| Gebalanseerde sigspunt [boodskap #27757] |
Fri, 29 October 1999 00:00 |
Jimmie
Boodskappe: 21
Geregistreer: October 1999
Karma: 0
|
Junior Lid |
|
|
On Fri, 29 Oct 1999 09:59:57 +0200, "Ron McGregor" wrote:
|
|stefan wrote
|
|>, "Alwyn Van Rooyen" wrote:
|
|> > what "insights" do you refer to here stephan? have you ever taken
time
|> > out of your day to try and speak to these Township dwellers?
|>
|> I did when I visited Soweto. Furthermore quite a few of my good
friends
|> grew up in Soweto or other townships and many still have relatives
and
|> ties there. They can in many ways provide a better insight than the
|> posters here, a large majority of whom I assume have never lived in
these
|> conditions.
|
|It is interesting to note that many foreign observers have been to the
|townships and therefore had the opportunity to mingle with the average
black
|South African on his own turf.
|
|White South Africans, on the other hand, don't go to the townships. We
are
|not tourists in our own land, so we tend to regard the townships the
same
|way as Americans would view the downmarket suburbs of New York, Chicago
or
|Detroit. Why go there?
|
|However, white South Africans, on a regular basis, get to experience
|something that foreign visitors do not. Our homes and cars are
regularly
|burgled. I personally do not know a single white South African who has
|never had something stolen, almost certainly by a black South African.
|
|This is inevitably going to create two differing perceptions. Stefan,
as an
|American, comes here and meets the black South Africans who are just
plain
|folks. But he doesn't have a house or a car here, so he doesn't
encounter
|the guys who break and enter.
|
|White South Africans, on the other hand, have almost zero experience of
the
|blacks who are just plain folks, but altogether too much experience of
the
|guys who break and enter.
|
|Inevitably, white South Africans judge the blacks, on the whole, as a
bunch
|of guys who break and enter. The outside world, on the other hand,
judges
|them as just plain folks, and can't understand why SA whites are so
|anti-black.
|
|It has been noticed that whites who move from foreign countries to take
up
|residence here in SA very often move from the one viewpoint to the
other
|after they have lived here for a while!!
|
|Some, like the Canadian Consul, request transfers, and I believe that
he
|accepted Beirut, on the grounds that he and his family would be safer
there
|than in Johannesburg!!
|
|It would be a good idea for foreigners to realise that white South
Africans
|do get, for their very high taxes, the dubious privilege of living in
the
|most crime ridden community in the world.
|
|But it would be an even better idea for white South Africans to bear in
mind
|that the black criminals, ubiquitous as they may seem, ARE a minority,
and
|the majority of SA blacks are just plain folks.
|
|We won't ever be able to bridge the divides as long as SA whites
believe
|that SA blacks are inherently dishonest.
|
|As long as that belief is around, SA blacks will believe, with some
|justification, that SA whites are inherently racist.
|
|PS participants who do not understand the word "ubiquitous" may obtain
a
|definition from me upon proof of payment of a reasonable donation to
either
|Boys Town or the fund to save the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra!!
|
|
|
|
] 
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