If you had told me that South Africans were passionate about their constitutional right to call each other by derogatory terms, I would have told you to put the blunt down or pass it along coz you’re clearly smoking potent stuff.
If you had told me that South Africans would be sufficiently moved to pen intelligent, 2 000-word essays peppered with big, academic words to explain passionately why coconuts were the scourge of our nation and the devil’s very own spawn, I would have laughed at you: “Ha ha, you delusional little idiot. My people have much bigger fish to fry than worrying about snot-faced little brats who go around malls speaking English through their noses in striped blazers.”
It takes a big man to own up when he is wrong. Allow me the dignity to be magnanimous in defeat. I was dead wrong. It seems that I completely downplayed the importance of weeding out coconuts and all coconuttyness from the landscape. The short little bishop with purple frocks seems to have got it wrong too.
I must confess that when I wrote my last blog about coconuts, I did so rather flippantly and without too much effort. When I made those assertions, I was under the delusion that I was stating the obvious. For the record, the universal truths I thought I was stating in that column were:
1. The whole notion of describing people as coconuts is retarded because the term is not very well-defined.
2. Whether any person is a coconut is a subjective matter and relative to where one is standing. That’s what the fancy graph was about.
3. In any case, honing in on whether people are coconuts is misspent energy. We have enough to worry about — who gives a flying kite that some people are more Eurocentric than others?
The more astute reader who followed the whole cadenza unfold will be quick to point out to me that most of the 130-odd comments on the actual blog seemed to agree that worrying about coconuts is a bit retarded.
In my defence, I’ll point out that the naysayers were far more passionate and compelling about the evils of coconuts than the guys who shrugged their shoulders and said: “Yeah, everybody knows that.” And I haven’t touched upon the avalanche of emails from readers who think I should purchase a one-way ticket to London to contaminate the atmosphere over there with my Eurocentrism.
But the real reason I’m dedicating an entire blog to the detractors is a bit more selfish and cynical. I really enjoy readers’ complimentary comments. After all, who doesn’t like being called a genie? (Thanks, James Tobias). However, I get an extraordinary and morbid satisfaction from the angry, righteously indignant ones. Really. I derive waaayyy too much pleasure from whipping people up into an emotional rage. I may or may not even be known to pleasure myself as I skim-read (can’t read ‘em all) through a 1 900-word response to a 1 400-word piece I’ve written.
So what got my peeps’ drawers so twisted into a bunch that they descended upon me like parents on a sandwich platter at a Tuesday PTA meeting? Well, it seems that quite a few people read the piece and started fantasising about a lot of things I didn’t actually say. I’ll confine myself only to my favourite hallucinations from my beloved readers. (Add “Ndumiso said” in front of all them):
1. The ONLY criteria for being a coconut are: speaking English with a “white” accent, having white friends and harbouring anti-African values.
2. Coconuts are great people. We should all aspire to be coconuts.
3. Coconuts are better than black people who hold on to African values. In fact, everything from Europe is better than anything from Africa.
Some members of the angry brigade defending their rights to hate coconuts as a matter of “national importance” were greatly entertaining. One of them induced uncontrollable fits of laughter in me when he started grading the coconuts according to certain categories. DJ Fresh, for instance, is an “innocuous” breed of coconut because he only twangs and nothing more. You have no idea how hard I laughed at this.
Another coconut-buster introduced some new criteria for identifying coconuts. It seems that the espousing of anti-government views also makes one a bona fide coconut, for example Xolela Mangcu. As my beer buddies would say: eish! It seems that not even black consciousness credentials will save one from being fingered as a coconut — yeah, the same Dr Mangcu, who was the director of the Steve Biko Foundation until recently. The paradox.
Perhaps my favourite comment of all came from a regular reader (he has a general Silwane Files-induced boner) who accused me of saying that all white people were the same. I guess that whole bit about me asking what Casper de Vries had in common with Bill Gates sailed past his head like an Israel-bound missile. For these crimes against humanity he suggested that I was guilty of hate crimes punishable by incarceration under the UK’s race-relations laws. I guess I won’t be joining the notorious chicken run, then.
But like I said, I’m a changed man. I believe that one of the attributes of intelligence is the ability to receive new information, process and assimilate it and come to new conclusions. Being exposed to new information and retaining one’s original stance makes one an impermeable rock of retardation, I always say. Having said that, allow me to exhibit just how far I have come in one short week.
