RaDical MiDDle - ColdType

Radical Middle | 169
in South africa, was a white person who (1) sought equal rights
for everyone and (2) was not communist.
Obviously, the liberals had no representative in parliament.
even the Progs, semi-liberals whose policy was a disastrous thing
called “qualified franchise” for black people, only managed a
single MP, Helen Suzman. Liberals were very undangerous, but
became quite a swearword nonetheless, being presumed to give
bad ideas to the blacks.
I didn’t quite know I was a liberal, to start with. The general
instinct fitted fine – let people be – but there was a lot of
cluttering. We were presumed to be apologetic about ourselves
and our whiteness. There was some idea that to be liberal you
had to be “on the side of the blacks”, and/or “identify with
the majority”; we must find out what “blacks” want and say
“we want that too” and if by cosmic error some blacks wanted
X and other blacks wanted Y, we had to know which ones
to uphold as authentic. Well, the whole country operated on
broken compasses, why shouldn’t we?
In time I grew to better understandings – stand for what you
believe; human respect is not about categories; wrong thinkers
also have rights – but time takes time to wear in.
Liberals were the pioneers. eventually I ceased to feel
unafricanly guilty about preferring Heath in his jam to Kaunda
in his motorcade, but as we moved on we passed the guilt bug to
our contemporaries. The toughies who had chanted supremacy
while we thrilled to illegal multi-racial drinking and – aah, the
upmanship! – illegal wrongly-racial lovers were now telling
us that this was black man’s country and our job was to walk
behind.
crazy nation, all right, but it does mean growth, notably into
recognising the person and not the race-group. It ain’t always
easy. By the Xth time that three-quarters of the black guests
haven’t pitched up you cease to blame the one-quarter who
have, but you think twice before you try again.
also, I found, you develop a lot of sympathy for the Questing
afrikaner.