This is the adapted text of an email I wrote Western Cape (WC) Premier Alan Winde and MEC for agriculture Ivan Meyer today:
I've been following the WC's government's statements and reaction to the murder of farmer Stefan Smit.
While this like any other particularly violent crime is tragic, the media's and WC government's reaction is excessive considering in 2017/18 20 336 people were murdered in the country with Nyanga police station's area having the highest of all stations (see here).
Of total murders, 2 930 were women and 985 were children, with 370 women and 279 children in the Western Cape (here). How many farmers were killed in the province? According to AfriForum, there were "17 farm attacks" to May 2019. I don't know if that includes murder.
But does murder of the most vulnerable members of the community – children – get the kind of attention farmers do? Is the DA, WC government, media, AfriForum, white right-wing, etc going to say they – women and children – of all social and professional groups are being targeted, that there is "genocide" against them? Are they analysing the data, disputing the numbers, leading internet and street protests and writing hysterical articles about their murders?
Is the DA, Western Cape and for that matter national government having urgent news conferences and preparing and spending taxpayer resources on safety plans to ensure their safety? Not at all. If they have, excluding the Safe Schools Project because it entails their facilities only, I'd like to hear about them.
But once again among a sector of the population, mainly white conservative and DA-run WC, for farmer murders, a comparatively secure and affluent group with access to own resources for their own protection, there's a call to arms and dark, conspiratorial murmurings of genocide and similar divisive talk.
Meyer reportedly said "farmers can't work if they must look over their shoulders". That's as fatuous and biased statement I've heard from any politician for a while, and that takes some doing. As I commented, "people on the Flats dodge bullets everyday but they go to work, sit in taxis that drive dangerously or in trains that are burnt or get stuck. They leave at sunrise and get home at sunset when villains are out in force. But do they say "we can't work if we have to look over our shoulders"? No, they get on with life. But Meyer makes a fulsome and false statement – farmers, like everybody else, are still working – for a comparatively affluent and secure socio-economic group. Why this fuss over them?"
Why the fuss when all South Africans, especially poor non-whites, face crime and conditions for crime every day? This attention is excessive and irritating because it explicitly values one sector of the population over the other.
But we know that no one cares about poor blacks, but they do about whites and particularly white middle class.
Pro-farmer activists say farm murders are statistically more significant and, therefore, more serious than other types. Farms by definition are isolated – if there's a statistical significance, it's like the fact people in well-lit crowds are less likely to be victims than alone in a dark alley at night. That's all it is, no global evil communist plot to rid the country of whites.
I don't think there's statistics for murders by occupation; I looked, but perhaps an academic study was done. Farming is just an occupation, like farm workers. But rarely do we hear about farm workers murdered. Arguably, their numbers could be as much if not higher. Why no issue about them?
The fuss, mainly by conservative-right whites and their lobbyists, about white farmers is not about the occupation of farming being targeted per se. It's about "farmers" as a proxy for "whites". That is, the meta-narrative is whites, specifically, Afrikaners, are being targeted and victimised by a nebulous (black) agenda or groups with genocide on their minds. This is coupled to the ANC/EFF's EWC agenda, which they say is evidence (I wonder what they did before EWC, a God-send). E.g. Amazingly stupid and incendiary comments like "the globalist left would be happy if all white men were killed", dangerous populist nonsense that's intended to get the conservative-right growing angry over their beers (except it's unlikely people like him - middle class away from the fray - will leave their comfortable armchairs where they're watching sport to protest on the street about this or any issue).
Elevating white farm murders above murders and violent crime victims in general is reverse racism and/or racially obsessive - that white lives matter more than the majority of black victims who are unnoticed and un-mourned except by their families. Whites are more "valuable" than poor blacks for whom no one cares.
And it's shameful and dishonest of groups like AfriForum and now DA WC, who are in agri-industry's pocket and at their beck and call, for constantly preaching and promoting this narrative. They claim otherwise, but their reasoning is based on racial rhetoric, not principle and argument. They agree "the majority of black people must suffer the consequences" for voting ANC, but pretend liberal they are, claim they really care about "innocent victims" of crime. Your, Brad's et al comments prove you don't.
