It's been a bit nasty around here the past few days , so in the spirit of reunification and bridging the cultural divide I thought I'd do my bit by helping educate white South Africans. They do after all so dearly need it. So gather up your spoilt priveledged children and have your slave waged domestic workers fix you a strong over priced, fat cat ,luxury alcoholic beverage. You're going to need it , for today I tell the grim truth about....THE TOKOLOSH!
If you ever enter the hut of a rural South African , you will no doubt find their beds standing on bricks . Understandably enough , this is not done for it's aesthetic nature , but for a far more sinister reason .
The Tokolosh .
If I had a font that could write that name dripping with blood , I would .Seriously .
The Tokolosh is some short little guy . I'm not sure what the general consensus is , but my personal theory is that he's only short cause he is weighed down with the pure weight of all the worlds evil . If science sought to quantify evil , it need look no further than the Tokolosh .
Anyway ,he is short (Napoleon complex anyone ?) and runs around generally looking for beds without bricks , so he can climb up and , well , do stuff . What he does no one is exactly sure .
After all , who would be stupid enough NOT to put bricks under their beds ?
I don't know about you guys , but something tells me the Tokolosh should GET A REAL JOB .
Jerk .
18 comments:
Is this supposed to be satire? Are there not people in SA who believe in this tokolosh?
yes , many people do. It's an attempy to lighten things p.
In today's civilization the Tokolosh is represented as a Rooster. This animal displays specific bad taste, has no original thoughts and cannot speak the truth. He also hides his shortcommings by writing crap about women. He is quite filthy and covered in chicken shit. Don't take him seriously though because therein lies his power... it will rot your brain. Very scary
The entire blog is satire as it is uses ridiculous memes as a rhetorical device to demonstrate how their own arguments are refuted by the application of facts.
Ok, Ron, now you are just way overestimating Rooster's cerebral capacity. Don't use his bullshit as a metaphor for "satire"... it defeats the purpose... it is just shit... no hidden meaning. shit is shit is shit. Don't become a victim like Greg... Don't let it blind you... see the rotting has begun
Well Anon whether or not I am in fact "overestimating Rooster's cerebral capacity" or not - I just thought that it was a plausible & possible explanation as no one can really be as credulous as this. As for Greg: I totally destroyed his latest ridiculous argument by pointing out that the President of Genocide Watch got started after witnessing the horrors of the Cambodian genocide. But I suppose according to his "logic": he will now "throw out" whether Stanton might be part Cambodian. I find it incredible the absurd lengths that he goes to in his bigoted desperate attempts to deny the growing genocide of a people he could not even be bothered to learn about. I doubt he could possibly be as old as he claims as his lack of knowledge is staggering.
Ron - you did not destroy my argument. I am happy to know that Gregory Stanton helped to investigate the Cambodian genocide. However, that does not explain why he thinks a genocide against Afrikaners is imminent or on-going. The feedback I am getting from my friends in SA, all of whom are black, is there is not an organized campaign against Afrikaners nor any other whites. Therefore this leads me to believe that Afrikaners are feeling the brunt and brutality of crime that others have experienced for years. Over the years I have taken the time to learn about Afrikaners though not nearly as much as about black South Africans. After all it was the latter who bore the brunt of oppression for centuries, not Afrikaners.
Well I notice that you just can not stop lying or face the facts. I destroyed your argument when I took away your rhetorical device of insinuating that Stanton was motivated due to the colour of his skin which as I exposed is ridiculous considering his past.
I doubt very much that you were "happy" to learn that he helped to investigate the Cambodian genocide as this completely removes the weapon on which you were hoping to marginalize him with. I am sure you must have punched a whole in the wall over this.
First of all the genocide is affecting the Boer people a lot more than the Afrikaners. To claim that the Afrikaners have not bore the brunt of oppression could be right when defining them as the segment of Cape Dutch descendents but to claim that the Boers have not also bore the brunt of oppression is to validate my point that you have done nothing to actually learn about this people. I am much more interested in the actual Boer people. Not the Cape Dutch / Afrikaners who have never known what is was like to struggle for freedom & to struggle to survive as the Boers have constantly had to do for centuries.
