I can almost hear the derision that I am going to get for this as I write it, but I think it needs to be said.
I feel sorry for white people living in the new South Africa. Here's why.
During apartheid, every white South African (even those who DIDN'T vote for apartheid) was viewed as the scum of the earth by the rest of the world. That's unfair already. Many of them didn't support the National Party, but they still had to deal with being branded as racist simply because they were born white in South Africa.
Then apartheid ended, and I think, from conversations I've had and heard, that those very same white people breathed a sigh of relief. Finally, they could move on, and they wouldn't be regarded as raging racists by every person on the planet.
Then it didn't quite happen that way.
All those people who were just WAITING for apartheid to end are STILL branded as racists just for being born white.
Now, I know there are plenty of white racists out there. I've met plenty of them. But I've also met lots that aren't. That don't care what colour people are, and that just want to get on with things.
Today, every time I see a black South African say to a white person on News24 'go back to Europe' I want to dig a hole and disappear.
Don't you think, if it was as easy as 'going back to Europe' that the people you make it patently obvious to that you hate would have done it already?
Don't you think that some (if not all) of the white South Africans in the country today (who are all descended from colonists, but really had no say in their ancestors coming here at all) might have preferred if if their great grandparents HADN'T come here?
Do you think that they would not prefer to NOT be in the minority, NOT be blamed for apartheid, and live in countries where they were just like everyone else?
Don't you think that they might prefer to live somewhere, given the choice, where they didn't face the huge problems we have in this country today?
I'd really like it if my fellow black South Africans could think of that for a moment.
If it's still not clear, think of it this way: if you were given the option, during apartheid, of staying here with a government that hated you, under terrible conditions, and with no end in sight, or leaving to go somewhere else where you would be accepted without question, would you have stayed?
I don't know how to solve the race problem in South Africa, but I do know this: white people can't simply pack up and leave because you want them to. I also know that if they did, we'd have a few new problems on our hands.
Unless our government makes an effort to come to some agreement with the countries that colonists came from that they're allowed back, most of those white people aren't going anywhere.
So we have a choice. Stop making pointless, stupid demands that they 'go home to Europe' or learn to live with the fact that they are South Africans, and they belong here.
Then focus on something important, like our terribly broken education system, our corrupt government, or the sad state of our state hospitals.
White people are a minority. They have no power. They cannot fix our country, and their leaving won't fix it either. It really is as simple as that.
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