By they don't agree whites deserve the same fate for decades of support of the brutal apartheid regime, which by the way, was not during a constitutional democracy as this one is, i.e. they all hate freedom of choice, and was one of the worst political choices of the 20th century. Typically, their comments display the short memories of whites forgetting they were complicit and benefited from apartheid.
This article was posted On April 9, which Politicsweb (PW) relegated to minor news. No comments to it, no opinionated PW investigations, no outrage from its hysteria prone social media warriors and writers. And no word from the DA Western Cape government.
However, had this been a "farm murder" where just one white farmer was killed, well that's another story. As I commented to Jerm's cartoon (another PW contributor tending to the disingenuous and hysterical like most of them) and related articles a few days ago, for the conservative-right farm murders means the end of the world. Child deaths and the thousands who die in the country unnaturally every year mean nothing in comparison. Who cares about poor blacks? As PW's commentators say, "they brought it on themselves" for voting ANC.
As I've come to expect of PW where, to paraphrase another exasperated commentator, "all reasoned and intelligent debate come to die among the vitriol", of course they'd say that. It is a conservative-right forum, which I'm obviously not.
And as I've come to expect of self-styled high IQ, model C school debating club not prodigies, they revert to type and the personal and sarcasm rather than the points raised. Naturally for the right-wing and alt-right (I don't know if they're the same thing, probably one more extreme than the other), one white's/farmer's death is more tragic than numerous poor (black) children. No comment to the issue, no quick come back, no usual dire PW commentator attempt at humour?
They should find it interesting and telling that PW already pulled this story after one day, and my comment was the only one of substance. That is, there probably were very few readers and/or it wasn't topical enough for the editor. My comment was the only one, except the one other being the usual childish jibber-jabber and not worth anything, not even my time except I'm replying to make the point for what it's worth, which to you all is irrelevant. SA's high crime and child murders are not worth PW's pages and its commentators' time and sympathy. That says more about you than me.
As it happens, I am reviewing my position with regard to PW (especially before I get banned). Unfortunately, over the past two years it's gone to the right, promoting and encouraging racially obsessed, racist, right-wing and white minority victimhood conspiracies, fake news and alt-fact. Almost to a man, [columnist] WSM a marginal case, it's columnists are provocative conservative, race-baiting apartheid apologists. Even the once respectable RW Johnson, an occasional columnist, has gone that way.
I disagreed with those on the left who called it that. But either I was mistaken, and I'm sure I'm not, or as I detected, it shifted right about the time it embarked on the new, paid-supporter approach. It's farm murder alt-facts and Coligny- and Rodrigues-type denialism last year signalled its new path. I suspect commercial reasons are playing a part - pandering to potential paying supporters among its already conservative-right wing readers who've been booted off other sites - rather than editorial/publishing direction and policy.
PW contributors affect insight but like most of them including regular writers they're ignorant of the state of the country and world. They follow once extinct but now resurgent modes of thought. And they're ignorant about me. I'm not a follower of the left and its media. I was banned from a far more high-brow site - The Conversation - than PW and its low-brow commentators for criticising the media's left-biased PC narratives.
I've been following the WC's government's statements and reaction to the murder of farmer Stefan Smit.
While this like any other particularly violent crime is tragic, the media's and WC government's reaction is excessive considering in 2017/18 20 336 people were murdered in the country with Nyanga police station's area having the highest of all stations (see here).
Of total murders, 2 930 were women and 985 were children, with 370 women and 279 children in the Western Cape (here). How many farmers were killed in the province? According to AfriForum, there were "17 farm attacks" to May 2019. I don't know if that includes murder.
