I'm just kind of struggling to figure out where I stand on the marches that are happening
today because on the one hand I feel a responsibility to take action because we've obviously been
given a democracy. I was born into this amazing democracy and there's a responsibility that
comes with that privilege to kind of hold government accountable and just steward what
we've been given while going forward but at the same time I've really been challenged
personally about the condition of my heart because there's a lot of injustice that has
been happening that I haven't really been heartbroken for which I don't think is right
and stuff that's been happening just around the corner for example about 15 minutes away
from where I live there's a community in the area Dustin Hook. Two things that have been
happening there the one is environserv which has been affecting that immediate community
severely but only when it started to affect kind of the greater surrounding area in the
upper highway area did it become an issue and then everyone was kind of up in arms about
it and it's kind of started to sort itself out but before that it's been affecting that
community and we did nothing about it which is not right and then another thing there
is that they haven't had water for the last year again nothing's been done about it and
no one's kind of spoken up for that community. It's tough because I want to hold government
accountable but I don't want to just do it from a place of like now it's affecting me
so I'm going to say something. That's the kind of crux of today is what is the motive
behind it what is your intention? Are you just saying something because now it's made
you a little uncomfortable? Kind of the crux of the issue is what is your motive or your
intention behind standing up? Is it because now you're a little bit uncomfortable and
now it's affecting you or is it really because you just want to hold governments accountable
and kind of exercise your rights in a democracy? So what's happening today is difficult for
me for a couple of reasons. Firstly it just feels like it's been put out there as the
call for unity to hold our leadership accountable and to exercise democracy but I don't trust
that it's actually that because there's been so many opportunities to do that in the past
that are real and that affected people in a real way. Black Americana which was the state
our leaders killing people for no reason at all really. Why couldn't we band together
as a country and hold our leadership accountable there? So what's happening today just feels
like actually something that's fueled by selfishness and people wanting to protect themselves
because for the first time something's happening that's directly affecting them so it doesn't
feel like a call for unity. It doesn't feel like hey let's stand together against our
leadership. It feels like oh no my wealth is being threatened my comfort is being threatened
my privilege has been threatened so now I want everyone to sort of come along and help me
make sure that I can protect what I have and that I can live as comfortably as I always
have. I can't align myself with what's happening in terms of protest in terms of Black Friday
because of that. Just also because Black for me is not a day. It's every day it's my whole
entire existence which sort of brings me into my second point which is we're trying to band
together to bring down a government but the government is not the issue. It's the system
in which the government exists. The truth of the matter is for me the state doesn't feel
significant and I know probably for a lot others because the government and the system
has never represented us. It wasn't built for us and so it'll always oppress us. It'll always
bring us down and so whether the zoom of falls or not we're still in a system that is not
for us. We're still in a system that we can never really prosper in and that's why like
I'm all for fight and corruption. I'm all for reconciliation and uniting and standing
together as a nation but this doesn't feel significant for me because I've never been
under any illusions. The government has never been for us. Our leaders have never been for
us. There's been no shift for the average Black person from apartheid to now. It's whether
we have a white president or a black president or we're led by the ANC or the DA. We're still
enslaved. We're still at the bottom fighting to be heard and that's why it's difficult for
me. I don't even feel worthy to represent the thoughts and the voices of so many because
I am a privileged Black person. I've lived a comfortable life. I just don't feel like
what's happening today is addressing the real issues so I just I struggle to and I don't agree
with the idea that not protesting today is slipping into passively because if I believe
that it was a genuine call for unity, a genuine call for democracy and for reconciliation and
then I'd be all for it but this doesn't change anything for the average Black person. I know
for a lot of people this is the penny dropping. This is everything that's happened in the past
week has finally brought them to the realization that stuff like what's meant to be happening
isn't happening. That our government is failing us but for me and for the average Black person
that's what we've always known. We've always known that our government doesn't serve us.
We've always known that the system doesn't serve us and so it's nothing new and it's great that
people are finally realizing that fact and that's a great thing but it's what we've always known.
So I think the best part about being human is that you're the only person that can control you
and you're the only person who can judge you or hold yourself to account. The important thing for
me is that this is a protest. This is a protest against leaders you have to see to be behaving
selfishly, grossly, selfishly, overtly selfish and it doesn't in any way undermine or demean
previous selfishness or previous corruption. I just think that the effects of what happened
with the cabinet reshuffle and borderline state capture are so grotesque and so overt that
they weren't a response. My response to this is not out of fear of overseas holidays or business
economic things or inflation. My response on this is one of holding, my is just being responsible
for my debit credit card to say not okay, not cool. To hold our leaders accountable to say
that's not fair, not cool. And in the context of our struggle as a nation and historically
and the racial complexities and tensions that live within those, within the power to be voice
wise, it's damn hard, you know, and listening to all the different viewpoints, I think it's really
hard and it's difficult and it's difficult to hold someone to account when there's such complexity
and I don't fully understand the complexity, all that I understand with my head, I don't fully
understand with my heart and that is because of my background and whatnot, but I think
passivity in the face of complexity on such a big issue is not okay, so the only human I can
control in this myself and the only motives I can judge on my own and so to be passive in the face
of complexity for me is not an option, you know, and that does mean if making a public comment
on something does call you to a responsibility at a level can set about the diet and the life
diet thing and I think that is something that I will be engaging on and just tackling injustice
with, you know, on a more public level, but I think the underlying thing for me is to be active
even in the face of complexity. So I think in trying to process what's been going on recently
just had a lot of thoughts around like the whys and the bigger motivations about what these protests
would be, I wrote something, I think I'm just going to read it, I think maybe I make myself
