White Privilege - A Double Standard
Written by: Douglas White
This whole racism debacle going on in South Africa today smacks of political opportunism at its worst.
The same standard should apply for all who espouse racism no matter how eloquently they splutter it. Just because someone is not literary trained enough to disguise their bigotry does not mean those much more eloquent are not equally guilty of causing irreparable harm to the dignity and reputations of individuals and social groups. There are those who have perfected the art of smearing - they get away with their bigotry and racist slander in the media every day. All in the name of exposing “white privilege”. This from respected journalists, political analysts, bestselling authors and the like.
The general consensus is that only white people are racist, power hungry and war-mongering; all the while, being the perpetual and willing socio-economic beneficiaries of apartheid. I think not…
Did white South Africans under apartheid have freedom of expression, freedom of association and abounding economic opportunity? In reality apartheid had very much a degenerative effect on white people - socially, politically, economically and not to mention, psychologically and ethically. Together the Immorality Act and functional autarky made sure of this. A gradual diluting of basic human rights further ensured the survival of the fascist nationalist state. This is not to say there were not and are not still those who prefer it this way. Racism most definitely has support among white people. What is not as quickly admitted is support for racism among black people.
Apartheid hurt all of us, blacks far more than whites and, paradoxically, we have all benefited from apartheid, whites far more than blacks.
“Whiteness" or "white privilege” is racist speak - it is hate speech. All who espouse such should be brought up on charges of crimen injuria and reported to the South African Human Rights Commission. Ethnicity and skin colour are by their very nature amoral and removed from the individual's ethics. Intellectually distributed meaning and inferred morality give these things life; the reason is often not without political motive.
Upholding the "white privilege" worldview removes any chance of the different race-groups becoming allies. One is left with a skewed version of reality, that is: having white skin in South Africa makes one unreservedly privileged and complicit with the past race warfare and therefore morally compromised. For what? Being white, that’s it! It sets up blackness as being the moral standard and the more normative state of being. It is racism.
The dictionary description of racism is: "the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics, abilities, or qualities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races".
They say anti-black racism is historic and the "white privilege" argument is therefore contingent and cannot be construed as racist. This is a weak dodge and intellectually pathetic. Racism is racism… Do we need to experience a genocide in order to say anti-white racism is a thing?
The white privilege argument is being deliberately skewed to advantage the leftist way of thinking. A kind of craving for the stable supply of "white racists" and "bigots" in order to legitimise their political identity.
The more these kinds of attitudes are published, the more it feeds whiteophobia. The more it plays into the hands of the extreme left.
Whiteophobia: The irrational fear of that which is perceived to have originated from white people - whiteness. Whiteophobia manifests itself involving the perceptions of an in-group (non-whites or blackness) toward an out-group (whiteness), including the fear that white people cannot be trusted, and fear that all white people are intrinsically racist and morally bankrupt. It includes the fear of losing absolute political power and involves the suspicion of all white activity and their involvement in government. Whiteophobia is often accompanied by an overwhelming desire to eliminate the presence of whiteness to secure the in-groups socio-political agenda and ethnic hegemony. Whiteophobia often ascribes stereotyped qualities to the out-group (whiteness) that, when taken on as absolute truth by the majority of the in-group, can result in genocidal action on the part of the in-group towards the out-group.
All who live in South Africa today are now equal - our constitution guarantees it. “Equality includes the full and equal enjoyment of all rights and freedoms.” However, an irrational dimension of this understanding is thrown around today. It goes something like this: "because we are equal, it is only logical that I should expect to gain the same wealth and resources as the other. After all, those privileged whites never earned it and that makwerekwere stole it".
In South Africa today, with resources and opportunity being particularly scarce, competition between similarly determined people unescapably will lead to conflict in one way or another. Those more productive will rise to the top. Green-eyed idle people wanting what they don't want to work for. The xenophobic attacks are a direct result of this cause.
Equal rights means a person has a right to support his life by his own work, legally, and rationally. It does not mean that others (the government included) must provide you with the requirements of life, no matter how history has played out.
The white privilege argument is really just an attempt at argument by intimidation. It replaces a discussion of the merits (the truth or falsehood) of a given idea with a menacing accusation - you are a racist. The worst form of crime if practiced by a white person and an inalienable right if practiced by a black person. It is intended to make one’s opponents retreat, protesting that they didn’t mean it. Mean - what? Its function is to hide or cover up some uncomfortable truth about their (your antagonists') essential identity. In this case, as it were, the fact that they themselves are in fact motivated by a supremacist viewpoint of their essential identity.
Douglas White (a pen-name) is a Johannesburg-based IT specialist and laissez-faire capitalism advocate with an interest in ethical philosophy, sociology, psychology and the martial arts.