I have seen the light. The discussion we are having about these self-loathing coconuts is an issue of national importance. I think that in the greater scheme of things, the right to call people coconuts, kaffirs and other such names is an important one. Just a few weeks ago, I would have thought our priorities looked something like:
1. Poverty alleviation
2. Racism eradication
3. Education
4. Unemployment targeting
5. Fighting HIV/Aids
…
97. Fighting coconuts
But I have seen the light. I think coconut-plucking needs to move up about 96 places on the priority list. I personally do not believe in bothering with anything that does not have any a practical use. I would hate for us to have such an exhaustive debate without trying to find some way of implementing our resolutions. Because I am an action-oriented type of fellow, I have taken the liberty of coming up with an action plan for the complete eradication of the cancer of coconuttyness from our midst. In the interests of simplicity, it is going to be a three-point plan of decoconuttisation (POD).
1. Development of tight coconuttyness criteria
Let’s all agree. We can’t have the current situation where the coconut witch-hunt is undermined by a lack of clarity about who is a coconut. Why, in my last post I invited the ire of some readers by suggesting that Jacob Zuma might be seen as a coconut by someone who hadn’t left Nkandla. I have already seen the error of my ways. The idea is ludicrous indeed.
My humble submission is that this serious matter of coconuts roaming the streets freely would need to be overseen by a parliamentary committee. The chair would have to be someone really focused and completely uninfected by this plague. It would be a tad difficult in the absence of the criteria, but I think that we can all agree that someone as determined as Bhutana Khompela would probably suffice.
2. Rounding up of coconuts
Once the criteria were established and agreed upon by the parliamentary committee on the decoconuttisation of the population (PCDP), every black person in the country would have to take the coconut test and anyone scoring, say, more than 60% on the test would be taken to a purification centre (PC).
We have a Bill of Rights in this country, which means we are not savages. We would never, for instance, round up the coconuts WWII-style and lock them up against their will. We would first implore all official coconuts to volunteer themselves to the PCs for re-education programmes like we do with TB patients. But we all agree that the gangrene of coconuttyness has probably eaten away at every fibre of Africanness in some advanced coconuts, and some more drastic measures might be needed.
To “encourage” coconuts to “volunteer” for re-education programmes at a PC, we might stamp every black person’s ID with his or her coconut status and make the “Coconut or pure African” field compulsory in every official application form. A little nudge in the right direction might even be the introduction of coconut quotas in the workplace, just to sweeten the deal. You will be surprised just how many people would voluntarily enter a PC to purify themselves under those circumstances.
3. Re-education of coconuts
Let’s face it, some people are probably lost causes. I’m not going to name names here, but some coconuts’ Eurocentrism has reached disgusting levels. I actually know a woman who moved out of a previously white neighbourhood when the number of darkies in her street exceeded three. “I moved out of the township to escape this nonsense,” she told me in confidence. That is just sickening.
But we are the rainbow nation and we would be undeterred in our quest to re-Africanise our lost brethren. The programme would have to be an extensive, six-month project. Six months seems to be just the right amount of time needed to indoctrinate our boys in tight-fitting blue polyester pants with appropriate values such as donnering bergies and sloshed students in that stupid little town under the big lump of rock. Six months would probably do the trick here as well.
We would have to lean on that great educationalist, that British woman … whatshername … who runs the Department of Education, to develop a tight curriculum. I imagine that the curriculum would probably cover topics such as:
1. The word is pronounced “mutter” and not “matter” — getting rid of the shackles of colonial speech.
2. Mogodu is your heritage — saying ox-tripe smells like shit is not cool.
3. Getting rid of the Xolela Mangcu affliction — even when the president is wrong, he is right.
4. Everything African is good and everything European is bad — weeding out that inferiority complex.
5. If you absolutely have to be a coconut, be an innocuous one — the DJ Fresh model.
I have absolute faith in my readers and I can say this much: someone is bound to come up with a much better programme than mine. I know I will not be disappointed. But this much is clear — we cannot live with this scourge.
PHANSI NGAMA-COCONUT, PHANSI!
The collective nation can thank me later. I will take the Order of Good Hope, thankyouverymuch.
silwanekanjila@gmail.com
Bhambatha
I am interested. I would like to read more. Please give your sources to us.
Zozo,
From what I can get talking to some individuals, a coconut is the person who believes they are superior to their fellow blacks on the basis that they were gifted with an education in a model c or some private school. In essence, I believe that a coconut use their nuttiness (so to say) to discriminate against their kind, devalue their background. They tend to pronounce even their names in a fake English accent (if you listen to the government ad on saving electricity. The boy calls his mother, mom, instead of mama or mha, which is common in the black communities. He also refers to his sister Nomkhitha in a way that the name is not pronounced in Nguni). A coconut is not someone who speaks all the time, except if their use of English is intended to ellevate them i.e. put them on a pedestal. A coconut is not someone who has white friends, unless having white friends for them means superiority to their kinds. A coconut is not someone who speaks with an accent, unless they see a fake accent as a way to elevate themselves above everyone else. In essence, a coconut is someone that because their association, use of English and accent makes them better than they were before they attained such private school or model c education.
