If Renton hadn’t been a smack junkie, he might have said instead … Choose communism, choose a skill and choose a trade. Choose a kolkhoz. Choose a flippin big factory. Choose washing your clothing with regulation soap. Choose not having cars, compact disc players, electrical tin openers or ribbed condoms. Choose DIY and wondering why […]
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Posted inNews/Politics
De Lille submits rabbi as candidate for Western Cape premier
“Independent Democrat leader Patricia de Lille has confirmed that a Johannesburg rabbi from the northern suburbs will be submitted as their candidate to contest the Western Cape Premiership in the forthcoming elections. Rabbi Alexander Carlebach of the Chabad Synagogue, Lyndhurst, Johannesburg, confirmed that he was joining the party but would not comment on the issue […]
Posted inLifestyle
Black and white and seeing red all over
At first, having returned to Cape Town after years away, I saw red when I saw all the white faces in restaurants and theatres. Where was the real change so many years after 1994? But then I read Sandile Memela’s diatribe against “white” theatre at the Cape, and I started to think. When Memela writes […]
Posted inLifestyle
Are men naturally funnier than women?
The other day I was having a conversation with a friend in which he argued that most women don’t have a sense of humour, and few women are really funny. Which took me back somewhat, given that I’ve always thought that I am quite good at being funny, in conversation. If anything, I was a […]
Posted inGeneral
Will they swear an oath of honesty?
I have since August 2005 had to climb into the open sewer of personality politics — at first without public demonstration, and then latterly, since August 2007, with overt and public demonstration — for the express purpose of sensitising community leaders about ethical leadership and honest corporate and public governance. Perhaps it was my egomania […]
Posted inMedia
I wish more advertising was like this
I’ve always believed in the power of advertising, not just to sell stuff, but to transcend the narrow boundaries of commercial speech, to express joyful creativity or capture a particularly telling insight — and sometimes both. This is especially true in South Africa. Think back to the 1990s, when the little white mouse used the […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Could a UDF ever emerge again?
Over the last week issues have been highlighted in the press regarding support for political parties by the non-profit sector, particularly public benefit organisations. Even the churches have entered the fray, with the obvious example being Rhema, which is classified as a public benefit organisation. According to the tax laws, it should not be supporting, […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Zumagate
South Africans are waking up to news this morning that the National Prosecuting Authority have purportedly been placed in possession of tapes, ostensibly handed over to them by the Zuma team as part of their representations to have the charges against the ANC president dropped, which include tapped telephonic conversations between inter alia former president […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Winnie, taxis and xenophobia
The Independent Electoral Commission has confirmed that Winnie Madikizela-Mandela is entitled to be nominated as a candidate for the African National Congress despite the objections that they have received. This may not be the last word on the issue as the Freedom Front Plus has confirmed that they are taking this matter to the electoral […]
Posted inLifestyle
Men, women, age and double standards
While reading an interview with Barry Hilton, the following revelations about his marriages caught my eye: “Then after I wrote off marriage and cursed it I met my darling Sandy, who is 19 years my junior, but you’d swear she is the older one in the relationship,” he told the interviewer. “When she met me […]
Posted inGeneral
Are Cape theatres alive with the sound of racism?
Being in the New Space Theatre for the first time since the old New Space closed nearly three decades ago — and only hours after reading Sandile Memela’s indictment of supposedly racist Cape theatre — had me wondering about his diatribe and the state of protest theatre right now. (Yes, I know, what protest theatre? […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Dalai Lama debacle as a case study on SA foreign policy
On May 28 last year, Washing Post columnist, Michael Gerson coined a phrase which is finding increasing resonance in the international corridors of power: “Whatever the reasons, South Africa increasingly requires a new foreign policy category: the rogue democracy. Along with China and Russia, South Africa makes the United Nations impotent. Along with Saudi Arabia […]