In South Africa a term as "hate crimes" do not exist unless of course the perpetrator is black and the victim white. When will this change and hate crimes will be dealt with equally? Do we have to go through a war first?
(8th March 2010) The South African government in the form of Minister of Police Nathi Mthethwa rightly said that “Farm and rural killings should not be politicised and all murders should be treated equally”. He further stated that “"We do not see it as anything else political or racist, we see it as just crime.”
So my question, thus the reason for this article: “Are all incidents treated equally,
and is all crime, “just crime”?
Firstly, let me give a brief summary to those who are not familiar with the South African government system. In South Africa the government system works like in any other country where there is a democracy.
The newest census figures states that 79.7% of the population is black, followed by whites 9.1% , Coloureds (mixed race) 8.8%, and the remainder 2.4% are categorised as Indian or Asian. In other words it is the opposite of the United Kingdom or United States. Minorities are protected in these 1st world countries and any attacks on minorities are dealt with in a harsh fashion by the media and government.
In South Africa, this is where things get a bit complicated for some strange reason when it comes to be a government that represent everyone on a fair and equal basis.
To start, let me give some examples of racism in South Africa. Last year an unfortunate case came to light where white, minority, students at the University of the Orange Free State shamelessly put black workers through an initiation. (The video can be found on Youtube.) The ladies were treated in a disrespectful way and as such the behaviour of these students were criticized, and rightly so. The incident was all over the news, locally and internationally. Most black people in South Africa became extremely angry which would be understandable with some ANC members using the issue to their selfish purposes, which just helped to encourage more racial hatred.
Let’s go back another year, where a young (white) boy, traumatised by a personal incident of a farm attack, took matters in his own hands by going into a township and murdering black township dwellers indiscriminately. It was a cowardly act and once again made world headlines. The boy’s actions received harsh treatment from the law and once again South Africans were up in arms and some politicians and parties played the race card. Inciting more hate.
Another year back, a white male with two black accomplices threw a worker into a lions den to get rid of him. An awful incident which should get everything justice throws at these perpetrators. The incident made international headlines and was shown as an example of a racist incident because one perpetrator was white while his accomplices that were black were disregarded. Politicians of the government were outspoken about this murder and we still hear this today, in forums, debates, as a prime example of “white on black” racism.
So you will agree with me when I say that the above examples are not crime but have a racial intend?
To South Africans and the world, the problem in South Africa seems to be a specific race.
Or at least that is what we are made to believe. My following question would be, when last, if ever, did you hear about similar incidents as above, but with the roles changed? I am not talking about “just” crime. I am talking where it’s clear racism like the examples above were involved?
Chances are you never heard anything. Ever. You also will not hear anything due to the media, political correctness and some individuals within the South African government that still think it's at 'war'. Individuals with selfish personal agendas or revenge. To say I make this up is like saying humans do not have fear. Its human. I am not saying it’s the whole SA government but to say there are no people with hidden agendas are very naïve.
I will give examples of where I see racist incidents against whites in South Africa which made an impact on me over a period of time of the unfairness of these incidents. There are so many, as to put them all here would take me days and probably leave most of you with “post traumatic stress” reading through all the stories.
So here are similar, true, stories but with the perpetrators switched.
David Jones, of the Daily Mail describes the brutal assault of a white woman, Mrs. Ame Brown, in her Johannesburg home, in the absence of her husband, who was working a night shift. Mrs. Brown's two young sons were bound at the wrists and forced at gunpoint to watch by the four-strong black gang which had broken into their flat as their mother was violated in turn by each of the gang members. Says Jones: "As the first man made way for the second, he spat out the hate-filled words Ame, an Afrikaner, will never forget: "For years you Boers always took from us. Now we're taking from you."In fact, Ame Brown worked as a care assistant looking after mainly black children at a Johannesburg home for youngsters. But her work on behalf of such an underprivileged, have-not section of the population obviously cut no ice with her assailants. Her race was all that mattered as far as they were concerned.
Lambert Theron, 20, Kempton Park Wimpy manager - CCTV filmed this young Afrikaner’s last moments: being hacked to death in a revenge-murder by two black co-workers – who accused him of ‘lying like all white men do’.
Then there is Jock de Gouveia? This elderly gentleman died after robbers dragged him for some kilometres on a rope behind his bakkie.(Pick-up)His face was totally disfigured. The police caught the three perpetrators after one was caught having Mr. de Gouveia's sim card and TV in his possession. Since Jock's been murdered many white farmers were dragged behind their "bakkies" (pic-kups) by black racists as if a "fashion" statement. Each deed more gruesome than the previous as if to out to each other.
I want to ask. Is it “just crime” because something was stolen, or is it just a convenient excuse? Do you really have to torture, humiliate, murder or even rape your victim for a cell phone or television? Is this “Just crime” Or mere an excuse by some to brush the seriousness of these crimes under the carpet?
