What we can learn from Bronze

LET’S LEARN FROM THIS GUY

A couple of different people shared this story with me this last week and it was so powerful that i really wanted to try and capture the heart of it in a blog post so it would stick around for longer. You have likely seen this iconic Olympic photograph before and wondered, like myself and so many others, what is going through the white guy’s mind and possibly questioned his actions:

Well this story [and seriously go and read the whole thing] gives us an indication of what was going on and it is a powerful story worth spending a few minutes on. The white guy’s name was Peter Norman.

Italian writer Riccardo Gazzaniga comments:

I always saw the photo as a powerful image of two barefoot black men, with their heads bowed, their black-gloved fists in the air while the US National Anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” played. It was a strong symbolic gesture – taking a stand for African American civil rights in a year of tragedies that included the death of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy.

It’s a historic photo of two men of color. For this reason I never really paid attention to the other man, white, like me, motionless on the second step of the medal podium. I considered him a random presence, an extra in Carlos and Smith’s moment, or a kind of intruder. Actually, I even thought that that guy – who seemed to be just a simpering Englishman – represented, in his icy immobility, the will to resist the change that Smith and Carlos were invoking in their silent protest. But I was wrong.

To be honest, i imagine many of us had the same reaction and thought. But he explains a little later:

Norman was a white man from Australia, a country that had strict apartheid laws, almost as strict as South Africa. There was tension and protests in the streets of Australia following heavy restrictions on non-white immigration and discriminatory laws against aboriginal people, some of which consisted of forced adoptions of native children to white families.

Smith and Carlos had decided to get up on the stadium wearing the Olympic Project for Human Rights badge, a movement of athletes in support of the battle for equality.

But then Norman did something else. “I believe in what you believe. Do you have another one of those for me”? he asked, pointing to the Olympic Project for Human Rights badge on the others’ chests. “That way I can show my support for your cause.” Smith admitted to being astonished, ruminating: “Who is this white Australian guy? He won his silver medal, can’t he just take it and that be enough!”.

Smith responded that he didn’t, also because he would not be denied his badge. There happened to be a white American rower with them, Paul Hoffman, an activist with the Olympic Project for Human Rights. After hearing everything he thought “if a white Australian is going to ask me for an Olympic Project for Human Rights badge, then by God he would have one!” Hoffman didn’t hesitate: “I gave him the only one I had: mine”.

Peter Norman returned home and was completely ostracised for his actions and despite running qualifying times for two different events for the following Olympics, he was not allowed to compete.

For years Norman had only one chance to save himself: he was invited to condemn his co-athletes, John Carlos and Tommie Smith’s gesture in exchange for a pardon from the system that ostracized him.

A pardon that would have allowed him to find a stable job through the Australian Olympic Committee and be part of the organization of the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. Norman never gave in and never condemned the choice of the two Americans.

The story has a sad ending as far as Norman was concerned, but a powerful one in the greater scheme of things:

Norman died suddenly from a heart attack in 2006, without his country ever having apologized for their treatment of him. At his funeral Tommie Smith and John Carlos, Norman’s friends since that moment in 1968, were his pallbearers, sending him off as a hero.

Only in 2012 did Australia finally recognise his accomplishment, acknowledge his success and apologise for their actions towards him.

“Peter was a lone soldier. He consciously chose to be a sacrificial lamb in the name of human rights. There’s no one more than him that Australia should honor, recognize and appreciate” John Carlos said.

“He paid the price with his choice,” explained Tommie Smith, “It wasn’t just a simple gesture to help us, it was HIS fight. He was a white man, a white Australian man among two men of color, standing up in the moment of victory, all in the name of the same thing”.

WE DO IT BECAUSE IT IS RIGHT

What stands out in that story for me is that Peter Norman never received acknowledgement for his actions. He did what he knew to be right. And suffered for it. But didn’t even bother to defend his name or try to make people see what he did. He was content to take a step backwards and let those who the fight was really about take the podium.

