RaDical MiDDle - ColdType

114 | denis beckett
one step: black boycotts. Part II was the wedge. every half-way
reform would leave more whites in dread of the half still to
come. The need was to re-paint the end picture.
On neither count was the sales case ideal. To people at one
end of the spectrum, only Satan could want equal citizenship. at
the other end, equal citizenship wasn’t dull rules of order with
space for arguers and obstructors. It was neat total takeover as
befitted a continent in shambles.
In the middle I fared no better, partly due to race heresy. The
calling-cry of the politically respectable – who are 3% of the
people and 97% of the media – is that racism is the problem. To
me, fear was the problem. There was a difference. The difference
became a problem.
I told you about Langa Skosana and the Mineworkers union,
where I got the dogbox for saying it was alright to chuck him
out. I’d say to the outraged, “How would you like Langa to have
the same rights and powers as you and me?”
They’d say, “Ja, fine, of course, he’s obviously an educated
chap”.
I’d say, “and how about his brothers and cousins and
neighbours and maid?”
They’d say, “Hold it, that’s extreme”.
I wanted Langa and his aunties and all to have the power
of citizenship and I also wanted them to be damn firmly
chained to the processes of citizenship. I couldn’t get excited
about whose tea-parties they would attend. I’ve been thrown
out of black functions for being the wrong colour – sometimes
Bc-type political occasions and sometimes shebeens where
people want to let their hair down without minding Ps and Qs
in english to the standards of some gawping whitey. If giving
people confidence that democracy was not just a swamping
helped them past the vicious side of race fear, bring it on.
That’s what I thought. But when I tried to talk the luminaries
of liberalism into championing ultra-democracy I met shock
and horror, often so hypocritical that you could puke. (Like the
great joy at having 2% black kids at your child’s school – “Look!