Mark Mathabanes Kaffir Boy
Kaffir Boy Webster dictionary defines racism as “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits an capacities and that racial differences produce and inherent superiority of a particular race”. Racism has run rampant throughout the world for a very long time, and still lingers very strongly today. The racist ideologies “claim that biological factors explain and even justify inequalities between racial and ethnic group” and because people have a way to convince themselves that what they are thinking or the way they act towards people is somehow acceptable, racism will never go away. In today’s world racism can be viewed exactly as it has been throughout history even back to its origins. It is used as a tool to justify actions against a group of people. We most often see this with
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conquered countries like South Africa.
In Mark Mathabanes Kaffir Boy the problems of racist ideologies are displayed through his own experiences of growing up as a black man in South Africa during the apartheid. The most common racist ideology that was represented in the book was prejudice. Prejudice is a rigid and unfavorable judgment about a group that does not change in the face of contradictory evidence and applies to anyone who shares the distinguishing characteristics of the group. This can be found everywhere in the world in every single person for some kind of ethnicity or race or gender. It is impossible not to have any prejudices because they are subconsciously forced into us, however not everyone has to act on them. Prejudice is based on the idea of stereotypes, or an unrealistic generalization of a group of people
often based on radical actions of other individuals within that same group. What was most interesting about this book were the prejudices that were displayed within Johannes’s own family. His mother had a very dim opinion of the general black population. At one point in the book Johannes was asking his mother a lot of questions about the essence of life and the topic of houses came up. He proceeded to brag that some day he would have enough money to build a really nice house for his mother and his mother went on to tell him that it would be impossible “ because its against the law for black people to own houses” (Pg 92). She then goes on to explain that this is the way it has to be because the white people have always made the laws since they had conquered the country. This passage gave insight into the helplessness that his mother felt. Even when Johannes would speak of riches, his mother would not have any of it. the Black people of south Africa were poor, the laws were an absolute and the whites were superior to the blacks. Another ideology that was very apparent in the book was the origins of race as a concept. This Racial scheme classified people; the idea of racial differences became the cornerstone of self righteous ideology justifying their right by virtue of racial superiority to exploit, dominate, and even annihilate conquered peoples and their cultures. This is a life style Johannes was born into and completely accepts. South Africa was segregated legally with the apartheid. It was two different worlds, one with blacks, and one with whites. The world for the whites was clean, very orderly and had a lot of money. The area for blacks, Alexandra, was very dirty with a lot of problems. The whites were able to do basically anything they wanted to in south Africa. They conquered the people and implemented their own laws that would best suit their style of life rather then the indigenous people.
“White people make laws because they’ve been making all the laws since they took over our country” (Pg 100) Because of this ideology, the whites would feel justified in all the horrible things that they did. Actions like the police raids were considered necessary to upkeeping their way of life. It was taken even farther then that however with blacks being the police raiding homes, killing people and destroying things. These men had two motives, the first being the need to provide for their family’s and hold a good job. The second was being integrated into white society. They were put in a position of power over the people and thus started to justify what they were doing to the people. This is an ideology that is responsible for a lot of the horrible things that have happened in the worlds history. Japans invasion of China and the occupation of the city of Nan King where they would kill all Chinese men on sight and rape most Chinese women before killing them. The commanders of the Japanese military made the Chinese out to be less then human, equivilent to dogs and told the soldiers to treat them accordingly. It is also apparent in Nazi Germany with the purging of the Jewish. Racism the worst ideology that grips the world today. Kaffir boy really helped me to understand that the explotation of conquered people is a very common occurance.
conquered countries like South Africa.
In Mark Mathabanes Kaffir Boy the problems of racist ideologies are displayed through his own experiences of growing up as a black man in South Africa during the apartheid. The most common racist ideology that was represented in the book was prejudice. Prejudice is a rigid and unfavorable judgment about a group that does not change in the face of contradictory evidence and applies to anyone who shares the distinguishing characteristics of the group. This can be found everywhere in the world in every single person for some kind of ethnicity or race or gender. It is impossible not to have any prejudices because they are subconsciously forced into us, however not everyone has to act on them. Prejudice is based on the idea of stereotypes, or an unrealistic generalization of a group of people
often based on radical actions of other individuals within that same group. What was most interesting about this book were the prejudices that were displayed within Johannes’s own family. His mother had a very dim opinion of the general black population. At one point in the book Johannes was asking his mother a lot of questions about the essence of life and the topic of houses came up. He proceeded to brag that some day he would have enough money to build a really nice house for his mother and his mother went on to tell him that it would be impossible “ because its against the law for black people to own houses” (Pg 92). She then goes on to explain that this is the way it has to be because the white people have always made the laws since they had conquered the country. This passage gave insight into the helplessness that his mother felt. Even when Johannes would speak of riches, his mother would not have any of it. the Black people of south Africa were poor, the laws were an absolute and the whites were superior to the blacks. Another ideology that was very apparent in the book was the origins of race as a concept. This Racial scheme classified people; the idea of racial differences became the cornerstone of self righteous ideology justifying their right by virtue of racial superiority to exploit, dominate, and even annihilate conquered peoples and their cultures. This is a life style Johannes was born into and completely accepts. South Africa was segregated legally with the apartheid. It was two different worlds, one with blacks, and one with whites. The world for the whites was clean, very orderly and had a lot of money. The area for blacks, Alexandra, was very dirty with a lot of problems. The whites were able to do basically anything they wanted to in south Africa. They conquered the people and implemented their own laws that would best suit their style of life rather then the indigenous people.
“White people make laws because they’ve been making all the laws since they took over our country” (Pg 100) Because of this ideology, the whites would feel justified in all the horrible things that they did. Actions like the police raids were considered necessary to upkeeping their way of life. It was taken even farther then that however with blacks being the police raiding homes, killing people and destroying things. These men had two motives, the first being the need to provide for their family’s and hold a good job. The second was being integrated into white society. They were put in a position of power over the people and thus started to justify what they were doing to the people. This is an ideology that is responsible for a lot of the horrible things that have happened in the worlds history. Japans invasion of China and the occupation of the city of Nan King where they would kill all Chinese men on sight and rape most Chinese women before killing them. The commanders of the Japanese military made the Chinese out to be less then human, equivilent to dogs and told the soldiers to treat them accordingly. It is also apparent in Nazi Germany with the purging of the Jewish. Racism the worst ideology that grips the world today. Kaffir boy really helped me to understand that the explotation of conquered people is a very common occurance.