Tag: race

The implicit racism of ‘All lives matter’

Men holding signs reading “Black Lives Matter” march in the 30th annual Kingdom Day Parade in honour of Dr Martin Luther King Jr. on January 19 2015 in Los Angeles. (Pic: AFP)

Last week, I stumbled across a BuzzFeed video of children from black families reminiscing about their parents’ struggles to put them through school and give them better lives. They talked of exceptional sacrifices: a mother who went without food to feed her sons, another who left a dancing career because of childbirth, or even the absentee father who made a point of always being there for his son. They spoke of retired parents rejoining the workforce to make enough money to get their children through college and of a mother sacrificing relationships because she wanted to avoid turmoil for her children. Like every normal person, I was moved by these stories and touched by the depth of sacrifice these parents made, as well as the gratitude their children exhibited. My disappointment in humanity however was awakened when I scrolled down to read the comments: “Are you going to make a thing about white families sacrificing for their kids too?” asked one user. “As parents we all make sacrifices for our children,” said another. There is something systemically off with these lines of thinking.

First, it is indisputable that all parents make some level of sacrifice for their children. Whether it is the discomfort of waking up in the middle of the night to check their crib, or forgoing something for the sake of their young ones. Nobody denies this. But the problem with the statements above lies in their complete ignorance of historical context. When the video showed black children remembering their parents’ struggles, it did not negate other people’s struggles. It does not mean that because they had difficult childhoods, then everyone else had it easy. When one story is told in positive light, it does not inevitably send everything else in darkness. Thus, the people who felt some level of bias in the story missed a crucial part of American history. History is not comparative in its telling, it is not linear in its production and neither is it singular in perspective.

This idea of sameness of struggle is usually echoed in response to the “Black Lives Matter” movement that sprung up after a number of police shootings in the United States. The same people who disregard America’s racial history want it to be said that “All Lives Matter.” But in reality, that statement in itself is an oxymoron and asserting it as true is nothing less than insincere on the part of its proponents. If all lives did matter, then the American justice system would be a completely different scene today. But all lives don’t matter, because American history is one of intended and completed racialisation of minority populations, especially black people.

Eric Garner and Tamir Rice are not victims of circumstance; they are a disclosure of successful policy implementation. American history is white history. The same country that declared “all men are created equal,” propagated slavery. If it was self-evident that some men were more equal than others in the founding of America, isn’t it logical that they still would not gain equality in the building of America? Whether it is America’s Prison Industrial Complex, or the Japanese Internment, whether COINTELPRO and the Black Panthers, or the Federal Housing Agency and Colour Coding (aka Redlining) which led to the rise of the Projects, American history was the active disenfranchisement of one racial group at the expense of another. The ideology of racial supremacy that founded the United States informed policy and led to the current injustices facing the black person.

If one is not a minority, they have probably benefited from the policies that allowed their families to own a home when other families could not because the FHA would not subsidise their mortgages since they lived in yellow or red lined zones. My point is not that people who are racialised as white are automatically racist, but they have benefited – whether intentionally or unwittingly – from the historical injustices of racism.

It is only in failing to understand this fact that you can hastily declare that all lives matter, and thereby repeat the incongruities in the founding documents of the American state. You will not understand that poverty breeds a social bubble in which violence is the only outpouring of economic frustration, because you have never needed to be violent. If you have only been on one side of history, you will never understand what it means to bend the arc of history toward justice when your opponent has power on their side. You will not easily wrap your head around the fact that at some point, this history shows itself in modern life; that this context paints the black life in all shades and hues. So, we could probably make a video of white children talking of their parent’s struggles after the housing bubble of 2008, or even of those white innocent people who die of police brutality. But we cannot account for their history because it has been the only history that has been told. What of that one police officer who likes black children? Or what of the fact that you have black friends? Or what of the fact that you have been to Africa? If you think these can erase the fundamental flaws and systemic injustices created in the writing and telling of American history, you are part of the problem.

