The trial of Oscar Pistorius has turned into a horror movie, bringing home the reality of an alleged femicide, and the trauma of crime in South Africa. In the hero’s tale, the villain brings conflict until the hero is able to resolve. State prosecutor Gerrie Nel has undertaken this heroism in the courtroom at the […]
Reeva Steenkamp
Posted inEquality, News/Politics
Resistant whiteness: On Pistorius, Memela and the dead bodies of women
Sandile Memela recently issued an apology to “countrymen” in the form of Dr Piet Mulder, The Freedom Front Plus, The FW de Klerk Foundation “and everyone who was offended” by his article “Oscar would be a hero if Reeva were a black man”. In the article, Memela questions if Reeva Steenkamp were a black man, […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
The real face of violence in South Africa
By Dariusz Dziewanski Violence in South Africa is nothing new. Both the devastating effects of violence, and the risk factors underlying it, have existed before the Oscar Pistorius trial and will continue to exist after it. What will cease to exist is a media and public fascination with violence. As interest wanes, violence will no […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
Mrs Khumalo, your daughter is not Reeva
Am I the only guy in this country who is fed up with black agony, pain and suffering being reduced to a sideshow? What is happening here is that black people are increasingly becoming invisible. Where is the outrage? We should be screaming prejudice, discrimination, unequal treatment and racism when the trial of the State […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Oscar would be a hero if Reeva were a black man
[For an update to this post see An apology to my fellow countrymen by Sandile Memela] Would Oscar Pistorius be on trial for murder if Reeva Steenkamp had turned out to be a black man? In fact, on Valentine’s Day last year when Pistorius fired four fatal shots at close range through a locked bathroom […]
Posted inGender violence
Oscar Pistorius and how Valentine’s Day kills
Today is Valentine’s Day — a day when capitalist consumption and heteronormative myth-making are in full swing: red roses (for the women, of course), images of happily-ever-after coupling (mostly of a heterosexual bend), and the coming together of brand “Hetero-Love” in a frenzy of consumerism and schmaltz. This day is yet another consummation of a […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Pistorius case highlights the failings of social media
Oscar Pistorius is an inspirational icon whose fierce love for his woman inadvertently had nightmarish consequences. That’s what the cloyingly vociferous fans on his website would have us believe. Oscar Pistorius is an ego-on-stilts with temper issues which, due to his arrogance, inevitably resulted in violence. That’s what his detractors punt on social media sites […]
Posted inEquality, Gender violence, News/Politics
Behind the shock and awe, the violence is ‘normal’
The murders of miners at Marikana by brutal state apparatus, the rape and murder of Anene Booysen by a group of men, and the killing of Reeva Steenkamp by her male lover have common threads. All three reflect a confluence of systems of violence that span centuries. Each is a product of past and prevailing […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
The Oscar Pistorius case: Time magazine is wrong, Lulu is right
Two mainstream media companies have turned the Oscar Pistorius case into an opportunity to ruminate on the perils of post-white rule. Time magazine and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) have both in their recent coverage used Pistorius’s defence to weigh in on the South African “culture of violence”. It is notable that these media companies […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Would stricter gun control have saved Reeva?
So Lulu Xingwana thinks we need better gun control. “Domestic violence is exacerbated by easy access to guns. We are making a call for stricter gun control,” she said at a media briefing last week. “As a country we need to wage a sustained and effective campaign against the availability of guns in our homes […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Anene, Reeva media frenzy reveals a nation’s shallowness
For the past three weeks we have been treated to a feeding frenzy around the deaths of two women due to violence in South Africa, by the media, by politicians and by commentators (myself included). But I am wondering if we are not losing sight of what is really at stake here. As a commissioner […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Where were you when you heard the news?
I was somewhere outside Frankfort on my way to the Clarens Craft Beer Festival when I heard the ruling. I can’t be sure exactly, but I know I was on the R26 and there were potholes, and SAFM was the only station I could pick up. 702 had kept me company from Johannesburg, onto the […]