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?

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 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?

“Blacks cannot be intelligent”

Both of these statements are racist, as they prescribe limitations to a specific racial group.