I've often said the middle class sit in their wonders of motoring engineering, sealed off from the world and don't see the poor, unemployed and homeless. But if they're observant, they don't need to walk for a change, as Institute of Race Relations' Michael Morris did, to see them. Instead, in their middle class bubbles, they choose to ignore the signs, and in Morris' case, the specific graffito that sparked his musings that "whites must face our [South Africa's] history".
The IRR-affiliated Centre for Risk Analysis' quality of life index that whites have the highest standard of living of South Africa's population groups is already known and evident. It's in the low poverty level for that group of 1%, and less than 10% (8% in 2014) of whites are unemployed. So what are they and IRR especially complaining about?
All South Africans - not only whites - are dissatisfied with the incompetent and corrupt ANC government and dismal service, no growth and development and poor politicians (incl DA). But reading the IRR's and commentators' and conservative/right's typically uninformed, ignorant and bigoted daily complaints about BEE and racial quotas and all the rest one would believe whites are on the skids and political and economic victims. They're not; they're doing very nicely thank you.
Unfortunately, Morris repeats that propaganda here which disappoints me as I believed he was perhaps the only extant rational IRR member. Without building an argument that logically connects his points - graffito and index to whites-as-victims conclusion - he segues from the positive assessment of white standards of living, something to be celebrated, to picking a fight with an anonymous person he probably presumes was non-white and ANC/left who wrote "whites must face our [South Africa's] history".
Despite his complaint, conservative fora like BizNews, PoliticsWeb and IRR's media propagande site Daily Friend are proof whites have not faced their part in SA's history, many having nostalgia for apartheid and believing there are no consequences for 50 years of legal racism and 300 years of colonialism. Their high standard of living, comparable and better than residents in western countries, is proof they remain unaffected and oblivious (incl in their DA WC 'bubble') of what happens outside their doors.
Similarly, like almost the entire white population, the ANC whose members are only a small percentage of the black and brown population, don't acknowledge or face the consequences of their failure to improve standards of living for black and brown South Africans, and beyond that, place SA on the path of reasonable prosperity for all.
So I find Morris line of thought - it's not a logical argument but more disjunctive stream of consciousness - disingenuous and the usual jaded IRR racial tropes. And disappointingly, I must finally conclude he's perhaps the last IRR member who has become obsessed with the "race" in IRR.
The IRR-affiliated Centre for Risk Analysis' quality of life index that whites have the highest standard of living of South Africa's population groups is already known and evident. It's in the low poverty level for that group of 1%, and less than 10% (8% in 2014) of whites are unemployed. So what are they and IRR especially complaining about?
All South Africans - not only whites - are dissatisfied with the incompetent and corrupt ANC government and dismal service, no growth and development and poor politicians (incl DA). But reading the IRR's and commentators' and conservative/right's typically uninformed, ignorant and bigoted daily complaints about BEE and racial quotas and all the rest one would believe whites are on the skids and political and economic victims. They're not; they're doing very nicely thank you.
Unfortunately, Morris repeats that propaganda here which disappoints me as I believed he was perhaps the only extant rational IRR member. Without building an argument that logically connects his points - graffito and index to whites-as-victims conclusion - he segues from the positive assessment of white standards of living, something to be celebrated, to picking a fight with an anonymous person he probably presumes was non-white and ANC/left who wrote "whites must face our [South Africa's] history".
Despite his complaint, conservative fora like BizNews, PoliticsWeb and IRR's media propagande site Daily Friend are proof whites have not faced their part in SA's history, many having nostalgia for apartheid and believing there are no consequences for 50 years of legal racism and 300 years of colonialism. Their high standard of living, comparable and better than residents in western countries, is proof they remain unaffected and oblivious (incl in their DA WC 'bubble') of what happens outside their doors.
Similarly, like almost the entire white population, the ANC whose members are only a small percentage of the black and brown population, don't acknowledge or face the consequences of their failure to improve standards of living for black and brown South Africans, and beyond that, place SA on the path of reasonable prosperity for all.
So I find Morris line of thought - it's not a logical argument but more disjunctive stream of consciousness - disingenuous and the usual jaded IRR racial tropes. And disappointingly, I must finally conclude he's perhaps the last IRR member who has become obsessed with the "race" in IRR.
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