The ancestors of the Boers were initially taken out of Europe by the ancestors of the Afrikaners. Then the Boers moved away from the autocratic rule of the Dutch East India Co starting in the late 1600s & all throughout the 1700s. The British conquest of the Cape had virtually no affect on the Cape Dutch who simply become loyal British subjects. While the Boers of the frontier on the other hand refused to be Anglicized as they developed into a homegrown people who were an intrinsic part of the African landscape. Which led to the mass exodus of the Boers of the eastern frontier as the Cape Afrikaners were fine with British Colonial rule.
Remember also that it was the Boers who were conquered after the second Anglo-Boer War. It was the Boer children who were killed in the British concentration camps to the point where the Boer Nation was almost eradicated. While the Cape Afrikaners were not scathed much as most of them were fighting against the Boers while serving the British Colonial power.
The Boers were the overwhelming part of the White working class during the 20 cent & the Broederbond made sure that they would never rise to high in the political order lest they scupper the agenda of the Cape based Afrikaner Nationalists.
The fact that you openly admit to not even talking with White South Africans -let alone the actual Boer people- speaks volumes & discredits any analysis you have as you have not taken the time to interview the endangered subjects in question.
This is tantamount to claiming that there was no genocide of Jews during the 1930s simply because you spoke to Germans who said there is none taking place. Not exactly a source which inspires confidence. The genocide of the Boers has been exposed & has been going on ever since the second Anglo-Boer War. The Afrikaners continued the cultural genocide of the Boers during the 20th cent by attempting to co-opt them & define them out of existence with the new regime reverting back to physical genocide picking up where their original master Cecil Rhodes left off.
Those who are murdered on the farms are killed execution style with little to nothing ever taken. This is a red flag that the killings have got nothing to do with crime & are blatant attempts at eradicating them as a people & are certainly aimed at driving them off of their land. The Boers' ancestors never wanted to be dumped in Africa the way they were. The Boers never liked the Colonial powers under which the were oppressed as well. The Boers never wanted the establishment of the macro state of South Africa. Furthermore: the Bantus were only oppressed by the Colonial powers after they were conquered from the late 19th cent onwards while the Boers have been oppressed by the Colonial powers since 1652. The Boers have been oppressed by the Colonial powers for centuries longer -except for the Asian & Khoi slaves- than most other peoples within the region.
The Boers have born the brunt of Colonial oppression for much longer than the other groups & are facing total genocide again yet you derisively assert they are not. The warning against committing the crime of denial is applicable here once again as the whole world can read the various posts.
Ron - I do not "punch walls" over anything you or Mr Stanton says, this is all in arena of ideas. I know relatively little about Mr Stanton or Genocide Watch for that matter, and was merely making a guess in what I said earlier. I have however met people from Human Rights Watch and they appear to be a reliable organization. They have documented abuses black farm workers experience. If you or Mr Stanton present evidence of genocide I will eat my words and write to the State Department of US.
You go to great pains here and in some of your posts on SAS to distinguish between Cape Afrikaners versus Boers. I may not have studied these groups to the extent that you have, but I do know their basic history. Do you know why they went on Great Trek in first place? One of reasons was that British ordinance prohibited slavery starting in a certain year - I believe it was 1838. Some of the Boers thought that this would give blacks and others who were slaves, some of whom were what are now called "Coloureds" too many rights. They believed they had a biblical right to rule over everyone, similar to some Jews they believed they were God's chosen people. My point is their belief in white supremacy and their own supremacy was a major factor that motivated the trek because they viewed the British prohibition on slavery as interfering in the system they set up. I know there were Cape Afrikaners, who went along with the British, and there were poorer Boers who were against British domination. A belief in white supremacy is something they all had in common. In the 1930s and after, even before the National Party came to power, the government of SA set out to solve the "poor white" problem, and they even invited the Carnegie Commission of USA to come to SA and study the problem and give recommendations. What is my point here? Your notion of the Boers as most oppressed just does not go with what actually transpired in South Africa's history. I do not deny that they suffered oppression at hands of British, and at times some of them experienced poverty that was comparable to blacks. However, for the most part black South Africans and "Coloureds" experienced far more oppression for the reasons I stated above.
