The politics of reality

decided that this email i sent to aaron was worth other people reading as well....

so, yeah, i was reading this article in the newspaper today about ex MK and APLA combatants who are now illegal arms dealers in many of the townships, particularly in the Joburg area. craziness. they are selling AK 47s and stuff that were used during the struggle and are left over now. of course now they aren't being used for any political struggle, but instead for ppl who are starving and poor and decide to take up arms against society as criminals in order to survive. it's really nuts. south africa is a fascinating, and sometimes terrifying, country. there are so many issues in the air, and so many things that need to be solved and really analyzed in some very different and new way, because it is beyond obvious that the old ways of doing things are really not working. and that if we dont do something, the future will become a very, very scary thing. even with this guy who was elected head of the PAC (Pan African Congress) ... (Letlapa Mphalele). i totally understand what you're saying that the violence commited by the resistance was different than that committed by the apartheid gov't, and i agree, for sure. but then at the same time you have to realize that the people killed in these massacres (St James Church massacre and Heidelberg Tavern are the 2 that this guy famously ordered... and the church was an interfaith church, and the Tavern was in Obs, which is a very diverse community, just for some context) and think "ok, these people have families too. and they werent the apartheid gov't, they were civilians." so now the fact that he has been elected head of the PAC definitely creates resentment and anger within those ppeople who were affected by those attacks, thereby in some way continuing a kind of racism that says "right, white people killing black people is bad. but black people can kill white people and it's fine." which is definitely not a good message to send, no matter what the history of the country is, ya know?

ah! like i said, very complex. because then what is the solution, ya know? because preventing all of the anti-apartheid activists who took up arms against the govt (and sometimes, esp in the later years, therefore against white people) out of gov't could prevent some very smart, important figures from having a voice in the country. so how do you balance those issues? how do you take into consideration the political direciton of the country and the emotional and psychological realities of actual people at the same time? not easy. and i definitely cannot pretend to have any of the answers.