Black privilege: South Africa’s dark secret

We’ve all heard about white privilege – but how many of us know about how black people unfairly benefit from their skin colour? Guest Writer Johan Van Eksteen shines a light of truth on this phenomenon that many will refuse to admit exists.

My fellow South Africans, there is a troubling part of our society that none of us ever acknowledge or talk about. Right at the middle of the centre of our country’s core, there is a phenomenon that many will try to tell you is “absurd” or “totally misinformed and misguided” to talk about.

Black Privilege.

Now, we’ve all heard about White Privilege. It’s boring. It’s old. It’s not even worth talking about any more. It doesn’t even exist – some people say that my skin colour gives me unearned benefits and privileges. But this just isn’t true. Every day when I came into work at my father’s company (this was just after I’d finally finished my degree after switching courses three times at UCT and I’d turned down several other job offers and taken up my dad’s offer) my pa would tell me “Johan, lots of people will think you’re going to become the General Manager here in three years’ time because you’re my son, or because you’re white, or even both.”

I knew then that I had to work extra hard to make sure my rightful place wasn’t given to some random. My whiteness disadvantaged me. Every day, I set the alarm on my iPhone 6 half an hour earlier. Every day, I ate low-fat organic yoghurt with a quick smoothie when everyone else was having their morning fry-up. Every day, I made sure I was out my four-bedroom apartment and in my Audi in N7 traffic before everyone else. Every day I had to make it look like I was working harder than everyone else, even when I wasn’t.

It was exhausting. It was difficult.

But I did it. I managed to excel despite my skin colour.

But Universities and so-called “academic thinkers” will never admit this simple truth to you: there are certain unspoken social and economic privileges that black people get and white people don’t just because the system favours black skin.

Ready to have your mind blown?

#1: Black people can make black people jokes

Let’s look at so-called “comedians” like Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock. If they make jokes about black people it’s “hilarious”. But if I tell a real knee-slapper about Phineas walking into a bar and asking for a job, it’s “racist” and “disgusting”.

I’ve spoken about this hypocrisy before.

It’s “racist as hell” when I apply half a tin of Kiwi shoe polish onto my cheeks and put on a pair of overalls, but when little boys paint their faces in disgusting ‘whiteface’, it’s “their culture” and a “Xhosa rite of passage to finally becoming a man”.

Hell, I can’t even use the word ‘n*****r’. I can’t even say it aloud, or even explain to you what word that is that I’m hiding behind stars. I have to say, like, “the N-word”. I can’t tell you how oppressive it is to have to go “uh” or “mmm” or make a strange bleeping noise during my favourite N****rs With Attitude song.

#2: Black people get jobs easily

This is the ugliest part of it. If I want to get a job, I have to work hard for years and years at a high-grade private school and with my private weekend tutors so that I can get a good chance to get into UCT or another tertiary institute. Then, I have to ask my parents for tens of thousands of Rands just to get my Master’s degree and then, even after all this, I still have to put in at least two years, bare minimum, at my father’s company just to make it onto the Board of Directors as a lowly Chief Manager of National Divisions' Procurement.

But look at our President or a lot of politicians. They didn’t get their Matric, and some of them even failed Woodwork, and they’re all employed.

“Oh, Johan,” I hear you rascal ‘intellectuals’ and ‘academics’ retort, “this is aimed at addressing the inequalities of the past. Black people used to suffer disadvantage because of their skin colour, so it’s an attempt at social justice.” And I reply: thank you for proving my point. You’re saying they get jobs because they are black. Checkmate.

#3: Black people get social benefits

Today, all across South Africa, thousands of black and coloured people have access to government RDP housing, government healthcare, and unemployment benefits. But just because most white people I know have homes and jobs and money and health insurance, does that mean that they should suffer this ugly system of reverse racism? Whatever happened to the vision of true equality that Nelson Mandela had for us all? If I want Comprehensive International Platinum membership Full Cover with Cashback guarantee after six years and no limits of hospital or doctor choice, I have to pay thousands of Rands for it. This is disgusting. I believe in equal opportunities for all, regardless of your skin colour or how many thousands of rand you earn per month.