Well now once again you just prove that you have not studied at all the history of the region & know nothing about the Boer people. First off: The Great Trek had almost nothing to do with the notion of "slavery"! This was the British propaganda. For one thing most of the Boers of the frontier did not own slaves. Canadian professor Wallace Mills notes this in his course & the Encyclopedia Britannica BOTH note that most of the Boers did not own slaves. The Great Trek was motivated over the constant frontier wars with the Xhosas who were killing so many Boers that they decided that the best thing for them to do was to trek away from the area as their ancestors had done from the VOC power back almost a century & a half earlier. The British Imperialism in the region was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. Piet Retief (another surname of French origin) only mentioned the abolition of slavery in his Manifesto in a vain attempt at getting the tacit support or understanding of the slave owning Cape Dutch. Which btw looked down at the Boers & ridiculed them for wanting to trek.
The fact that you presume that the Great Trek was over slavery further demonstrates your ignorance over the topic.
The following is an excerpt from the course by the Canadian Professor Wallace Mills.
[ Landless poor whites.
- recent interpretations tend to stress more mundane factors and motivations for the movement. The migratory habits to acquire more land, which were firmly established by trekboers throughout the 18th C, had been bottled up for 40-50 years and there were growing numbers of landless white males. In trekboer society, this was a terrible situation and fate. Their only course was to become a ‘bywoner’ to some relative or other farmer with land. As such, they would provide services (usually as an overseer) and be allowed to use some land for a few cattle or agricultural purposes. This meant that their status was only a bit better than non-white servants.
- this interpretation sees the ‘Great Trek’ as merely the bursting of the dam that had bottled such migrations up for over 2 generations.
Piet Retief’s Manifesto.
- Retief was one of the most influential of the Great Trek leaders. Among those who joined the Great Trek, he was a bit unusual in a couple of respects. He was much better off than most trekkers; at one time he owned over 20 lots in Grahamstown as well as farm properties. As can be seen from his letter (it was translated for publication in the Grahamstown Journal), he was better educated than most who were illiterate or just barely literate.
- Retief’s so-called manifesto has too often been accepted uncritically and without analysis of context. Not all the assertions can be accepted at face value. It must be analysed carefully and critically.
- for example, the complaint about the abolition of slavery and the process of compensation for a long time went unexamined and was repeated innumerable times as a factor in the trek (by both friends and critics).
-however, investigation revealed that slavery was not common in the eastern frontier areas from which almost all the Voortrekkers came. Besides, no new slaves could be imported after 1807 and the prices of the existing slaves had risen markedly. Very few (if any) Voortrekkers had ever owned slaves. Retief’s only known connection was that at one time he had borrowed money from an ex-slave woman!
Shutting down of migration after 1780s.
- the earlier expansion had left some land not taken up behind the leading edges and the pushing back of the Xhosa in the early wars in the 19th C had made some land available (however, the 1820 settlers had also been assigned much of that); nevertheless, the voracious appetite for land among trekboers meant that by the 1830s, landlessness had grown. In effect, the on-going migration that had characterised the 18th C had been dammed up for almost 50 years. Thus, the Great Trek can be viewed as the bursting of the dam. Thus, the Great Trek can be seen as merely the resumption of the earlier process.
- this interpretation is supported by the fact that late in the 19th C when the problem of landlessness again reemerged in the South African Republic (Transvaal), a couple of attempts were made to organize new treks farther into the interior (into Zimbabwe or Angola). These efforts were blocked by Rhodes who wanted to ensure that it was the British Empire that got these areas. ]
Wallace Mills. The Great Trek.
The following is from American author Stephen Crane.
[ As far back as 1809, Hottentots were prohibited from wandering about the country without passes, and from 1812, Hottentot children who had been maintained for eight years by the employers of their parents, were bound as apprenticed for ten years longer. The missionaries were dissatisfied with these restrictions; both of them were removed by an ordinance passed July, 1828, when vagrant Hottentots began to wander over the country at will. Farming became almost impossible; the farm-laborers became vagabonds and petty thefts took place constantly.
Early in 1834, Sir Benjamin D'Urban, called "the Good," was appointed Governor. A legislative council was then granted the colony, but its powers were not great.
