I wasn't sure what exactly I should blog about until I stumbled up on this on the internet. This is a picture uploaded from facebook of a white-African man with a dead African American Child in front of him. It's so sad to see this kind of stuff on the internet. It doesn't say if he did it but, the fact that someone would really upload this to facebook is just crazy to me. I wouldn't be surprised if a million people aren't harassing him over the internet now. Here's the full article for you guys to read
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/205136/20110829/facebook-racism-hate-crime-south-africa-white-man-hunter-photograph-eugene-terrorblanche-user-invest.htm
Racism can be found all over the internet and there is a perfect example. He probably put his facebook under a fake name because if he didn't then uploading that picture was just stupid. I even took the time to try to find him on facebook but all I found were groups protesting against him. I wonder what people said to him when he posted that. Hopefully they caught him and he is being punished for this!
Kassie,
ReplyDeleteThanks for "breaking the ice" on the blog and being among the first few to post.
Youre right to point out the offensive nature of the photo above, and how someone could use it as their facebook photo and be "proud" of it is beyond me.
However, I think we need (even after a few classes) to start thinking about the way race operates as more than simply an individual act of hatred, stupidity, violence or crudeness. I know its the beginning of the semester, but we need to start understanding the ways that race/racism is not just perpetuated by these outrageous people, like the person who posted this on facebook, but rather how race/racism is implicit in the very structures of our lives that are perpetuated by normal people and not just extremists.
South Africa is outside of our classes scope and this photo is very specific to the racial politics in that nation. However here are a few questions that your post brings to mind that are more relevant to our course material and the types of posts that we are hoping to see on this blog.
-Is the use of this image simply an individual act of hatred and violence, or does it say something much larger about race either in Africa or more broadly the United States?
-The outcry surrounding this image could be a means to start thinking about the racial dynamics of European colonialism in Africa. How does this image evoke a long history of racial violence throughout Africa that in many ways was created through European imperialism?
-What does this image show about the racial dynamics of South Africa today? What is South African apartheid and in what ways does it continue today?
-What similarities can we draw between South African apartheid and the racial inequalities throughout United States history? Has the United States society ever operated through a structure similar to apartheid and does it today?
-What similarities can be drawn between this photo and lynching photography from the United States? Photos which were popular souvenirs and postcards for a large part of American history.
-How is the internet been used as a tool to both perpetuate racism, but also as a means for anti-racist activism?
-What is the legality of using an image like this on facebook? Which bring up a series of questions about the legality of internet hate crimes and the means by which they could be prosecuted.
-What about questions of access and the internet. Is access to the internet higher among people of a particular race, especially in South Africa. How has this shaped the conversation around this photo?
These are the sorts of ways that we need to start thinking about race and racism. Rather than seeing it as an individual act of violence or hatred, we need to start thinking about the ways that it functions institutionally in our everyday lives to create a vast system of inequality.
Dont be discouraged because this is your first post and Im sure at this point everyone is still just beginning to deal with these very complex issues. As we move forward throughout the semester I am sure that we as a group will develop a much more critical understanding of the way race and racism operate.
-John