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Friday 26 September 2008

The voices of the future.



I am feeling serious lately. Where did my funny-juice go? Oh wait, that was gummi-berry juice. Explains my super-human strength and lack of humour.

I blame not having a job. I sit around and I think too much. I have been thinking about the future. Not my own, but the future of South Africa. Dunno why that country takes up so much of my brain space. It just does. I blame UNISA with their Africanised syllabus.

So yes, the future. The future is not about me and my kind. Sad but true. We pale folks have to accept that we are a minority, and just not very important in the grand scale of things any more. I really feel that the future is all about the poor folks. It has to be. They are getting antsy and unless this is addressed soon things may get messy.

I do not blame Mbeki for this situation. He was a sensible man on the economic front. He realised that poverty needed to be addressed, but not at the cost of collapsing the economy. So he focussed strongly on a top-down approach, enriching a few at the top and hoping it would filter down in time. He kept the country (relatively) stable.

But time is not something poor people are interested in. They are tired of waiting. This is why they have resorted to hero worship. They need a Messiah. I have read that people think Zuma will feed them, clothe them, make miracles happen. What Zuma will do on this front is anyone's guess. It is a mess really. You can't just go out and hand out houses and cars. He inherits a very difficult situation indeed. 

Why do I have this sinking feeling that the future may hold the reverse of what the poor need? There is something about those vocal Zuma supporters that leaves me unsettled. Their propensity for "killing" perhaps?

Nevertheless it is time for the voices of the marginalised people to be heard. Soon.

In some ways I feel very redundant right now. Who needs another white South African voice out there? My time has gone. Yet this does not make me feel too sad. And it won't stop me writing and thinking. We can be useful still. We have skills, we have education, we can pass these on. We can contribute to a better future, we just have to accept that our voices and our demands will not be very important. If we can swallow that and move on then we can get on with just living our lives for the better.

Does any of this even make sense? How does a generation accept and deal with their redundancy? And does it really matter since they are redundant anyway?

                                       Or is it just me talking shite?


P.S. I nothing about economics or politics, so please inform me of where I go wrong.

8 comments:

Tamara said...

Not talking nonsense - I fell like you spoke my thoughts.

po said...

Thanks Tamara, that means a lot to me actually. I am lad to know I am not alone thinking this kind of stuff.

Cam said...

All i can say Po is...Happy Weekend! :)

po said...

yay for the weekend, thanks Ches.

@ngel said...

it is a strange place we find ourselves in. only time will tell...

6000 said...

Your thoughts, so who am I to correct you?

But careful on the Zuma supporters. The papers love Malema and his "Kill for Zuma" quote. A guaranteed hit story every time he pipes up. Hence all the coverage.

Countrywide, black and white, young and old, he's seen as an idiot.

White South Africans are far from redundant. That is a fallacy borne of pessimists and those who still dream of the glory days pre-94.

SA has a very bright future. All you have to do is look at the people instead of looking at the papers.

Rest easy, chicken!

po said...

6000: good point, I am away from the people and only read the papers, hence my probably skewed ideas of what is cooking.

I really need to work on evaluating what I read in the media, so much of it seems sensationalist and over the top.

Unknown said...

I don't think us whites are that redundant, just outnumbered. But we're still very important to the economy and infrastructure and I think things are not all bad.