The Boers had never been greatly in favor (many opposed it strongly) of slavery, but they had yielded to the general custom and over three million pounds was invested in slaves throughout the colony in 1834. Sir Benjamin D'Urban proclaimed the emancipation of the slaves, who had been set free throughout the British Empire, in August, 1833. This freeing was to take effect in Cape Colony on the 1st of December, 1834.
The news of the emancipation was felt to be a relief, but the terms on which it was conducted were productive of unending trouble. The slave-owners of Cape Colony were awarded less than a million and a quarter for their slaves -- and the imperial government refused to send the money to South Africa; each claim was to be proved before commissioners in London, when the amount would be paid in stock. To make a journey of one hundred days to London was, of course, impossible to the farmers; they were at the mercy of agents who made their way down to the colony and purchased the claims, so that the colonist received sometimes a fifth, sometimes a sixth, or less, of the value of his slaves. The colonists had hoped that a vagrant act would have been passed by the Council when the slaves were freed, to keep them from being still further overrun by this large released black population, but this was not done. ]
The Great Boer Trek.
The slave owners were the Cape Dutch in the Western Cape most of whom did not go on the series of mass migrations later called the Great Trek. Therefore if slavery was a motivating factor then why did MOST of the slave owners not go on the trek? Do you even know how it later became called the Great Trek? This was done by Afrikaner Nationalists historians during the 1930s as part of a deliberate attempt at co-opting the Boer's history in order to suit the Broederbond backed Cape based Afrikaners' imperialist political agenda! The only grievance anyone had about the abolition of slavery was the fact that the compensation was impossible to collect.
[ The discontent, so often, and to his detriment, ascribed to the Boer was exaggerated and misrepresented, as, for instance, in the matter of the freeing of the slaves, when he was described as being inhumanly against their liberation. No! Your Majesty, it was not the Christian Boers' repugnance to the emancipation, but his opposition to the means employed in effecting same under the blessed British rule. Is Your Majesty perhaps aware how the Boers became possessed of those slaves? They, the Boers, had no ships to convey the slaves from Mozambique and elsewhere, as none other than English vessels were allowed to bring slaves to the Cape market; therefore, it was from English slave-ships that the Boers first bought their slaves, and in this manner enjoyed a short season of prosperity; for, assisted by their dearly bought slaves, they could have their lands ploughed and sown with grain, which, under the blessings of Britannia's laws, could be sold for not more than 18d. per bag.
It was thereafter shipped abroad by English merchants and sold at immense profits. And then,Your Majesty, the Boer was suddenly told: "Your slaves are free, and you will receive compensation to such and such an amount for them, which you will have to go and get in England." Your Majesty, how could the Boer be expected with his ox-wagon or horses to go and fetch same?
To have undertaken, at that time, a voyage so dangerous and lengthy (a hundred days or so being the time required to accomplish same) would have cost more than the small amount of the indemnity he was to receive for his dearly bought slaves. What could the Boer do? The only means left him was to engage the English dealer, from whom he had purchased the slaves at exorbitant prices, to go and fetch the money for him, or to sell his chance for what he could get. ]
From: General Petrus Joubert. Vice President of the Transvaal Republic. During the tenure of President Paul Kruger whom he ran against 3 times. This excerpt is noted in the Story of the Boers: a book compiled by a Dutch diplomat named C W van der Hoogt who met President Paul Kruger & was published in 1900.
The notion that the Boers "believed in White supremacy" is a total canard as their "racism" was ALWAYS patriarchal in nature -as even the leftist Afrikaans bloger Wessel van Rensburg of the Mhambi blog notes. The Afrikaner Nationalists in fact invented an entire mythology in order to justify their racist ideology which in the process recast the Boers as having White Execptionalist sentiments when this was a total exaggeration as the Boers & even Afrikaners as well were formed out of a people who were partly of Indian / Malay & Khoi origin. The Boers never believed in the domination of other peoples. The Afrikaner Nationalists promoted their program to protect the White domination of the macro State of South Africa as they hardly believed in racial purity -it was just a means to an end: to control the State the British created.
The Boers are not the MOST oppressed - as I noted the Asian slaves. I noted that they are the LONGEST RUNNING oppressed people in the region next to the Khoisan -who ironically due to their simpler lifestyle were living much freer among themselves in the northern Cape areas. The ancestors of the Boers were forced out of Europe (& Asia) by the VOC who flooded them out of their homes. A great many did not even have proper surnames so the VOC named them after the towns they took them from ie: van (which means of or from) then the name of the town. For example: van Rensburg / van Graan / van der Merwe etc.
