Without prejudice

THREE years ago, I was helping a young matriculant from an extremely deprived background to wrangle her way through the bureaucracy as she registered for a first year at university. One day she phoned, close to despair. A hitch had arisen, and it looked like she would be unable to register after all.

But I knew the hitch was a mirage, a problem created out of thin air because the university staff had not listened to her and taken her seriously. So I deployed a secret weapon I have. I picked up the phone, put on the frightfully plummy colonial accent common to white people in the region of South Africa where I was born, and demanded answers.

Within minutes, the whole situation turned on its head. The 'fyngekleede dame' (elegantly-dressed lady) on the other end of the phone listened respectfully as I outlined the situation and how repeatedly staff had failed to read documentation, listen and hear what they were being told. She herself, personally, would sort it out, she said, and keep me informed by email; the pair of us were invited to her office the next morning for tea and biscuits to fill in the only remaining form and get a student number.

Since then, the young woman in question has gone on to get her BSc. She’s going to become a sterling member of our society, contributing to our economy, perhaps becoming a researcher who adds to the sum of human knowledge in important ways, or a teacher who helps others succeed at science.

But that first step might never have happened had she not had me to call on. She ran up against the prejudice commonly experienced by the poor all over the world, and more than a whiff of racism. Yes, even from middle-aged black staff on admin who, like the rest of us, have learned behaviour deeply ingrained in their psyches, from generations of segregation and discrimination.

This is how white privilege, that newest of buzzwords, works. I don’t come from a stereotypical white family – we were poor. But even so, fully 20 years into our ‘new South Africa’, just being white still produces benefits in terms of access, respect and many other things.

And this example also illustrates why racism does not work for us as a society. It deprives us of precious human capital.

In 2009, examining racism against the native Americans in Bolivia and Guatemala, Jake Silva wrote about the “negative consequences of social exclusion on human capital formation and economic contribution. Human Capital is the knowledge and skills a person possesses that enables them to produce economic value. The indigenous people’s lack of education, access to economic opportunities and political power to change their situation severely limits their capacity to form human capital, lowering the amount of economic value they produce. Using Guatemala and Bolivia as case studies, this paper specifically proposes that systemic racism and social exclusion […] significantly contribute to the economic underdevelopment of countries …” (The Economic Effects of Racism in Guatemala and Bolivia)

Even if there were no moral or human case against racism, it would be of benefit to all of us if we fought social exclusion in order to increase our human capital and thus improve economic performance.

I honestly believe that the majority of us do not harbour hatred for our fellow citizens. We don’t have to be culturally homogenous (in fact, I’d hate to live in a country that lacked difference) to share many major goals and pull together, as we did over the 2010 World Cup.

But all privileged people – indeed, all of us – need to be aware of the silent expressions of prejudice - the ones we are unaware of - which often manifest as dismissiveness or lack of respect, or patronising behaviour. This is the inevitable product of thinking that someone is ‘only’ – only a woman, only a poor kid, only a black person, only whatever. When this kind of thinking is in play, it acts to deny equality of opportunity.

We need to actively audit our behaviour, at work, in the streets and malls, in interactions of all kinds, to ensure we are not excluding people, denying them access or a hearing or respect, through unconscious and unexamined assumptions. (This, by the way, obviously applies big time to the inheritors of white privilege, however unwilling we are to have it; but it’s a way of being that would benefit all of us to adopt.)

And we all need to be more active in fighting the ugly bigotry that’s made repeated news recently.

Yesterday I saw a journalist I know describe online how she once had to write a story about hideously racist comments made by a local singer (no, not Steve Hofmeyr!), all of which she obviously had to read: “Die aand by die huis het ek gehuil oor daar soveel haat in mense is.” (That evening at home, I cried because there is so much hatred in people.)

Two white Afrikaners responded, saying that it had made them cry, too: “Die ding is, hoe hou jy op huil? En hoe vra ons om verskoning vir die seermaak?” (The thing is, how do you stop crying? And how do we apologise for all the hurt?)

How? By showing that racism is unacceptable. By saying, loudly and publicly: “You don’t speak for me, not even one word”. By boycotting businesses and taking other concrete actions to show our disapproval. It’s time to stand for what we believe in.

Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Martin Luther King, Jr    

*Mandi Smallhorne is a versatile journalist and editor. Views expressed are her own. Follow her on twitter.