Culture of Violence and Silence!
The idea that gender based violence only occurs within certain races, cultures and geographic locations in the world is wrong!The idea that racism only happens to “those people over there” is incorrect!And the idea that we as human beings do not oppress or judge people based on our own fear, belief systems, up bringing and background is a LIE! We are not born racist, we learn to be racist.I have had the privilege of growing up in a family where we are open and accept people for who they are; I have had the privilege of being apart of the new generation that seeks out to find the commonalities, the love and to build solidarity with everyone living on this planet. The new generation in my humble opinion, is trying to see a world without discrimination and oppression a world who understands that no we are not all the same but what is beautiful about us is that we are all unique and all have certain gifts that we have been blessed with. You cannot have one without the other and it is important we have that knowledge and that two-eyed seeing so we are able to put back the pieces of our world, and learn to respect each other. It is important we recognize that your struggle is not as worse as my struggle, or her struggle or his struggle. It is important to note that we all have closets and deep dark spaces that we are not proud of, we all have those elephants in the room and until we understand that we cannot get to a place of love and acceptance without realizing this. I have come to realize even more on those journey that racism, homophobia, gender based violence and gender inequality is common in all households, NOT excluding white people/white South Africans.
The old generation is of the mindset that women still belong in the kitchen and that women need to be ‘’housetrained’’….sorry I still pee on the carpet! And that we are not allowed to have opinions. Despite being in 2016, with all the education, awareness, the apartheid being lifted and the way the world is shifting for the better they still use derogatory terms for homosexual people, for women, for black people and yet they still DO NOT understand the intergenerational affects of slavery, racism, cultural sensitivity, the apartheid and residential schools…. but heaven for bid you say anything remotely racist to them or about them and the world is over…. I am sorry I didn't know my racism was worse then yours, I did not know it was okay for you to speak your mind and not I? I didn’t know it was okay for you to be bigot and not me and my people?!
I have seen this in this country time and time again and it reminds me of the way people treat and talk to our Indigenous brothers and sisters in Canada. They will speak slowly and loudly to the black South Africans at the grocery store like they are stupid and slow. They will use words like ‘’articulate’’ and ‘’well mannered’’ as if because they are black they cannot be either.
And unfortunately because the colour of my skin I am subjected to this violence and prejudice, they believe because I am white I must have the same views as them, I must have something to say about ‘’those people’’ when in fact it is the exact opposite. I stand up for the oppressed whether that be for your sexual orientation, your gender, your race or your socio-economic status because I know, and my people know for generations and generations how it feels to be oppressed. I know I cannot change their views but ill be damned if I am going to sit there and allow for the injustice and the violence to continue.
What people need to understand is yes violence comes in the form of physical and sexual but I am talking about the violence that occurs in our everyday lives, in our workplaces, at school, with our friends, in politics and in our communities; the emotional, the verbal, the spiritual and the psychological abuse that we have even accustomed and taught to ignore. We all need to STOP believing that violence, of any form, is culture- when the only culture around violence is SILENCE! It has taken all of us to build up that silence and create that culture now it will take everyone to BREAK IT!