How to be One bit Less Racist: part ‘The They’

i have decided to resume the series on ‘How to be One bit Less Racist’ with this piece by my friend, Andy Vaughn. The interruption and focus on some of the bigger questions i though was completely important and necessary, but i also still see these seemingly tinier aspects as crucial to us starting to retrain our minds and thoughts and become less racist in the day to day interactions we have with people, while keeping in mind that the big issues still very much need to be dealt with. Here is Andy:

It took me a full four months before I realized what was actually being said. It was just four letters, yet it carried the social weight of a two ton Tessie.

“They”

Over and over I would hear a casual remark about the mysterious “They”. But who were these “They” that kept being dropped into casual conversation and snide remark?

I had just moved to beautiful South Africa and traveled around the countryside as a full time missionary. I stayed in homes and churches of every variety of home found in the Rainbow Nation. No matter where I stayed, I kept hearing about “They”, and as I stood over a lekker braai fire I finally pieced it all together.

“They” were the faceless, nameless murderers, thieves, skelm, and scallywags that were making South Africa hemorrhage fear and terror.

‘Did you hear “They” robbed another farm? Killed the boer, and then raped the wife.’

‘Eish, bout – not again’.

I wasn’t sure if “They” was a Soweto street gang or something else, because if I was tracking the tones and knowing looks correctly, everyone had a pretty good idea what was being said (or implied) by “They”.

“They” = “I want to blame the blacks, but don’t want to sound racist”

It wasn’t ever“Two boys stole my cousin’s bakkie”, it was always “THEY stole my cousin’s bakkie”.

One way we can become a tiny bit less racist, is to say the words we mean. This leads to accountability, which (hopefully) leads to some remorse. When we drop the linguistic gymnastics designed to get our all too racist point across without being held accountable, then we hear ourselves say things that should shock us into repentance.

Somewhere Martin Luther is still admonishing us to “Sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.”

When we see our hearts for what they truly are (whether it be racist, greedy, slothful, or even depressed) we can start finding the solution. We can get healed by the Master Healer. All the code talk and shifty language is just a dodgy way not deal with the real condition of our hearts and minds.

My commitment is to start saying what I really mean – and being accountable for what’s coming out of my heart and mouth. It won’t always be fun, but it’s much better than the alternative code talk so many of us have engaged in for far too long.

How about you? Is this something you’ve observed in your friends? Or maybe caught yourself being guilty of?

Maybe it’s a ‘they’ but it might also be a ‘those people’ or various other secret codes we might use to not have to say the very words we are thinking. Share your thoughts with us in the comments. 

[To catch the rest of this series, click here]

How to be One bit Less Racist: We interrupt this series to take a bit of a step back…

i received two sets of comments after the last post in this series and felt that both were worth sharing.

The first was from Sabrina and was really helpful in reminding me that racism can be localised. One strong example we came against when we were in the States is that the term ‘coloured’ there when referring to a person of colour, is very strongly racist, whereas in South Africa, for the most part, it refers to a particular group of people, who as far as i have been able to ascertain, do not take it offensively [although some prefer to refer to themselves as brown] but definitely doesn’t carry the strength it does in the USA. So Sabrina reminded me that the ‘girl’/’boy’ post was referring specifically to the South African context:

Sabrina: I totally hear what you are saying and totally agree that people should respect each other and use respectful terms to do so. But I think that you must also acknowledge that in this particular blog because you used specific terms you are speaking from an ethnocentric perspective and so what you say is culturally constrained and not a universal truth. So for example I live in Ireland and many women of all ages refer to each other as ‘girls’. I’m in my 50s and call myself a girl and refer to my friends as the girls. In fact I smart a little if someone refers to me as that ‘woman’ over there. For most women in our culture the term ‘girl’ would be considered endearing rather than insulting. For males in Ireland the word ‘boy’ would really only be used for prepubescent boys, then they become teenagers, young men or men but just like women use the word ‘girl’ men would tend to use words like ‘guys’ or ‘lads’. So my point is what is insulting in one country or culture might not be insulting in another country or culture. So I totally agree with your point that people should address each other respectfully in a way that is acceptable within that particular society. However to dictate particular words makes it only applicable to the the example society that you discuss here rather than universal to all societies. It is a little difficult to explain so I hope that you ‘get’ what I mean.