What is there to be done in the world around us because it is the right thing to do and not simply because of what it will bring for us? How much are we prepared to risk or sacrifice for what is right? 

In South Africa i think the answers to that first question are many. For me one of the pressing needs as a white person is for me to try and figure out what it means to be a better Ally to my black and coloured friends. To Listen more. i believe that greater economic balance is essential, cos i’m not sure i’m suggesting we all have the same, but i definitely feel like the disparity between rich and poor [and by rich i mean anyone reading this on a computer and possibly phone that belongs to them and by poor i mean people whose struggles are enough food and money for rent and not what meal to order at a restaurant or what label of clothes to buy]. i have no idea how this will happen and so much more wrestling needs to happen and part of that is figuring what it means to live more simply. There’s a lot, but this story is a good reminder that it needs to not be about me, and that it doesn’t necessarily have to be seen [unless it being seen mobilises other people to do a similar thing]. Lots to think about. And do.

How to be an Ally: Move to the Back

Continuing the search on how to be a more effective ally when it comes to my black, coloured and indian friends in South Africa. While it was not specifically an Ally Series post, this piece i did yesterday titled, ‘Before I Comment’ is one we would all do well to pay attention to. Thinking before we rush in to an argument with an opinion or to try and take control is a definite way we can be an Ally.

This one feels like a bit of a tricky one

Before i comment…

Yesterday i wrote a post titled, ‘Before you favourite, RT, forward…’ which started with Back to the Future memes [not serious at all] and ended with alleged swimming lesson racism [very serious]. The focus being on people on various social media platforms sharing stories that arrive as ‘Breaking News’ or are sensational or emotionally-charged, before they have bothered to check whether they are authentic or not.

i want to take it a little bit further today, while continuing to emphasise yesterday’s point.

And i want to address it through the lens of the ‘swimming lessons’ debacle in Cape Town where, in a nutshell, a woman with a black African sounding surname tried to enrol her children in swimming lessons with an organisation and they told her there was no space. Then she created a new email address with a very white sounding surname and they were instantly accepted. The emails were shared and it looked like a case of obvious racism.

SOME IMPORTANT CONTEXT

In terms of establishing context, i want to share a comment my friend Linde wrote which is so crucial:

Linde: This is what the minority of business owners in Cape Town who insist on alienating black clientele have created. Even I have created a white alias e-mail profile to ensure that I get treated fairly on every occasion. Unless this rise of discrimination towards black people ends or at least lowers to the same level as in other parts of SA black people will continue being on edge and since it’s difficult to get the law to act on such cases social media is the only recourse. I get that innocent people’s businesses are getting hurt – this is unfortunate, but I hope that instead of getting defensive these businesses realise the reality of the situation for black people and consider ways of ensuring that their procedures are as transparent as possible.

Cape Town has a recent, let’s say present and completely unacceptable history of racism. i have heard that from a number of black people who live in Joburg and have visited or come here for work, and i am aware of it from a number of incidents involving restaurants, people looking to rent and neighbourhood watch incidents. We seem to be doing worse than the rest of the country. And anyone committed to being an Ally, as i most definitely am, has to has to has to be aware of this and take this deathly seriously and be prepared to stand up against it any time it raises its head. Our starting point needs to be that this stuff is real, it happens and it has caused a lot of hurt for a lot of people and the kinds of experiences that i as a white person have never had to face.

AN ALLY IS SOMEONE WHO DOESN’T SIT BACK 

So the moment someone posted this story on my page i sprung into action, emailing Virgin Active who i heard were linked to this school. I received some information from them suggesting that we did not have the full story [apparently not all the emails were shared which can completely be used to change the flavour of the story] as well as testimony from a friend of mine who uses the school and told me the accusations had taken her completely by surprise as she has used the school for a number of years and it is completely diverse.

Now this is where events got a little unfortunate. My personal context was that i was in the middle of a busy day and i caught a whiff of this when i popped into Facebook and didn’t have sufficient time to respond more extensively and so i jumped on, on my phone, and typed a quick status update asking people to pause until we had more story and this is where i got it wrong.