The Boers trekked away from the VOC at the first opportunity then about a century later in 1795 they had their first freedom struggle against Dutch Colonial rule on the eastern Cape frontier whereupon they adopted the red / white & blue horizontal tri colour to symbolize their opposition to the orange / white & blue horizontal tri colour of the VOC. The Boers were the first freedom fighters of Africa as well. Now to lump the Boers in with the Afrikaners is a total disservice as the Boers have had to struggle against the Afrikaners & were & are still under a form of Afrikaner domination.
Joubert is also another Afrikaans surname of French origin. I make a habit of trying to point this out as I have personally studied the significant French roots of the Boers & Afrikaners & tire of the constant parroting of the ignorant & erroneous notion that the Boers & Afrikaners are "of Dutch origin". When in fact the Boers have very little Dutch roots -the Cape Dutch have a lot more Dutch roots- as their ancestors were the German / Frisian & French Huguenots the VOC sent to the Cape which was run by the Dutch.
The notion that the Boers believed that they had a "Biblical right to rule" others can be quickly debunked when considering the findings of historian André Du Toit (the entire name are French names) who noted that prior to the Anglo-Boer War: the Boers were not noted for their religiosity & had in fact adopted a homegrown religious belief system which was based on Malay origins.
Quote from Christianity in Central Southern Africa Prior to 1910. From Irving Hexham & Karla Poewe. Scroll to Traditional Boer Religion.
[ The argument that Calvinism played a central role in Boer society, from the earliest settlement at the Cape to the present has an initial plausibility, but a growing number of scholars believe this interpretation lacks evidence. To date, the best discussion of an alternate interpretation is found in the works of André du Toit who argues that before the late nineteenth-century frontier Boers were not noted for their religiosity. I myself also have developed this view, suggesting that identification of Afrikaners with Calvinism did not take firm hold until after the horrors of the Second-Anglo Boer war. ]
Link to paper.
Furthermore: the Boers never set up a system on the frontier. True they attempted to set up republics but they were soon reversed by the Colonial power. The first Boer Republics did not last much longer than about a year. The Trekboers in particular lived a nomadic lifestyle which historians noted was similar to how the Khoisan peoples lived. The Boers are the descendents of this desert dwelling people who lived in the wagons in which they traveled or in circular shaped Khoisan influenced huts. This was hardly a people who had the power or sophistication to promulgate / construct complex political ideologies whether they be race based or otherwise. The notion that the historic Boers even held such racial sentiments was the propaganda of the Afrikaner Nationalists -who were basically the Cape Dutch rebaptized as Afrikaners- who claimed such as part of a racial based political program -in the name of controlling the state- which also in fact marginalized & suppressed the actual Boer people who were during the 1930s too poor to politically resist the ascending power of the Afrikaner Nationalists.
Note also that General Butler of Britain noted during the late 19th cent that there were 3 distinct White groups in Southern Africa: the British or English speakers / the Cape Dutch & the Boers. The word Afrikaner was not used as this term had yet to be more fully propagated by the Cape Dutch who started calling themselves such after the language they spoke & had earlier named.
The late Boer Patriot Robert van Tonder also always insisted that the Boers were a different nation to the Cape Dutch. He left the National Party in 1961: when South Africa became a republic in order to pursue the restoration of the Boer Republics as was clamoured for during the late 1940s.
The Boers were often conditioned out of their unique identity by the propaganda of the Afrikaner Nationalists but they have never disappeared as a distinct nation.
The Boer Professor Tobias Louw also noted the distinction between Afrikaner & Boer during an open letter he wrote to the Institute for Security Studies back in September of 2003 of which the following is an excerpt.
[ Another point of grotesque confusion that we need to clear up, is that Boers are not "Afrikaners". None of your co-workers seem to have any understanding of this. All Boers are aware of the systematic subterfuge and distortion of "identity" that has been the result of the makings of the Broederbond and the National Party, based upon the then image of the British imperialist gentleman. This artificial identity was meant to wean away the Boers from their strong identify, from their history, from their nationalism, and thus weaken them.
