Be Colour Blind
"No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, background or religion" - Nelson Mandela
I am summoning old demons that have
been buried beneath the surface today. I am not colour blind, not at all.
I see colour, I love it in all its shades and tones and most of all, I love the
blends and mixes you get when you're combining different colours-something beautiful
always comes out. In this case, I am not referring to paint, crayons or
pastels, today I’m talking about race, ethnicity, diversity- the hype of living
in a rainbow nation. I see beauty every day, no matter how messed up life is. I
see it walking on the streets. I even talk to it, laugh and cry with it, greet,
wine and dine with it, debate share and stimulate intellectual growth with all
of these beautiful, different colours that I meet, see and live with on a 365. I
love colour and I relish learning about different people, different cultures
and language if granted the opportunity to do so. I see it all as a blessing. However,
it is really a shame, a disgrace, a pity- that it cannot be appreciated in
peace.
There will always be a significant amount
of people, who just do not want to accept that we are living in a new era, I
mean- the world has evolved and so have we - get with the programme. I believe
that humans are equal despite the structures and hierarchies that we have
created for ourselves, besides the greed, sense of entitlement and self-ordained
superiority amongst races and cultures. So this brings me to a very burning
issue that has been making its rounds on social media, accompanied by the
#GHSdefendyourgirls. So, we are at it again with these Model C institutions.
First, we challenged what I would like to call, the Politics of the Black African School girl’s hair in Pretoria Girls
High, where our young black girls were being coerced to conform to a code of
conduct instructing them to chemically straighten their natural hair. And then
recently, at the Pietermaritzburg Girls High School, a young white girl was defended by the school, after using the ‘K-word’ in a vicious voice note, which
was circulating via the WhatsApp social network.
However, here’s what shocks me the most.
Get this: Miss Zoe Morris, a grade 11 student, went on her little hate spree simply
because a black girl mispronounced her name and then the school, blamed the
racial slur on “Exam Stress”. Ladies and gentlemen, “Exam Stress” now causes
people to become so livid over the mispronunciations of their names, that they
actually become racist towards each other. Now, no jokes or anything but if I had
a hectare of land, for the number of times my name has been butchered by my
former school teachers and peers of different racial descend, my friend. I’d be
able to start up my own city. Institutional racism is a thing. It’s happening every
day in schools but we’re too ignorant. When these young black girls who felt
like their human rights and dignity were violated, that justice needed to
prevail, the same school that has a supposed zero tolerance for racism, called
for an emergency assembly only to tell them to “Stop whining because no one is
going to care about this in five years’ time…” says a person in leadership
[Daily Vox].
So apart from being disrespected and
stripped of their dignity, they were being silenced. I can’t help but wonder if the
same protection would have been adopted for a Nonkohliso or a Mokgadipule girl,
who had had enough of having her teachers and peers slaughtering her name, saying it as “Nonkoshlisow” or “Mokhadiphulay”. I won’t lie, knowing how to say a person’s
name correctly is a sign of respect IF they are also making the same effort And
a person’s name is their parents' declaration of who and what they are or will be- it’s the
first prophesy of what you will become, the first sign of love. Mine is Nosipho
Funeka neh – A wanted gift to the world - this is what my parents saw in me. But in
my entire life, I have been called things like, “Noshlipho, Nosphipho, Nosy,
Nozy, Noz. Nosphow, Nosie, Fun-ek-ah, Funika”. That makes me a victim too right? Just like Zoe, but the difference between the likes of her and the millions of
other kids out there who go through the same thing, is that we are not born with/to hate, We’re not born seeing
colour. We tolerate, we accept and educate others on how to get it right and we
learn to do the same.
We’re a beautiful nation. We’re diverse,
we’re cultured and we’re interconnected. We have a history that we should be
moving away from, not moving towards. At this point we should be accepting that
whether you’re categorised as Black, White, Coloured or Indian- you’re beautiful, we’re equal
and we’re in this life struggle together. We should be as welcoming to each other
as little children are before they are taught that ‘She is this colour, you are
that colour therefore you can’t play with her because you are better/ you are less”, this is
how it starts. The day we learn to emancipate ourselves from our ideologies of
supremacy and the idea of a chosen race, will be the day that we see the mix
blending well together, producing something new- something mysterious and
intriguing to the world.
I wish this language of hate could end. I wish we could end the privilege, the superiority,the
entitlement, the racism, because whether we like it or not it all goes back to her roots. She reminded me of the very reason that the racial divide will live on even in a new
South Africa. Moreover, the school reminded me of how there will always be more
preference for one race than the other, how the system will always protect the
wrongdoers and incarcerate the victims. All because they see colour, they see
difference, they see preference and in the latter they create division, disruption
and chaos- they create and add fuel to the hate. If only we could all be colour blind, just for a day dear friends, to experience the beloved country’s true beauty, in serenity. Now wouldn’t that
be wonderful? I challenge you to challenge yourself, challenge others, challenge the world to be Colour Blind. I'll do the same.
Till Next Time- Stay Liberal.
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