#also i bet you don’t know how to pronounce apartheid or fynbos

[go-to-the-mirror]

We had fires too. Where I lived, it was in the Fynbos region, and there were often wildfires, which caused people to have to evacuate, and killed people, people had to put out their township they lived in then go to school and write a bloody exam. There was a drought, we had to ration our water, the dams were so empty that the tap water wasn’t safe to drink.

Your countries have issues. America has issues. The UK has issues. So do other countries.

Thank you, and good night.

We’re at [insert American political event] season, which means every American will not shut up about being American. God forbid you ever mention another country.

Who cares about corruption plaguing South Africa? All they deserve is misinformation and only being brought up as a talking point against [insert billionaire who made money of Apartheid] without any understanding of the lingering effects of it, only fucking caring about our issues when they’re a good reason to get angry at someone you don’t like.

Shut the hell up about Elon Musk getting his wealth from an emerald mine during Apartheid until you actually do you goddamn research on how mining affected people of colour living there.

Also, if we’re talking about countries with poor responses to COVID19, think about the homeless South Africans living in townships — did you know about townships? Don’t think you did — who were so crowded together, that of course they were going to get COVID and of course they were going to die from it.

Do you think about the crime rate, there? Every university barring Stellenbosch has been burned down at least once, it’s why I wanted to go to Stellenbosch, because hey, women have 1/3 chance of being raped in South Africa, but at least it’s the safest fucking university there. Why is the crime rate so high? The unemployment rate. It’s the highest in the goddamn world.

My dad, qualified as a paramedic, was a teacher at a university, white, able-bodied, couldn’t get a job. He had to go to Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Ukraine for a bit. We didn’t see him for months. Think of the people who aren’t privileged. The people in townships who beg on the street for food, who have to commit crimes, who can’t get into good public schools because…

There’s this thing in South Africa where you can pay half the school fees and have the government pay the other half, in public school, half and half public schools. I went to a half and half elementary school, and I don’t remember seeing… anyone who wasn’t white. Everyone was white.

My sisters went to a half and half high school, and there were so few nonwhite kids, everyone who wasn’t white went to HH and they had better rhythm and always won spirit and HH wasn’t a half and half.

I don’t know much about the political situation in South Africa, but I know how much people love to bring up that goddamn emerald mine, and I’m not saying it’s okay that he makes that much money, but I’m saying that you could try bringing my country up as more than a fucking talk point. We’re more than a talking point. We’re a country. Bring us up, or shut up about us.