My good friend Nkosi [who is probably being way more gracious than he needs to be] weighed in with these very powerful words that really made me stop and think. Boom – punch to the face right there.

Nkosi: My difficulty with this series Brett is that I feel it is more based on individual experience which I always try to avoid. Individual experience leads to reactionary actions which are limited actions. The fact that in this status in particular we are talking about “boy and a girl” and we already know they are black shows the biggest problem of racism. The fact that a domestic worker is black and “must not be refered to be a boy or a girl” shows a problem. Why does the domestic worker have to be black? Now for me the solution to racism will come from asnwering that simple question! Racism won’t end as long as blacks are still the definition of a domestic workers in houses of white people, they are petrol attendants in cars of white people, they are tellers in shopping malls of white people etc. So I am just going to read other peoples responses on this!

Just a further input on this issue, in my culture it is boys who wakes up to clean up after dogs mess and the irony of it all is that the boys are normally wakened up by their fathers but the same fathers wakes up to clean the dogs mess of white people. The dignity of the white peoples gardener’s is what matters for me!

In our culture shacks were created for pigs but it is our fathers who find themselves in shacks (Dignity again).

So basically for me racism is the power that puts white people as a group on top (to be the domestic helped) and black people as a group at the bottom (to be the domestic helper)!

Nkosi makes some strongly helpful points. And i believe he is speaking of the bigger picture and the systems that need to be changed and there is a whole lot of ongoing conversation about that. [Which often feels helpless because it is so huge and so much needs to be done]. So maybe the best thing is to stop for a moment and just read what he said again and let that sink in a little. Maybe it will help emphasise the hecticness if i was to replace myself and my father in that story and then try tune into those emotions.

So i don’t want to remove focus from any of that. It is all true. We need to catch a wake up and really realise what is going on around us. And try to figure out together what can be done to bring change faster. BUT at the same time i do still feel that maybe it is a BOTH/AND thing rather than an EITHER/OR. When the Bible gives slaves advice on how to treat their masters, i don’t believe it was condoning slavery, but in the context of what was a bad and unjust thing, saying that ‘Since you find yourself in this [unjust – understood] place, here is a way to live that is kingdom.

And so while the present situation [with, for the most part, black people cleaning white peoples’ houses] is not a fair and good one, there is still, i believe, ways we can work within that broken system to live in the best way possible until it is fixed/better as a whole. So if you have someone older than 20 cleaning your house or garden or looking after your children, in South Africa, then calling them girl/boy feels unacceptable. As does paying them minimum wage over a living wage. And a whole lot more.

What do you think? Are we able to tackle the smaller subtler racist tendencies that we may not always notice in ourselves while still needing to take on the bigger systemic changes that need to happen? Or do you feel that we need to start at the top and move down? Is this a helpful series to invite people to share their thoughts on, or is it proving unhelpful? 

i would very much love to have your feedback on this before the continuation or decimation of this series…

[To jump back into the series and look at how we refer to people as ‘they’, click here]

I Write What I Like – Steve Biko: Part human face

Another passage from the chapter titled ‘Some African Cultural Concepts’:

‘Yet it is difficult to kill the African heritage. There remains, in spite of the superficial cultural similarities between the detribalised and the Westerner, a number of cultural characteristics that mark out the detribalised as an African. I am not here making a case for separation on the basis of cultural differences. I am sufficiently proud to believe that under a normal situation, Africans can contribute to the joint cultures of the communities they have joined. However, what I want to illustrate here is that even in a pluralistic society like ours, there are still some cultural traits that we can boast of which have been able to withstand the process of deliberate bastardisation. These are aspects of the modern African culture – a culture that has used concepts from the white world to expand on inherent cultural characteristics.