Franklyn Odhiambo is an alumni of the African Leadership Academy, and a student of Political Science and Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Kenyan.

9 years ago

South African black doll breaks the mould in high style

Maite Makgoba, the founder of Childish Trading and Manufacturing (AFP)

She is black and trendy, and young South African girls are learning to love her.

Meet Momppy Mpoppy, who is a step ahead of other black dolls across Africa who are often dressed in traditional ethnic clothes.

Decked out in the latest fashions and sporting an impressive Afro, complete with a tiara, Momppy could play her own small part in changing the way that black children look at themselves.

Maite Makgoba, founder of Childish Trading and Manufacturing, said she started her small business after realising that black dolls available on the market “did not appeal to children”.

“They were frumpy and unattractive, some in traditional attire. That is not the reality of today,” said the 26-year-old entrepreneur.

The dolls are assembled in China, but the real work starts in Makgoba’s tiny workspace in downtown Johannesburg, where they are styled and packaged before they are sent to independent distributors.

Inside the two-room warehouse, miniature pieces of clothing are sewn and pressed by hand. Appearance is everything.

Eye-catching ballerina skirts, denim pants and “on trend” jumpsuits with bright high heels are some of the items in Momppy Mpoppy’s impressive wardrobe.

Among the different Mpoppy outfits are “Denim Dungaree Delicious”, “Rockstar Tutu”, “Mohawk Fro” and “Seshweshwe Fabolous” — with each doll costing R180 rand.

To complete the experience, the company also makes matching clothes for girls who own the doll.

“This is more than just a business, we are creating awareness, that our dark skin and thick Afro hair are pretty as they are,” said Makgoba.

“We want kids to see beauty in Mpoppy, to see themselves while playing with her.

“Dolls are often white, people in magazines are white, even in a country like South Africa where the majority are black.

“Black children are confronted with growing up in a world that does not represent them, everything is skewed towards whiteness.”

Body image
Makgoba admits that the fledging company which she started in 2013 faces a stiff competition from established toy brands, but she was encouraged by the “overwhelming response” from buyers.

“Parents and children have quickly taken to the doll. But we still need to convince large retailers to sell our brand,” she said, declining to reveal exact sales numbers.

Nokuthula Maseko, a 30-year-old mother of two, said her children had “fallen in love with the unusual doll” after she came across it on social media — the company’s biggest marketing tool.

“I like the fact that the doll looks like my kids, in a world where the standards of beauty are often liked to Caucasian features,” said Maseko.

“The kids love the doll.”

“This is a big social movement … it can help prevent body image insecurity among children,” she added.

But the Johannesburg mother said she was not in a hurry to throw away her kid’s white dolls.

“At school they play with their white friends, so this is my idea of maintaining that realism, so that they are aware of different races and not that everything is just white and only looks a certain way,” she said.

Black dolls are not new, but the African market has for a long time been flooded with white dolls, creating an image of porcelain skin perfection with long shiny tresses.

The iconic 57-year-old Barbie range has dominated global sales, selling over one million a week globally — including a selection of black dolls.

It’s a tough challenge to build a brand name for start-up companies like Makgoba’s and others such as Queen of Africa, a popular black doll from Nigeria who is kitted out in ethnic attire.

According to Johannesburg child psychologist Melita Heyns, toys have a long-term influence on children.

“It’s not just entertainment … dolls are a big part of a girl child’s life, it’s important that such toys help build a child’s character and self-esteem,” said Heyns.

Mpoppy’s creators plan to export to neighbouring African countries, changing young mindsets one doll at a time. – By Sibongile Khumalo

9 years ago

Madonna, Malawi and the problem with celebrity adoptions

Twitter was recently ablaze with criticism over Madonna posting a photo of her adopted black Malawian children, David Ritchie and Mercy James, rubbing her feet.