#4: Black people get automatic sympathy

We all know that our local media is a sick-lie-birthing nest of incestuous, revolting snakes writing in pools of their own corrupt, foetid shit, but what we never talk about is how much it prefers stories about black people. Every time there’s a shooting or tragedy or political scandal involving black people, you’ll guarantee that they’ll have front page coverage every single time without fail. But if a white guy commits a crime, for him to get attention he has to shoot his model girlfriend and be handicapped - and even then, all he gets his is own channel on DSTV.

Where is the extensive coverage of the billions of white lives lost just this year alone in farm murders in South Africa? Where was the six-page analysis of beloved artists like Steve Hofmeyr having their constitutionally-enshrined Freedom of Speech violated on Twitter?

This might sound like I’m repeating myself, but if a black person says a white oke called him a K-bomb (oh look! Another word white people arent’ allowed to use! Doesn’t this censorship make you feel sick?!) everyone will believe him, but if I say that a Muslim oke is going to blow up a plane, or a Romanian is going to steal my job, or that suspicious black guy in my gated community is doing reconnaissance to rob me blind, it’s “racial stereotyping” and “terribly racist”.

#5: Black people get justice

Every day we see scores of black families see justice. People who rob them or murder their family members are thrown straight in jail, often without any real trouble or controversy or even a lawyer to play lawyer tricks. That's true justice.

But where was the justice for Reeva Steenkamp’s family? You see how the system favours giving speedy, same-day justice to black families, but not to white families.

I’m going to stop now, but I think we can all agree that I’ve only revealed the head of the ugly three-kilometre snake. I look forward to the day that we all receive true equality – black or white. Previously Disadvantaged or Currently Disadvantaged.

If you want to read how to reach this futuristic utopia, perhaps you, too, should vote ANC, like me.

Dear Woolworths

I go to Woolworths. It doesn't end well.

Text reads:

Dear Woolworths,

I am an aspiring novelist. For years now, I have been obsessed by human emotions – particularly feelings like sadness, depression and disappointment. Whether it’s the unforgettable angst of Post-Modernist greats like Paul Auster, the protagonist-destroying genius of Thomas Hardy, or even the lost ideals and broken dreams of dystopian wastelands by seminal thinkers like George Orwell, I’ve been dreaming of writing the saddest, most depressing tragedy of our time.

Which is why I’m writing to you.

“But what does sadness have to do with Woolies?” I hear you ask yourself. “We’re just a food company that provides South African customers with high-quality food and other such luxury goods!”

Well, let me explain.

You see, when I was a silly university student, I thought that true depression and disappointment had to come from life-changing, moving experiences that would haunt you until the day you die: the death of a parent; being forcibly drafted to fight in an unjust war and slowly losing your mind through the trauma of the daily horrors of the battlefield; getting an iPhone for Christmas and seeing it’s only the 16gb white 4S instead of the 64gb Black 5C.

But recently I’ve realised that you can experience these soul-emptying horrors just by going down to your local Woolies.

But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. This email starts as many emails to you, I’m sure, do: with a trip to my local Woolies.

You see, I had high hopes. Huge dreams. A childlike naïveté that we see only in Masterpieces of incomprehensible literary significance.

All I wanted was to buy a simple lunch for the weekend. My hopes weren’t complex or unrealistic: to start with, I’d have an organic, preservative- and chemical-free salad (maybe some rocket and iceberg lettuce with imported Italian tomatoes and extra-virgin Olive oil) and then move onto some fresh, imported Finnish Ocean Salmon on a bed of steamed locally-sourced new potatoes and authentic farm butter, and finally, to end, free-range farm-fresh Ayrshire double cream with organic, hand-picked, and ethically-sourced non-GMO strawberries.

I’m a simple man, of simple tastes, as you can see.

