View from my balcony this morning in Cape Town.
(c) Cynically Jaded.
Tag: south africa
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This is not Africa
TRIGGER WARNING [RAPE]
The Silent War is a social awareness campaign about rape in South Africa illustrated and designed by Greg Richards.
“As there are six colors in the South African flag I developed six different areas of rape to raise awareness towards. Each poster carries a different colour of the flag. The six areas are: child rape; why men rape; woman’s chance of being raped versus learning to read; South Africa being the rape and HIV capital of the world; women are primitively referred to as fair game by men; and the frequency of rape incidents per day. For each image the person is looking directly at the viewer to create a direct communication of the campaign’s message.” writes Richards.
OK but where is the racial diversity? One the issues with rape in SA is that yes, although it does affect the black population at a higher level than other groups, it doesn’t mean that it is exclusive to black people in this country. It’s the same way that people think that black people are the face of HIV/AIDS. This campaign also seems to over-simplify the issue, from what is shown above.
“Still proud to be South African?” – urgh, that tag line gets to me. I may not be South African by birth but I’m very emotionally attached to this country and honestly, I just don’t like the worth and pride of South Africans being linked to this issue. There are many reasons to be proud of being South African and I haven’t met a single person here that goes around boasting about rape or HIV/AIDS rates in this country so I don’t see why there’s a need to question their pride.
Also, something about the way these ‘people’ were drawn doesn’t sit well with me. They all look like they were inspired by a UNICEF or UNHCR handbook.
why wouldn’t people be proud of their country ? yes, it’s not perfect, but it’s a beautiful country with beautiful people ! as you said it’s not like people are proud of the rape issues so much that they have included them in their national anthem or what not… I feel like this campaign is somehow racist. Those people are just black people who look kind of sad/abandoned, so it’s like those are the only people here who get raped and rape each other : black people. “Strangely” when they want to claim good things, it’s like there are 200 billion white people in this country, but rape? oooh, the blacks. There’s no set profile for rapists or people who get raped, but do all these folks look alike?
hmm thats weird, i thought there were white people in SA too, or rape just happens to black people living in SA now? what? the artist is white? supriseeeee
To add to the responses above, the writer is obviously ignorant of many dynamics in South Africa, and South Africans themselves have had more powerful and meaningful anti-rape campaigns, some even headed up by Charlize Theron. So this is opportunistic, if nothing else. Another little known fact, or seldom reported fact is that in many rural areas, black witch doctors (a.k.a. sangomas) have been stupid and irresponsible enough to tell their patients that sleeping with a virgin (including babies) is a cure for AIDS. This was a major trigger in child rape a few years ago. So the moral of this story is, if you don’t know what you’re talking about, keep your elitist bull to yourself. South Africa has a lot more going for it than just rape and crime, and if you bothered to take a holistic view of the country, you wouldn’t find any reason to include that supposedly catchy phrase about being proudly South African. If you have money to waste on advertising campaigns, use it to expose to corruption and greed in the ANC-led government. That is by far the biggest threat to democracy and service delivery in South Africa, not crime, or rape, although both of these are strongly opposed by numerous civil groups and society as a whole.
Sensationalistic bullshit. That’s all this is. What irks me even more is that it’s the colonialists that want to teach us how to undo what they entrenched through the policies that they established in South Africa that gave rise to apartheid and gender inequality in the first place. Talk about selective amnesia, you arrogant pricks!
(sorry, I needed that rant!)
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Scenes from the Kruger National Park
Zebra striking a pose
Wandering elephant
Grazing giraffe
Giraffe grazing
Little beggars
Buffalo taking a leak at sunset
Imposing elephant (c) Cynically Jaded
Scenes from the Kruger National Park in 1997. Scanned in from prints captured by my very old 35mm point-and-shoot camera. We wandered too far into the park and ended up being about 80km (50 miles) away from the main gate when it was close to sunset. In our rush to exit the park, we came across a pack of hyena that literally brushed past the side of the car. Their glowing eyes at night was enough to scare the crap out of you, especially knowing that they were completely wild and not raised in captivity either.