Hope this helps
Mandrake,
We are both Xhosa, and we both were educated in a private environment where we were a minority. You were educated in South Africa where you were aware of the racial issue (whether later in life or as a kid). As someone mentioned here, you had to give up something to fit in, as I did. Some of us try to get it back and some of us see whatever we lost as a worthwhile sacrifice to finally fit into our new environment.
I am proud of who I am, proud of where I come from (raised by a single mother, and had to walk barefeet going to school). Do our environment define us? Indeed they do. There are some individuals who see education as a way out of poverty, out og gangsterism and out of misery. I am one of those. Then, there is a very small minority that sees private education as a way to elevate themselves above who they were, not only from an economic status, but a social status too.
Now, we may agree or disagree about who is a coconut. Frankly, the label means nothing. It is the actions that need to be discussed. Do you believe that being educated in a private school make you superior to other people who do not have the type of accent you have, did not go to Rondebosch boys high, SACS or even KES and does not have white friends, but received similar education, as inferior to you? If you do, then that is sad. If you do not, cannot see why you would think you are a coconut.
Being a loner or part of a smaller group is part of life and we do not call those people coconuts. We see them as weirdo or cool depending on what side we fit in. Just because you find yourself in a small group does not make you a coconut.
Now, I am curious as to why you believe you and Ndumiso are coconuts. Is it because you have white friends that makes you believe you are a coconut? That would make most people that work in South Africa coconuts. does the fact that you speak English 99% of the time make you a coconut? then I would suspect that the majority of working South Africans are coconuts. Are you a coconut because you speak in an accent?
Only you can tell.
If people call you a fool, would you start defending foolishness?
SubsKriber,
I wholeheartedly agree with your criticism of Ndumiso. I am so disappointed in the man/dude/boy or whatever he prefers to be called. He is funny and is a good writer, but argument and debate are not his strong points. He creates a strawman argument i.e. he created a ridiculous argument and argue against it. He subscribes this ridiculous argument to those opposed to him, either because he is unable to listen to other people’s views, or because he is pandering to the “majority” in this case those who often congratulate him. He seems eager to get “Funny Ndum ndum” types of responses which seems to have done in his ego. You will notice that he never addresses any of the issues I raised or you raised, and as you point out, he ignored racist messages written in support of his column, because it suites his purpose.
As has been argued a number of times, anyone that calls themselves a coconut has to believe they are better than other black folks because they were educated in some private white school, speaks English with a confused twang and have simply hates the body they are in.
To be honest, I would have never thought that Ndumison fits that stereotype, but his vociferous defence of the indefencible suggests to me that perhaps that there is some guilt somewhere. so what!!! If Ndumiso looks down on his fellow blacks and believes that his speaking in a borrowed accent makes him superior, then that is his prerogative. I could not give a damn. I know who I am, I know where I come from and I am no bloody coconut.
I suspect that my general knowledge is wider, my experiences richer and my grassroots more established but I would never look down on Ndumiso. I will pity him and those that forsake who they are in order to fit in with the minority, but I will never believe I am superior to him or the people that live in squatter camps.
I am critical of my own, but as critical of the others too. Our government has f***ed a few things in this country and I dod not need to lose my identity to say so, but they have done somethings good too.
As a country, we need to pull together towards one direction, instead of creating small packets of individuals with agendas that seem to be defined by the need to be superior than anyone else.
anyone that believes whites are superior is a fool. We are all equal, though financially some of us are more equalled than others (to paraphrase George Orwell’s Animal Farm).
Let us be proud of who we are, without committing social suicide by eliminating who we are.
While the French accepts anyone that speaks French equally, the English could not give a damn whether you are educated in cambridge. As long as you have that skin, you are inferior to them.
Our mothers used “he-man” and “umemezi” to lighten their skin. they bleached their skin in order to look white in Africa. What a silly idea? These women suffered a great deal.
I remember jokes told about them. I suppose today, we have exchanged facial bleaches for cultural bleaches. Same effect in the hands of someone with no backbone and dignity.
@subSkriber
Now I understand why Ntate Ngcobo prefers the readers that argue with him to those of us who love him
lol lol LOL
Ndumiso, thank you for the funny article but on a serious note…Thanduxolo Duduza has hit the nail on the head on many of the points that he raises. Dan Oostuhuizen is an idiot.
Zozo
White teachers brainwash African kids, force them to pronounce English words with that fake Eurocentric accent, and tell them that they are luckier to be educated in white schools than their fellow African folks.
Obviously the half-witted African parents condone this neo-imperialist drivel and encourage their kids to talk English at home and they talk to their kids in English. The kids start developing superiority complex towards their fellow African folks who may be seen as unsophisticated and less cunning.
White teachers and half-witted parents tell the kids that they are better than their fellow African folks who don’t behave like exempted natives.
