SA still needs to overcome racism

If anyone doubted whether we are a sporting nation or not you needed to take note of last weekend. Kaizer Chiefs versus Sundowns, South Africa versus Ireland in the Rugby World Cup and Pirates versus Stellenbosch on Sunday.

The usual football banter was in full swing and it is showing no sign of abating almost a week later. The banter although fierce, is generally good natured and has no prospect of creating lasting acrimony between the rival fans.

In our stadiums there has never been a necessity, unlike everywhere else in the world, to separate rival fans because our football has never been tribally fierce as it is in Europe and elsewhere.

In SA you may find members of the same family supporting rival teams. I am a lifelong Kaizer Chiefs supporter, my eldest son supports Pirates, my wife supports Sundowns and my youngest son vacillates between Chiefs and Pirates.

I get a lot of banter whenever Chiefs loses and I do the same when it is my turn. Contrast this with whenever rugby national team and to some extent the Proteas play.

Racially charged discussions, to put it mildly, kick in. All you have to do is to read underneath any rugby or cricket report on social media and you will see this ugly side of our country rear its ugly head.

It seems like a lot of people were left behind in 1994 and they secretly pine for the ‘good old days’ when everyone ‘knew their place’.

The era when no one disturbed them while playing ‘their sport’ as it happens now with ‘kwotas’ as they call it.

Add this the contingent of our society who call themselves ‘All Black supporters’ whatever that means.

Suddenly, you can see that as much as we may pretend to be a “Rainbow Nation’ as Mandela dubbed us, we have a long way to go.

As we close the Heritage Month it leaves us with a lot of questions. If we were so united, how come a simple thing like a rugby or cricket game can turn us against one another so easily?

The vitriol thrown at a black Manie Libbok has been awful but shamefully not unexpected.

A flyhalf is like the quarterback in Gridiron in America and until recently, it was a preserve of white players.

Apartheid has done a lot of damage to the mentality of people.

We need to go deep into the problem like Germany did after Nazism.

They effectively dealt with it — made Holocaust denialism a crime and have made sure that every German child learns the truth so that nothing like that ever happens again.

Our approach was to put a bandage over the wound and not deep clean it.

This is why racists, even in public platforms, have been emboldened.

The incompetence we see in government is hampering rather than help towards this goal.

What heritage are leaving behind for our children, I wonder.