Media freedom is one of those topics that its easy to raise a consensus around. For those of us that remember that bad days of apartheid, the consequences of a media held back by a government threatened by the truth needs no exposition. It is thus not surprising that there has been a loud and…
In a world of stupid politicians, sometimes the most you can hope for is the opportunity to pay someone to do the right thing. Barely a day goes by in South Africa without someone accusing someone else of being corrupt. Newspapers are filled with scandal after scandal involving “millions” or “billions” of misappropriated funds; we…
Whatever the truth of the backward and forward between Judge Richard Goldstone and the Sandton Shul is, the heated words that have made it into the press speak of a major blowup behind the scenes. True to form, the community, in the guise of the Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein, has made a belated attempt to…
This week saw the news that the UK government is considering shutting off NHS benefits for homeopathic treatment. Their argument is simple: there is no evidence that homeopathy works, so why should we be using taxpayers’ money to pay for people to use it? The notion that homeopathy is bunk may come as a surprise…
In a world buckling under economic recession, in a country of violence and crime and poverty, how can anyone find the time to care about the treatment of animals? The simple answer is: we have no choice. The very fabric of our humanity is being torn apart by the brutality and horrors being perpetrated, and…
Is ZA News much needed political satire, or more tired fuel already smouldering fires? ZA News, based on the UK’s Spitting Image from years back, is a new internet-only TV show that uses the cartoon images created by cartoonist Zapiro to inspire a bunch of beautifully built puppets of South Africa’s politicians and public figures….
South Africans are the worst kind of bipolar sufferers: put some bleeding guy with an oblong-shaped ball on a patch of grass and the entire country clings to one another like chewing gum to an economy-class table. But raise the topics of crime or politics and we’re ready to go to war with one another…
Losing South Africans to alleged international paradises of peace and tranquility is tantamount to the painful, but unavoidable, removal of a cancer from the human body. We are left weakened, saddened and worse-off, but with a remaining chance to live a full and happy life. The current available emigration statistics are reportedly unreliable and sound…
Living in South Africa is exhausting. We are always one small step away from mass hysteria. Or that, at least, is the impression you’d get if you based your knowledge entirely on the news media, Tuesday being the most recent and vivid example. Now, it’s understandable that if big political events take place the media…
This past weekend I decided to buy a new couch for my home. Wearied of endless trips to Fourways, battling through the traffic, wasting petrol, dodging Metro Police roadblocks, I decided to check out online catalogues for the stores before traipsing off there. Genius. First port of call: Google. Search “couches johannesburg”, “furniture johannesburg”, “couches”,…
