"When you say your racial identity is essential to who you are rather than incidental, then you've got the ingredients for tribal warfare." So says Victor Davis Hanson in the latest episode of the Daily Signal.
Increasingly, the word "white" is being used as a pejorative. All day, every day, we "palefaces" are being made to feel guilty about being white. In this video, Mr Hanson analyzes what's going on, and what it means for the future of our nation.
Racial preferences and identity-based politics have weakened social cohesion instead of strengthening it. A society built around shared values, assimilation, and equal treatment under the law is being replaced by a growing focus on group identity and grievance. That's the sad truth of "the Anglosphere" today.
Mr Hanson warns of lessening governmental accountability to citizens via the dissolution of American citizenship. The concept of citizenship, he adds is an essential component of Western civilization.
In his book, Mr Hanson argues that the concept of the "citizen" is historically rare. Yet it was among America's most valued ideals for over two centuries. But without shock treatment, American citizenship as we have known it may soon vanish.
The historical forces that led to this crisis (Mr Hanson writes) are:
* the evisceration of the middle class over the last fifty years, which has made many Americans dependent on the federal government
* open borders, which have undermined the idea of allegiance to a particular place
* identity politics have eradicated our collective civic sense of self, and
* a top-heavy administrative state which endangers personal liberty, along with
* formal efforts to weaken the Constitution.
As in the revolutionary years of 1848, 1917, and 1968, 2020 ripped away our complacency about the future. But in the aftermath, Mr Hanson believes, we as Americans can rebuild and recover what we have lost. The choice is ours.
Having watched the video, Walt's New Year's resolution -- the only one -- is to run [or ski? Ed.] to the nearest bookstore and buy the book!
Something that many of our readers may not understand about the current rioting and looting in South Africa is that the problem is not so much racism as tribalism. Things were quieter yesterday in Johannesburg -- all that "reparations shopping" tires you out, eh -- but still out of control in Durban, the biggest city of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), where whites and "Asians" (read: south Asians) have formed armed self-defence militias to protect themselves and their property.
Most of the looting, though, is black-on-black.
Like many other African countries whose borders were established by Europeans in the 19th century, South Africa is an amalgam of different tribes who dislike each other almost as much as they dislike whites. The biggest groups are Zulus (21 %), Xhosas (17 %) and the Sotho (15%). Smaller minorities are the Tswana, Venda, Ndebele, Swasi, and Pedi, among others. The Khoi-San -- the ones we used to call "Bushmen" (see the excellent movie The Gods Must Be Crazy) -- are originally hunter-gatherers who have inhabited the land for a long time.
As you might guess from the name, Kwa-Zulu Natal (formerly just "Natal") province, is the homeland of the Zulus, a fierce and warlike people whom the British imperialists fought hard to displace in the 19th century. Pictured below is a painting of the Battle of Isandhlwana, fought on 22 January 1879, the first major encounter in the Anglo-Zulu War between the British Empire and the Zulu Kingdom.
Eleven days after the British commenced their invasion (for such it was) of "Zululand" (as they called it), a Zulu force of some 20,000 warriors attacked a portion of the British main column consisting of about 1800 British, colonial and native troops and perhaps 400 civilians, killing most of them
During the final hour of the battle, a contingent of about 4000 Zulu warriors broke off from their main force to attack a small mission station at Rorke's Drift, about six miles distant. A force of about 150 British troops -- mostly Welshmen of B Company, 2nd Battalion, 24th (2nd Warwickshire) Regiment of Foot -- held off the attackers in a fierce two-day battle which has been immortalized in one of Walt's favourite films, Zulu, starring Stanley Baker and Michael Caine.
Here is a clip of one of the opening scenes of the movie, showing some handsome men and beautiful women doing a pre-marital dance, in preparation for a mass marriage.
Readers who were not transfixed by the sight of the dancing girls may note that the missionary (played by Jack Hawkins) had a little conversation with the Zulu chief, who was actually... wait for it... a Zulu chief! Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi played his grandfather, Cetshwayo kaMpande, king of the Zulu Kingdom from 1873 to 1879 and its leader during the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879.
After a lot more fighting, "Zululand" was incorporated into Natal province, which was renamed KwaZulu-Natal in the transition from the apartheid era to the "new South Africa". Mr Buthelezi was still the Zulu Chief, and from 1975 to 2019 led the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), the main opposition to the Communist-dominated African National Congress (ANC), which has ruled South Africa since 1994.
They do have elections in South Africa, about as free and fair as the American presidential election of 2020. The IFP never had a chance of forming a national government because it is supported almost exclusively by the Zulus. The other tribes fall into line with the ANC, and the whites and Asians make up the Democratic Alliance, never really a force in SA politics, nationally.