Thus we see that in the area of music, the African still expresses himself with conviction. The craze about jazz arises out of a conversion by the African artists of mere notes to meaningful music, expressive of real feelings. The Monkey Jive, Soul etc. are all aspects of a modern type African culture that expresses the same original feelings. Solos like those of Pat Boone and Elvis Presley could never really find expression within the African culture because it is not in us to listen passively to pure musical notes. Yet when soul struck with its all-engulfing rhythm it immediately caught on and set hundreds of millions of black bodies in gyration throughout the world. These were people reading in soul the real meaning – the defiant message “say it loud! I’m black and I’m proud”. This is fast becoming our modern culture. A culture of defiance, self-assertion and group pride and solidarity. This is a culture that emanates from a situation of common experience of oppression. Just as it now finds expression in our music and our dress, it will spread to other aspects. This is the new and modern black culture to which we have given a major contribution. This is the modern black culture that is responsible for the restoration of our faith in ourselves and therefore offers a hope in the direction we are taking from here.

Thus in its entirety the African Culture spells us out as people particularly close to nature. As Kaunda puts it, our people may be unlettered and their physical horizons may be limited yet “they inhabit a larger world than the sophisticated Westerner who has magnified his physical senses through inverted gadgets at the price all too often of cutting out the dimension of the spiritual.” This close proximity to Nature enables the emotional component in us to be so much richer in that it makes it possible for us, without any apparent difficulty to feel for people and to easily identify with them in any emotional situation arising out of suffering.

The advent of the Western Culture has changed out outlook almost drastically. No more could we run our own affairs. We were required to fit in as people tolerated with great restraint in a western type society. We were tolerated simply because our cheap labour is needed. Hence we are judged in terms of standards we are not responsible for. Whenever colonisation sets in with its dominant culture it devours the native culture and leaves behind a bastardised culture that can only thrive at the rate and pace allowed it by the dominant culture. This is what happened to the African culture. It is called a sub-culture purely because the African people in the urban complexes are mimicking the white man rather unashamedly.

In rejecting Western values, therefore, we are rejecting those things that are not only foreign to us but that seek to destroy the most cherished of our beliefs – that the corner-stone of society is man himself – not just his welfare, not his material wellbeing but just man himself with all his ramifications. We reject the power-based society of the Westerner that seems to be ever concerned with perfecting their technological know-how while losing out on their spiritual dimension.We believe that in the ling run the special contribution to the world by Africa will be in the field of human relationship/ The great powers of the world may have done wonders by giving the world an industrial and military look, but the great gift still has to come from Africa – giving the world a more human face.’

[For another passage from Steve Biko looking at Perceived Inferiority, click here]

I Write What I Like – Steve Biko: Part community over individualism

i am still slowly making my way through Steve Biko’s ‘I write what I like’ and here is a passage that i marked a while ago from Chapter 8: Some African Cultural Concepts:

One of the most fundamental aspects of our culture is the importance we attach to Man [by which i think he is referring to people as opposed to individual – brett] . Ours has always been a Man-centered society. Westerners have on many occasions been surprised at the capacity we have for talking to each other – not for the sake of arriving at a particular conclusion but merely to enjoy the communication for its own sake. Intimacy is a term not exclusive for particular friends  but applying to a whole group of people who find themselves together either through work or residential requirements.

In fact, in the traditional African culture, there is no such thing as two friends. Conversation groups were more or less naturally determined by age and division of labour. Thus one would find all boys whose job  was to look after cattle periodically meeting at popular spots to engage in conversation about their cattle, girlfriends, parents, heroes, etc. All commonly shared their secrets, joys and woes. No one felt unnecessarily an intruder into someone else’s business. The curiosity manifested was welcome. It came out of a desire to share. This pattern one would find in all age groups. House visiting was always a feature of the elderly folk’s way of life. No reason was needed as a basis for visits. It was all part of our deep concern for each other.

Take a moment to pause there and think about what you’ve read. Anything stand out for you? A concept that seemed foreign but sounded quite nice actually? Or does this have a negative ‘not for me’ kind of vibe?