Little did I know that Woolworths are the authors of devastating reality. Like a wide-eyed child straying uncomprehendingly into the Valley of the Shadow of death, so was I totally unaware of the three-tonne metaphorical hammer of cold, jarring truth that would soon come smashing into my hopeless dreams. My face was a Christmas tree of joy and smiles. Optimism and hope traced every word and thought I had. And it was not to last.

And then I went to the salad aisle.

There was no rocket. None at all. Worse still, the lettuce wasn’t Iceberg lettuce, but the far less crispy and delectably sweet Mountain Blue. Then, to add insult to injury, the only olive oil you had was “Imported Virgin olive oil”. No ‘extra-virgin’. None at all. I had walked on the precipice of the void, and the abys had noticed me: its dark, ugly eye cracked open a peep, that glaring, festering red and orange iris of pure evil turned its devilish gaze on my childlike innocence.

Thinking that perhaps this was just a once off, I went to the next aisle. ‘Oh well,’ I thought, completely unaware of the yawning chasm of disappointment that awaits all men, ‘as long as my lunch isn’t spoilt.’

All writers are periodically struck with writer’s block, and this is one of those times. How do I convey even half the… the… *horror* I felt when I saw that all you had was Norwegian fresh-river trout? How do I put across to you the magnitude of soul-wrenching tragedy of seeing only Jacket Potatoes? How do I find the words that accurately sum up the disgust and disillusionment that moved me to thoughts of suicide when I saw that instead of real butter all you had was butter-identical spread?

It was at that moment I realised there is no god. Life is a journey of suffering and loneliness and disappointment. As children, we are wrongfully raised by our parents to believe there is some justice and fairness in the world. I now see that both my parents are liars and deceivers of the worst kind and deserve the eternal nothingness that will greet us all when we are lying on our death beds, cold, lonely and utterly terrified of the coming darkness.

I mean, your strawberries weren't even organic, and neither was the cream. Worse yet, when I thought that perhaps I could salvage some of my childish dying hopes and wonderment by having perhaps organic blueberries instead, you were all out. That was when I realised that the Bible is a meaningless tome replete with falsehoods designed to make us think the world is some kind of a wonderful, lovely place instead of the desolate hellhole it really is. “I looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked back.”

And so, after all this, I just want to ask you how you did it. Was it planned? Did you meticulously plan each incredible, Post-Modern step of this shopping experience, or was it just sheer luck? Did a team of writers collaborate on this amazing feat of Golden-Era-Pastoralist-Value-smashing stream of consciousness? How did you know that my keen, intense desire to feast on luxury goods - when coupled with the overwhelming disappointment of having to, eugh, *settle for less* - would produce such deadly melancholy?

Would your team of genii artists perhaps be interested in writing a joint-authored novel that makes Sartre’s Nauseum look like a colourful, light-hearted children’s book filled with smiles, bunnies and rainbows?

I wept when I watched your new Asimbonanga advert on Youtube – perhaps even as hard as I wept when I held the bottle of cream and saw it hadn’t been locally sourced.

How can I make my readers feel even a tenth of the despair you’ve inflicted on me?

Yours in faith and mad hope,

Matthew de Klerk

Author, poet, chasm-gazer, Smartshopper

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UPDATE: 28/01/14 - Woolworths tweets and emails me back.

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UPDATE: My "primary psychological caregiver" replies

Text reads:

Dear Ms Jaftha,

My name is Dr Johan Van Eksteen and I am Mr de Klerk’s primary psychological caregiver.

I am sorry to have to be the one to inform you of this, but yesterday at approximately 4pm, Mr de Klerk fell into a deep bout of insanity. Yesterday he was found in his home curled into the foetal position holding a jar of non-imported Italian tomatoes muttering the words “contains preservatives” over and over again. We here at the South African Therapeutic Intervention and Restitution Emergency Psychological Care Ward are giving him all the best care and treatment.