What does this have to do with this week's riots? Just this... Some Zulus, seeing that the IFP would never get their hands on the levers of power, defected to the ANC, which is now split along tribal lines. The disgraced ex-President, Jacob Zuma, is a Zulu, and it is his people who are now in the streets. If Mr Zuma lived like a traditional Zulu chief, well, why shoudn't he?!
Mr Zuma adheres to many traditional Zulu customs, including polygamy. This has endeared him to some segments of the population but has also been a source of criticism from others, who find some customs to be at odds with what they consider to be "modern societal norms". In February of 2010, Mr Zuma addmitted that he had fathered a child out of wedlock, something frowned upon in traditional Zulu culture.
He also had to deal with allegations of impropriety regarding extensive upgrades -- "for security reasons", of course -- to his private homestead at Nkandla in KZN. An official report in March of 2014 concluded that many of the publicly funded improvements made to Zuma’s homestead, such as a swimming pool, an amphitheatre, and a cattle kraal, were... wait for it... not security-related. Mr Zuma was found to have "benefited unduly" from the "upgrades" ans was asked to pay for some of them. Whether he ever did so is not known.
The list goes on, but the present hoorah comes down to the feeling of Mr Zuma's supporters that he was persecuted for living the life to which he was entitled. And if he corruptly received certain benefits, well, what American president could plead "not guilty" to similar accusations? And anyway, it's not like Mr Zuma is white! He's just another victim!
Besides, in today's South Africa, any excuse for rioting and looting will do as long as it is somehow tied to making non-black people pay for the oppression of black people, once upon a time. Thank goodness that's only South Africa and not any place closer to home!
So, farewell then, Comrade Robert Gabriel Mugabe, former President-for-Almost-Life of Zimbabwe. Reports from Hahaharare (the fun capital of Africa) say that you submitted your resignation, in writing no less, just as impeachment proceedings got under way this afternoon. By quitting now, you dodged a bullet... literally.
It has come to my attention that there were some readers who didn't get the joke in the meme that accompanied my post on Comrade Bob's dismissal, just a few weeks ago, from the position of World Health Organization Goodwill Ambassador created for him by the incredibly naive (or corrupt?) Chair of that "organization". To understand both that and the last line of the first paragraph, be advised that in chiShona, the main native language of Zimbabwe, "Hendiende!" means "I will not go!"
"I will not go!" was Comrade Mugabe's attitude even after his own ZANU-PF party fired him as its President following a military quasi-coup late last week. On Friday he read, rather haltingly, a statement saying he would "preside" (as a president does) over a party congress scheduled for next month. On Sunday he called a cabinet meeting for Tuesday morning, and "presided" over the handful of ministers who turned up. Meanwhile, on Monday, his own party launched in Zimbabwe's Parliament a motion to impeach him, which was being debated today when he finally said that he would go, after all.
Many observers, including Walt -- and let me remind you that I spent several years in the land of bambazonke -- assumed that there were only two ways Robert Mugabe would be dislodged from his position. Either he would die in his bed or in some other location, due to a severe case of lead poisoning. It was only a question of which would come first. His resigning in writing may reflect the way the world has changed in the 21st century. Yes, even Africa. There was no storming of State House, no being hung upside down from a lamppost, no execution by firing squad, not even a quiet private hanging. The coup was bloodless and, apart from the singing and dancing in the streets, quiet.
Does this mean that the povo -- the poor people of Zimbabwe -- can expect to see some improvement in their lives? Under Comrade Bob, the former Rhodesia went from being Africa's breadbasket to another African basket case. His legacy is a standard of living, an average life expectancy and an average annual income all lower than they were in the bad old days of "white settler rule".
He will be remembered for the kleptocracy which impoverished his people, for the Gukurahundi massacres in Matabeleland in the 1980s, for the farm invasions of the 1990s and later, and for the brutal repression of the opposition any time it seemed at all close to winning an election.
Mr Mugabe's place is like to be taken by Emmerson Mnangagwa, aka ED Mnangagwa [no relation! Ed.], the vice-president whom Comrade Bob purported to fire, earlier this month, to pave the way for the succession of his wife, Gucci Grace. As Western governments rush to congratulate Zimbabwe on its peaceful transition, they forget that Comrade ED was deeply involved in most of those crimes.
Mr Mnangagwa is known as "The Crocodile", for his association with a group of black nationalist rebels in the early days of the fight against white rule. Others say the appellation stems from his power, ruthlessness and ability to survive the tough, sometimes aggressive world of African politics. We all know how crocodiles deal with their enemies, right?