Brett: Okay everybody with the Virgin Active messaging and the swimming lesson panic I have a friend there who is on it and the investigation is happening but we need to slow down a little now and not get crazy before we have the full story. Good people are checking it out. As they should.

i realise now that i made a poor choice of words and despite the rush i was in i should have done better. Ncumisa, Linde and Sindile tackled me on my comments and rightly so. When many black people have spoken about incidents such as these or being refused entrance at a restaurant etc they have been labelled ‘crazy’ and so that word in itself was a bad choice. i’m not sure that i know how i could have conveyed what i needed to [some of the information i received was behind the scenes and in confidence and so while i had some extra info i was not able to share it all, which put me in a very tricky place] but i do have a good idea that this statement came across as many others have done in terms of deligitimising the concerns and making it seem like i was trying to explain away or defend something that had come across as clearly racist.

i get it. i completely do. i messed up.

TRUE, RIGHT, HELPFUL, KIND

When we look at any comment we make via social media and possible any article we share or joke we ‘like’ i think these four words can serve as a helpful guide for us.

Is what i am about to say True?

Is this point i am trying to make Right?

Is me expressing this thought or opinion going to be Helpful?

Am i being Kind in this moment?

A 5th one i thought of as i was writing these out was, ‘Is this Clear?’ which relates to word usage, context, language and more – are people going to receive the message i am trying to give?

TRUE/RIGHT 

i think these two overlap and my previous post deals with a lot of that.

Some comments relating to the swimming pool incident but which can relate to other online shares:

Dave: It gets so ugly. People don’t have all the facts, but then get horrifically personal and aggressive. it becomes anti-social media. ordinary moms, dads, people we know, MDs who lead companies, respected (if not respectable) radio presenters all go on a venomous tirade of filthy vitriol. I spent the weekend unfriending and blocking a lot of people who should know better, and who I don’t need to add negativity to my life.

Joanne: “Cock-ups and misunderstandings are better resolved directly than via social media.” – yes, yes and YES. I am totally over people coming straight to SM with everything. If they haven’t had an immediate response, if things don’t go 100% their way, if ALL their dreams don’t come true: go straight to social media and totally obliterate someone’s life or business. Which basically makes such a person, at best, a spoilt brat or, at worst, a bully. I’d like someone to show it to me. What? The written warranty they received at birth guaranteeing them total happiness at all times. If you can’t produce it, then get into the queue with the rest of us and listen to the boring music while waiting for an agent to attend to your call.

Lisa: My heart sank reading the mudstorm that met Aimee’s allegations. Mainly because I’ve dealt with that company for about four years, and could tell here from experience that it’s much more a case of #everydayincompetence than #everydayracism. Honestly, when I want to reschedule my kids’ time slots, the admin lady always says ‘waiting list’ and doesn’t get back to me. I suspect they partly run quite an old-fashioned paper-based business where it’s quite tricky to figure out the schedules. When you nag and ask the swimming teachers, who know better what slots are open or not, you can eventually get things moved around in under a week or so. I’ve had similar experiences with preschool and primary school waiting lists, where one staff member is more helpful or informed than another, or you kind of need to rattle their cage to remind them who you are. I find the witchhunt response on FB (“just close your business now you racists!”) a bit hard to stomach.

Linde: It’s funny how we live in a society that loves Whistle Blowers. Whistle blowers rarely have concrete evidence – their very act of whistle blowing is the catalyst for investigations being initiated. It’s funny how everyone disapproves of the whistle blowing in this instance but not even one person has suggested of a better more transparent way of doing business in Cape Town. Is this because people don’t value the contribution black people make to white businesses or the SA economy?