a bit understood in my writing, so I've called it going on diet, a very wide protest, aka a call
to consistency, some things I've understood better this week, my voice competes with your voice
which competes with her voice, amidst what is a call for unity, when what is clear is that beneath
the surface of competing voices there is a much more worrying fracture, it's so deeply entrenched
that it feels almost impossible to call for a united front, when there are wounded layers
beneath begging to be recognized, I think most of us would agree that we don't want to see our
leaders continue making deeply problematic and undemocratic decisions, thinking they can do so
without being accountable to the people they serve, I don't stand for that, leadership goes
alongside humility, something has gone terribly wrong, the only thing is we urge our people to
make our voices heard, but what some of us don't understand is that many voices have already been
shouting in desperation for so long and somehow their shouts have been silent, you want a united
front to borrow a business term you need buy-in, you'll maybe only ever get that buy-in if and
when you begin the arduous process of acknowledging and addressing the deepest fracture that caused
this mess in the first place and that's like both historical and ongoing and structural and on a
hard level, I speak this first and foremost to myself before I speak it to any other, protesting
injustice and exercising your democratic right is a powerful thing, so powerful that it inevitably
entails some weighty responsibilities, most of which involve accountability for your actions,
asking myself if I'm going to protest do I understand the implications and ramifications
of what I am getting myself into, because it means I'm committing to following through on what I
publicly declare I stand against, this is not a one-day affair, this is a continuing commitment
to a cause that I believe in, it is also a commitment to standing against injustice in its various
insidious shapes or forms because injustice is injustice, it's not something I should be turning
on one day and off the next, a selective justice is how I've heard it explained recently, selective
justice is a mark of privilege which I bear, I guess the point is if you're going to protest awaken
yourself to understand what it's about at a deep heart level, don't do it if you're only going to
do it on a Friday, live what you say, live a consistent commitment against injustice on a Monday,
a Tuesday, in April and in September, today, tomorrow, next year and in 20 years, and here is
my big metaphorical title moment, it's like a diet versus a lifestyle change, diets are fads,
you get into them and then you inevitably lose steam or interest, they're not sustainable, a
lifestyle change is understanding fundamentally that certain habits are less conducive to what's
healthy living than others, you change your habits in order to change yourself and you change
yourself because you will never change anything or anyone before you dig deep inside first,
don't claim to protest if you aren't prepared to undertake the risky lifestyle change that comes
with it, the accountability and commitment to speak out continuously against injustice, I'm
saying that from here on out and on the journey that I've been on in the last few years, I would
like to state that I would like to be consistent, I don't want to be on diet, I want to change my
lifestyle, to be consistently more aware and brave enough to be active about the many insufferable
and continual injustices around me, even though it's terrifyingly overwhelming and on most days
all I feel is tongue-tied and more than anything to be more consistently listening, so much more
listening to be done. When it comes to this whole protest thing, it's impractical to protest because
the people who have power are the, it's the NEC, only the, only the NEC can like get on Zoom as they
deal with them. But the problem is the NEC don't want to angry the people from the
Council of Provinces who are pretty much responsible for the agenda that is set within
each province, so the moment these guys, these guys start speaking out, the Council of Provinces
people are just going to attack them because they are 1000% pro-Zuma. The only true people who can
like dethrone Zoom are the ANC supporters pretty much. If they were to stand up and, you know,
actually take back their minds instead of following leaders, allowing leaders to impose the political
mindset they should actually start thinking for themselves and decide. And if they were to decide
against the Zoom I believe then it would be a whole lot smoother. So maybe, yeah, this is all
pointless guys, you're wasting your time. For me trying to understand what's been going on has been
rather overwhelming. What's touched me the most is constantly feeling a cultural divide and with
the protest it's shown us how strong that cultural divide really is. I think for me that's, that's
what's touching me more is the people and not the government. The workplace is somewhere that you
spend most of your time really. You know, you come in eight hoppers eight and you leave hoppers five,
like majority of your hours are in this space and what I've been challenged with is how do we invest
in this place and how do we invest in the people around us and then from there start taking that
into your general life. And that's from small interactions from the lady at the till or the
guy that's putting in your petrol or somebody that in the gym change room. How do we connect?
How do we unify? Because what's happening now is a time where we should be united and we're not.
That's what bothers me the most and that people haven't been, they've been complacent for change.
We rely on our government to change things and for time to change things but in that mindset
we become complacent and we don't do things. We don't turn around from everyday actions and
move into something new. For me I think language is a big one. Why is it that a workplace only
speaks English? Why hasn't that changed? Why must others learn English but others mustn't learn Zulu
or Bosa? The question always just goes back to why and is it fair? No, it's not fair. It's not
fair. What's been happening is not fair and the fact that people are feeling that things haven't
been for the people and they will never be for the people so they're just not going to do anything
says a lot about our current situation. It's protests like this that do cause for a voice in
many ways whether that's standing still in silent or going to the streets. Either way this day has
brought about some sort of shift or change into a new perspective or new dialogue. That's where I
think we should be focusing our attention is going. What are the outcomes from a day like today
and how do we implement that into our everyday? I think we tend to focus on the negative so easily
because it's obvious but there's little things that have been happening throughout this week that
are actually positive. They may be hurtful but growth comes through pain and we just need to
keep reminding ourselves and keep recognising that's what it should become. It should become a
lesson for growth, a lesson for unity, a lesson for cultural divide and how we're going to create
those bridges. I think that's kind of where my stance has been. I haven't been investing in news,
I haven't been investing in trying to understand why people are protesting. For me it's been
why are we not united? Why isn't the whole of South Africa fighting for this change?
That's where my heart's been. That's I think where it would always be my heart's always with the
people. It's not focused on the leaders. I prefer not to get too involved with politics in a way
and I would rather prefer getting involved with myself and the people around me.