Details at this point are sketchy, but we’re in the process of piecing together the chain of events that led to my patient’s total and utter loss of connection with the real world. At this moment, all we know is that he went into his local Woolworth’s with the desire to buy Imported Norwegian Salmon, a delightful salad, and a delectable desert.

Now, again, details are not clear, but what we have gathered from eye witness reports is that he – and several other shoppers, who we were lucky enough catch and give early treatment – had to instead buy Finnish River Trout. We’re not sure what sort of depraved animals you have running the store (I mean, what kind of sicko makes us stoop to buying something else when stock runs out?) but rest assured we will get to the bottom of this.

If these allegations are correct – if it’s true that you did not have farm fresh Ayrshire double cream and forced your customers to buy the canned Clover stuff, that you inflicted upon our clients the grievous trauma of having to, *eugh*, settle for a generic brand of spaghetti instead of the Nice Stuff That Comes In The Pretty Black Packet – then we will take this injustice to the highest court possible. We cannot idly stand by when fascist food outlets like you are denying innocent South Africans their basic Human Right to Imported, non-GMO, non-gluten, ethically-sourced, Organic lettuce.

I’m sorry, I have to go. Mr de Klerk has just found out we serve generic brand fruit juice and not Woolworths ™ 100% Pressed Organic Cherries and Berries and he’s trashing the canteen.

Dr Johan Van Eksteen

Clinical Psychologist and Chief Caregiver.
S.A.T.I.R.E. Psychological Care Ward, Pretoria, Gauteng

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UPDATE 30/01/14 - Woolworths replies to Dr Van Eksteen

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UPDATE - Dr Van Eksteen succumbs to the disease; Detective Paul E. Snyman of the Police Force has to step in.

Text reads:

Dear Ms Jaftha,

Things have gotten quite serious this side. Unfortunately, Dr Johan Van Eksteen is unavailable to reply your email - but more on that in a moment.

My name is Detective Paul E. Snyman and I am the chief investigative officer who heads the South African Local Crimes Divisions' Crimes Against Humanity Bureau. You may be unfamiliar with the work we do, but basically we deal with serious allegations of human rights infringements. When a man has been wrongfully arrested, we are there. When a mad dictator enacts war crimes against a rival tribal group, we're on the case. And sadly - as I'm sure you know by now - when an innocent, decent, law-abiding South African man is forced to use Woolworth's Free Range 1% Milk on his muesli instead of being free to exercise his god-given, constitutionally upheld basic right to Fat Free non-organic anti-GMO certified cream, we have to step in.

Now, details are sketchy, but we're sorry to say that Dr Van Eksteen, too, has gone mad. According to the medical records our team has pulled from the S.A.T.I.R Emergency Psych Care Ward in Pretoria, Mr De Klerk (the original complainant in this fiasco) slipped into a deep state of trauma sometime on Wednesday afternoon after a shopping trip to the Wolworths store in the Seapoint St Johns shopping centre. First respondents and medical tests have since confirmed he is suffering a reasonably common psychological phenomena in cases like these: a debilitating depression and sadness, often characterised by unnecessary vocal outrage and anger, which usually comes in the form of asking to see your manager and saying "ag" and "unbelievable" a lot while you tap your foot and scowl over your handbag at cashiers.

This syndrome - which usually affects white women in their mid-forties - is known only as Furst-Wuurld Syndrome.

Mr De Klerk did not respond to any treatment. Doctors tried everything - Woolies Original deep-fried tempura rock shrimp on a bed of steamed rice; a fresh summer salad with lentils and spring onion served with a side of avocado mash and balsamic reduction - but nothing could coax him out of his mad stupor or lessen the effects of Furst-Wuurld Syndrome. Finally, exasperated and on the brink of giving up all hope, Dr Van Eksteen decided to try a radical treatment that had only been recently tested in clinical trials.

