Did we steal your brick making techniques?

Juan's comment: "I do not see why GP needs to make comments like, blacks were denied educational opportunities,in order to quantify his stance. How did whites deny them education? By tying them up and not allowing them to learn? Since when did it become our responsibility to educate other cultures? Since you advocate so strongly that your culture is equal to mine? Give me proof of where you invented something or built something that we cant or couldnt?

Or did we steal your brick making techniques and sand too? My arguments might seem like typical colonialist arguments, but history has very few instances that help YOUR arguments. We built these universities that you now claim as yours. Your arguments that AA is justified are all based on a belief that you would have built all this and achieved all this if we had never come here. Again history, nor the present, offer much proof to assist you." [Source]

Answering Juan's questions:
GP [Gauteng Blog] doesn't need to make comments like the one you suggest above. GP is under a moral obligation to at least think them. Not to quantify his stance but to prevent what happened from ever happening again. Apartheid South Africa denied black South Africans education by denying it to them. How else would you deny anyone education, when you're in a position of power? You say, "No." They did tie black people up, and banished some to an island, and did others in like only they know how, and not allowed them to learn, yes. In 1978 your folks spent $696 (4 306 Rands) on your education, as opposed to $45 (278 Rands) black parents spent on their child. Your responsibility has never been to educate other cultures, you're flattering yourself. The responsibility of people in power, anywhere, is see to it that everyone has equal access to schooling and to opportunity. No, my culture is not equal to yours. My culture is better than yours. Black people have built many things that white people didn't even dream of building, and vice versa.

You didn't steal our brick-making techniques, you nicked the damned bricks themselves. Your arguments don't seem in the least like colonialist arguments, they are the very definition of colonialist arguments. History says the African was enslaved abroad and on his native content by those wielding more brutal weapons. Of course you built the universities, if by "you" you mean the one who was in power then. Who else could have built them? Oliver Tambo in Tanzania?

I don't know if the black person would have built "all this" if the white person "had never come here." It's hard to say because by coming here the latter destroyed communities and lives and culture and families, and carted the healthiest black people back to Europe and South America to help build those places. However, I'm interested in finding out how you know for a fact that Africans couldn't have. This must sound familiar to you: "[We have] raised the life standards of the occupied inhabitants in all areas (infrastructure, water, employment, universities and hospitals) much more than they could have achieved in any other scenario. [Source]"

Talking to Juan:
Black people have undergone quite a lot at the hands of white people. White people have undergone very little at the hands of black people, all over the world, but especially in America and in South Africa. I've always been amazed at how the transition from minority government to majority government did not turn uglier. There's of course the question of farmers getting killed. While that tragedy cannot be overlooked, I'm happy that there has been no all out bloodbath. From 1652 when Jan Anthoniszoon Van Riebeeck arrived till 1994 when Mr de Klerk stepped down, nastier things than you can imagine were meted out to the black population. That's 342 years, Juan, or three centuries and 42 years. And you can't take 12 years (1994 to 2006) of practically no ill-treatment!

For more than two years, Tutu's Truth and Reconciliation Commission listened as South Africans testified about atrocities committed by all sides under apartheid - abducted loved ones who never returned, torture in police cells, the formation of death squads and bodies burned beyond recognition as their killers enjoyed a barbecue on the side. [Source]

...it is in the economics of South Africa that the greatest crimes of apartheid are reflected, and where the greatest test of reconciliation will have to come. The country had the highest inequality in wealth distribution in the world -- 20 per cent of the population owning 75% of the wealth. [Source]

Just like you, I was scared of the swart gevaar, the bloodbath I thought was coming. But in the end you and I weren't afraid of the same swart gevaar. You were and are still scared of being swamped by the black wave of freedom. I was afraid black people would want to revenge. Well, in relative terms, they haven't. I still don't understand, however, how after more than three centuries of life under the weight of racism, the black South African doesn't beat the racist into a pulp, but instead reconciles with him. And it is the racist who now complains, after only 12 years of no discrimination against him. That's what assures me my culture is better than yours, Juan, and that by quite a stretch.