As we drove further on, I braked sharply at the sight of a massive towering shadow in front of me. There were no streetlights, so all I saw was this movement of huge proportions crossing the road. I soon realised it was an elephant bull followed by a calf. I had to crane my neck to see the top of it. By far the biggest animal I’ve ever seen in the wild. We eventually made it in one piece to the gate, and after a brief search of our vehicle, we were allowed to leave the park.
If you haven’t been to or heard of the Kruger National Park, to put it into context, it’s size is big enough for the whole of the UK to fit in it, with room to spare. It’s huge, untamed, and beautiful. It’s one of the biggest eco-tourism attractions in the world. On this same visit, we saw lions, giraffes, monkeys, numerous species of buck, zebras, hyenas, snakes, tortoises, wildebeest, crocodiles, hippos, and so much more. The best part is that we saw it in their natural habitat, not behind a caged enclosure in a zoo. We drove at slow speeds for almost 10 hours through the park to find these beautiful animals.
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About Reverse Racism
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.
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My struggles with those symbols
It feels like I’ve come almost full circle in my contemplations regarding that dastardly symbol that grates me each time the thought flits through my mind. After reading a post on Tumblr this week, I was suddenly faced with the realisation that perhaps my response to this matter has been one of extremism rather than purposeful reason.
My contempt for the moon and star as symbols of Islam has not abated. But my resolve to separate myself from the community based on this contempt that I feel is wavering. I maintain my position regarding the double standards and hypocrisy demonstrated by many Ulama of South Africa. I have not engaged with others outside of this country, but I have no reason to believe that the mainstream views will be equally distastefully biased towards the popular vote rather than the principled reality. A reality that dictates that the moon and star are symbols of paganism adopted directly into Islam from pagan roots and has never had any reference to any Islamic practise either during the time of Rasulullah (SAW) or after.
But this is clear to me, and is therefore not at the core of my uneasiness tonight. The post that I read this week on Tumblr spoke of unity in the Ummah and what acts were overlooked although known to be incorrect at the time of its occurrence, in favour of maintaining such unity. These acts were overlooked by learned companions (RA) in their endeavour to maintain unity above all else. Suddenly, with this in mind, my decision to remove myself from the gathering at the local masjid out of protest against that horrible symbol affixed to the minaret and dome seems to be an act of extremism rather than conscientious objection.
I used to feel assured that my position was correct and my behaviour justified. I’m now left with only the feeling of surety regarding my position, but no longer my behaviour. I’m starting to doubt if staying away, and avoiding the difficult discussions with the trustees is in fact the correct way to deal with this, and more importantly, if it is a justifiable response to what is a bid’ah but not necessarily a major act of kufr.
May Allah guide me in this matter. Ameen.
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Being a Muslim in South Africa
This is a view from a layman, an average Muslim, who was born and raised in South Africa. This is not the view of an academic, or a scholar, nor someone that holds any other identifiable titles as a Muslim, other than being one of the masses.
Given the generalisations about Islam in South Africa, I thought it prudent to share some real life experiences and observations about living here as a Muslim.
Islam was introduced into South Africa over 300 years ago by a Malaysian political prisoner that was banished to South Africa from his own country. He is commonly known as Sheikh Yusuf. He was largely responsible for establishing unity amongst the other Muslim prisoners or slaves that were brought to South Africa under the auspices of the Dutch colonisers back then. I’m not a history boffin, so suffice to say that this is largely accepted as the beginnings of Islam in this part of the world, in Cape Town to be specific.
Muslims from India were also amongst the indentured labourers brought to South Africa by the British colonialists. They subsequently established the biggest Indian community outside of India which is in Durban, on the South African east coast. A thriving and very active Muslim community exists there these days. So from the two opposite ends of the country, the Shafi’ee madhab was entrenched in the lives of the Muslim community in Cape Town with a strong Malaysian culture, while the Hanafi madhab was entrenched in Durban with a strong Indian culture.
