Time to confront the evil of apartheid, not only of De Kock who defended it
If apartheid assassin Eugene de Kock did not exist, white South Africans would have had to invent him to absolve us of our complicity in (and/or our benefitting from) the system of apartheid, which de...
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Welcome to Worcester – and apartheid 2015 style
If you are poor and black and live in South Africa (especially in a rural town), you do not enjoy the same rights that the rest of us take for granted. Sometimes state agencies – including the police –...
View ArticleRhodes statue – a reminder of strangeness made ordinary in democratic South...
The timely campaign by students demanding the removal of the statue of Cecil John Rhodes from its central position on the campus of the a University of Cape Town (UCT) raises broader questions about...
View ArticleSteve Hofmeyr at the KKNK: why the idea of false equivalences is destructive...
The idea that fairness and justice requires identical treatment of all people in equivalent situations regardless the context or the relative power of the persons or institutions involved, is...
View ArticleAt the Venice Biennale – An ugly, condescending scream on the wall
This past Saturday and Sunday I visited the Biennale exhibitions at the sprawling Giardini and Arsenale venues in Venice. I saw many beautiful, disturbing and shocking works of art and some wondrous,...
View ArticleOn eating snakes, punching sharks and animal cruelty legislation
There seems to be curious anomalies in the manner in which many South Africans (and the law) view the mistreatment of animals. The arrest of Pastor Penuel Mnguni for animal cruelty over the weekend for...
View ArticleTo address wrongs of the past Stellenbosch language policy must change
In the now well-known Luister documentary several black students from the University of Stellenbosch speak about the alienation and disadvantage they experience because of the predominant use of...
View ArticleExcluding students from University because of lack of funds may be...
Students across South Africa are protesting against proposals by University managements to increase student fees dramatically in 2016. These proposed increases would make it even more difficult for...
View ArticleMurder of criminal suspects by police brutalises us all
The video published by the Sunday Times this weekend showing a police officer killing Khulekani Mpanza, has elicited the most shocking and bloodthirsty responses from many people calling in to radio...
View ArticleDebate on Stellenbosch language policy is about who is made invisible and who...
Earlier this week the Democratic Alliance (DA) criticised the announcement by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Stellenbosch (now partly retracted) that from next year “all learning at...
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Boston bombing shows we see the world from US perspective
The media in all its diverse facets – and all of us who consume it and help it to be profitable – have hard questions to answer. Why do we direct so much of our sympathy and understanding towards rich,...
View ArticlePistorius: the horror of a broken (white) body
The publication of pictures of the scene where Oscar Pistorius shot and killed Reeva Steenkamp has elicited much negative comment from certain sections of society well-disposed towards Pistorius. Many...
View ArticleHell is other people (trolling the Internet)
There is something about the anonymity provided by the Internet that seems to bring out the worst in people. Too ashamed of their opinions to write under their own names, they regularly post the most...
View ArticleWhen a joke is not a joke
There are not many people who would happily agree that they are humourless. (Idols judge Randall Abrahams may be one of the few people who, in public, at least, pretend to be humourless.) This is why...
View ArticleThe emotionally charged Hlophe case, revisited
It has become very difficult to have a rational discussion about either the legal issues or the issues of principle underlying the way in which the complaint lodged collectively by judges of the...
View ArticleEmployment Equity: Solidarity case affirms its role in addressing effects of...
It will take many years to address the corrosive effects of 350 years of colonialism and Apartheid and to rectify the profoundly unfair and unequal racial distribution of resources, opportunities and...
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The remembrance and forgetting of things past
How we choose to remember the past says much about our present day emotional affinities and ideological commitments. When we choose to ignore awkward facts about a person’s past after they pass away,...
View ArticleWe recognise sex and gender as classifications, so why not race
In newspapers and on social media platforms one of the most telling and persistent responses by Democratic Alliance (DA) supporters opposed to the party’s fleeting and half-hearted support for racially...
View ArticleStructural racism: the invisible evil that must be addressed
The Democratic Alliance (DA) finally bit the bullet and admitted that race still matters in South Africa and that race-based redress measures remain necessary to address the effects of past racial...
View ArticleTentative thoughts on reconciliation
Some South Africans are fondly remembering the late Nelson Mandela as the father of reconciliation in our country. But for many others the word “reconciliation” leaves a bitter taste on the tongue....
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Why redress measures are not racist
Anybody who highlights the pervasive racism and racial discrimination still experienced by black South Africans are invariably attacked by enemies of equality who oppose legal measures to address the...
View ArticleRights and law: The untold, human stories
Oppressive legal rules and regulations can have a devastating effect on the lives of ordinary people. Conversely, ostensibly emancipatory legal rules and regulations – including rules and regulations...
View ArticleWhite, Afrikaans universities – when will they truly transform?
The damning independent report on the various dehumanising initiation practices that still occur at the Potchefstroom campus of North West University (NWU), and the response of many members of the...
View ArticleHow to have a meaningful discussion on affirmative action
It is not easy to have a reasoned and intelligent discussion about the legal scope of affirmative action measures. The many agitated (but completely uninformed) responses to the recent affirmative...
View ArticleWhy is Afriforum threatening to censor a work of art?
Afriforum, an organisation that fights for the preservation of white privilege, is threatening to go to court to have the song of a Cape Town based hip-hop collective called Dookoom declared hate...
View ArticleXenophobic attacks: apartheid-thinking alive in South Africa
The attacks on foreign owned businesses in Johannesburg last week and the refusal of many South Africans to acknowledge the xenophobic impulse behind these attacks – as well as the odious...
View ArticleWhy does our government discriminate against poor, black children?
It seems unthinkable that a post apartheid government would – through wilful neglect, callousness or incompetence – perpetuate and further entrench the educational apartheid so lovingly championed by...
View ArticleReeva Steenkamp – was it a race crime or a sex crime?
In her excellent essay on the murder of Reeva Steenkamp (Bantu in the Bathroom), Jacqueline Rose concludes: “Depending on how you look at it, the killing of Reeva Steenkamp was either a sex crime or a...
View ArticleJudge Mabel Jansen: what happens next?
When a judge expresses bigoted views about an entire group of people based on their race, gender, sexual orientation or another such characteristics, it taints not only the judge involved, but also the...
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No, religious freedom does not justify discrimination
Another week. Another incident of racial and homophobic discrimination comes to light. This time the perpetrator is the owner of Sodwana Bay guesthouse, André Slade, who says no black people or gays...
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