big white mouths. get a copy of NFT at exclusives books in rosebank da mall, in Cape town go to Clarkes Books in long street, in Durban go to either Adams or Ikes. read niggas read! and for whites the price is R100.00
andile the author of Blacks Cant be Racist!
@ Greg Walliser – you say “It means that black people, had they been more technologically advanced and in need of slave labour would have done precisely what the Arabs (lets not forget them here) and the Europeans did.”
You need to read some history. The enslavement of
blacks by other blacks is well recorded in the history of West Africa. The explorer Mungo Park was taken captive in the Malian Empire, and recorded how captive nations were enslaved. These were not Arabs. I personally know a Malian man (he works with my husband) who currently owns slaves which he has inherited. White sailors were also enslaved by Moroccan rulers.
We all have it in us to be racist. Renaming and/or re-defining the condition doesn’t make it go away. Acknowledging this very human propensity means that one can confront it and do ones best to counteract it. This “blacks can’t be racist” discussion isn’t helpful. Remember that many white S Africans genuinely believed that they could justify their racism. Remember that many Nazis believed that they could justify their racism.
What a ridiculous argument! So only once people are in a position of power can they be racist? Separating racist behaviour from racist intent is utterly meaningless. It means no one could have been alarmed at Hitler’s ideologies until the point at which he began exterminating people. All Andile’s argument could do is blind people to racism until it’s too late.
Its amazing that people would throw this sort of Veil on an issue thats so discriminatory just so that they would not be percieved as narrow-minded.
“White privilege continues unabated largely because the “myth of sameness”, “non-racialism” and “the rainbow nation” has obscured the continuation of racial hierarchies in post-apartheid SA to the point of normalising black suffering and masking ill-gotten white benefits.”
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
Brent: Are you trying to say that blacks enslaved whites at some point in history?
Perhaps the author(ANDILE) should of rather said that we
must ALL begin to change ourselves first positively rather than flap our lips negatively.
Then we can begin to change then majority by
education before liberation RATHER than liberation
before education speak…
I can only guess the author’s motivation is to
make a quick buck from the majority…?
“Blacks cannot be racist”
“Blacks cannot be intelligent”
Both of these statements are racist, as they prescribe limitations to a specific racial group.
“Brent: Are you trying to say that blacks enslaved whites at some point in history?”
I find this an interesting question and the answer depends on how you define “white” and of course “black”. If we entertain the notion that “black” encompasses all those people that are not “white” this could create some problems. Let us look at some examples from history shall we.
For example are the Iranians “black”? During the Classical period, slaves from Thrace, mainland Greece and other parts of the Balkans (areas we would assume are “white”) were sold as slaves in Persia. However, this form of slavery lacked a racial element so can it be called “racism”? Consider the Roman Empire in which a small number of slaves could be classified as “black”. However, the vast majority of slaves came from regions of Europe (France, Germany Hungry etc.) and looked like people we would associate with “white-ness”. Was the Empire racist? The corsairs -those fearsome Muslim pirates of old -provided further problems. Corsairs operating out of North Africa regularly raided the coastal shores of Britain, Spain and France for slaves in the High Middle Ages. However, the corsairs and their masters also brought many slaves from the West African nations of the period (and some of the corsairs were themselves of Western African descent -often freed slaves). Were their activities racist?
Thanks for the engaging debate everybody. Lots to think about. And yes Andile, I’ll gladly be your copy editor!
I think it’s time our white brothers and sisters stopped playing the victim ……we still have bread and butter issues post 94 and you are still priviledged .
Well said ELLE!
Nothing can be further from the truth.How many Black boys want to play rugby and ultimately achieve that?We know that it takes a lot of nutrition at home alone to build a body ready for the sport.Then it goes to the school.Former Model C schools were given the best facilities to prepare anyone for rugby and that includes a coach who only did rugby.You then get provincial teams who do not recruit in the townships.These are the very provincial teams that vote people like Oregin Hoskins as SARU president cause he does not address transformation vigorously.Just as Gerald Majola is failing.As you go higher up the ranks of rugby to the Springboks,we see why Pieter De Villiers is struggling to get players.
Thought-provoking piece Suntosh. Well written.
Sadly enough, racism will forever remain a permanent feature in SA body politic.
I stand to be corrected, but I think that South Africa faces a class question that has manifested itself in visible racial forms, because of the heritage of apartheid and general colonial rule. The main cause of concern is more the issue of gross inequalities between black and white, as well as amongst black people as a racially group.
The honest truth is that racism, pre-1994, served largely an economic purpose (minimising labour costs, by enslaving and devalueing the labour of the majority “the other”; which happened to be the black populace). The only way that to sustain the super exploitation of the mineral wealth of “the majority other” to serve narrow interests of the “minoity self”, was by imposing a racist ideological superstructure. By tempering with the pycho-social realm of mainstream society, the “self” could justify and prolong the enslavement and super-exploitation of the “majority other”.
The creation of the super-class and class underdogs, by racial lines is what’s been eating at us for so many years now.
So if we don’t address the racial divisions of class subjugation, racism will forever be an albatross and a permanent feature of South Africa’s body politics. If we don’t address the class questions, as a consequent of historic disadvantage, racism will remain a permanent feature in South African society.
I appreciate Andile’s “conceptual fidelity” point. And I understand that on a large scale black people do not have the power to subjugate white people, so in that sense they cannot be racist.
But then this is my question: On a small scale, on the level of individuals and groups of people, black people may well have the power over white people. Perhaps not as far as to subjugate them, but power nonetheless.
So if individual black people, or groups of black people, purposefully use the power they have over a white person, or white people, to harm them or control them, and if they are doing this motivated by racial antagonism, then wouldn’t that be racist?
This could be as small a thing as a black teller at Home Affairs dishonestly making a white person jump through unnecessary hoops and bring extra documentation and giving them incorrect information, purposefully because they are white. Or on a slightly larger scale, workplace politics where white employees are purposefully marginalised in a black dominated environment.
I am not saying that this is a widespread problem. But surely, if and when this sort of thing occurs, it would fit the definition of racism?
What about Zimbabwe? In Zimbabwe, the Mugabe regime has the political, economic and social power to discriminate against whites, and it has done so via land confiscation. So in situations where blacks actually do have the power to discriminate against whites (like in Zimbabwe), do said actions become racist, or do they remain something other than racism?