The ISS should take note that the Boers never wanted a singular state with a single government ruling all the peoples of the sub-continent. The Boer Republics were taken from them with violent force. Even the terms of the peace treaty of Vereeniging in 1902 stated unambiguously to see to the restoration of Boer independence as a people before any political rights be bestowed upon the African peoples.
But we Boers are not colonialists or imperialists. The Boers never engaged in any "Christianizing" mission work to convert the heathens as did the American, Scottish and German missionaries. Our forebears wisely thought it best not to interfere with those values and views that other people cherish and hold sacred. The Boers made no bones about the fact that they were not great supporters of the capitalist system, as it was seen to be nothing else than another form of Imperialism. No wonder then that the Irish, the Russians, and so many others from Europe joined in the defense of our freedom. The Boers never sought to "civilize" and "develop" other racial and cultural groups from a position of cultural superiority. The Afrikaners tried it for many years, and failed dismally in more than one way.
Take note that the Boers today have good reason to be immensely frustrated and angered. We have not only lost all forms of the partial self-determination we previously enjoyed, through the treacherous dealings of Afrikaner politicians, but have lost virtually all rights to make a decent living and bringing up our children with good values and good learning. All indications are that the marginalizing of the Boer will only get worse under the present regime, which is regarded by us as illegitimate. ] End of quote.
Furthermore: the growing genocide of the Boers is likely already known by the State Department so sending a letter to them would not change anything. Most Americans were made aware of this growing genocide back in Jan of 1999 when the CBS television program 60 Minutes aired a segment in which the late Ed Bradley interviewed a one Mr. Marais (another surname of French origin) among others & reported on the killing of the mostly Boer farmers. This program was rerun again in July of 1999. Prince Charles has also expressed his concern on the matter after receiving a letter from a person documenting the growing genocide. There is no excuse for being in constant denial of this topic.
Ron - you seem to know quite a bit about Boer history and I am impressed with fact that you can cite sources which you have referenced here and on some of your posts on SAS. Question for you - how did the term "Boer" originate historically? Was this not a derogatory term that British used to refer to some of the poorer Afrikaners whom they encountered? Then, you have argued here and in some of your posts on SAS that Boers did not believe in supremacy. But they did believe in predestination, did they not? If you look at the Battle of Blood River - 1838 for example, and how that has become such a big part of Boer folklore, of popular history if you will that parents pass down to their children and how they described the outcome of the battle (a few musket-armed Boers triumphant over massive Zulu regiments) as having been biblically predestined, certainly that is Calvinism is it not, whether the Boers called it that or not. Then, fast-forward to Boer Republics - we are referring to Transvaal and Orange Free State before the end of Anglo-Boer war. Was not white supremacy, and Afrikaner (Boer) supremacy at core of system of laws and customs the Boers set up there?
The term Boer originated to describe the pastoralists of the frontiers. The Boers are the dscendents of the Trekboers (which meant: migrating farmer) who trekked into the frontiers during the late 1600s & throughout the 1700s. Then later the term was shortened to Boer [1] as many began to settle down becoming known as Grensboere or Border Farmers. The British did indeed propagate the term Boer to describe the poorer frontier folk - but they often used it in a derogatory manner. Similar to how a Serb will refer to himself as a Serb as a matter of cultural designation while his enemies will call him a Serb in a derogatory or disrespectful manner. Regardless of how the British used it: the term Boer had a history in the region prior to the arrival of the British as most of the trekking Afrikaans speaking people of the northern & eastern Cape frontier were farmers or pastoralists.
