Excuse me while I blame apartheid*
September 13th, 2008 § 13 Comments
By Khaya Dlanga
Many white people see no just cause in blacks blaming apartheid for anything. It ended almost 14 years already; get over it already, they say. Often it is said with indignation, if not irritation, as though to say, how dare they!
Those who insist we stop talking about it tell us it’s in the past, so we should forget about it. Perhaps it would be easy to forget if we didn’t bear the scars of the past. For some it’s not mere scars; some walk around with deep sores that are still healing — slowly. Every now and then, the sore is disturbed and the healing process is reversed.
It is easy for the “perpetrator” (I use that word liberally here) to say: “Forget about it,” because he does not want to be reminded of his sins. At the same time it is also too easy for the victim to keep playing the victim card instead of getting on with it. There is a middle ground somewhere between these conflicting feelings.
When we blame the legacy of apartheid, most white people take it as a personal attack on them for having benefited from the system. Or they accuse blacks of refusing to take responsibility for whatever is going wrong in the country. This is not the case. It is an attack on the system. We are not asking you to feel guilty. If anyone needs to get over anything, it is white people who walk around carrying guilt. This guilt might paralyse them, or even make them unwitting racists. Or, even worse, cause them to overcompensate, thus wiping away any sincerity in their efforts to balance the past.
To be honest, had I been white during the height of apartheid I don’t know if I would have had the moral fortitude to stand up against the National Party government. Perhaps I would have condemned it in the comfort and privacy of my mind.
The legacy of apartheid is very real. Let us not pretend that people don’t have a legitimate reason for blaming it for their current condition, as some excuse for their lack of progress. It is an undeniable fact that the vast majority of black people were denied a good education; some were even denied an education. The government of the day did not bother to build schools for them.
Where there is education, opportunity soon follows, and without it blacks were caught in a vicious cycle of stagnation. They saw no real progress for themselves. Instead of passing on wealth from generation to generation, their descendents inherited poverty and a very visible reality that they were not allowed to prosper in the land of their birth.
To dismiss these realities as mere laziness on the part of the black person is a clear lack of understanding of the position the formerly oppressed find themselves in today. The black person is still playing catch up.
We in the black community are lacking decent education, even with the new government. The teachers who teach most black students did not get a fantastic education themselves. With these steep hills to climb, it is a miracle that so many children who went through those schools have managed to extricate themselves from the web of hopelessness.
Jobless blacks in the townships and in the rural areas do not expect the government to do anything for them. What they want are opportunities so that they can improve their lives — not handouts. Many of them don’t see these opportunities, so they create some for themselves even in the bleak conditions in which find themselves. Young men create car-wash businesses and young women hair saloons, to name just the most obvious examples.
On the other hand, blacks look at white misbehaviour through the prism of race without seeing the core of the problem. When we only look at it that way, we don’t try to solve the issue.
The black community must not confuse with racism the young white man’s anger. He cannot understand why he has to be at the back of the queue when he seeks employment. Let’s say that he is too young even to remember apartheid. Shall we now punish him for benefiting from a system that was not of his choosing? Is it his fault that he just happened to have been born into it? Whether he would have grown up to be a perpetrator of the evils of the previous system or not is immaterial. What matters is that the system ended before he could be a conscious and active participant in it. What do we do now?
Having said all I have, I would like to point out that I am not as naive as to believe that racism does not exist. Sadly it is does. We saw manifestations of it recently at the University of the Free State.
Whether we admit it or not, we are all victims of apartheid. But we cannot be victims forever. We may have been victims, but we don’t have to think and act like them. The only way we can raise above it is when we first seek to understand. However, this must not excuse bad black or white behaviour.
*first published March 28 on thoughtleader.co.za
yum.. history can take a long time. things have to be remembered and hopefully one day they won’t be quite so relevant. like… as someone born in britain, it’d be stupid of me to bitch about the 400yr roman occupation or the viking one or whatever. time hey..
yum? i meant to type ‘yup’
Blame appartheid. Don’t blame *me*
This is, I think, a very good and emotive point, why should we as white South Africans forget the error of ‘our’ ways? Why? After all, ‘we’ are all responsible for apartheid right? ‘We’ were all there, ‘we’ are all to blame.
In these debates and discussions, it is very easy to slip into generalising about who did what, where and when. It is so easy to be accusatory and blame history for current problems. This is not responsible nor is it accurate and to blame all whites for this legacy is just wrong. Black South Africans are not the only victims of apartheid.
Of course people are still hurting from the past, of course there is still a lot of resentment about South Africas history. Do you honestly think though, that it helps to point the accusatory finger at an entire racial group for a minority’s historical misdemeanours? What does this achieve? In my mind it only achieves more resentment and further cultural divide.
