Thank you a thousand times over for that post. These race debates are doing my head in. I’m goffal/coloured from Zimbabwe, with family from SA, my dad was a freedom fighter. As stated in a previous post; the most discrimination I’ve faced has been from other ‘people of colour’. In the West white people might have privilege but in our countries? I don’t think so. (White farmers in Zim being killed, and ripped off their farms; where’s the privilege in that?)
My sentiments exactly! People that pull the race card are too bloody cowardly or lazy to get out of their self-imposed limitations and brave a new approach to life other than the hatred and discrimination of the past. Even those that do still experience this absolutely must realise that it is actions of individuals and not race groups. Even if the group is of a predominant race, it is still the acts of individuals that speak on behalf of their demented group, and not an entire race.
The entire debate about racial supremacy and privilege is a moot point. Oppression has long ceased on that basis and has, for a long time now, shifted to simply oppression of class and wealth, and nothing else. The colour of your skin only matters to people that are still influenced by the bigoted realities of the past. White supremacy may have established the slums and the informal settlements, but it certainly is not what is maintaining it.
And those that still believe that it is an active force to be reckoned with are exactly the same ones that are abusing their authority to establish reverse racism in so many parts of the world. So at this rate, in a few years’ time, we’ll be talking about black privilege, and nothing would have changed except the reversal of the skin pigmentation of those enjoying the privileges.