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So, we don’t have any social life here yet; and so, have had limited conversations with other people here, including white people. But of the few we have met, almost every white person has made a racist comment and couched it by saying he/she wasn’t being a racist. Ummm, YA, you were!
Our first encounter was with Gina’s friend, Scott, at the braai. We live in this posh (for South Africa) neighborhood near Florida Road, a place with high-end, classy restaurants. Well, Scott lives near us; however, he tells us he doesn’t go there because it has become “too black”. Chris and I commented only days earlier that Florida Road is almost totally white, save for the black wait staff who serve the whites at the restaurants. Only a couple of places on Florida, we have discovered, are more diverse, and we appreciated this. Ughh. Anyway, as he was bringing us home, somehow this comes out of his fiancé’s mouth: “The blacks breed like rabbits…I am not a racist…they just do.” Perhaps we should expect it in South Africa, but we were pretty stunned; and unfortunately, speechless. Later, I came up with the perfect rebuttal about it being a poverty issue, rather a race issue. Ha! So take tha… I mean, you just got so secretly schooled in my brain, buddy.
Our landlord (who we love for many reasons) commented the other day that the streets are being named after “terrorists”—a dig at the government for naming streets after black apartheid activists and other revolutionaries (including Che Guevara). And then, we go to check out this gym and the thoroughly red-bulled, wide eyed, frenetic trainer tells us we don’t want to go to a competing gym because “there are a lot of black people there…but it’s not a black-white thing, okay?…there just is and you won’t get on a treadmill and it is dirty.” Just tell me it’s crowded, alright!? And, YES, you are a racist! Again, we sat wide-mouthed and didn’t say a word. And yes, I still joined that gym BECAUSE it is close by, not because the black people are nowhere to be found (which is true because of his exclusivity). Sigh.
We understand this is a different culture with a history of hardcore racial tension under apartheid, but we can’t believe the extent to which these sentiments are vocalized, TO RANDOM STRANGERS. It just frustrates us that the assumption is that because we are white people, we naturally have the same values. We plan on thinking through our new approach to these comments.
We do not share these values and silence is saying we do. We want to be ready next time, damn it.
Yeah, this is a complex issue in SA. Having lived there, I also experienced similar comments from the white (and even colored) South Africans. The more I heard them, the more I wanted to scream, "racist"...and the more I needed to hear the other side of the complex race relations. So, I ventured into a black community and realized that each community has their own narrative about "the other". It is their way of coping (and trying to make sense) of the raw wounds from apartheid. Instead of me judging their comments as racist or not, I tried to understand where the comments came from. Good luck...this is one of the most difficult issues to make sense of...
ReplyDeleteAt face value, yes, there's a lot that might appear to be racism here; and it comes from all racial quarters. i say appear, because a lot of what you hear is just fear mixed with ignorance which in turn mixes in to create prejudice. When fear and prejudice collide, the darker side of human nature is revealed. Racism was once the cornerstone of much of European and North American politics and economics for many centuries, and only as recently as 50 years ago was it adequately tackled in those climes. New generations have replaced older ones as voices of reason and this will need to happen here in South Africa as well. I'm not trying to shift blame and focus here as to alleviate anything that is going on here. I'm purely trying to reason that time is needed for things to get up to speed. I'd certainly not defend either side of the racially divided. I just know my mind is not polluted with what ails them. What I find is a real shame over here is how the politicians have adopted an approach of filling their own pockets with the funds meant to develop this country and benefit the underprivileged. Public funding simply disappears in to seemingly thin air and nobody seems to be able to do anything about it. It just might the way how this story has to happen and in due course, when the majority middle class comes to earn, instead of steal their wealth, then they can set up a new approach. Things will change and they invariably do.
ReplyDeleteGreat car!
ReplyDeletePoor Sven. The guy is so desperate to make "friends" that he's trolling the streets.