This month we get an extra day. In a leap of optimism I am going to suggest that on this extra day we all just get along. Like the good ol’ days… when was that again?
My fellow compatriots have taken to the universities to torch the buildings and burn the artworks. At the same time #boycottoscars and #oscarssowhite is trending.
Is it alright that everyone has a problem? A problem over religion, sex, sexuality, skin colour, preference, diet, belief, origin, education. Or is having a problem the only problem? What do you plan to solve by tearing down paintings off the university walls and burning them? Every year South African university students and staff protest rampantly and the reason why is lost behind the brutality of destruction. Losing sight of the future and of the solution and acting in a way that deserves no reward.
Wherein lies the solution to the Oscar race discrepancy? The all American noddy badge event must be boycotted for liberty, right? How many red heads have won an Oscar? How many bisexuals have won an Oscar? How many Atheists have won an Oscar? How many Jews? How many midgets have become president? What exactly needs to change? Here on the southern tip of the dark continent a friend of mine applied for a position at one of these universities. He was the only applicant. As a white male, he of course did not and could not get the position, despite being overqualified. Is that a solution?
Would the boycotters be pleased if they were given their own award category, would that appease or would sex then become an issue again? Would the boycotters be pleased if a law was promulgated, like good ol’ BEE in SA, that someone of the traditional African colour had to win? Should this years award for best actor not be awarded for the simple reason that there are only white ‘applicants’? Is that not as insulting? Is this boycott then not insulting to every single Oscar winner?
History seems to have taught us nothing. Education seems to have gotten us nowhere. When will we see beyond our differences, and act beyond our fears and our greed?
We pick our battles and I think it is time we pick smarter. The vast majority of wildlife in the world is bordering on extinction. Post colonialism lands are defunct and destroyed. Life that once thrived in Africa is but a myth. Our seas are drowning in our litter. Yet we fight each other while we fight disease, desperate to eliminate dying young while we are eating every living species out of existence. Then conflict over skin colour.
It is an insult to humanity to deem colour a difference we still challenge. We are all in this together. Why can’t we just be kind to everything that lives? When will we fight for the life, the dwindling species around us that needs our attention? When we will join forces to restore earth, above all else, and boycott that destruction?
otherwise 