Thought Leader

As SA matures, South Africans must take time to reflect on the foundation they’re erecting their democracy on. Such introspection demands asking tough and uncomfortable questions. They cannot be answered based only on politics, knowledge or experience. The answers will require foresight and a vision of a future (and better) South Africa. One such uncomfortable…

By Matthew Beetar If Monty Python were still in business they would need look no further than the University of KwaZulu-Natal for material. The absurdity of the management of the institution, ironically pitched to be “inspiring greatness”, has reached a new level of disregard for the staff and students. The coping mechanism of laughing instead…

On March 17 1992 the National Party, under former president FW de Klerk’s leadership, asked white South Africans a difficult question in the form of a referendum. The question was: “Do you support the continuation of the reform process which the state president began on February 2 1990 and which is aimed at a new…

There is probably nothing as tiresome, irritating and reactionary in contemporary South African discourse as the knee-jerk accusation of racism in response to anything critical of the ANC government, of any black person or of any institution that happens to be managed by black people (in the broadest, Biko-esque sense of “black”). Ironically, this knee-jerk,…

Which kid doesn’t enjoy Saturday morning cartoons? My kid is no exception and I join him often enough, but this Saturday I am annoyed by Pin Pop’s very obviously sexist TV commercial on e.tv. Why is it being screened at a time when toddlers are bound to be tuning in? Does the answer lie in…

Exactly 100 years after Africans were dispossessed of their land and stripped of their identity and heritage, the ANC government has subsidised the opening of the new headquarters for blackness. This comes in the form of a legacy project worth more than R120 million to promote, protect and preserve the legacy of Black Consciousness visionary leader…

I have listened to political analysts, academics, businessmen and women and ordinary people trying to convince me that Julius Malema is the biggest problem this country has ever been confronted with post-democracy. I have heard arguments about how he is a “populist”, an “opportunist”, a “demagogue” and “a danger to the future of the country”….

This past week I have been confronted once more with the debate as to whether we should ‘’talk’’ about apartheid and by extension race relations. First I tuned into Eusebius McKaiser’s talk show on 702 where a gentleman called in to ask whether ‘’we can stop talking about race every day’’ and McKaiser responded by…

Many arguments have risen out of Gillian Schutte’s “Dear White People” perhaps the most progressive provided by Jackie Shandu in “Black people, fight your own battles”. Shandu argues that because Schutte’s letter is addressed to white people, it ought to be dismantled and dissected primarily by the white community who it seeks to engage in…

Well before Gillian Schutte’s letter to white people calling on them to reflect on their whiteness, its invisibility and centrality in the reproduction and edification of white power, the very experience of blackness has been characterised by this same demand. Yet, as is wont to be the case, it would be Schutte’s, a white woman,…