One of the most shocking recent examples in 2009 was that of two anti-white racist crimes involving the torture-murders of Alice Lotter, 77, and her daughter Helen, 57, which caused a wave of abhorrence amongst the entire white community because of its incredible cruelty. The women, both frail, were tortured to death at their farm in Allenridge in the Free State on April 1, 2009. According to forensic evidence, the Lotter mother and daughter died excruciatingly painful deaths: First tortured by being stabbed with broken glass bottles into their vaginas; one of the women also had her breasts cut off while she was still alive – and then both women’s blood, police forensic experts found, had been used to paint the ANC’s anti-Afrikaner hate slogan ‘Kill the Boer Kill the Farmer’ on the walls of their homestead.
The list of crimes against "white" minorities, victims of murder and torture goes on.
Where is the media, other than the small column on the 3rd page of the newspaper? The national or international outcry? Where is the outcry from the government, or their leadership or lack there of to deal with these issues on a fair basis? Is it because you do not know? Do not care? Or is it because you know, and only care when it is not one of your own, yet only shout “racist” when it’s a specific race? Are we so brain washed, politically correct that we are unable as human beings to treat things in a balanced way?
Or are we so indoctrinated by mass media, becoming sheep of “popular general opinion”, or too scared, even lazy, to travel the lesser road of doing research and reaching out to people from other races? Maybe they have a point when they complain, yet are immediately silenced with the word “racist”.
During 1999 the South African infantry has been rocked by the murder of seven individuals, six officers and one civilian by Twenty-eight-year old Lt Matubela, after losing his salary from repeated misconduct, went on a rampage in the base. His targets were only whites while not shooting at any other race. What was interesting about this case was that the government said it was racism. But, not racism from Lt Matubela, but from his colleagues!
The victims becomes the ‘perpetrators’, and the perpetrator, the true racist, get away with it. What does this say about our society? Or where we are heading? Though this was a military incident it is still interesting looking at the dynamics in which ‘racism’ is sold to the people.
The majority are the ones who tolerate crime, there for we much judge the racial tolerance of criminals. At night we can only pray that we would not be murdered by somebody with a vindictive racial attitude. We do not get to vote on the attitude towards crime, yet we are told that it is not geared towards us. “It is “only” crime. We have to take the word of the majority, that criminals do not use racial bias. In other words: “Criminals are just criminals and incapable of being racists too, unless of course they are part of the minority”. Everyone else is, well, “Just criminals, doing “just crime”; this is what the statics and some government officials make us believe.
The only ones that believe these officials are the uninformed or the racists themselves that roll their heads gleefully the other way.
The media seems to believe that these allegations of hate crimes or racism are all fabricated lies. These crimes have been continuing since 1994 and are ever on the increase, to such worrying statistics that GenocideWatch.org, founded by Gregory Standon, is very concerned.
The South African government does what everyone government in power does when there is a crises, by playing it down by minimizing the seriousness of the matter. A few years ago it was also done with crime. “What crime”: it was asked by the then President Mbeki? Today we see the same cycle but this time “the what”, was replaced with “the just”.
When will people, both black and white open their eyes and see some of these murders for what it is not. Not general crime, like theft and murder but where the victim of one race is tortured by someone from another race.
It is definitely NOT “Just crime”.
The question needs to be asked. When is crime not crime anymore?
Are we as individuals, organisations, media or government so blinded by our prejudices and colour coded eye patches, that we only cry out when the victim is one race the perpetrator another?
“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing” - Edmund Burke
This article probably asks more questions than to give answers, but the sole purpose is to make you think. Everyone is not as equal as some people make things out to be. Maybe you see this already, but then I might ask, why are you silent?
In order for human kind to evolve to the next level, we will need to look at these things on an equal basis and treat them as such. If not, we are just re-inventing the wheel of racism, with the roles changed.
One last question is why should these things be dealt with on an equal basis?
My answer is, if you do not, it creates more hate from one group against another because of ignorance and the lack of direction from leaders. These type of hate crimes are becoming more and more by the day because people are not educated by the government leaders or media,to realize it is not one specific group that is to blame, but that its a sickness which affects all.
Any question please feel free to email me.
Links:
“Just Crime”
http://www.news24.com/Content/SouthAfrica/News/1059/c83a40f67a0a4da0b5a5a715b380db53/08-03-2010-12-46/Farm_killings_not_political
Dr. Gregory Stanton – Founder of Genocide Watch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_Stanton
Farm Murders – Part 1 of 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3S71PbichSw
Farm murder name list:
http://censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com/2009/12/farm-murders-names-dates-sources-s.html
and
http://censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com/2010/02/name-lists-rural-murders-south-africa.html