In your comment to my post you ask for "proof of where [blacks] invented something or built something that [whites] cant [sic] or couldnt [sic]" build. They've built an apartheid-free, bigotry-free, torture-chamber free, pass-law free South Africa, that's what. Want more examples? There's Thomas Jennings's invention.

Thomas Jennings was the first African American to receive a patent, on March 3, 1821 (U.S. patent3306x). Thomas Jennings' patent was for a dry-cleaning process called "dry scouring". The first money Thomas Jennings earned from his patent was spent on the legal fees (my polite way of saying enough money to purchase) necessary to liberate his family out of slavery and support the abolitionist cause. [Source] Let us not forget refrigerated trucks, the telegraphony, the McCoy Engine Lubricator (The real McCoy? It's him), the blood bank, the foil-electret microphone, and many other achievements. And the short shafted assegai.

I want to know why you're scared. You're not angry, as you purport to be. You're scared. Is it because you think the world as you knew it careened and went belly up, and now you have no landmarks? Is it because we "don't really [want] a solution to racism, it's too sweet, this freedom to blame other people for your own mistakes. While I can be racist I don't have to look in the mirror and see what's wrong with me, with my people. I can just find fault with the other side. This is how the human race resolves problems, it's always somebody else's fault. You know what the best part of that is? You. Right now you think I mean somebody else, you think I'm talking about the other race. [Source]"

Comments

[Bryan Wilhite]

Rethabile, now is my opportunity to make the statement to you that always wanted to make: suppose you "win" over these people you are "engaging"---okay what is "victory" like? Perform the Thought Experiment see the scenario through...

What I see are adult humans who finally admit that they were ignorant as children---and now you have a stable full of docile, grown-ass children looking to you for breast feeding. I see it as a misdirection of resources and a slap in the face to all of the colonized African ancestors, these rebellious children, who lost their lives to trying to prove to children that adult Africans are not children. Woe to the rebellious children...

These "problematic issues" that you are "exploring" in an "open forum" are not to filed under "cultural sensitivity"---you are trying to become intimate with people who are simply uneducated and uninformed. Do not reinvent the Babylonian wheel when you have a smooth Nile river to travel on... Respect the hard work of the assimilation projects of Negroes of the past and learn from their mistakes. Really, truly explore what it means to be accepted and respected by the ignorant.

Success in this context means establishing relationships based on inequality where you know about Africa and Europe (and maybe China and India) while your "white friend" only knows about white Africa, white China, white India and Billy Ocean.

[Rethabile]

Bryan: I hear you. But I still must insist that dialogue with most adversaries is an essential part of any and every solution. And then there's the fact that I do not consider most South Africans adversaries, black, coloured and white. Only a few deserve that appellation. I'm listening hard, though, just as I'm listening to all others who have something to say. Just as we should all listen. Except to people who do not want to be listened to, like my friend Juan.

[leonard]

Although, I feel redundant to your dialogue - having had to leave thirty years ago, I'd simply like to say how I admire what you are saying and the understanding you show.
Thanks Rethabile.
I would add that when I arrived here, a Zambian activist asked me where my idealism would be when my family was massacred in the bloodbath that we were all sure would come...
I am still amazed that this did not happen.

[Bryan Wilhite]

So Martin Bernal who, is of European stock, wrote a book called *Black Athena: The Afroasiatic Roots of Classical Civilization*, it would be a "racist" error on my part to not listen to him.

Cheikh Anta Diop was married to French woman of the Gallic I suppose. It would be an error to not listen to her because she was married to a great man.

But when we are all sitting around on deep rumbling motorbikes, getting ready to go and someone pulls up in a tricycle honking their little horn, do not waste your time on this easy rider unless you specialize in souping up tricycles.

[Juan]

Rethabile

What you mean is you are listening hard to those who have something to say which fits into what you want to hear.

It is nothing new just like the arrogant ANC they only listen to those who support them the rest must automatically be racist.

And you accuse ME of being the one who makes excuses for my cultures mistakes.

You keep blaming my culture for your cultures failings and we will see how far that takes us.

So if you and Mr Whilhite would like a taste of what more and more young white people are feeling, go read my reply.
http://spaces.msn.com/opposition

[Rethabile]

"What you mean is you are listening hard to those who have something to say which fits into what you want to hear."
--------------------
If you imagine that you may leave a comment such as the one you left, and have me say "Yes, you're right," then you've got another think coming.

