I'm not going to say I'm speaking for all of us because I know many out there are living comfortable lives, have well paid jobs, have a nice house or two in the suburbs or overlooking the ocean. Others will remain patriotic and defend our country by denouncing her detractors such as this "Happiness Survey" that says we are a very unhappy country. For an educated mind this survey is very easy to shoot down: Population 50m, sample size 1000, was the sample representative etc? Well here are the stats that are not mentioned in the sample:
1. We have close on 50 murders per day according to SAPS (close to 90 according to Interpol). This means that more than close to 20000 or more people are murdered per year, and if you take this over a number of years and estimate the number of relatives and friends affected (made unhappy by this), we are looking at millions.
2. We are the rape capital of the world. Estimated rape of women and children is well over 2000 PER DAY. That means hundreds of thousands of victims per year and again, millions of families and relatives affected.
3. Other crime statistics rank us as one of the worst countries in almost every category.
4. We have minority groups that have their lives threatened daily by politicians, on Facebook, on Twitter, at protests and more. Xenophobia and hate crime (some will say genocide) is rife and a weekly occurence.
5. Unemployment is at over 20%, which in my books means a lot (millions) of unemployed, unskilled, Unhappy people.
6. We have a government that steals and misappropriates billions of taxpayers money each year. Taxpayers are not happy.
7. If you havent noticed, we currently have the highest number of protest/service delivery marches in our history. Those people don't look happy.
8. Our nation team, of our national sport, is anything but an inspiration to the majority of South Africans.
9. Electricity increases by 30% per year, petrol has recently hit an all time record, the government is trying to toll us to death and the NHI is lurking to shave off some more savings off our salaries.
10. Its Winter and some of us really don't like the cold!
But hey, maybe thats just me and I should learn to not moan and be happy for the things I have because I am more privileged than millions of fellow South Africans dying in the streets, dying of Aids, being raped and murdered, waiting to die with no job or home or education or hope of a future.
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