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| US President Donald Trump before signing a proclamation to honour Martin Luther King Jr day in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on January 12, 2018 [Joshua Roberts/Reuters] |
This is a response to
the article by Sisonke Msimang (the writer) titled Trump
rage ignores the truth. That article portrays
outrage at Trump’s remarks regarding predominantly black countries as ‘the
folly of victimhood’ and ‘a disappointing reminder that outrage can be
addictive even when it is wholly ineffectual.’ My considered view is that this
article, and others who agree with this view, provide a safe haven for racism
and white supremacy by deflecting attention from the reality of bigotry and its
dangers to our multi-cultural and intercultural society. By legitimating racist
remarks in the context of a genuine discussion on migration, bigotry is not
only justified but actively encouraged as a way to shine a light on issues
affecting society – thereby ignoring its capacity to reduce human worth and set
the scene for violent conflict.
In the article Trump rage ignores the truth, the writer
concedes that Trump is a racist, but proceeds to wonder, ‘why anyone would be
offended by the racism of a known racist.’ This is a shift in the burden of responsibility;
that is to say, the writer presents the view that it is not the historically
dominant people who must refrain from racist attitudes and remarks, but the
historically oppressed who are not to take offense. They must accept the fate
of racist remarks without any outrage; thereby normalizing the abnormal and
encouraging passivity in the face of denigration. Making a case for higher
tolerance of and thus capitulation to bigotry is truly remarkable, more so in
light of the reality that social norms are not self-enforcing and need to be
constantly engaged if they are to be effective. It reinforces the historically
dominant people’s views and the oppression of those that have been historically
marginalized and abused. There can be no reason why bigotry must be tolerated
at all, or whether society should similarly refrain from outrage when hearing reports
of rape by a known/convicted rapist or further evidence of harassment of women
by a male dominated society. It is a truly repulsive suggestion.
The writer also wonders
why people are concerned with Trump’s racism and not ‘the merits or demerits of
the large debate about the role and place of migrants in wealthy countries like
the US.’ Thus imputing an obligation on the historically marginalized and
oppressed to work through the vile foliage of racist remarks to locate legitimate
discussion points. This is oblivious to the power of words. The
(mis)charaterizaion of people has led to repression, domination, extermination
and genocide. The history of the world is replete with the all too nasty
outcomes of allowing people to be viewed as lesser beings, as cockroaches or
their countries as ‘s***y.’ The overwhelming focus on racism is meant to shine
a light on the value of human life, more so those lives which history has not
treated with as much worth as those that are currently denigrating them. It is
wholly insufficient to point to a debate on migration to sanitize and disinfect
patently toxic language which has the effect of dehumanizing people and thus
expose them to racism, xenophobia and the attendant dangers to human life
(genocide, lynching, e.t.c). It is not, as the writer claims about ‘hurting
some feelings’ but preservation of human life.
The writer of the
article wonders why ‘so few people want to address the truth that lies at the
heart of Trump's statements…Poor people do not leave their countries because of
wanderlust: They leave because life feels pretty "s***ty".’ This
is not a new argument and was actually at the heart of the imperial and
colonial projects. Material and economic superiority was used as the basis to
‘save’ indigenous peoples from their ‘s***ty’ ‘backward’ existence by invading,
dominating and at times, exterminating them to establish more advanced systems
of governance. The same superiority is now the basis to defend bigotry. This
would place such remarks as those by Cecil Rhodes in gratitude for being born
to the British Empire and not in the presumably ‘s***ty’ African ones as the
basis for a discussion on technologically disparity and not its racist views
and the resulting pain and suffering endured in perpetuation of that belief.
This is truly abhorrent.
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| John Rhodes: "To be born English is to win first prize in the lottery of life." Image Credit: http://symbaoe. canalblog.com/Cecil |
This is where the
fundamental fallacy of the writer of the article truly lies, the false notion
that one cannot reject bigoted statements whilst at the same time working for
their people and continent. These are presented as mutually exclusive: “This -
it seems - is a more important reality to address than whether a discredited
man who is a known provocateur has hurt some feelings.” However, one need not
accept the bigotry of a known racist to address the real problems in various
parts of Africa.
The article is a
legitimation of extrinsic views of Africa as a uniform jungle of misery. Africa
is a vast and diverse continent with its own heterogeneity. It is not a
uniform, seamless morass of tragedy as some in the global north have sought
to portray, with the latent agreement of the writer of the article in question. These ancient notions are to be
challenged and rejected rather than embraced and propagated. It is disingenuous to point to
‘poor people who have been left out of the “Africa rising” narrative’ as though
this is not, in varying degrees, a shared phenomenon with other regions of the
world as shown through the Brexit vote and Trump's election.
Further, and most
importantly, the suggestion that Trump, made these remarks informed by the
nuances of the difference between Cape Town and Crossroads is patently ludicrous. He is perpetuating an imperial racist view of Africa and is not
aware of the minutiae of life in Nairobi or Port-au-Prince. The writer is
expressing frustrations of mis-governance whilst Trump is expressing a racist
imperial view. By attempting to conflate the two, the writer gives white
supremacist views safe haven under the guise of a genuine discussion on
migration.
When a woman is the
victim of domestic violence, we do not ask what she had done or said.
Similarly, we do not ask what the victim of rape was wearing. We know the right
thing is to condemn and convict. Bigoted statements do not begin genuine
discussions... they end them.
Racism is not and should not be what brings us to the table, it is the
signal that we should stand and walk away.