Claire: It’s the whole idea of Internet Mob Justice… People rant, other people share, and before you know it, with very few facts at hand, people are shutting down businesses or destroying people. I’m not saying Cape Town is innocent in the race problem. Far from it. But like they said, it’s more incompetence and bad admin skills in this instance. Mob justice… If it’s not okay on the streets, why is it okay online?

i don’t think it is undermining our quest to root out racism at all to ask that we do our due diligence when it comes to the facts of a story before we start handing out pitchforks and lighting torches. i do get that ‘questioning the validity of stories of racism in Cape Town’ has become a huge source of pain for those who have lived them and so there is a fine line [and many people in this case believed that the emails shared constituted enough proof to proceed] and we need to be sure that we are not trying to make excuses or defend the guilty by asking for proof. We also need to be committed to seeking out those answers if we are not sure.

My first response [before i shared the story] was to try and verify the story by emailing Virgin. i imagine that not everyone that had something to say to/about me did that much. Which is typical of the kind of slacktivism social media encourages – getting heated up and vocal and sharing, retweeting, liking, but not necessarily doing anything practical. If we are going to call for truth and rightness in terms of dealing with issues that are raised then we have to be prepared to go that extra mile and make sure we do the necessary research as far as possible and don’t simply use the line as a means of backing up our inaction.

My friend Jez shared this story of  a palestinian boy killed by Israel during the First Intifada. With the Israel/Palestine situation being a hugely volatile one, this photo immediately rocketted through social media spheres evoking huge emotion and anger and passion for the cause. Until a reporter did a little bit of digging and found that the image was actually taken from a movie called ‘The Kingdom of the Ants’.

Seen the movie ‘Wag the Dog?’ A fictitious war is created for televisions across America to cover up an infidelity of the president. The scary thing is that it is not just a movie any more and we have to be more and more careful about the ‘news’ we so easily trust. With anyone able to jump onto Photoshop these days as well as more high profile digital manipulation, seeing is definitely not believing any more.

While we may not always be able to establish absolute truth because of things like that, we can and should be responsible in doing as much as we can to corroborate the authenticity of anything significant that we share before rushing to click.

HELPFUL

Next up, a helpful thing to ask before we post, share, comment, is the question: Is this Helpful?

It may be right and true, but sometimes the thing we have to add may not be all that helpful. It may distract from the real issue at hand, it may cause people to go off on a tangent, it may unnecessarily invoke anger [like my use of the word ‘crazy’ – while i understand what i meant and was trying to get across it was a very unhelpful word to use and i should have done better!] and more.

Is this adding to the present discussion? Is this going to be useful in moving us forwards?

If we can get into the habit of asking this question our social media presence will be enhanced hugely.

Different Dave: We all need to be careful of that hair-trigger that develops on our social media weapons of mass destruction. And when someone stands up and challenges the reaction to an event like this, that same hair-trigger goes off in their direction too.

 KIND

Lastly, is it Kind? It may be Truthful and Right, and it may even be Helpful, but is this thing that i am about to share, Kind?

The Bible talks about ‘Speaking the Truth in Love’ which doesn’t mean the same thing as ‘Speaking the Truth in Nice’ and we see Jesus get hardcore with both the religious leaders of the day [Pharisees, Sadducees] and His own followers when they are being hypocritical or misrepresenting the Truth.

But sometimes asking the question, ‘Is this Kind?’ will help us to make good decisions, and more often than not it will help us choose relationship over being right [a great choice to err towards].

Will this mean we never get it wrong? Probably not. Life can be quite complicated and a tone-free environment is not the easiest place to always communicate what you think, feel and mean and even if you do it perfectly, someone else’s day, frame of mind and context may come into play against them. There is much space and need for grace, forgiveness and love. BUT i do think that if we ask the question – Is what i am about to share True, Right, Help, Kind and Clear? – more often before our fingers vomit their words upon the keyboard and out onto the screen, that we may be well on our way.

For the sake of building community and working towards reconciliation and building both a better province, nation and world, let’s commit ourselves to trying a little bit harder on this one.