These are things never done in the Westerner’s culture. A visitor to someone’s house, with the exception of friends, is always met with the question, “What can I do for you?”. This attitude to see people not as themselves but as agents for some particular function either to one’s disadvantage or advantage is foreign to us. We are not a suspicious race. We believe in the inherent goodness of man. We enjoy man for himself. We regard our living together not as an unfortunate mishap warranting endless competition among us but as a deliberate act of God to make us a community of brothers and sisters jointly involved in the quest for a composite answer to the varied problems of life. Hence in all we do we always place Man first and hence all our action is usually joint community oriented action rather than the individualism that is the hallmark of the capitalist approach. We always refrain from using people as stepping stones. Instead we are prepared to have a much slower progress in an effort to make sure that all of us are marching to the same tune.

How about that section? This might be a revolutionary concept for some of us. Think about how we do friendship and community and compare/contrast it with what Steve is saying here. 

Nothing dramatises the eagerness of the African to communicate with each other more than their love for song and rhythm. Music in the African culture features in all emotional states. When we go to work, we share the burdens and pleasures of the work we are doing through music. This particular facet strangely enough has filtered through to this present day. Tourists always watch with amazement the synchrony of music and action as Africans working at a road side use their picks and shovels with well-timed precision to the accompaniment of a background song. Battle songs were a feature of the long march to war in the olden days. Girls and boys never played any games without using music and rhythm as its basis. In other words with Africans, music and rhythm were not luxuries but part and parcel of our way of communication. Any suffering we experienced was made much more real by song and rhythm. There is no doubt that the so called “Negro spirituals” sung by Black slaves in the States as they toiled under oppression were indicative of their African heritage.

The major thing to note about our songs is that they never were songs for individuals. All African songs are group songs. Though many have words, this is not the most important thing about them. Tunes were adapted to suit the occasion and had the wonderful effect of making everybody read the same things from the common experience. In war the songs reassured those who were scared, highlighted the determination of the regiment to win a particular encounter and in the case of the Black slaves, they derived sustenance out of a feeling of togetherness, at work the binding rhythm makes everybody brush off the burden and hence Africans can continue for hours on end because of this added energy.

Attitudes of Africans to property again show just how unindividualistic the African is. As everybody here knows, African society had the village community as its basis. Africans always believed in having many villages with a controllable number of people in each rather than the reverse. This obviously was a requirement to suit the needs of a community-based and man-centered society. Hence most things were jointly owned by the group, for instance there was no such thing as individual land ownership. The land belonged to the people and was merely under the control of the local chief on behalf of the people. When cattle went to graze it was on an open veld and not on anybody’s specific farm.

Farming and agriculture, though on individual family basis, had many characteristics of joint efforts. Each person could by simple request and holding of a special ceremony, invite neighbours to come and work on his plots. This service was returned in kind and no remuneration was ever given.

Poverty was a foreign concept. This could only really be brought about to the entire community by an adverse climate during a particular season. It never was considered repugnant to ask one’s neighbours for help if one was struggling. In almost all instances there was help between individuals, tribe and tribe, chief and chief etc. even in spite of war.

Hm, definitely think there is much to be appreciated and possibly learned and assimilated from here. What jumped out for you the strongest as you were reading this piece?

[For another extract from Steve Biko’s ‘I Write What I Like’, this time on the human face, click here]

Home from home

i mean, how can you not love that, right? Coming home to Cape Town was an easy one.

But leaving Oakland was also a less easy one than we may have thought. It was surprising to both tbV and myself just how much like home it felt to us. Which was great.

And had a lot to do with the people and some of the places. Especially getting to stay for a month with Aaron and Sarah Postma-Ruff who we had invited to live with us for about 7 months when we were here last. With a lot of stuff that previously belonged to us [furniture, home-made wine box book shelves, purple cushions and towels] being incorporated into their new home, it certainly had a bit of an ‘ours’ feel. When Aaron met us at the airport dressed in his home-made Hello Kitty suit, it was like game on. We had arrived home.

Favourite Indian restaurants and board games and boss’ new hot tub and weekend away with housemates and blockbusting movies and Netflix and Frosting-in-a-Can and giant Chocolate Bacon Peanut Butter Cups and visiting old church family and baptism-and-barbecue day and all-night-snack-fest-board games and sunsets and radio podcasting and hammocks and of course the reason that allowed us to get over – a sequel to last year’s Houseboat Youth Group Camp speak on Lake Shasta:

So really just an incredible time and a month felt just about right. Opportunity for two more book share launches and conversations on church. Being in the winning city of the NBA championships as it happened.