This is a forum for discussion. It is neither a place for warring nor for giving or taking orders.

I, and the other people who participate here, essentially listen and discuss.

Saying: "Since when did it become our responsibility to educate other cultures? Since you advocate so strongly that your culture is equal to mine?" isn't discussion.

Your mind is already made up, and sadly, it is made up of and about hogwash. The future of South Africa, and indeed of the world, isn't about who's superior, it is about how we can all live together in peace, and in prosperity.

[Bulelwa]

Hey, Rithabile,

I came across this guy Juan's comments on another blog...was it yours? I was so shocked. I've been away from South Africa for a little over a year (was back in June last yr), but in the little time that I have been away I forgot that people like Juan exist in South Africa. The sad thing is that there is not an ounce of shame in his tone. I had really forgotten that such people exist, so much so I felt a bit confused. Being away from home all I think about are the good things, but he just woke me up to this harsh reality of my country. It really perplexes me, that someone who is my peer (being 25, he's just 2 years older than me), thinks this way. I read in his profile that he lived in East London and he absolutely "LOVED it"-- it figures. I used to live in King Williams Town, just over 50 km away from EL, and there really is a lot of racism in that area- no wonder he loved it so much.

Sometimes I question my own idealism. I like to think I believe in the equality and dignity of all people, coupled with freedom of speech, but when I come across such instances, I am tempted to reject all these ideals. Reason being that it is this very respect for everyone's viewpoints that I hold that allows me to ponder and even tolerate such remarks.

Should I, as a Black South African, whose whole being, past lineage, and future offspring have been trampled underfoot by white supremist oppression and colonial rapine be so tolerant as to allow people like this fellow rattle off with such banal verbal (or textual in this case) incontinence?

[Bryan Wilhite]

Rethabile: "What you mean is you are listening hard to those who have something to say which fits into what you want to hear."

Rethabile I do not think you know how hearing works. Most people listen to what they think they should hear. The brain does more tuning out than tuning in. This provides focus. Now without the help of CIA intervention we can test the fruits of my focus and see what success comes from I listen to and what failures come from what I failed to hear.

What is even deeper is that by "listening" to what you write on this Blog, I know that you and I are profoundly different people yet we have had extensive dialog over the last few weeks.

I am sure that you do not know that there is more genetic diversity in Africa among pre-colonial Africans than with Africa and the "rest of the world"... The gene pool in Africa is deeper because all humanity comes from Africa. All this science can be "deformed" into this conversation to tell us that there is a great deal of mental as well as physical "diversity" between you and me (even though we may have the same complexion). Yet I am here writing to you.

The white mind supposes that you and I are "the same," so I feel "comfortable" exposing my thoughts in this forum. This is not the case yet I have been here writing to you.

[Bryan Wilhite]

CORRECTION Juan: "What you mean is you are listening hard to those who have something to say which fits into what you want to hear."

Sorry about this Rethabile. I thought you wrote the above quote. I have trouble with the CSS formatting here.

[Rethabile]

No problem at all. I did know "that there is more genetic diversity in Africa among pre-colonial Africans than with Africa and the 'rest of the world'..."

Africans are indeed genetically much closer to Europeans than they are to Australian aborigenes, or to other "black" peoples.

[Rachel]

With the benefit/hubris/arrogance/etc of being a way-far outsider here, I have one small thing to say.

When I was in university, in 1996, I attended a lecture by one of my very favourite feminists, Gloria Steinem. In the middle of her speech, she had a remarkable statement, and Ms. Steinem, please forgive me the 10-year-old paraphrase here. It was, in essence: "sexism has not only denied women the freedom to explore all their abilities in their relationships, it has also denied men the same freedom - the freedom to be nurturers and carers." It rocked my head back, and the insight guides my relationships now.

I think, writ larger, the point still has universal truth as exposed here in these discussions. Racism, apartheid, denied freedom to black South Africans (is this the correct terminology?), but the bitter fruit is ripening now for all.

[rofovnifo]

Hi

Looks good! Very useful, good stuff. Good resources here. Thanks much!


G'night