Should we not follow in the humble footsteps of Madiba and Tutu and the TRC and get on with our lives in a way that our children can be proud of and not further stoke the fires of racial indifferences.
Lets not forget about what happened in South Africas past, but let us too, be proud of how far we have come as a nation united and lets move into the future together and as a shining example of acknowledgement to the world.
Well said Khaya, and I realise you wrote this quite a while ago but this remains a very topical issue for all South Africans.
Let’s get real about this. The angry young white male just needs to calm down. It may seem unfair that just because they weren’t there or don’t see why they should be punished for something that they “didn’t do”; while in fact their forefathers benefited from a policy that was one of the worst atrocities to humankind and they made sure that their progeny would continue to reap the rewards long after they were gone.
For every angry white guy out there are about a hundred even more angry black people. I’m talking about the countless numbers who everyday are faced with their reality of unemployment and poverty, who don’t have the proper skills and education to make anything of themselves because they didn’t get the same opportunities as their white counterparts, who live below the poverty line, who everyday face an uncertain and murky future and won’t be able to provide for the families, for whom everyday is a reminder of the injustice of the past and everyday its psychological warfare. I’m talking about mental slavery, generations of broken men and women and that legacy is being passed on…. the list goes on and on. So, yes apartheid ended 15 yrs ago but the road to retribution is a long and painful one and everyone pays. Apartheid was a dog of a policy that made sure that black people would be screwed for generations and it may be in the past but the effects will linger for years to come.
Don’t get me wrong… I too am proud of how far as a nation we’ve come. I will get on with my life, work hard, get an education and strive for a good life. But as a young black person, I’m going to blame apartheid for my woes all the way, you can be sure of that
We’ve got 400 years to catch up on, not forgetting Slavery but we’ll get there, we will pass on wealth from generation to generation.
Again, this is an old article, but the following link is very relevant:
http://www.fslgh.gov.za/CABINET LGTAS FINAL 25 November 2009.pdf
Have a look at the relative state of service delivery in the provinces (pp7-8). After 15 years, the current government cannot escape criticism, but the legacy of apartheid is clear. The ‘white’ areas have excellent infrastructure, ‘black’ areas have shocking infrastructure. This is not decay. This is infrastructure that never existed. The scope of the problem is huge. Where the current government must bear the blame is that very little seems to have changed, but they did not create the lack of infrastructure.
And I repeat, the infrastructure did not disappear due to lack of maintenance. It was never there. In some areas service delivery has decayed, but not to the point where it does not exist. If it has decayed to that level in just 15 years, then it was not done properly to start with.
copy and paste the link into the address bar, rather than clicking on it.
i would love to have may car cleaned by those automated and computer wahsers ~-,
U couldn’t have put it any better!!!
What I hate is the youth who blame apartheid and whites for everything. I didn’t benefit from apartheid. I’m to young. Same as how youth of today are to young to use apartheid as the reason for not making something of their lives.
I have full respect for the past generation who were truly part of the struggle. But I have none for the new generation who try to ride the coat tails of the apartheid excuse.
I do think it is fair to rule out the possiblity of the youth of today being affected by the ramifications of apartheid. Im a 19 year old black female who was not directly affected by the system but I have inherited the need to always prove myslef and prove that I inherently deserve to be treated equally and not because legislation mandates individulas to do so.
We can not deny the fact that white privilege exists and will continue to do so unless we deal with the race related issues that permeate our society. The broad paint brush effect that South Africa has adopted creates the illusion that we are all equal and issues related to race do not exist. Phrases such as “get over it”, “the race thing is getting old’ are the reasons why we have not moved on as a country. Until we DEAL with these issues pervasive racism will continue to exist.
I do agree with you that some use apartheid as an excuse for
their lot in life but there are some of us who are attempting to make something of our lives but are held back by the colour of our skin. Being black does not award me any privileges,being a young black woman does not entitle me to anything that a white young woman is not,
instead it requires me to prove that I deserve as much as she does. The youth, and South Africans at large are still affected by apartheid
and to deny would be a grave injustice to those who fought for a democratic and just South Africa.
This is a really great piece. It really raises the question of whether whites must ultimately pay the price for the actions of the forefathers. As a young 18-year old white male, studying my first year at university, privileged and blessed (etc), sometimes I say to myself that I SHOULD stand at the back of the job line even though I very deeply don’t want this to happen. Must I pay for the actions of ‘whites’ that were of no relation to me, do not share the vision I do, had no idea of the horrid legacy they were creating…?
This question becomes even more valuable in the context of privilege across race. Many of my black colleagues are just as, if not more, privileged than I. What do we do in a case like this? Should I then still stand at the back of the line, or should the COLLECTIVE PRIVILEGED stand at the back of the line and allow the disenfranchised, underprivileged to take the first shot at success?
Food for thought. Excellent discussion, Khaya.