Mashele’s solution to problem of racism is pie in sky

Your columnist Prince Mashele’s article, titled “We all have to confront the race issue”, in Sowetan of 26 February, has reference. Mashele writes, “Race is a big factor in South Africa’s public life, yet we only talk about it when some racist has done or said something stupid”.

Let me use some definitions and see if Mashele has used his terminology correctly and understands what it means.

Race is defined as specious classification of human beings created by Europeans (whites) which assigns human worth and social status using ‘white’ as the model of humanity and the height of human achievement for the purpose of establishing and maintaining privilege and power (Ronald Chisom and Michael Washington, Undoing Racism: A Philosophy of International Social Change, People’s Institute Press. People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond. 1997. Second Edition. p. 30–31).

A racist is one who is both privileged and socialised on the basis of race by a white supremacist (racist) system.

By this definition, people of colour cannot be racist, because they do not have the power to back up their prejudices, hostilities or acts of discrimination.

With these definitions, everything that Mashele wrote in his article regarding race is off the mark if we look at the definitions of ‘race’, ‘racist’ and ‘race relations’. Consequently, there is no need to waste space and energy addressing issues which are off the mark.

Mashele also wrote: “It is true that we black people are poor and underdeveloped, largely because of colonialism and apartheid, but getting stuck in the blame game will take us nowhere.”

Who is playing the blame game? Is Mashele trying to say when the Jews were pointing fingers at the Nazis they were playing the blame game? What is he trying to say? How many millions of Africans perished in Africa?

It is interesting how he sneaks in colonialism into his discussion without having mentioned racism or white supremacy in his entire article considering that colonialism, imperialism and capitalism are vices or by-products of white s upremacy (racism).

White supremacy is a historically based, institutionally perpetuated system of exploitation and oppression of continents, nations and peoples of colour by white people; for the purpose of maintaining and defending a system of wealth, power and privilege.

What is Mashele’s proposed solution to this complex issue? Normalising race relations for a better South Africa will require readjusting the white mind and fixing the black mind.

Mashele is implying that the black mind is worse than the white mind. The man has internalised racism.

Mashele is wasting his time, there is no way Africans are not going to demand justice to redress the injustices of the past. He must just forget it.

He believes a lot in magic. Racism is a local and global power system, it is not going to be eradicated through incantations. It must be destroyed.

‘ ‘ There is no way Africans are not going to demand justice to redress injustices of past