This feels like a post which will be helpful for a lot of people to read, so if you agree please take a moment to share this via your social media channels – that is, if you feel like it is right, true, helpful, kind and clear…

[To read the Before you Favourite, RT, Forward post, click here]

How to be an Ally: On being a non-black Ally in Africa. [Guest Post: Alexa Matthews]

Continuing with the conversation about ‘How to be an Ally’ with my friend Alexa Matthews who has a huge heart for this kind of thing and the humility to understand that we are trying to figure it out as we go along:

I have sat with this for a little while – and was hoping to send it off before leaving South Africa for a holiday. I am still wrestling with whether I as a non-black person should be writing this. Simply as part of me knows that this is something that some days I get horribly wrong rather than just right.

Being an ally, for me, doesn’t mean simply choosing to mindlessly go along with the loudest voices shouting about what is happening in the black community – that is not being an ally.

It’s about being willing to listen, hear and acknowledge that on my own, or only surrounded by people who think like me I have an incomplete story or picture of what is happening in our country and being willing to hear why people think the way that they do – whether it is the same or different to me.

Taboo Topic: The People who Work for Us – Intro

This is a complex one. We don’t presently have a maid/domestic worker but have spoken about the possibility of employing someone in that role. And this is not a witch hunt to try and make anyone feel bad [unless you need to be feeling bad and then don’t feel bad but just change how you’re living!].

A number of months ago i was chatting to a domestic worker at a friend’s house and just hearing some of her story

Learning Xhosa: Your move.

In August, i invited you all to Come and Xhosa with Me.

After two weeks i shared a post called Xhosa and Effect, highlighting some of the things i was thinking about as we were busy with the course.

I am Stellenbosch [and other stories we tell our kids before they go to bed]

So this past week a picture appeared on my Twitterer of a white girl with a statement written on a board that made me cringe:

Suddenly more and more of these pictures were popping up all over Social Media and turns out there was an #IAmStellenbosch group inviting students at the University to write statements about themselves which challenge the stereotype of a typical Stellenbosch student and highlight the differences and individualities of each student.

Their vision statement reads: To create an awareness of the thousands of individual identities that are housed in this university and bring them together into a single identity that is Stellenbosch University. 

To those who have been keeping some kind of eye on recent Stellenbosch events, this seems to be a response to the Open Stellenbosch movement, much of which was capture in the video ‘Luister’ that was put together by Contraband Cape Town in collaboration with Open Stellenbosch which you can see over here linked to an article by Layla Leiman in which she writes, ‘The documentary shares the testimony of the lived experiences of black students at Stellenbosch University and the culture of racism, discrimination, exclusion and violence that continues at Stellenbosch University 21 years after democracy.’

What is quite interesting to me, reading the vision and mission statement of #IAmStellenbosch [which you can find in their Facebook group] is that line one of their mission is: To create a platform of communication in which students listen to each other this not being through dialogue but discourse.

Whereas their poster campaign seems to be a knee-jerk reaction doing quite the opposite.

And it becomes quickly clear from reading some of the response comments to #IAmStellenbosch that there is some deep listening that needs to happen:

Nkosikhona Rabu Ntshiqa: This is all silencing fam. No real issues are on this mission statement; there’s nothing about the curriculumn change or anything hard core as that. Please take Black people serious; these are baby answers to very old and martured problems. There is no decolonization or anything of such form in this mission statement; this is all Mandela politics

There is no systematic change or anything of such. Students won’t take each other serious if this is all that you guys are planning to do. The same system that was undermining Black people is the same one used even now; this will cause conflicts and more frustration amongst Black people. We demand true decolonization; not just pictures of people with no problems writing shit and smiling for the camera; this is a serious issue please treat it with such seriousness and energy. Don’t waste our time.

Ruwayne Williams: This #iamstellenboschcampaign is the same as the stupid#whereisthelove event which was used to silence black voices and ignore black pain.#Furious#

Bonunu Ditshego: Is this something like#AllLivesMatter campaign that followed#blacklivesmatter? You people should take your patronizing BS and F yourselves. Try to#StopKony while you at it.