The 75-year-old was a loyal henchman to Comrade Bob for years, gaining a reputation for being astute, ruthless and effective. He was was one of those who helped the dictator cling to power when, at times, it seemed as if his grip might be weakening. As Zimbabwe's Minister for National Security, he became notorious for overseeing the Gukurahundi -- the brutal 1983 campaign against supporters of Comrade Mugabe's rival, Joshua Nkomo. Between 10,000 and 20,000 Ndebele people are estimated to have died in Matabeleland during what was really a tribal war. A good deal of the killing was done by the the Zimbabwe army's Fifth Brigade, equipped and trained by North Korea.
Since then, Comrade ED has kept himself busy in various government positions, most recently as one of two vice presidents. Nor has he been averse to accepting the rewards of his hard work. He is rumoured to have amassed a considerable fortune and been involved in the development (read: looting) of the Marange diamond fields, in which something like 15 billion dollars is said to have disappeared. Mr Mnangagwa was targeted by US sanctions in the early 2000s, for undermining democratic development in Zimbabwe, and he was named in a United Nations investigation into exploitation of mineral resources in Congo.
A former UK foreign secretary told Sky News, "The negative is he's got a lousy record - he was involved in the very serious massacres in the Matabeleland a long, long time ago. His succession, if that's what happens, would be a continuation of the status quo.". Prominent Zimbabwean opposition politician David Coltart (a really decent human being) tweeted, "We have removed a tyrant but not yet a tyranny." Or, to put it the way they do in neighbouring Moçambique: a luta continua!
That's what Peachy said about the inhabitants of Kafiristan, just before Danny's wedding, in the movie version of Kipling's The Man Who Would Be King.
Some may think that Kafiristan is a fictional place, that no people in this day and age (or Kipling's 19th century Raj) could be so backward and barbaric. They would be wrong. A Google search for "Kafiristan" - try "Waziristan" too - will reveal that it's an area straddling the northern part of the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The people there are pretty much as pictured. Only the rifles disclose that this is a fairly modern picture. The people are as they were in Kipling's day, and for centuries before. Always have been and always will be, the benificences of the Western invaders and foreign aiders notwithstanding. Here's a story from the Swat Valley -- same region -- as found on AP today.
Earlier today, a Taliban gunman walked up to a bus taking children home from school and shot and wounded Malala Yousufzai, a 14-year-old activist well known for championing the education of girls and publicizing atrocities committed by the Taliban. For her work in promoting the schooling of girls -- one of the things we're fighting for in Afghanistan, right? -- Malala was nominated last year for the International Children's Peace Prize.
The Taliban take a different view. Their spokesthingy, Ahsanullah Ahsan said, “This was a new chapter of obscenity, and we have to finish this chapter. [That's why] we have carried out this attack.”
Meanwhile (Sherin Zada writes) the problems of young women in Pakistan are the focus of a case before the high court, which ordered a probe into an alleged barter of seven girls to settle a blood feud in the remote Dera Bugti district of Baluchistan province.
The district deputy commissioner told the court that a council of the Bugti tribe, one of the more prominent tribes in the province, ordered the barter in early September to settle a feud between two sub-tribes. He did not know the girls' ages but local media reported they were between 4 and 13 years old.
The tradition of families exchanging unmarried girls to settle feuds is supposedly banned under Pakistani law but still practised in the country's more remote tribal areas, where Sharia law and a militant form of Islam still hold sway. Apparently the denigration and abuse of women and girls is OK, according to "the religion of peace".
This is the Maghreb, the western or "sunset" countries of North Africa. They are all Arabic countries, all Muslim. And many of them, along with next-door Egpt and other Arabic Muslim countries of the middle east, are in turmoil.
But the unrest -- dare we say revolution? -- won't easily spread through sub-Saharan Africa, even though countries such as the Congo, Uganda and Zimbabwe are poverty-stricken, chaotic and ruled by corrupt and incompetent "Big Men" who would seem to be ripe for the picking...or should we say "shooting".
Revolution is often a luxury of an educated middle class, and much of Africa is too rural and too poor to sustain a national uprising. Dictators in sub-Saharan Africa often defend their power through a politically loyal military – in contrast to Egypt, where the troops tolerated protest.
Technology is another factor: Internet access is still relatively low in most of Africa, making it harder to organize protest. And the ethnic and religious rifts in many African countries are a huge obstacle to the organization of national protests.
Forcus on that last sentence, please, because it's the key to understanding Africa. York is saying, in another what, what V.S. Naipaul said in The Masque of Africa, reviewed here earlier this week.
The problem ... make that a problem with Africa is the culture of Africa. Underneath a thin veneer of western civilization [Is that not an oxymoron? Ed.] you find the real Africa, bedevilled by tribalism, supserstition and ignorance.
All the goodwill and foreign aid we keep throwing into the Dark Continent is not going to change that. The only hope is that the Africans will change themselves -- evolve, in other words -- and that will take centuries. Don't hold your breath.