In the image which she posted on Instagram, Madonna is lying on the floor with the children kneeling on the ground in front of her, as they each rub a foot. The caption reads, “#motherlove… how I’m gonna get through the day. Mercy and David give the best foot rubs!! #rebelhearts.”

(Screenshot)

Regardless of the fact that Madonna has been raising these children as her own since 2009, some of Madonna’s fans and the general public found it offensive that she would post the pic of them massaging her feet. The photo sparked outrage on Twitter with where the argument was made that she is treating them as slaves.

On the other hand, there were also Black and Latino women who were not offended by the photo, responding that this is a “normal” act of love that occurs between a mother and her children, stating that they only saw an innocent expression of love by both Madonna and her children. Such a seemingly “innocent” act is by no means uncomplicated when it comes to Madonna.

Her preferred method of making the headlines lately, seems to focus on stirring racial tensions in order to get publicity. Last year, she caused similar controversy by posting an Instagram photo of her white son, Rocco Ritchie, in the boxing ring with a caption reading, “No one messes with Dirty Soap! Mama said knock you out! #disnigga.” In doing so, many of her critics wondered how then, was she addressing her black son, David? Her response was to brush them off as “haters”.

Given such a response, either the pop star is a racist or she is oblivious to historical and contemporary race relations or she is simply insensitive about them – all which are problematic for a parent raising black children in a world where racial hierarchies are still prevalent.

Another and perhaps more plausible reason was that she is doing it for publicity. Madonna – never one to shy from controversy – was very aware of the message, meaning and reaction she would get by posting both of these photos.

Why this photo angered so many

When a rich white woman from the Global North adopts poor black kids from the Global South, one needs to consider what the historical structures that lead to this situation are. This includes the inequality in global racial, social, political and economic relationships. When critics saw this photo it reminded them of these historical injustices that are still permeate our societies.

Although some who saw the photo commented that ‘racism’ is a part of the past, it is not and shouldn’t be treated as a relic in the backdrop of a world where black churches are target of hate crimes in the country of Madonna’s birth.

Colonialism is also not a relic of the past because neo-colonial relationships exist in this new global world order that keeps “Third world” countries poor and in need of interventions such as “aid” and “adoption” whilst protecting the interests of the Global North and its businesses. To some, Madonna’s actions are a simple extension of the colonial processes. She is an epitome of the “Great White Savior complex” in which a white savior comes to “save” Africans from themselves, their land, but causes damage to Africans along the way.

Madonna in Malawi

Since the day she set foot in Malawi, her entire involvement there, including the adoption of the children and the building of the schools has been controversial at worst and deceptive at best. Madonna has caused her fair share of damage in Malawi in her attempts to “save” Malawi. This has been covered by the media, including Malawian journalist Mabvuto Banda, who meticulously chronicles Madonna’s involvement there.

The star circumvented the country’s adoption laws due to her position as a rich celebrity from the U.S, the Kabbalah center which was affiliated with her charity was being investigated for tax fraud by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS); she hired a PR company who scapegoated Malawian employees for being “corrupt” when her money for her academy went missing. Prior to this, she had colluded with the Malawi government to displace villagers for the school that never materialised; and she then said she would build smaller scale schools but built a handful of structures, most of which were classrooms which she called “schools”. Many of her actions involving Malawi speak to a rich celebrity who feels very much entitled in her transactions with Malawian people.

US pop diva Madonna sits among Malawian children during a visit to the Mkoko Primary School, one of the schools Madonna’s Raising Malawi organisation has built jointly with US organization BuildOn. (Pic: AFP)

Not that every single international adoptions involving rich white celebrities from the global north adopting poor African children is problematic. Madonna did not have a seamless Angelina Jolie-style adoption. It was a Madonna-style one – filled with controversy. In light of the aforementioned controversies in Malawi, when pictures of her using Malawian kids to rub her feet surfaced, it was likely to make some people uncomfortable. The photo was a commentary on much larger issues surrounding Madonna’s involvement in Malawi, and more specifically international adoptions there.

