On Christi van der Westhuizen’s 'Zapiro'/bless his satirical name, 'Zuma'/victim and 'us'/them/women/men

I invite all readers to look at Christi van der Westhuizen’s photo on her blog on Thought Leader. Please note — hopefully without my prior interpretation — that she has chosen a photo where she is looking “down” on you, suggesting she, as a woman, is not looking “up” at you, in other words she is not a victim. But of course it has the “other” meaning of “looking down” on others. In her photograph she is already suggesting othering: herself/us. (And she is the primary in the dichotomy, not the secondary, underlined by her current refusal to dialogue with her “secondary” readers).

“My” photo choice for my blog was obvious (to me); I just didn’t want the public to see my slight double chin, hence the hand. I want to look straight at “them”, be honest, listen and keep my vocabulary reasonably simple, thus implying a willingness to communicate and learn. My wife would not agree that my double chin is merely small. However, I still choose to look directly at my readership in my photo, not down at them. Many readers out “there” are extremely sharp, intelligent and I advise “myself” to do well to respect “their” thinking and “their” ability to find the many flaws in my blog posts. Which they do, and enough with the inverted commas.

The mighty Traps’s blog photo has a Tony Leon-like or Ken Owen-like tough “this-town-isn’t-big enough-for-both-of-us” look, but the mighty Traps is most certainly also honestly looking straight at you and he is inviting commentary on his posts, with the caveat, “if you are out of line, I am going to grill you”. Fair enough: this is why I have not commented on his posts — yet — partly because of a fear of patriarchal, authoritarian figures like criminal lawyers.

Sarah Britten’s photo sweetly invites you in for a cup of coffee and to say whatever you want to say, but underneath the unassuming grin (slightly mischievous but very hospitable – to me) she is easily capable of the most astute observations on South Africa “outside” South Africa. Ooops, sorry, forgot the “ ” rule.

Christi van der Westhuizen’s most serious flaw in her latest post, “Zapiro, Zuma and us” is that she does not do her readership justice. She never replies to her readers. She has implicitly and discourteously created an aloof, arrogant, othering, “looking down” attitude towards her readership. She need not deign to stoop to dialoguing with her commentators. Christi, you had better realise that by not respecting your readership you are being disrespectful and irresponsible in your treatment of people, not the “people” or “women” you invent in your rather grandiose blog, “Zapiro, Zuma and us”.

“Some” of us have actually read Jacques Lacan et al., Christi, and (not to be directly collocated with Lacan) the enormous, enriching variety of radical feminist thinkers available. But their salient dialogues have no direct bearing on the Zapiro (bless his satirical name) cartoon.

Christi van der Westhuizen has used the Zapiro (bhsn) opportunity to take a whack at “us/Zapiro” with her own personal axe-grinder: the secondary status of the man/woman dichotomy. She has not “read” the cartoon; she has only “read” her own axe-grinding agenda: the heinous abuse of women. On the topic of “literal” rape I want be clear: when it comes to raping women, I lobby for bringing back the death sentence. Rape in my mind is right up there with cold-blooded murder and child abuse, and please note, Christi, that I use simple, honest English, not academic-speak, which, though it has its place, tends to obscure the real issues Zapiro (bhsn) is reminding us of.

Christi, I was frightened by your dismissal as almost secondary or tertiary the ANC’s disregard for the judiciary system and its attempt to create exclusionism for the likes of Zuma when you matter-of-factly write, “Meanwhile, the Scorpions are being dismantled as part of the attempt to stop the case” and you don’t pause to think about the terrifying, staggering consequences of the Scorpions’ dismantling as “we” perhaps hurtle towards a Mugabe-like era. By bringing in the subjugation-of-women issue into a context where it does not belong, you do that selfsame, extremely crucial issue serious violence and injustice. I invite you to deign to notice that some of YOUR readers have already pointed out some of my argument on your blog. Yet, incredibly, in keeping with your “looking down on us” photo, you do not communicate with your readership. You remain – tacitly – aloof, arrogant and irresponsibly silent. Aren’t you othering your readers? Othering South Africa?

To use Sarah Britten’s anti-sexist/sexist “go girl” remark, well, Christi, go girl! Speak to us/me. Respond to me/us. Change your photo. I am waiting outside the saloon, with both holsters. The left holster contains the Dhammapada and Chairman Mao’s little red book, my right hand is hovering above Zbignieuw Herbert’s poetry and The Complete Idiot’s guide to Lacan, Judith Butler, Donna Haraway et all. But I actually want to listen to the real you, not the one you portend to be in your misfired blog.

Proposed Christi van der Westhuizen responses, written by Rod MacKenzie(a writer who really wants to get back to his original blog-theme, explaining China to South Africans, and vice versa, but has wittingly/unwittingly been drawn into this discourse):

– Rod, by dichotomously placing me on the right hand side of your Rod/Christi discourse, I am unable to respond as you/they or they/you have defined me as a subjugated woman from the outset in this discourse, so I cannot …
– Rod, when are you going to grow up/mature or mature/grow up? Can’t you see the real issue in the Zapiro cartoon is women, not the way Zuma and the ANC are completely destroying us all … The fact that we are being slowly but surely annihilated is of course totally beside the point. The cartoon is about women, but let us carefully look at that portentous, overly political, collective word, “we”…