The predestination belief among some Boers stems from the Calvinistic tradition. The Battle of Blood River is often tragically misunderstood in the West as it was the outcome of a defensive posture when the Boers came under attack by Dingaan. The elected leader of the Natal contingent of Boers: Piet Retief attended a formal ceremony at which the Zulu King Dingaan ceded the empty portion of land south of the Tugela River (of which Dingaan had duplicitly already promised to the British & others) after Retief did Dingaan's bidding to return cattle which was stolen by a rival tribe. But during the formal ceremony commemorating the agreement: Dingaan suddenly ordered Retief & his entire delegation of some 70 people to be killed. After this was done Dingaan & his Zulu impis then went on to kill a total of about 500 Boer civilians in two main massacres -the main one: the Bloukrans Massacre- [2] who were still waiting for Retief's return. Those who survived the massacres debated whether they should return to the Cape or not but the decision -made mainly by the women spurring the men on to remain - was ultimately made to remain where they were. A new leader Andries Pretorius was elected as the leader of the area Boers. Pretorius later proposed negotiating for peace if Dingaan were to restore the land he had granted to Retief. [3] Dingaan responded on December 16 1838 with an attack on the Boers at Ncome River who formed a laager & successfully defended their position. The later alliance between Pretorius & the new Zulu King Mpande saw the establishment of the Natalia Republic on the land which was promised to the local Boers by Dingaan. This republic was later annexed by the British in 1843 whereupon most of the Boers trekked northwards joining other Boers established there which led to some friction.
The point of the Boer Republics was certainly not about Afrikaner supremacy as the Boers repeatedly refused the constant overtures of the Afrikaners. [4] President Paul Kruger did not like the Cape Afrikaners & did not want them coming to his republic. The Western Cape based Afrikaner Bond started floating the notion of Afrikaner Nationalism & tried to co-opt the Boers' struggles as somehow being part of a greater White Afrikaans speaking platform. The Boers of the republics were having none of it as they did not want to be under Cape based Afrikaner domination.
To erroneously infer that White supremacy was at the core of the laws within the Boer Republics is a complete misrepresentation of the point of the republics. The point of the republics was to create a political dispensation which could protect the Boers from the constant encroachments of the British Colonial power. It is interesting to note that the drive to establish republics was mainly the result of British encroachments [5] as many Boers thought the establishment of formal republics would jeopardize their trading with neighbouring tribes. Remember also that the Boers were at times aligned with Griquas [6] / Rolong & Zulus against British Imperialism. If the aim was to establish White supremacy then what in the world were they doing aligning themselves with mixed race & Black tribes & fighting against the White British? If you look at the origins of overt racial politics in the region: it started with the British. The Boers even considered joining an alliance with the Xhosas in order to drive the British out. [7] The Boers have never believed in dominating other peoples as all they wanted was to be free from foreign or alien domination & thus they had to make sure to have alliances with neighbours in order to help protect their long term survival. The Boers were anti-Colonial & the neo Colonial mindset of the Cape based Afrikaners had yet to eclipse the Boer people & ascend to power in the region.
Notes.
1. Bowdoin College.
Quote: [ Their contact with the local Dutch government became more and more tenuous and most of them lived hard rural lives, moving farmsteads frequently, and quite independent of government and education. By 1745 they were known as Trekboers, which means "wandering farmers," a term which was later shortened to Boers. ]
2. Tourism Natal.
Quote: [ After killing Retief and his party, Dingane's impis (army) moved into the valleys to the west under the Drakensberg mountains where the Voortrekkers were encamped in family groups. ]
3. The Great Boer Trek. Stephen Crane.
Quote: [ On three occasions the scouts brought in some captured Zulus, and Pretorius sent them back to Dingaan to say that if he would restore the land he had granted Retief he would enter into negotiations for peace. ]
4. Micheal Barthorp. The Anglo-Boer Wars. page 44.
Quote: [ In the Republics the Bond did not flourish: neither President Brand nor President Kruger wanted his authority questioned. ]
While Barthorp often erroneously referred to Boers as "Afrikaners" one must remember that this is a common error made during the 20th cent as the Broederbond retroactively turned the Boers into "Afrikaners" as part of a rhetorical devise in appropriating the Boers' history & of projecting a false connection between the Cape Afrikaners & the actual Boer people who in fact long since moved away from the Cape Dutch.