But does murder of the most vulnerable members of the community – children – get the kind of attention farmers do? Is the DA, WC government, media, AfriForum, white right-wing, etc going to say they – women and children – of all social and professional groups are being targeted, that there is "genocide" against them? Are they analysing the data, disputing the numbers, leading internet and street protests and writing hysterical articles about their murders?
Is the DA, Western Cape and for that matter national government having urgent news conferences and preparing and spending taxpayer resources on safety plans to ensure their safety? Not at all. If they have, excluding the Safe Schools Project because it entails their facilities only, I'd like to hear about them.
But once again among a sector of the population, mainly white conservative and DA-run WC, for farmer murders, a comparatively secure and affluent group with access to own resources for their own protection, there's a call to arms and dark, conspiratorial murmurings of genocide and similar divisive talk.
Meyer reportedly said "farmers can't work if they must look over their shoulders". That's as fatuous and biased statement I've heard from any politician for a while, and that takes some doing. As I commented, "people on the Flats dodge bullets everyday but they go to work, sit in taxis that drive dangerously or in trains that are burnt or get stuck. They leave at sunrise and get home at sunset when villains are out in force. But do they say "we can't work if we have to look over our shoulders"? No, they get on with life. But Meyer makes a fulsome and false statement – farmers, like everybody else, are still working – for a comparatively affluent and secure socio-economic group. Why this fuss over them?"
Why the fuss when all South Africans, especially poor non-whites, face crime and conditions for crime every day? This attention is excessive and irritating because it explicitly values one sector of the population over the other.
But we know that no one cares about poor blacks, but they do about whites and particularly white middle class.
*
Pro-farmer activists say farm murders are statistically more significant and, therefore, more serious than other types. Farms by definition are isolated – if there's a statistical significance, it's like the fact people in well-lit crowds are less likely to be victims than alone in a dark alley at night. That's all it is, no global evil communist plot to rid the country of whites.
I don't think there's statistics for murders by occupation; I looked, but perhaps an academic study was done. Farming is just an occupation, like farm workers. But rarely do we hear about farm workers murdered. Arguably, their numbers could be as much if not higher. Why no issue about them?
The fuss, mainly by conservative-right whites and their lobbyists, about white farmers is not about the occupation of farming being targeted per se. It's about "farmers" as a proxy for "whites". That is, the meta-narrative is whites, specifically, Afrikaners, are being targeted and victimised by a nebulous (black) agenda or groups with genocide on their minds. This is coupled to the ANC/EFF's EWC agenda, which they say is evidence (I wonder what they did before EWC, a God-send). E.g. Amazingly stupid and incendiary comments like "the globalist left would be happy if all white men were killed", dangerous populist nonsense that's intended to get the conservative-right growing angry over their beers (except it's unlikely people like him - middle class away from the fray - will leave their comfortable armchairs where they're watching sport to protest on the street about this or any issue).
Elevating white farm murders above murders and violent crime victims in general is reverse racism and/or racially obsessive - that white lives matter more than the majority of black victims who are unnoticed and un-mourned except by their families. Whites are more "valuable" than poor blacks for whom no one cares.
And it's shameful and dishonest of groups like AfriForum and now DA WC, who are in agri-industry's pocket and at their beck and call, for constantly preaching and promoting this narrative. They claim otherwise, but their reasoning is based on racial rhetoric, not principle and argument. They agree "the majority of black people must suffer the consequences" for voting ANC, but pretend liberal they are, claim they really care about "innocent victims" of crime. Your, Brad's et al comments prove you don't.
By they don't agree whites deserve the same fate for decades of support of the brutal apartheid regime, which by the way, was not during a constitutional democracy as this one is, i.e. they all hate freedom of choice, and was one of the worst political choices of the 20th century. Typically, their comments display the short memories of whites forgetting they were complicit and benefited from apartheid.
