Race rows
Racism has appeared its ugly head in South Africa again. Terence Pillay looks at the latest incidents that have gone viral.
It’s been one hell of a week. And it’s just started. Not one, but two new race wars have gone viral in South Africa and making news abroad as well.
First we had one of the leaders of the Rhodes Must Fall movement, Ntokozo Qwabe who reportedly bullied a waitress with a racially charged note on a bill informing her that he’ll leave her a tip when she gives back the land. He later boasted on his Facebook that he made this waitress cry “white tears”.
In another incident, a loose-lipped Cape Town man’s racist Facebook post went viral after he went off on Sports and Recreation minister Fikile Mbalula for his ban on three sporting codes hosting international tournaments. Matt Theunessin’s hate speech was screen-grabbed and sent across social media sparking a Penny Sparrow-like reaction to his racism.
For me Matt Theunessin should be immediately charged with hate speech and made to appear before the South African Human Rights Commission. It’s a no-brainer. But Qwaba’s racism, like most South African’s is more underlying, but equally hateful and perhaps more dangerous.
Firstly, it seems disingenuous to go and bully someone and then say he understands that she has no land but she needs to go and mobilise other white people to give back the land – like it’s her responsibility. I think the problem is that his level of discourse is so different to hers. He’s operating at an academic level, which already puts him at a position of power over her. He’s coming from a different vantage point so it’s like someone standing here and trying to convince a child’s doll that it should go to church. It’s a philosophical point of departure that is completely disparate.
He’s in a position of power academically because he’s got access to a political, philosophical and ideological language with which he can debate – well, he’s not even debating, he was just being as ass – and that already placed him on an uneven keel to her. She was an innocent, working class girl trying to make ends meet and take care of her sick mother.
It was such as waste of energy. If he wants to make a case or promote his cause he is certainly demonstrating a lack of maturity in terms of where he’s taking his battle to. It’s like fighting a skirmish on the beaches here when you actually should be doing it in the mountains over there.
The irony is that this leader of the #RhodesMustFall campaign, is himself a recipient of a Mandela-Rhodes scholarship and I would really like to know what the code of conduct stipulates when you accept this money. It’s the same as those medical students who went off to Cuba and spent all their time at church; not going to lectures and studying towards their degrees but complained and protested when they got kicked out. This is just another example of the embarrassment that these so-called future leaders are inflicting on the image of South Africa on the rest of the globe. As far as I am concerned, they should have paid back that money. They wasted all these resources, went for what was essentially a holiday and time at church and got ousted. And there was no repercussion. But that’s not even my point.
This student’s politics and behaviour is questionable and he should be sanctioned by government, like every other white racist has in the country. Just because he’s black doesn’t mean this is not racism. For example, those black students at Cape Town university who wore the “F*** White People” t-shirts got away with doing so and faced no sanction. In fact some of the commentary on social media said that it’s not really possible for black people to be racist because they were previously disadvantaged. What nonsense! So all this hate speech that is continually spewed after incidents like this is not racism? Again, what nosnsense!
This guy’s scholarship should have been immediately revoked. He’s promoted hate, was clearly racist and has brought the institution that’s funding his studies into disrepute. He should be taught a very, very hard lesson. Much like Matt Theunessin.
Then, let’s take a look at those girls that dressed up in purple costumes and went to a party... They got lambasted, attacked and had their characters ripped apart because someone thought they went with “black face” when they were merely purple aliens. Why was there such an outcry about that and not even a whimper from government about this?
I don’t know where the idea that you can’t be racist if you’re black has come from. It’s like saying you can’t be homophobic if you’re gay, which is complete nonsense. I know a lot of gay people who are entirely homophobic – they hate lesbians, they hate transgender people, they hate transsexuals and other gay people. And the same should apply to any race group. And moreover, we should not tolerate this hate!
Our experience in this country is that when a white person says something racist against a black person, everyone jumps up and down, political parties weigh in, it makes international news and rallies are held to shame the offender. So why the double standard? Should this not apply to any race, anywhere? Take this Qwaba incident, for example, why aren’t people being as militant? Why isn’t government being as militant? Any form of hate speech or racism should be tackled equally.
I think we’ve reached a point where there’s this hyper-sensitivity and that’s what all these kinds of incidents promote. I mean everybody is allowed to have different political views, but if you choose to be an idiot and ram your ideologies down other people’s throats in this racist manner, like express your political persuasions on the back of a till slip or call people racist names on Facebook, you should face discipline.
The fact is: this person did it for the sole purpose of publicity. He knew that this is what would happen on social media and he went for gold. It was carefully orchestrated, he knew it would go big and he wanted to further his cause. But it has completely backfired on him though. The last article I read on the subject says people have started to donate money to help the waitress take care of her sick mother and that figure stood at R100 000.
This kind of scourge happens all the time, but it’s not brought to the fore because it’s not Qwabe posting it on Facebook. But we should be calling out racists, even if they’re among our anthology of friends. This is the only way we can begin to get a handle on this. And as South Africans we need to talk about this and bring about awareness on issues like these.
Do you think we have a double standard when it comes to dealing with incidents of racism and reverse racism in this country?