International adoptions

Rather than being quick to celebrate that someone has come and “saved” children who would otherwise have lived a life of squalour, we need to look at the larger implications of international adoptions for Malawi. There are “bigger issues” such as consideration for the welfare of adopted children.

Malawi has a real problem with international child trafficking where children are sold as sex slaves, sex workers or otherwise are exploited for their labour. Therefore, in a country susceptible to such dealings, when a seemingly ‘innocent’ foot rub surfaces, it may very well remind some people of the thousands of adopted children from African nations who are exploited for their labour under the guise of ‘adoption’.

Of course, many have argued that Madonna can afford to hire workers in the service industry to provide services such as massages to her. However, exploitation and abuse of children is not an invention of the poor, nor limited to them – it can happen anywhere and in many forms. The abuses suffered by MacKenzie Phillips at the hand of her own celebrity father is one example of how money is not a determinant of parental abuse.

To argue that it is impossible for a rich celebrity to abuse the labour or services of a child is simply absurd – particularly a child that they adopted. The whole situation was strangely reminiscent of Cinderella – with Madonna in the role of the evil step mother who works her adopted step child to the bone. Although unlikely, one can only hope that David and Mercy are not secretly living a life of service to the material girl.

Madonna’s actions are not benign. She knew what controversy she would stir by posting it. She has never posted such photos showing her biological children doing this. Most likely, the sole purpose for posting the photo was for publicity. The Instagram photo made reference to the hashtag “#rebelhearts” – the name of her new album. This speaks to an attempt by a celebrity to shamefully use race and privilege in order to get some attention.

Sitinga Kachipande is a blogger and PhD student in Sociology at Virginia Tech with an African Studies concentration. Her research interests include tourism, development, global political economy, women’s studies, identity and representation. Follow her on Twitter: @MsTingaK

10 years ago

The Rachel Dolezal fiasco: Are we all just playing at race?

Rachel Dolezal. (Pic: AFP)

I am a Puerto Rican Jamaican of Chinese decent. Well that’s not technically true but in a post Rachel Dolezal world it could be.

The recent ‘outing’ of the ex-NAACP Washington branch president who’s been accused of falsely portraying herself as a black woman has the world once again grappling with notions of race, culture appropriation and to what extent Elvis and Eminem stole black music.

After being ‘exposed’, Rachel Dolezal has said that she identifies as black. ‘I definitely am not white’. She has said that she’s always seen herself as black to the extent she used the ‘brown skinned crayon ‘ when drawing herself as a child. However, her parents refute this claim, saying she probably had not even met any black people during this ‘artistic period’ of her youth.

Her past as a little white girl who possibly knew no black people did not stop her from becoming a pretty prolific ‘black woman’ who went on to lecture about the Black Power movement, release statements on movies about black history and hold a leading role in one of America’s top advocacy groups that champions the rights of African Americans.

Debate has raged on about what it is that can make a person change race – rather than what makes one engage in a gross act of appropriation. What does it mean to be x race? When Micheal Jackson changed skin colour, was he still black?

When we speak of ‘white trash’ or ‘black excellence’ who is it that are included in these and other racialised categories?

We cannot ignore the fact that to some extent race is very superficial in nature: it is how you look. As much as I may want to be a pretty white blonde girl I cannot be because people will take one look at my mocha skin and be like ‘sugar honey bear you are not a white girl’. I may be able to possibly pull off blonde, but not white.

However, one must also consider the performative aspects of race, the behavioural aspects that are supposedly indicative of a race. For example, when Julius Malema once lashed out at a BBC journalist, saying ‘don’t come here with that white tendency’, many people instantly knew – or thought they knew – what he meant. Of course, not everyone would have the same ideas but the notion of a core group of ideas remains. Personally, I always think of white tendencies as the ability to go from zero to call your manager in five seconds flat, but this could be a side effect of having lived in Cape Town for too long.

