Racism

If you happen to be African, a woman, Palestinian in Israel, or belong to a group that is routinely subjected to prejudice by a dominant population, you can usually spot bigotry the moment it shows its grotesque countenance.  But, what if said bigotry is of the insidious variety – when

The captured men could have been specimen of some hibernating genus to be quickened into brutal medieval “new-world” life in a culturing of slaps, kicks, branding with hot iron like cattle, lashes from horsewhips; slave auctions and unpaid back-breaking donkey’s labour in inclement weather f

Adulation keeps flowing in, after the release of Black Panther, Marvel’s black superhero movie that features many Black firsts: the all Black star-studded cast, led by a Black superhero, and his Black love interest, was directed by a Black man.

Talking about race does not divide people. What divides people is racism. The most violent experience you can subject someone to in South Africa and the globe is racism. It is a painful encounter that confronts black people daily.

The rising tide of racism is borne out of a recycled old belief that black and brown people are genetically inferior.

NOTE: This Strini Moodley Memorial Lecture was delivered on 19 July 2017 at Howard College Theatre, Howard Campus, Mazisi Kunene Avenue, University Of Kwazulu-Natal (UKZN).

Introductory observations

The old way

‘I grew up in Rhodesia,’ I said out loud recently, whilst taking a walk with my son (he’s 35, I’m 69).

His face soured.

‘Why do you have to say that? Why can’t you say Zimbabwe?’

There has been the dialectical and organic relationship between the benefits and misfortunes of capitalism and racism in South Africa since their inception in the country.

On 22 March 2017 Khalid Masood perpetrated on the grounds of England’s Westminster Palace what was described by the British security forces and the media as a “terrorist attack”.