But i think mainly just the people. We really love a lot of the people there quite a lot. Which is why i guess it feels a lot like home.

Took a moment to think about Philly today. We were there for the same amount of time as Oakland. We loved the place and loved a lot of the people. But i’m not sure for me that it would have that same kind of feel. i guess maybe cos the setting for Oakland provided a lot more space to be real and honest and challenged and to challenge, and the freedom to be ourselves.

The last night pretty much summed it up. Meant to be finishing off our stay with board games with Aaron and Sarah and never got round to playing the games because we just got so caught up in life-transforming wrestling-filled conversations about life and money and being church and changing the world and stuff. And then my mate Dave [one of the 4 Horsedawgs of the Apocalypse] came round after working til midnight to help me sort out some stuff on my new computer before we flew away. That is family right there.

If you want to get your signature on the ‘Get Brett Fish and tbV back for Houseboats 2016’ petition then maybe we will see you all again next year, same time, same place. After all, Americaland may need a lot more African missionary types to head that way before it can feel completely caught up with the rest of the world. Or something.

Oakland, we will miss you. But Cape Town? It is GOOD to be back…

How to Craft a South African Kaleidoscope

i just read a really helpful piece by Brene Brown titled, ‘Own our History. Change the story’ which is focused on Americaland which has what feels like a completely different story, when it comes to present race issues, in many ways, but also some remarkably similar overlaps.

Owning our stories is standing in our truth. It’s transformative in our personal and professional lives AND it’s also critical in our community lives. But we don’t think about history as our collective story.

Until we find a way to own our collective stories around racism in this country, our history and the stories of pain will own us.

Brene is writing into the story of Americaland and yet replace ‘US’ with ‘South Africa’ and so much of this still rings absolutely true:

Our collective stories of race in the US are not easy to own. They are stories of slavery, violence, and systemic dehumanization. We will have to choose courage over comfort. We will have to feel our way through the shame and sorrow. We will have to listen. We will have challenge our resistance and our defensiveness.

We have to keep listening even when we want to scream, “I’m not that way. This isn’t my fault!”

We have to examine and own stereotypes and prejudices. Every single one of us has them. It will be tough.

We will need to sit down with our children and talk about privilege. This means honest conversations about how we were raised and what we need to work on. No blaming or shaming, but truth. It’s not productive to deny how hard we all work for what we have, but it’s not honest to deny that many of us are afforded privileges based on who we are and what we look like.

Osheta Moore, a woman of colour in Americaland who i deeply respect had this amazing post to write after the tragic events of the Charleston shooting that occurred this past week. Some advice she gave to Americans which could be well extended to white South Africans, as we try to make sense of the violence and deep-seated hatred and racism that is prevalent across the nation, even 20 plus years after our first officially free and fair elections:

Today, I offer two responses that promote peace, lay a foundation for unity, and point to the love of Jesus as displayed on the cross.

I’m sorry.

And

I’m listening.

I’m sorry because we’re called to be peacemakers.  We are the ones on the front-line of violence with the sword of the Spirit- his words that bring life.

We’re called to be the ones to cry out, “Immeasurable worth!” when image-bearers are devalued.

We’re the voices of justice.

We’re the ones who draw in the sand and level the playing field.

As peacemakers, we’re tasked with identifying with our Prince of Peace who overcame our blood-thirsty enemy by shedding his own blood- selflessness and love flows from the cross and lies out our chosen path- humility.  “I’m sorry” tames the anger.  “I’m sorry” respects the pain. “I’m sorry”positions you as a friend and not adversary.

I’m listening because we’re called to be reconcilers.  Like Jesus reconciled us to the Father- it’s a painful process.  A denying process.  A humiliating process.  But a Kingdom process, nonetheless.  “I’m listening” says, “yes, I have an opinion and yes I have strong feelings, and yes this makes me feel more than a little helpless, but I’m going to press into this specific pain and listen.”

We need to own our history, and the fact that we are still very much walking through muddied waters that are filled with consequence, privilege, hurt, abandonment and more.