Back to the Dolezal matter. What does having the ‘right criteria’ to belong to a certain race entail when there are so many ideas that come with it? To her credit, Dolezal embodied what it is to be a black woman to such an extent that no one called her out on it for over a decade. Her track record is quite impressive. She studied at the traditionally black Howard University and did her Master’s thesis in Fine Art as a series of paintings presented from the perspective of a black male, focusing on the journey of what went on inside the mind of a black male.

Not to mention she kept her hair game on fleek, as the youth like to say. One friend went on record saying that ‘she would have fooled you too.’

(I haven’t managed three years without being called out on something that would qualify me as being a ‘white girl’, having only now been saved by my dreadlocks and love of smooth jazz.)

However the deeper question is: has this need to keep the notion of racial traits pure left us with something lacking nuance and depth? For example, to say something is black in nature is somewhat tricky because is it African American or African? Is it Nigerian in nature or Rwandese or North African? Or does it have a Bob Marley Jamaican feel to it?

The Dolezal fiasco makes me question what it means to be a certain race. What does it mean for these fixed categories when some can blur the lines to such an extent? For all intents and purposes Dolezal had all the makings of a black woman: the integration into a community, the family, the academic credentials and the lived experience by being at the heart of the black struggle movement. Heck, she even had the hair and we all know how important hair politics are to the average black woman.

Thus in light of all this, did she lie by saying that she was black?

What we should be focusing on is not the way in which race can sometimes be ‘put on’ or ‘taken off’ but the way in which there are consequences to ‘wearing’ this supposedly ‘non-existent’ identity. Race, like any other identity, does not exist in a vacuum as something one can simply don and or take off with no consequence or context. It exists within a larger framework that works to create a hierarchy, privileging some over others.

The Dolezal case has exposed the fundamental discomfort we all feel: the notion that some people can cross this line, and manoeuvre within this structure at their own ease whilst others remain chained to it, unable escape the consequences of racial societal forces.

When people talk about how race does not really exist they discount the reality that has been borne in notions of racial identity. To do so is to deny the historical and contemporary structure that makes skin bleaching a multibillion-dollar industry, the history that made slavery, apartheid and colonisation possible, and how this history plays out today. It is to deny occurrences such as #BlackLivesMatter and debates that stem from #JeSuisCharlie (or JeNeSuisPasCharlie). It has the possibility of discounting the fact that when millions of Africans die they are simply a number, but when one French couple is murdered it is international news.

It denies the nuances, inequalities and hierarchies in existence that affect people’s lives daily, that mean the difference for some between life and death, being afforded humanity or not.

The Dolezal case not only shows us the ghostly nature of the racial structure but also to what extent many of us are unable to escape this ethereal jail that we have built ourselves. This is what scares us the most. We have realised we are trapped in something that fundamentally does not exist, but still we have no real way of escaping it. Those who sometimes attempt it do it extremely badly (here’s looking at you, Iggy Azalea) while those who succeed in blurring the lines are met with scorn and suspicion.

Kagure Mugo is a freelance writer and co-founder and curator of holaafrica.org, a Pan-Africanist queer women’s collective which engages in activism and awareness-building around issues of African women’s identity, experiences and sexuality. Connect with her on Twitter: @tiffmugo

11 years ago

Race and racism in the Republic of Cape Town

(Pic: Gallo)

Cape Town is so conservative. It’s not surprising then that the rest of the country calls it “The Republic” – a country not quite a part of the so-called new South Africa. You don’t have to look far to see whom Cape Town caters for. Just take a short drive from Vredehoek to Khayelitsha, as a start. If you’re not the driving type, take one of those cute red tour buses, plug in those nifty little earphones and learn the unpalatable history of this city, said with such timid self-awareness so as not to give away what nearly every Capetonian knows – that Cape Town is still divided along racial lines.

