Ugly bits of human nature?

I wasn’t sure what to title this piece.

With the declining health of Nelson Mandela the last few weeks, I have seen something that has been bothering me quite a bit. An ugly bit of racism. From my nation. The Afrikaner.

I am an Afrikaner. Half of my family were French Huguenots that fled persecution in France, and came to South Africa in the hopes of making a better life.

The other half came from a German village that was burnt to the ground.

The Germans came to South Africa from Speyer after it burnt to the ground during the  war of Palatine Succession in 1688. The Huguenots arrived the same year.

They settled in the Cape area, and like many others, endured the Great Trek in the 1830’s – 1840’s when the British came to control the Cape Colony. The Great Trek was a fascinating bit of history, those families were made of tough stuff. Hauling oxwagons over mountains, in some cases the mountains were too steep and the wagons were disassembled and carried, piece by piece, over the mountain and reassembled on the other side. Racial separatism formed part of the constitutions of the 3 new settlements in Transvaal, Free State and Natal – but they prohibited slavery. Much of the racial separatism stemmed from their religious beliefs.

Even before the Great Trek, the settlers had border wars with the Xhosa tribes.

During the Trek, they encountered the Zulu and more battles ensued.

Later on as they settled the interior, the Afrikaner fought the British in the Anglo Boer wars. That was a nasty business with the British adopting a scorched earth policy, burning our farms and homesteads to the ground and putting our wives and children in concentration camps (where 26,000 died). We were oppressed in a land we fled to, to get away from oppression.

I am no psychiatry expert, but I have read about how the oppressed can become the oppressors. Which is what happened in 1942 with the introduction of Apartheid.

I was born in 1975. I was oblivious to Apartheid and what it meant during my childhood days. I know that our men had to do compulsory military duty for 2 years after leaving school. I went to an all-white school, I had a black maid growing up (whom I loved dearly)

But it is truly only when one starts thinking outside of ego, and putting yourself into the other persons shoes, that one starts to understand.

That understanding I find, is lacking in a large population.

There are white Afrikaners that say that the blacks were better off during apartheid

They say that the crime rate was lower during apartheid. And maybe it was! My early childhood memories of my grandparents place were of ornate burglar bars in front of the windows that open, and a low garden wall and gates, mostly to keep the pets in.

I remember when they installed the security doors in front of the outside doors. And then burglar bars in front of all the windows. Next, Grandpa started locking the gates. Slowly, the neighborhoods low walls got replaced with 8 foot high electric fence, or walls with electric fence on top.

At first all you had to do was lock your vehicle to prevent it being stolen. Then came the guerilla steering wheel lock. Then immobilizers, then satellite tracking devices became mandatory in order to insure your vehicle. Guards in parking lots became the norm. Gated communities with security, and security firms and armed response patrol the streets. Crime is the reason I left Africa.

I don’t have the answer for that. I do not truly know the reason for all the violent crimes in South Africa.

I am sure inequality plays a role. Corruption is rife.

I do believe that education is a great part of it. And understanding. And the latter is surely lacking. I have read so many nasty posts on Facebook the last while. It would appear that farm murders in South Africa are rife. White farmers are targeted in extremely violent crimes, too horrific to describe. Why? I am not sure, but I have some ideas.

Some white farmers treat their workers well, but others truly treat them as nothing better than slaves. The farmer lives in a nice house while his workers live in housing that he provides – which is mostly just basic 2 or 3 rooms. A lucky few have indoor plumbing and electricity. Most are illiterate and live far away from schools. The kids have to walk for miles to get to school. You can see the discrepancy there.

But there are other senseless murders too. When I was growing up, we had a neighbor  Mrs Robinson. The sweetest old lady, lived by herself in a middle class neighborhood at 94 years old. Well, her trusted gardener came to her house one night. She opened the security gate. He raped her and strangled her and took off with a few bucks. Why? I will never understand.

My uncle was shot dead by intruders while sitting in front of the TV one night. My aunt was in the bedroom and was lucky to get away with her life. She had jumped through the window and stood outside trying to dial the police, when the intruder found her, pointed the gun at her, grabbed her cellphone and ran away. My cousin was hijacked at gunpoint one night with her two small children by her side.  That kind of violent crime is rampant, the last statistics showed 52 murders per day in South Africa.

But the crime is a side-aspect of my rant here. My rant is really about racism.

Every white person should think about what it would be like to live in the townships of South Africa. The sprawling mass of one room shacks where millions of poor blacks live. They cook over fires or with kerosene. Some have power while others light their small homes with candles. Lots do not have indoor plumbing. Some have to walk for miles to fill water jugs for drinking water and to wash clothes by hand. Put yourself in that position. For years you were oppressed by the minority rule. Your schools were separate, your education sub-standard. Because your oppressors believed that you just needed basic schooling to become a manual laborer (for the men) or a maid (for the women).

Picture living in a one room shack with your family while you see the oppressor living in nice middle class homes with vehicles, electricity and running water. How does that make you feel? Really and truly put yourself in that position. Ask yourself if you would feel bitterness towards your oppressor, the same way your ancestors felt bitterness towards the British, and their ancestors felt bitterness towards the French and German oppressors.   

In 1993 the public schools finally became mixed race. Really that is only 20 years ago.

How do you make it right? The new government, aware of the lingering innate racism in the hearts of most white Afrikaners, instilled Affirmative Action – meaning that if a black person and a white person with similar qualifications applied for a job, the black person will be chosen. They came up with Black Economic Empowerment – where companies should reflect the demographic of the population in their employment by employing 80% black and 20% minority. The same thing happened in sports teams.

I do not believe that this is the right way. It keeps racial segregation alive.

I do not know what the right way is. It would be like asking my great-grandfather who fought in the Boer War to make friends with the British. Or a Jew to forgive and befriend a German. It takes great courage and understanding and compassion to be able to forgive and understand.

Nelson Mandela can tell you a thing or two about courage and forgiveness. He left the bitterness behind when he walked out of prison. He understood that the healing required forgiveness. And I think that is the heart of the matter – in order to truly heal the soul, one needs a deep understanding that forgiving and feeling compassion for your fellow human being could bring true peace.