We need to very much be able to say, “I’m sorry” – not necessarily that ‘i did that thing’ but definitely that ‘i benefitted from that thing having been done’ and ‘i see how that thing being done has left a deep legacy of hurt for you and your family’. 

We need to listen and really hear the hurt and the stories, the needs and the desires and dreams – rather than assuming or presuming that we know or could ever understand living as a person of different colour or culture or story, we need to simply close out mouths and start to listen more, create more spaces for others to share their stories and experience so that we can begin to have a bit more of an understanding and start finding better ways of moving forwards together.

i know and i recognise more and more that i personally still have a long way to go and it is important for me to catch the racism and race-mindedness and prejudice in my own life.

i need to have more occasions of recognising and celebrating the diversity of the different people of my country and creating opportunities to engage more deeply and profoundly with others who are not like me.

i need to be braver in calling out racism where i see it and refusing to let friends and family especially [but also strangers where it feels safe to do so] get away with being subtly racist or prejudiced in what they say out loud. It is okay to say, “That is not okay!” in love but firmness.

And so much more. But let’s continue to step towards this. As we stop to listen and own up to our stories and grieve with those who are suffering or who have suffered, and as we seize opportunities to build deeper friendships with people who are not like us, so we will move closer towards being a country of true diversity and the “Us vs. Them” will be transformed into “Us and Them” and then hopefully disappear completely into a beautifully mosaiced and kaleidoscoped ‘Us’.

[For more thoughts and conversations around a better South Africa, click here]

I Write What I Like – Steve Biko: Part History and Heroes

A further extract from the same chapter as the last one i shared, this one looks at the history that is taught and the need for young black men and women to have stories and heroes they can relate to:

One writer makes the point that in an effort to destroy completely the structures that had been built up in the African Society and to impose their imperialism with an unnerving totality the colonialists were not satisfied merely with holding a people in their grip and emptying the Native’s brain of all form and content, they turned to the past of the oppressed people and distorted, disfigured and destroyed it. No longer was reference made to African culture, it became barbarism. Africa was the “dark continent”. Religious practices and customs were referred to as superstition. The history African Society was reduced to tribal battles and internecine wars. There was no conscious migration by the people from one place of abode to another. No, it was always flight from one tyrant who wanted to defeat the tribe not for any positive reason but merely to wipe them out of the face of this earth.

No wonder the African child learns to hate his heritage in his days at school. So negative is the image presented to him that he tends to find solace only in close identification with the white society.

No doubt, therefore, part of the approach envisaged in bringing about “black consciousness” has to be directed to the past, to see to rewrite the history of the black man and to produce in it the heroes who form the core of the African background. To the extent that a vast literature about Gandhi in South Africa is accumulating it can be said that the Indian community already has started in this direction. But only scant reference is made to African heroes. A people without a positive history is like a vehicle without an engine. Their emotions cannot be easily controlled and channelled in a recognisable direction. They always live in the shadow of a more successful society. Hence in a country like ours they are forced to celebrate holidays like Paul Kruger’s day, Heroes’ Day, Republic Day, etc., all of which are occasions during which the humiliation of defeat is at once revived.

Then too one can extract from our indigenous cultures a lot of positive virtues which should teach the Westerner a lesson or two. The oneness of community for instance is at the heart of our culture. The easiness with which Africans communicate with each other is not forced by authority but is inherent in the make-up of African people. Thus whereas the white family can stay in an area without knowing its neighbours, Africans develop a sense of belonging to the community within a short time of coming together. Many a hospital official has been confounded by the practice of Indians who bring gifts and presents to patients whose names they can hardly recall.

Again this is the manifestation of the interrelationship between man and man in the black world as opposed to the highly impersonal world in which the Whitey lives. These are characteristics we must not allow ourselves to lose. Their value can only be appreciated by those of us who have not as yet been made slaves to technology and the machine. One can quote a myriad of other examples. Here again “black consciousness” seeks to show the black people the value of their own standards and outlook. It urges black people to judge themselves according to these standards and not to be fooled by white society who have white-washed themselves and made white standards the yardstick by which even black people judge each other.

[For the next passage looking at Community over Individualism, click here]