*
Postscript
Politicsweb, the conservative-right website that always features farm murders prominently and stridently with its editor James Myburgh and others penning numerous conspiracy-type pieces about it, on April 9 published an article sourced from News24 about 1 000 child murders in the country in one year. It was relegated to minor space and ran for one day. Except for my comment, it passed unnoticed (not counting the one commentator's jibber-jabber criticism of mine). I wrote, presciently what I said to Winde and Meyer (above):This article was posted On April 9, which Politicsweb (PW) relegated to minor news. No comments to it, no opinionated PW investigations, no outrage from its hysteria prone social media warriors and writers. And no word from the DA Western Cape government.
However, had this been a "farm murder" where just one white farmer was killed, well that's another story. As I commented to Jerm's cartoon (another PW contributor tending to the disingenuous and hysterical like most of them) and related articles a few days ago, for the conservative-right farm murders means the end of the world. Child deaths and the thousands who die in the country unnaturally every year mean nothing in comparison. Who cares about poor blacks? As PW's commentators say, "they brought it on themselves" for voting ANC.
As I've come to expect of PW where, to paraphrase another exasperated commentator, "all reasoned and intelligent debate come to die among the vitriol", of course they'd say that. It is a conservative-right forum, which I'm obviously not.
And as I've come to expect of self-styled high IQ, model C school debating club not prodigies, they revert to type and the personal and sarcasm rather than the points raised. Naturally for the right-wing and alt-right (I don't know if they're the same thing, probably one more extreme than the other), one white's/farmer's death is more tragic than numerous poor (black) children. No comment to the issue, no quick come back, no usual dire PW commentator attempt at humour?
They should find it interesting and telling that PW already pulled this story after one day, and my comment was the only one of substance. That is, there probably were very few readers and/or it wasn't topical enough for the editor. My comment was the only one, except the one other being the usual childish jibber-jabber and not worth anything, not even my time except I'm replying to make the point for what it's worth, which to you all is irrelevant. SA's high crime and child murders are not worth PW's pages and its commentators' time and sympathy. That says more about you than me.
As it happens, I am reviewing my position with regard to PW (especially before I get banned). Unfortunately, over the past two years it's gone to the right, promoting and encouraging racially obsessed, racist, right-wing and white minority victimhood conspiracies, fake news and alt-fact. Almost to a man, [columnist] WSM a marginal case, it's columnists are provocative conservative, race-baiting apartheid apologists. Even the once respectable RW Johnson, an occasional columnist, has gone that way.
I disagreed with those on the left who called it that. But either I was mistaken, and I'm sure I'm not, or as I detected, it shifted right about the time it embarked on the new, paid-supporter approach. It's farm murder alt-facts and Coligny- and Rodrigues-type denialism last year signalled its new path. I suspect commercial reasons are playing a part - pandering to potential paying supporters among its already conservative-right wing readers who've been booted off other sites - rather than editorial/publishing direction and policy.
PW contributors affect insight but like most of them including regular writers they're ignorant of the state of the country and world. They follow once extinct but now resurgent modes of thought. And they're ignorant about me. I'm not a follower of the left and its media. I was banned from a far more high-brow site - The Conversation - than PW and its low-brow commentators for criticising the media's left-biased PC narratives.
I have contempt for local media including independent alternatives because they serve own opaque agendas that's not in the public interest, or refuse to tell the stories that must be told. PW was the exception but has become like them in its own way.
It was the only local media I regularly read. I've come to accept most of its commentators are irremediably toxic, bigoted and racist, which I can take or leave. But I can't abide a publication that shows its colours so clearly with often little attempt at reason and objectivity. At least the leftist media are subtle. Thank you [PW] for reminding me why I must no longer bookmark you.
Also see South African media's reaction to social crises: The silence of the lambs.
Postscript added: 13/06/2019
It was the only local media I regularly read. I've come to accept most of its commentators are irremediably toxic, bigoted and racist, which I can take or leave. But I can't abide a publication that shows its colours so clearly with often little attempt at reason and objectivity. At least the leftist media are subtle. Thank you [PW] for reminding me why I must no longer bookmark you.
Also see South African media's reaction to social crises: The silence of the lambs.
Postscript added: 13/06/2019
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