Zozo everyone seems to know what I have written about Jabavu, even Sandile Memela has an article dedicated to this half-witted exempted native.
Most of amakhosi were tricked or coerced into giving land to the oppressors, some were given money, but with none or little education I can forgive them because oftentimes they did not understand the consequences of their actions.
Just like the half-witted parents who consent to their children speaking foreign languages in their household and even go to an extent of telling them to choose suchlike friends, dont understand the lasting effects of indoctrinating their kids with exempted nativity.
I thought calling someone a coconut was a compliment. Like being called a “kaffir-boetie” or kaffir-lover. Its a badge of honour; a sign that you can’t be defined by your ‘race’. The racists don’t like it because it confuses them: Why do they look black but act white? Why do they look white but act black? Racists believe your colour dictates your character, but coconuts and kaffir-boeties confound them!
A week ago I read your book,( Brilliant stuff by the way)And because of the read some of the things you talked about were still vivid in my mind like the “Eish joe I dont have it” This was the caurse of my uncontrollable laughter on Saturday when a couple of friends and I went out to celebrate a birthday.Both of them ordered the most expensive stuff on the Spur menu and proceeded to add on drinks(they must have been very thirsty because they had 3 each before the main caurse)and sources
to their meals. When the bill came they each popped out R80.00.Seeing the ‘Eish joe” line coming I whipped out my cell and started calculating my part of the bill(R78.60)of the R392.30 total.After this no body spoke, there was complete silence at our booth.Then Simultaneously birthday girl and the other friend started saying they dont have have it,I laughed so hard because I just couldn’t believe that they were pulling that on me and so soon after I had read your book.To cut to the chase, I also didn’t have It hence I had limited my meal to the R78.00.Since I refused to fall for the Eish joe line- you should have seen the credit cards whizzing out of purses (they each paid for their share, no one offered to pay for the other)it was really funny though.
Faith,
Best way to deal with these people, if you had intended to pay is to make it clear that each person will pay for themselves. chances are that they will limit themselves. When everyone is done, you can then pick up the bill and guarantee you it will be very lite.
Bhambatha
Was John Langalibalele Dube educated by whites, blacks or both prior to his studies in the USA?
Simple solution, swop the brains of the coconuts with the brains of the whiggers.
Coconut and proud. In Zim, we used to be called amaNose Brigade – those who spoke through their noses. I think our parents are also to bare the brunt for bringing us up to be these Eurocentric cosmopolitan beings that can switch quite easily between race and culture in speech and mannerisms. To be honest with you, some of my white friends are quite envious.
For those of us who were brought up in a post colonial era of the new Zimbabwe, I think our parents yearned for us to become what they could never were. I may have grown up in the same Matabeleland province as parents, but my upbringing was a reflection of what they never had, or possibly would be been the stuff their childhood dreams were made of. They didn’t go to a pre-school that gave phonetic and elocution lessons, or had the chance enrol in one of the country’s finest schools steeped in a culture of all round excellence. While my father in his youth may have had to bring the cattle home after school, I had cricket and tennis in the afternoons and while my mother’s packed lunch may have been dry sweet potato, I found the cold meats and salad lunch unpalatable.
Inasmuch as I may believe to be a product of a modern democratic Zimbabwe ruled by the black majority, I remain a minority. Few have been so fortunate to have a privileged upbringing in a country where poverty and social injustice is the norm. University abroad in Europe and North America, I became suddenly aware that I can hardly spell in SiNdebele or complete a sentence without borrowing a word from English. I daren’t try read. I may have a Nguni name with such gracious meaning but then again I have to second guess what my first language is. I sometimes ask myself: what language do I actually think in?
I am a product of those pedigree dreams which my African parents had for me – to be all they could never be. But has it also turned me into a mongrel? A hybrid who can command an intellectual debate on western politics but shys away from some siNdebele cultural and social norms which have been diluted by western influences along the way!
Bhambatha
I see you still have not replied to my request for your sources?
Oldfox
Thanks for mentioning John Dube. His grandmother was one of the first converts to christianity by the missionary Daniel Lindley (one of my ancestors)
Mhlanguli Ncube
Cultural and social norms change. South African blacks were forced back into tribalism by deliberate policies to keep them “inferior” – which Sol Plaatjies and others fiercely tried to resist.
Everyone
English is an international language. I don’t think the Australians, New Zealanders, Americans or Indians ( to name just a few ) would appreciate being called European or British.
I don’t know how relevant this is but my late Dad was given to singing in moments of stress…
“i’ve got a lovely bunch of coconuts,
there they are standing in a row,
big ones, small ones, some as big as your head,
give ‘em a twist a flick of the wrist,
that’s what the showman said
i’ve got a lovely bunch of coconuts,
everybody throw and make me rich,….”
… not the new national anthem ???