Sandile Mzilikazi Khumalo: This is the kind of institutionalised racism pandered by liberals who want to the existence of class identifiers, in particular the experiences of the black working class, at the expense of superficial individual identities.

THIS IS NOT JUST A SOUTH AFRICAN PROBLEM

During our time in Americaland, i became very aware that the story of people of colour over there mirrors that of those living in South Africa in so many ways. Even though the chief narrative is quite different for a number of reasons, many of the same themes and similar experiences and mindsets seem to pervade and so i believe there is a lot to be learned from studying both.

Earlier this year #BlackOutDay started trending on the Twitterer as a means for black people to celebrate black beauty and fight against the kind of negative images black people were used to seeing in the media:

You Tube personality Franchesca Ramsey told ABC News:

“Unfortunately, in most popular media talking about black people and our bodies, it’s mostly of us breaking the law, being killed or mistreated,” Ramsey added. “So it’s nice to combat these negative images and stereotypes with positive representations of ourselves.”

i found this blog post written by Akilah Hughes titled It’s Not About You which highlights some of the same issues that the detractors of #IAmStellenbosch are seeing and feeling:

During the wildly successful Blackout Day of March 6, black people posted and reblogged selfies on social media to promote community and the acceptance of features less visible in popular media. It was an uplifting day meant to remind black people, “you’re beautiful, too.” Some white people took offense. It wasn’t long after #BlackOutDay started trending worldwide on Twitter that the ‘whiteoutday’ hashtag became a thing.

Blackout Day did not claim that non-black people are immune to body image issues, or that others don’t face societal pressures. But, without fail, any time a historically oppressed group asserts their equality by boldly denying any inferiority to someone outside their group, some member of the un-oppressed majority takes it personally. Well, when oppressed groups take the initiative to lift themselves up, it is not an invitation to victimize yourself. Would you go to a toddler’s birthday party and kick over their cake to announce that you, too, have birthdays? The answer should be “no.”

Akilah ends off her post with this statement:

It. Wasn’t. About. Me.

Since that conversation, I’ve learned to listen before I follow my knee-jerk reaction and take offense at movements about which I’m not educated. It isn’t always easy to stop the instinct to be defensive, but it is necessary if things are ever going to get better. After really hearing the other side, ask yourself if anyone loses rights or status when that group gains theirs. John F. Kennedy said, “A rising tide lifts all boats.” It’s important to remember that sweeping progress benefits us all, so let others do what they must to finally achieve equality.

HOW DO THOSE IN THE KNOW DEAL WITH THOSE WHO AREN’T?

Which brings me to a question i posed as a status on Facebook yesterday and want to dig a little more deeply into:

Brett Fish Anderson: So ‘‪#‎IAmStellenbosch‬‘ – ridiculous right? As is ‪#‎YesAllPeople‬ response to‪#‎YesAllWomen‬ and ‪#‎BlackLivesMatter‬. i was thinking about it today and it comes i think out of a place of ignorance. So my thought is that it belongs perhaps to the privileged (and not the marginalized) to sit and explain to those in ignorance. So they can know. If then, they choose ignorance after being informed, well then they’re on their own. Those are thoughts that have been running around my head.

As friendlyly as is possible, what is your response to that? i know many of my informed friends are just exhausted from explaining and that for too long it was expected that the marginalised should explain so that is my light bulb moment for today. What think you? ‪#‎IAmFacebook‬

To which some of my friends responded:

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Nick Frost: The marginalized can’t explain because the privileged don’t listen. That’s what the whole thing is about, the inability to shut up for once and listen. Stellies students think they can slap a hashtag on a half assed “upliftment initiative” and sing their problems away.

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Bruce Collins: Yeah. I looked at that #iamstellenbosch stuff and all I could think was “what is the point?”

It seems like a way to minimise what people are really experiencing by saying that others do not have similar experiences. It is also, in my opinion, an attempt to justify all that’s wrong at Stellenbosch. You see, just because some people are ok with the status quo that doesn’t mean that the status quo is right.