You see, he had read somewhere that the delicious taste of Woolworth's 600g Prime-smoked Pork Side Rib, perhaps basted in a rich honey-mustard glaze and served alongside a bed of roast organic peppers and imported Mediterranean vegetables, accompanied (of course) with a bottle of 2008 Vergeleugen Old Cellar Merlot, might just snap him out of it. It was a crazy shot, but it's was their last chance to restore fairness and balance to a sick and unjust society.

Little did he know the dark, unspeakable horrors that awaited him.

He went to the the Woolies in the Sandton Centre, and all you had was the 400g Shoulder Rib. Worse yet, it wasn't certified antibiotic free, and instead of a tasty glaze your insidious, hateful staff could only offer a generic meat marinade.

marinade! For shame. Does your insane depravity know no bounds?

By the time Dr Van Eksteen had reached the wines aisle and saw that you only had the 2009 Chardonnay in stock, and that he'd have to wait up to 5 minutes while the clerk checked the storeroom, it was too late. The early symptoms of FWS had sunk in - immediately evident in him updating his Twitter feed to say "OMG @Woolworths just ran out of the Merlot I wanted #ag #unbelieveable #injustice" and loudly exclaiming that this bloody happens all the bloody time why can't you people just do your jobs all I wanted was to have a nice meal and now what must I do now flippen starve.

Although he was quick to take early counter-measures - such as Googling images of starving children in Darfur to remind himself of the plane of reality he was slowly losing his grasp one - it was in vain. Dr Van Eksteen quickly succumbed to the same illness that claimed Mr De Klerk.

We have of course, quarantined the two men, but we strongly recommend handing out free samples of your Tapas and finger snacks as an immediate precautionary inoculation measure to prevent a possible epidemic. Who knows how many customers have had to buy a Mega instead of a Magnum ice cream because of your blatant and perfidious misjudgement?

Currently, no one is pressing any charges but we expect prompt and full action on your part. This tragedy must never be forgotten, and never, ever again be repeated.

#FWS #NeverForget #BlackWednesday

Yours in all faith,

P.E Snyman,
S.A.L.C.D, Crimes against Humanity Bureau
Pretoria

Why this white South African is voting ANC

Guest writer Johan Van Eksteen explains his controversial political decision – and argues why everyone should vote the green, gold and black.

The ANC is evil and filled with money-hungry pricks who don’t give even the most basic shit about the poor or disenfranchised people of our country – a country they have slowly but surely betrayed on a fundamental level.

Or at least that’s what the corrupt “news” media wants you to think.

So, South Africa, I think it’s about time we had a serious discussion about politics and why these lies are standing in the way of turning our country into a developed, prosperous nation.

But Johan, you’re white? How can you vote ANC?

Confession time: I’ve voted DA all my life. Ever since I was just a kid standing in front of the ballot box trying to decide whether to tick ANC to piss off my parents or tick DA because I’m white and it’s expected of me, I’ve never chosen the wagon-wheel and spear-flag.

Until now.

Now, you might call me a uncritical, blind fucktard who is actively supporting the death and destruction of our nation and lending my support to a system of widespread corruption and nepotistic cronyism, and so on and so forth, but give me a moment to explain why this is important.

You know, I used to be just like you. I used to comment on News24 articles about how disgraceful the state of our country is. I used to tell all the okes at my braai on Sunday exactly what was wrong with this blerrie country. I used to make clever puns about “cANCer”.

But then I did my research – and what I found truly shocked me.

Firstly, the ANC is a party that truly cares about the economy. Since Zuma took power, he alone spent half a billion rand on infrastructure development to the country. And that was on just one house - imagine a South Africa where every man and woman in positions of power is flooding the economy with employment and raising the GDP through similar construction projects?

Also, the import of once “luxury items” into South Africa is becoming commonplace. Once upon a time, BMWs were reserved for the elitest of the elite – no longer. Expensive goods like Chivas, gold watches, Blue Label and Mercedes Benz S Classes are almost mundane now. Lots of people talk about debt and unemployment – but in a future where everyone and their brother has an expensive car, how can debt exist?

