Apartheid Crash Course

The standup comedian Trevor Noah’s autobiography, Born a Crime, is about his life in South Africa only, so it doesn’t talk of his career as a comedian or life in the West. What it describes about the apartheid regime in South Africa is horrifying. Unlike many evils of the West, this is a recent one that continued till the 1990’s. It is thus not something that can be brushed aside as “It was a different era, you can’t apply today’s standards to older times”.

 

Apartheid was created after “studying” the institutionalized racism of Australia, America and Netherlands.  America, for example, moved the natives to specific areas called “reservations”, practiced slavery and then moved onto segregation. In South Africa, they did all of the above to the same group (blacks). The outcome? “The most advanced system of racial oppression known to man”.

 

A system built on the idea that races should not mix has to declare inter-racial relations (romance, marriage, children) illegal. Why?

“Race mixing proves that races can mix – and in a lot of cases, want to mix.”

But such mixed-race children did get conceived. They were considered neither black nor white – they were “colored”. (Indians were considered another group altogether). And none of these groups should mix, as per law. Noah himself is a colored child – white (Swiss) father, black mother.

“Where most children are proof of their parents’ love, I was the proof of their criminality.”

Hence the title of his book is Born a Crime.

 

But such color categorization was never perfect. Unlike Indians, the Chinese were classified as black! Why? Because the Chinese were too few in number to warrant a separate color category, so they got thrown into the lower black category. But the Japanese were classified as white. Because the apartheid regime wanted good relations with the advanced Japan…

 

Amongst the various colors, there was a hierarchy. Whites on top, blacks at bottom, of course. The others were not all at par – each set was given some privileges but not others. Kept them divided, resentful of each other. There was even a scheme by which one could hope to become white! Submit an application, and a lucky few would be bumped up to a different color with more privileges. At other times, the government could demote you to a lower color as well.

 

Under apartheid, there were these Bantu schools, designed to “cripple the black mind” – they taught no science, no history, no civics. If you deliberately exclude such subjects, you can imagine the level of the kids who finish such schools.

 

While the whites needed blacks to do the menial jobs, under apartheid, the blacks couldn’t live near/next the whites. Which meant blacks had to travel to and from the white neighborhoods and cities daily. Yet the government created no public transport for blacks. Inevitably then, black bus operators arose to serve a genuine need but were technically illegal as they were not authorized by authorities.

 

Restaurants could obtain special licenses to serve black customers in white people outlets. Why this provision? Because apartheid was about keeping black South Africans out, not blacks from other countries – if those foreigner blacks had money, they were welcome.

 

About the end of apartheid, white version of history is the official narrative in Western capitals:

“The triumph of democracy over apartheid is sometimes called the Bloodless Revolution. It is called that because very little white blood was spilled. Black blood ran on the streets.”

 

Tongue-in-cheek, this is how Noah describes the eventual end of apartheid and Nelson Mandela came to power:

“For centuries colored people were told: Blacks are monkeys. Don’t swing from the trees like them. Learn to walk upright like the white man. Then all of a sudden it’s Planet of the Apes and the monkeys have taken over.”