Anyone who lives in the city centre will vehemently deny this although it’s evidently clear, from the racial makeup of boardrooms and suburbs to those who are left to enjoy the city after 5pm. It is an awkward contradiction for a city that desperately wants to be seen as a progressive “World Design Capital”. Unless by design it means the invisible lines that run across the city, dividing it into specific racial areas: the whites in affluent suburbs and the CBD, the blacks and the coloureds in the townships; a spatial arrangement akin to that of a chest drawer with distinct shelves and compartments that contain each puzzle piece of Cape Town in its place – except for the bergies and buskers who seem intolerable nuisances. (Remember the assault of a blind busker by police last year?)

The other not-so-famous incidents include a “private function” policy at certain bars, such as Asoka, where black people have the unfortunate position of being turned away at the door once the colour quota has been reached. There was also that interesting piece of journalism by the Cape Argus, last year, which uncovered what was evidently a stated preference for white tenants by property owners in suburbs around the City Bowl. The city has vehemently refuted claims that it’s racist. Here, I must concede that Cape Town isn’t racist – at least not in the classical sense of what we see in documentaries and exhibitions about apartheid. There are no “Whites Only” signs around the city. It must be an unfortunate coincidence then that there are hardly any black people who live in the affluent parts of Cape Town. It must also be an unfortunate coincidence that novelist Teju Cole, in his interview with City Press about the Open Book Fair, stated: “[Cape Town] is a divided society where privilege accrues very much to people who are white and who have money.”

A woman carrying a child walks down an alleyway in Blikkiesdorp (“Tin Can Town” in Afrikaans), a settlement of corrugated iron houses about 25km east of Cape Town. (Pic: AFP)

When I went to the Open Book Fair in Cape Town last September, I nearly tripped over myself when I realised how homogenous the audience was – a pale sea of whiteness jostling around brilliant black writers. I distinctly remember thinking: don’t these white folk find it strange that there are no black people at this event, except for a negligible number of tokens, myself included? Contrast that to the Jozi Book Fair or any art opening showcasing a black artist’s work. Johannesburg, as far as art is concerned, has a more diverse audience; a more informed audience than Cape Town, and a notably larger black middle class. Some attribute this to the economic status of the city but the alternative answers avail themselves easily when you speak to black professionals who are about to relocate to the City Of Gold. Often you’ll hear that there is little or no transformation within the organisations and companies situated in Cape Town. The bosses are white, the tea lady is black, Jabu answers to Chris. In a nutshell, Cape Town companies are run by white males.

As if this wasn’t enough, even the visual arts crowd is predominantly white despite the fact that “nearly two thirds of emerging visual artists under the age of 40, in South Africa, are black” according to Joost Bosland, one of the directors of the Stevenson Gallery in Cape Town . The very people, I presume, these emerging black artists would love to have a conversation with through their work never get to see the work, at all. And the art industry seems perfectly fine with this. Typically, you’ll find a group of black artists doing work that concerns something about them being black but it’s shown in spaces and to people who aren’t quite engaged with the stories being told by the artists; people who appreciate the work from a distance. Some artists struggle with this. I chatted to Mohau Modisakeng, a visual artist, about how race plays out in the arts: “I look at art as a language, a language that functions like any other – using pictures and symbols. And my language is informed by my mother’s story and my father’s story, and how I grew up. I’d say my audience is people who share the similar circumstances in life, whether it’s social, political or economic. They are my ideal audience, but I can’t get to them because of these frameworks that are in place.”

These frameworks are a historical fact that persists to this day. A present reality that is burdened by our history of deliberate social exclusion, which makes for very specific demarcation of the various groups who are in or out, or comfortable or not comfortable in a space; a fact currently at play in this city, sans the apartheid signage. The white man who recently told my friend at the Harley’s Liquor store that he wished “he’d gotten rid of all of you when we had a chance” simply because he thought she was jumping the queue to pay for a bottle of red wasn’t racist – he was being conservative, by Cape Town standards. He just wanted her to know her historic place and to remain in it – and that place is nowhere near him and his lily-white Cape Town CBD.

L.L. Fikeni lives, writes and works in Cape Town.