I’m a true natural-born Afrikaaner. I love the bush. I love Mother Nature and the wild. Under the ANC and thanks to Eskom, long-forgotten and obsolete sciences like astronomy will return to the forefront. South Africa will be a shining beacon in the star-gazing community. Or rather, it won’t be a shining beacon, which is even better. And just like with Zimbabwe and the tireless, ceaseless efforts of the ZANU-PF, South Africa, too, is seeing a slow return to a Golden Era of Pastoral Values.

Growing up in the Transvaal, I hated school. Today, my kids are carrying on that fine family tradition. And who is supporting my family values and personal beliefs and culture? The ANC. Who else could make school less boring by taking away boring things like teachers’ salaries and textbooks, and yet still suffer no negative effects in our National Matric Pass Rate? If anything, we’re passing more and more students – and this is despite the ‘media’ saying schools have gone to the dogs.

And we’re seeing the benefits of this even now. For example, I think we can all agree that’s we’re sick of okes who blame apartheid for everything. Now, this might make my political choice seem paradoxical (Zuma blamed Eskom on apartheid)– but ask yourself: who is helping us to get over and finally forget apartheid? The DA, who always talk about the role they played in it, or the ANC, who is making sure that our children don’t have the schools, paid teachers or history books to learn that apartheid ever happened and constantly obsess over it?

We as South Africans have a history of foreign meddling and imperialist forces trying to force their way of life on us. One of the many ugly examples of this is in alternative medicine. Parties like the DA (and sadly, even early ANC leaders – thankfully a distant memory!) blindly support western “scientific” medical charlatanry, which so arrogantly sneers at traditional and alternative treatments.

A western-centric hegemony on vital medicines and alternative treatments is stopping people getting access to proven cures like that super cure-all beetroot or the world-famous panacea, garlic. It’s a shame that Thabo Mbeki’s legacy didn’t do more to discourage people’s trust in imperialist quackery. How many thousands of now-dead AIDS patients would still be alive today if they hadn’t been misguided into taking expensive pills that the state was wasting our hard-earned tax rands on? The thought of this makes me feel so sick that I have to take an extra -strength, 1-part-per-100-million homeopathic tincture just to keep writing this article.

Another fitting nail in the coffin of the idea that the ANC is a bad party is the simple fact that they want true racial equality in South Africa. The ANC – unlike the liars and thieves in other parties – want us to all be equal.

Once upon a time, shoddy public services, water and electricity cuts and bad social services were solely reserved for an oppressed black minority. By making sure that these things no longer just affect a disenfranchised minority in smaller areas in the outskirts of urban zones, the ANC is introducing true egalitarian society filled with empathy and equality.

Once upon a time it used to be white racist police killing black people who were merely standing up for their basic human rights. Those days are over. Now we have people of all colour in the police killing black people who stand up for their basic rights.

Hell, it used to be only white leaders who introduced oppressive laws trying to curtail freedom of speech and give free reign and no accountability to police. But now we have politicians of all colours doing that. Even I think that the ANC is singling itself out as a bastion of progressivity – and hell, I’ve been called racist for some of my controversial opinions.

And on this point, just ask yourself: what has the DA ever done? Nothing. Nothing at all – and I don’t care what ‘facts’ or ‘statistics’ or ‘internationally-recognised socially progressive programs’ you quote to try and make your sick lies sound sweet as honey. Worse yet, let us not forget that the leader of the party has the same name as a giant radioactive Japanese monster. Is that not reason enough to err on the side of caution?

As a wise man once said, but better the devil you know than the DA-Zille you don’t.

VIVA ANC VIVA.

Expat missing rude South Africa

Citing the endless and intolerable stream of politesse and good spirit he has experienced from French people since his arrival in the country last year, expatriate and once South African citizen Erik van der Westhuizen said this morning that he “really really misses the fuck-you, cold shoulder attitude of [his] home country.”