5. Joseph Stromberg. Journal of Libertarian Studies. 1999.
Quote: [ Author Timothy Keegan argues that British involvement in Trans- Orangia set off Boer state formation when some Boer leaders realized the opportunity that a real state could provide for capital accumulation (especially of land) through political means. What is fascinating is that the old Boer maatskappy ideal of ordered near anarchy had adherents who opposed creation of a proper state. This comes out in Keegan’s discussion of the British Orange River Sovereignty’s attempt to rally or coerce Boers into fighting Moshweshwe’s Sotho in 1851. Those who traded with the Sotho, had agreements with them, or found the British more threatening, refused to go on commando, and stated their satisfaction with their “friend” Moshweshwe. ]
6. Joseph Stromberg. Journal of Libertarian Studies. 1999.
Quote: [ Alliances cut across racial and cultural lines, and it was not unusual to see Boers allied with Griquas or Africans against some current opponent (which could include the Empire). ]
7. Joseph Stromberg. Journal of Libertarian Studies. 1999.
Quote: [ Participants in the 1815 Slagters Nek rebellion had seriously negotiated with a neighboring Xhosa chief for support in driving out the British. Martin Legassick notes that while Boers expected their servants “to be non-white: they did not expect all non-whites to be their servants” (another possible contrast with the Empire). When necessary or expedient, individual (Boers) or whole communities might live in alliance with, or even under the theoretical jurisdiction of, a native chief. Andries Pretorius and Hendrik Potgieter, Voortrekker leaders, were torn between being leaders in the European sense or transforming themselves into African chiefs who happened to be white. ]
Furthermore: even if some of the laws of the old Boer Republics could be interpreted as having a racial aspect to them: it was of little consequence as the Boer governments could hardly control their own citizens let alone the non-Boer population.
Afrikaaner genocide is an apt thing to talk about in the same breath as the tokolosh. Both are cultural myths bred on Neurosis.
Define your terms. The term Afrikaner is just an Afrikaans word for African hence by definition everyone in Africa is an Afrikaner. If you are talking about White Afrikaans people: further clarity is still required as the more affluent Cape Dutch descendents are often much better off than the Boer descendents most of whom are part of the working class or are impoverished. The growing genocide against the Boer descendents is a documented phenomenon.
Greg:
Addendum.
The following is from: Colonial South Africa and the Origins of the Racial Order. by Timothy Keegan. Chapter: Dutch Beginnings. On pages 35 & 36.
[ Throughout the subsequent decades, it was (very anti-humanitarian) British settlers, and not Boers, who developed a rhetoric of racial and cultural superiority to justify ongoing imperial subversion of the Xhosa. Boers increasingly resented this imperial militarization of the frontier districts, proved unwilling military conscripts, and even on occasion showed some fellow feelings towards the African Chiefdoms. Certainly when new frontiers of imperial aggression were opened up north of the Orange during the brief period of British rule there at mid century, Boer and Sotho were to throw in their lot together quite openly at crucial junctures against the British presence.
But the Trek cannot be said to have been motivated by a desire to conquer and subjugate. If anything, as that prominent (Boer) frontiersman born and bred, Andries Stockenström, pointed out, Boers were indifferent, if not hostile, to the acquisitive machinations of British settlers and rogue governors bent on military expansion. As Stockenström wrote, ' The theory which makes the black irreclaimable savages, fir only to be exterminated, like the wolves, was not of Boer origin' - implying ( correctly ) that explicitly racist notions about the Xhosa and other African peoples were a British innovation.
The predominant ideology of the colonial frontier was thus decidedly predicated on the ideal of racial exclusiveness. But this did not imply that subjugation of the great mass of African farming peoples encountered beyond the Khoisan frontiers was either a practical possibility or even a desired ideal. This is were the earlier liberal interpretation breaks down. The power, the desire, the need to impose racial supremacy on a sub continental scale at the level of the state and its institutions was an impulse that had other origins at other historical junctures. White supremacy as a total system of hegemony and subjugation grew from the centers of power - meaning (in the main) centers of imperial power - outwards, and not the other way round. It was not on isolated frontiers that such an ideal took root. ] End of quote.
This further refutes your assertion. Furthermore: both Canadian Professor Wallace Mills & American libertarian author Joseph Stromberg note that the political notions of the frontier Boers verged on anarchy which is the total opposite of the required political philosophy to enact a Statist based racial supremacist paradigm.
Correction. The anti-racist Afrikaans blogger Wessels van Rensburg noted that the racism of the Boers was paternalistic. I used the wrong P word. Van Rensburg correctly points out that the paternalistic racism of the Boers was not of the same harsh or extremist variety as the chauvinistic racism of a KKK or a National Front.
Wow... going back to the original post, I posted an article recently doing a sceptical analysis of the tokoloshe myth here.
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