Furthermore, #iamstellenbosch is all about speaking and very little about listening.

What bothers me most are all the “I’m not a racist” statements. Instead of saying that, live it by listening.

Nick Frost: White guys listening to rap music does not equal the end of racism. Sorry #iamstellenbosch

Bruce Collins: Word! That was so ridiculous. “I am Afrikaans and my favourite artist is Drake”
Noddy badge? Hell no!

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Alexa Russell Matthews: Opportunities to be allies is what went through my head…. [This is a reference to a piece i am working on putting together with some friends of mine over here]

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Beben Cadman: It does not end anything but it highlights stereotypes. Doing something is better than nothing.

Kerri-Leigh Wayne: Exactly, it reinforces stereotypes

Beben Cadman: I don’t think it does. I think the more we say who we think we are the more it creates dialogue, the more we can be challenged, the more we grow. It’s the pretentiousness for a long time that culminated in these realities in this crucial year of 20 years of democracy. Yes we should be listening but talking tells us where we really at. I welcome any dialogue as long as we as people are challenged, reconciled and unified. Even us who might think we standing on the right side of human rights.

Tanisha NishNash Schultz: I feel “I am Stellenbosch” is trying to reinforce unity amongst students.

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Wayne Eaves: Good ask – we are at the beginning of a rise of a new wave of black consciousness in SA (or one just more public, I admit my ignorance), a conversation to which we are not invited at this juncture. Speaking into something uninvited is in many ways the quintessential essence of postmodern privelege. We need to learn to listen, to dig into our own history, deconstruct and restructure various paradigms – which facebook does not give me space to deal with – love the question!

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Megan Furniss: I have a new take. A brand new one. I will no longer be embarrassed by these ignoramuses. I will not care about them.

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Kerri-Leigh Wayne: It definitely isn’t the marginalised who should be explaining. I try to be listening more, like Wayne suggests, that’s been something I really have to work towards. But I still talk to white people around me, even if they remain ignorant and my views are unpopular, because I was, and still am, ignorant too. Being called out is what helps me to see that. I am not embarrassed by these people – they don’t represent me and many people have been socialised quite heavily into believing what they do, so it does not even reflect on the type of person he or she is. I also try not to ever take a conversation (or its derailment) personally. Having said that, I cringe intensely when I see an album like the #IamStellenbosch one but I am glad to see that some of the heaviest criticism of the privileged views espoused by the photos are being tackled by white people in the comments section.

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Brett Fish Anderson: i will blog further on this cos i think it is a helpful conversation to do a little deeper in. i think one of the big problems is that those of us who are somewhat informed – who have walked a bit of a journey in this – take for granted the informedness we have and then assume others have it and are making those same choices. i think we need to give more grace to uninformed and ignorant so that they have the opportunity to become informed and norant? Okay that’s probably not a word but it should be.

i doubt a student in Stellenbosch was being malicious, they honestly did what they thought was a good thing and so there has to be some moment of that opportunity happening to change that. i look back on my journey and at 41 I have been digging into this stuff more deeply for the last five years and so i could quite easily have been that student. I didn’t do so good. So it feels necessary for me to be prepared to take time to coach other people through.

Megan Furniss: You know what I think Brett? You are clever and kind and norant, and brave and full of energy. Spend it on those who need it most, and who can use you best. Others can get in line. There is work to be done and we need to act fast. Just went to witness Lingua Franca and I was totally humbled by them. It’s not about ‘us’ (read white people) anymore.

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What about you? If people around you [or online] seem ignorant about something which you have learned/studied/lived through/experienced do you believe that it is worth taking time and energy to school them with the facts so that they can understand and have a chance to ‘get it’? Or should the focus and emphasis be on those who do and moving forwards with them? Play nice in the comments but i would LOVE to hear some conversation on this…

[For some Creative Ideas on How to Become a Better Ally, click here]