In John Fowles’s novel, Daniel Martin (Triad Grafton, 1978), there is a wonderfully revealing passage as far as humourless politicians are concerned – the type that justifiably comprises the butt of comedians’ jokes. Dan and Jane (an old friend and one-time lover who accompanies him on a work-related trip to Egypt) are at a dinner-party […]
General
Posted inEquality, General, News/Politics
Julian Assange and injustice
Some time recently, someone sent me a WhatsApp message contrasting the political positions of Julian Assange of Wikileaks and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook. Underneath photographs of these two gentlemen, respectively, they read as follows: “Hi, I’m Julian Assange. I give private information on corporations & gov’t to you for free and the media calls me […]
Posted inEquality, Gender violence, General, News/Politics
Inxeba reveals the paradox of our own wounds
I have been gay for as long as memory serves me. I vividly remember spending the bulk of my formative years vacillating between denial and self-hate; from a young age I somehow knew that acting on my romantic feelings would come at the unbelievably high cost of shaming my family, my friends, and my culture. It […]
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The present ‘world dis-order’
Bernard Stiegler, referring to the battle for the attention of (particularly young) users of technical devices such as smartphones, writes about the ‘dis-attention’ that results from this. What he has in mind is the manner in which capitalism, not wasting any opportunity for marketing, uses these mnemo-technical devices to disrupt the flow of attention on […]
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I’m sick of us and its making me fat!
They say that you can never be too rich or too thin. I am neither. I’m very sick. I feel like I’m being smothered. Like I’m drowning. Like I’m dying. I’m sick of: Julius Malema Floyd Shivambu Tom Moyane Bathabile Dlamini Patricia de Lille and the Cape Town City soap opera The gap between rich […]
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Obituary: Prof Bame Nsamenang, committed humanist and leader in African psychology
It is with great sadness that the world heard of the passing of Professor Bame Nsanemang on February 2018. He was one of Africa’s great psychologists. A doyen of developmental science, whose lifelong commitment to building a discipline responsive to the needs of all of the people of the world, he will be sorely mourned […]
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The question of heterotopia and/as dystopia
The term, ‘heterotopia’, was used by Michel Foucault in a brief text – titled ‘Of other spaces’ – published in Architecture /Mouvement/ Continuité (October, 1984; translated from the French by Jay Miskowiec). It is a richly suggestive text, although academics who can’t deal with poststructuralist thinkers’ complex writings have generally derogated it with all kinds […]
Posted inEquality, General, Media
The craving for power
The hankering after power is as old as human beings; no, older – it is as old as the first unicellular being that emerged from the primeval morass of evolution. After all, like all organisms since then, it would have tried its primitive best to survive, to stave off death. And isn’t that already an […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, Equality, Gender violence, General, Health, Lifestyle, Media, News/Politics, Sport, Tech
Hey Bibi, Hey Bibi, Hey
Hey Bibi, Hey Bibi, Hey! What do they Say Bibi, Say Bibi, Say? Oh Bibi, Oh Bibi, Oh! So Bibi, So Bibi, So? That you’re crooked like a question mark That you’re dining on public like a lark That you’re turning greased wheels for greased ends That you’re taking gifts from well heeled friends That […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, Equality, General, Health, Tech
Optimism vs. realism regarding the future
The TIME magazine of 15 January, 2018, titled ‘The Optimists’, is edited by Bill Gates, one of the two richest individuals on the planet – this alone already (at least partly) explains his optimism, which is understandably not necessarily shared with people in positions of less economic power. Reading it is an object lesson in […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, Equality, Gender violence, General, Health, Lifestyle, Media, News/Politics, Sport, Tech
Please release Ahed Tamimi and Ahed Tamimi’s family
Office of the Prime Minister Israel pmo.gov.il United Nations Amnesty International Re: Ahed Tamimi Dear Prime Minister, My correspondence of 26th January 2018, 4th February 2018, 11th February 2018 and 18th February 2018 refers. Please release Ahed Tamimi and Ahed Tamimi’s family. Yours sincerely, Avishkar Govender Durban, KZN, South Africa [email protected]
Posted inEquality, General, Health, News/Politics
The decline of the American Empire
It is no exaggeration to say that America ain’t what it used to be. Several articles I have read recently indicate this, whether they focus on Trump’s disastrous presidency, on social or educational matters. One in particular caught my attention yesterday (see here), and another this morning (see here), both of which draw one’s attention […]