The lost Continent

Ten days ago, sitting in my flat, I would have never thought that the country I was once proud of would spin out of control in the way that it has.

The hatred and barbaric behaviour that South Africans have shown, is quite clear to me that we’ve lost respect for each other and the personhood. Why do I say the ‘personhood’? It’s because if we saw each other as human beings first, all these crimes against humanity would not exist.

These scenes that I’ve witnessed in the past few days are not new to this continent of ours. We’ve seen them in Rwanda, Burundi, Kenya, Uganda, Darfur, Zimbabwe and other African countries where Human Rights violations are the norm. Only when these acts are closer to home do we speak out and respond to crisis but when it’s happening to others, it’s okay because it’s not us that suffer. Are we ever going to learn to stop responding to crisis and work at eliminating all forms discrimination that might lead us to such. Prevention is better than cure.

These act of evident hatred did not start 10 days ago but they have been happening for years, it is only now that the visuals are so disturbing that everyone is feeling repulsed, shocked, ashamed and condemning these acts. For example, Sizakele Sigasa, Salome Masooa, Zoliswa Nkonyana and recently Eudy Simelane, these are women that have been brutally raped, tortured and murdered in the past two years in this country and all because they were different and the rest of the country disagreed with their lifestyle. No one said a single word to these injustices because in the eyes of Africans…they deserved it.

Today another form of hatred has shown its ugly head, xenophobia, and people have died including some South Africans and all because they look different. When are Africans going to learn that killing is not the answer and no one deserves to be treated like an animal regardless of their sexual orientation, race, colour of their skin, country of origin and all other factors that are different in every human?

For as long as we don’t learn that Human Rights are indivisible, we will have such acts of barbarism occurring everywhere and all the time. Tomorrow we will be killing other because they’re ‘short’ and we don’t like it and we will find a justification for it.

As women’s rights, lgbti rights, children’s rights defenders we should start acknowledging that all these rights we are fighting for, are Human Rights and we need to come together and fight these injustices for a better continent free of hate and discrimination in all its forms.

Cry my beloved Country

What has happened to this once beautiful country and its people? I’m asking this with my head hung in shame; it is painful and heartbreaking to see our people being reduced to animals like this.

I was once a proud South African but now I’m even ashamed to be called one or be associated with this country. As a person that travels a lot to other African countries, I’ve never as a foreigner in their countries been treated the way we have been treating them.

My heart bleeds to all my brothers and sisters and especially because as a lesbian woman, I can relate to the discrimination they’re facing. Discrimination in all its forms is rife in Africa. It’s time our people realised that Human Rights are universal and indivisible and all human kind is entitled to them regardless.

I’m going to be blunt and realistic about us as South African people, you might not like what I’m going to say but it is a fact that we are all aware of.

South African men in particular, have lost their minds (I’m not talking about the minority that still have their senses because I know a lot of good guys, it’s sad they have to be packed with these idiots). These are the same people that expect ‘foreigners’ to come to South Africa in 2010 and bring their money. We are busy killing our own black brothers and sisters, I don’t see any Chinese, Italians being attacked instead I see my own reflection on TV being burnt and killed.

These idiots even have the guts to appear on television and justify their inhumane behaviours. Our damn so called President is silent (I’m sure he sees no crisis), all other politicians are silent too, they have nothing to say or they just don’t want to take any responsibility. A state of emergency needs to be declared and the army must intervene or a lot of people are going to die for nothing. I am so angry that I have about a million emotions going on in me.

My beloved country is going down and its people are not even aware, soon we will be like the likes of Zimbabwe, Darfur, Rwanda because this is headed towards a civil war. Our brothers have lost their minds and we can’t do anything about it.

They claim foreigners are taking their jobs and houses but I know very well that they don’t have jobs because of their laziness and not wanting to work for anything in their lives. They want handouts and that’s how it has been for years.

I walk in the townships and see brothers sitting in corners, smoking and drinking with no care in the world. They have the opportunity to go to schools but no, school is too formal for them. Schools have rules…they don’t want to be told what to do so they sit in corners and feel sorry for themselves and blame all their problems on everyone else except themselves.

First it was “blame everything on apartheid”, now it’s “blame everything on foreigners”…what will it be tomorrow?

In the news one of the residents of Alexandra mentioned that “foreigners take our jobs, they steal and they rape our women”. Now something is wrong with this statement, I don’t know what you think but something is really wrong here…let’s go back to what we’ve read in the news lately:

It is our South African fathers and brothers that are raping women, murdering women, beating women up and stealing…yes, a couple of times I’ve seen a foreign name appear in the news for crimes but it’s always been our own South African men and no one else. My fellow sister, Eudy Simelane a Banyana Banyana player was not gang raped and murdered by 7 FOREIGNERS; it was 7 brothers from ekasi (township), brothers she knew. Sizakele and Salome were not shot execution style and raped by FOREIGNERS …it was by brothers they knew. Gugu Dlamini was not stoned by foreigners but by her own community. Zoliswa Nkonyana from Khayelitsha was not stabbed, clubbed and killed by FOREIGNERS; it was 20 boys from her neighbourhood…SO WHAT THE HELL IS THIS GUY GOING ON ABOUT?!!!

I’m angry and amazed by how far South Africans will go to abdicate responsibility for their own lives and laziness.

We are heading towards self destruction and we don’t even see it.
MAY GOD BE WITH ALL OF US, we need holy intervention because we’re not going to get it from our politicians.