You can email Terence Pillay at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter: @terencepillay1 and tweet him your thoughts.
First we had one of the leaders of the Rhodes Must Fall movement, Ntokozo Qwabe who reportedly bullied a waitress with a racially charged note on a bill informing her that he’ll leave her a tip when she gives back the land. He later boasted on his Facebook that he made this waitress cry “white tears”.
In another incident, a loose-lipped Cape Town man’s racist Facebook post went viral after he went off on Sports and Recreation minister Fikile Mbalula for his ban on three sporting codes hosting international tournaments. Matt Theunessin’s hate speech was screen-grabbed and sent across social media sparking a Penny Sparrow-like reaction to his racism.
For me Matt Theunessin should be immediately charged with hate speech and made to appear before the South African Human Rights Commission. It’s a no-brainer. But Qwaba’s racism, like most South African’s is more underlying, but equally hateful and perhaps more dangerous.
Firstly, it seems disingenuous to go and bully someone and then say he understands that she has no land but she needs to go and mobilise other white people to give back the land – like it’s her responsibility. I think the problem is that his level of discourse is so different to hers. He’s operating at an academic level, which already puts him at a position of power over her. He’s coming from a different vantage point so it’s like someone standing here and trying to convince a child’s doll that it should go to church. It’s a philosophical point of departure that is completely disparate.
He’s in a position of power academically because he’s got access to a political, philosophical and ideological language with which he can debate – well, he’s not even debating, he was just being as ass – and that already placed him on an uneven keel to her. She was an innocent, working class girl trying to make ends meet and take care of her sick mother.
It was such as waste of energy. If he wants to make a case or promote his cause he is certainly demonstrating a lack of maturity in terms of where he’s taking his battle to. It’s like fighting a skirmish on the beaches here when you actually should be doing it in the mountains over there.
The irony is that this leader of the #RhodesMustFall campaign, is himself a recipient of a Mandela-Rhodes scholarship and I would really like to know what the code of conduct stipulates when you accept this money. It’s the same as those medical students who went off to Cuba and spent all their time at church; not going to lectures and studying towards their degrees but complained and protested when they got kicked out. This is just another example of the embarrassment that these so-called future leaders are inflicting on the image of South Africa on the rest of the globe. As far as I am concerned, they should have paid back that money. They wasted all these resources, went for what was essentially a holiday and time at church and got ousted. And there was no repercussion. But that’s not even my point.
This student’s politics and behaviour is questionable and he should be sanctioned by government, like every other white racist has in the country. Just because he’s black doesn’t mean this is not racism. For example, those black students at Cape Town university who wore the “F*** White People” t-shirts got away with doing so and faced no sanction. In fact some of the commentary on social media said that it’s not really possible for black people to be racist because they were previously disadvantaged. What nonsense! So all this hate speech that is continually spewed after incidents like this is not racism? Again, what nosnsense!
This guy’s scholarship should have been immediately revoked. He’s promoted hate, was clearly racist and has brought the institution that’s funding his studies into disrepute. He should be taught a very, very hard lesson. Much like Matt Theunessin.
Then, let’s take a look at those girls that dressed up in purple costumes and went to a party... They got lambasted, attacked and had their characters ripped apart because someone thought they went with “black face” when they were merely purple aliens. Why was there such an outcry about that and not even a whimper from government about this?
I don’t know where the idea that you can’t be racist if you’re black has come from. It’s like saying you can’t be homophobic if you’re gay, which is complete nonsense. I know a lot of gay people who are entirely homophobic – they hate lesbians, they hate transgender people, they hate transsexuals and other gay people. And the same should apply to any race group. And moreover, we should not tolerate this hate!
Our experience in this country is that when a white person says something racist against a black person, everyone jumps up and down, political parties weigh in, it makes international news and rallies are held to shame the offender. So why the double standard? Should this not apply to any race, anywhere? Take this Qwaba incident, for example, why aren’t people being as militant? Why isn’t government being as militant? Any form of hate speech or racism should be tackled equally.
I think we’ve reached a point where there’s this hyper-sensitivity and that’s what all these kinds of incidents promote. I mean everybody is allowed to have different political views, but if you choose to be an idiot and ram your ideologies down other people’s throats in this racist manner, like express your political persuasions on the back of a till slip or call people racist names on Facebook, you should face discipline.
The fact is: this person did it for the sole purpose of publicity. He knew that this is what would happen on social media and he went for gold. It was carefully orchestrated, he knew it would go big and he wanted to further his cause. But it has completely backfired on him though. The last article I read on the subject says people have started to donate money to help the waitress take care of her sick mother and that figure stood at R100 000.
This kind of scourge happens all the time, but it’s not brought to the fore because it’s not Qwabe posting it on Facebook. But we should be calling out racists, even if they’re among our anthology of friends. This is the only way we can begin to get a handle on this. And as South Africans we need to talk about this and bring about awareness on issues like these.
Do you think we have a double standard when it comes to dealing with incidents of racism and reverse racism in this country?
You can email Terence Pillay at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter: @terencepillay1 and tweet him your thoughts.