From these two areas, Islam spread throughout South Africa with mosques and communities existing in every major city and most rural areas as well. Offshoots of these communities have dabbled in Sufism and have largely focused on establishing community services and charity organisations. Many large and very beneficial organisations that provide and facilitate burial services, orphanages, mosques, madrasahs and other essential services stem from the Sufi groups. However, there is also an active engagement across all communities of all madhaib throughout South Africa that play an active role in establishing such structures and support systems for Muslims in their communities.
The overall culture in South Africa is largely conservative with a strong focus on individual piety in the Indian communities, with a more overt community-focused culture in the Malay communities. Limited success has been noted in the spread of Islam to the indigenous black communities in South Africa, with this largely being blamed on the same conservative and insular nature that was engendered in the Muslim communities as a result of apartheid. One of the benefits, but also curses of apartheid was that it strengthened communities of similar racial backgrounds, but in so doing, also led to very little efforts focused on inviting other race groups to Islam. Hence the relatively stagnant pace at which Islam has grown in the country over the last few decades.
There is a significant interest being shown by other race groups in Islam these days, with reverts becoming more common than ever before. However, the Indian and Malay sub-cultures often isolates reverts from the rest of the Muslim communities when it comes to social events, but not when it comes to integration in the mosques. It’s a strange mix that takes some getting used to. Not that I’m condoning it in any way.
Generally, there is no shortage of bid’ah and bickering in many parts of various communities as is existent in Muslim communities throughout the world. But there is also a concerted effort by many to break the silence and the dogmatic following of tradition in the way Islam is practised here. Politically, Muslims enjoy freedom of religion and are able to practise Islam openly. The sight of women in hijab and niqab in shopping malls and public spaces throughout the country is not a rare sight at all.
The Tableeghi Jamaat is active predominantly in the Indian community, and have their own mixed bag of successes and failures regarding the ideas and principles that they seem to propagate. But I guess this is true about many groups and not just them. Overall, for a Muslim, South Africa is generally a very tolerant place to live, and the Muslim culture is mostly embraced, except by some of the old school predominantly white Christian communities that still hold onto the ideals of the apartheid era. This can be seen in the hurdles and obstacles that need to be cleared before mosques can be established in predominantly white neighbourhoods, and even more so in the resistance that we get in requesting permission to recite the adhaan out loud. But the Muslim communities have been able to overcome many of these obstacles, even though at times it takes up to 8 or 10 years to get permission to have a piece of land rezoned for the building of a mosque. So our struggles in this space mirror those of Muslim communities in other western countries as well.
There is a high prevalence of men, women and children that have memorised the Qur’an. There are also many established institutions that offer formal studies in Islamic subjects, mostly aligned with the Hanafi madhab in the form of Darul Ulooms. There is room for much improvement, as is always the case, but overall, Alhamdulillah, being a Muslim in South Africa is not as trying as being a Muslim in most other non-Muslim countries around the world.
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This photo was taken with my cell phone from the plane just before landing. In this photo you can see the sprawling township of Soweto to the bottom left (probably less than 5% of the actual township which houses over 3 million people), three huge mine dumps in the front centre and left, and the national soccer stadium that is famed for being shaped like an African pot (or calabash) just off centre to the right. The CBD of Johannesburg is in the distance with one last notable land mark being the mine dump that is currently being demolished to the centre left. The removal of numerous mine dumps around the city in recent years has resulted in a massively changing landscape.
Urban legend has it that the mine dumps, being a remnant of the very early mining days in and around Johannesburg, are still rich in gold dust because of the less than efficient mining practises of days gone by. After a Japanese firm offered to purchase the seemingly worthless land for a pretty penny, it sparked renewed interest in the dumps resulting in the sand being reprocessed and reasonable quantities of gold once again being extracted from these mine dumps. Whether or not there is any truth to this, I may never know. But it does make for an interesting tale to tell my grandchildren some day.