“It’s been like this since I got here: just a ceaseless wave of gentility and good manners. On buses, at schools, at markets, in the street – it’s nothing but 'bonjour, Monsieur, comment ca va' this and 'excusez-moi' that and 'merci beaucoup' yada yada. I can’t even buy a packet of ham and a baguette in solitary, lonely, lovely silence without some arsehole greeting me and murping on about “how are you?” and all that shit. It just makes you miss the old days, you know?

Van der Westhuizen says his homesickness extends to many, many sectors of society, including rude shop keepers, unhelpful department officials, and egotisical and lazy police officers.

“The society here just makes no sense. I didn’t lock the door yesterday, and my house wasn't even broken into. Hell, last week one police officer asked me if I was lost, what I was looking for and whether he could help me,” said the forty-eight-year-old South African ex-national. “As if that’s any of his fucking business.”

Government officials and political figures of South Africa have since responded quickly to the reports, saying they are working on alleviating the dreary and depressing feeling of homesickness Van der Westhuizen currently suffers, by making South Africa as “unmissable as possible.”

“We’re really sorry he feels this way, but we want to reassure him that we’re doing everything in our considerable power to make him never feel these terrible sentiments again,” said a spokesperson for the government. “We’ve made fantastic progress already, what with Eskom introducing unwavering load shedding that is only going to get worse, the general decline of confidence in government, our internationally-mocked justice system, and the slow breakdown of social cohesion stemming from reports of racism and racially-motivated attacks."

Government now says that they are mere months from having Van der Westhuizen feeling smug and happy at his decision.

“As we move into Zuma’s next inevitable term despite him lacking the basic qualifications, abilities, intellect and organisational skills to organise a dump in a public toilet, we’re sure he’ll be one of those ‘jassis, but I’m glad I left, have you seen how that blerrie country is going to the blerrie dogs?’ ex-Saffer Australian ex-pats in no time.”

DVD companies adopt Adam Sandler anti-piracy measures

Taking a firm stance against the worsening global trend of illegally downloading films and series, DVD and CD production companies have today announced their decision to embed all their products with powerful anti-piracy measures, such as Adam Sandler’s Funny People or Jack and Jill.

"When we look at past cases of illegal downloads and internet piracy, we see time and time again how any CD or DVD protected with embedded content made by Adam Sandler is a powerful agent in deterring torrenters from stealing films,” said a spokesperson for Miramax Pictures, Hugh Torrent. “No one downloads them. In fact, the measures are so powerful that they have been known to even instill overwhelming sensations of nausea, vomiting and suicide in those exposed to them.”

"Imagine the scene: you're a pirate. You want to watch the latest Game of Thrones episode, but don't want to support the studio or actors in it. So you just illegally download from some shady site. That awesome theme music plays - we like to lull them into a sense of false security - and then BOOM. Subtle racism and vomit-inducing fart jokes bereft of any talent hits you straight in the brain."

Torrents said the historical evidence was powerful.

“Time and time again, we have seen the potency of footage embedded with this protection software. In the past we have run many, many experiments testing the latest versions of this defence software. Like when we first introduced the advanced content protection software in Spanglish and then slowly started to perfect it into its pirate-viewer-kryptonite forms in Blended and, oh god, Grown Ups 2. Literally no one pirates that last movie. Sure, it was so powerful it physically sickened legitimate viewers in the theatre, but that's the price we pay in the war against torrenters.”

And despite universal outcry from international human rights organisations and activism groups saying that such measures are “an extreme abuse of power” and “a despicably cruel extreme”, movie companies have stood by their decision.

“We’ve tried to scare off pirates with Cease and Desist letters, legal threats, huge fines, jail time, and really stupid anti-piracy adverts, but [illegal downloads] have continued unabated,” he said. “It’s about time we took extreme measures.”

However, the move has been branded “unoriginal copy-catting” by the South African film industry, saying they’ve been doing this for years.

“Piracy has been a huge issue in South Africa for years,” they said. “This is why we routinely protect our CDs and DVDs with content produced by Steve Hofmeyr and Leon Schuster – anti-piracy methods so powerful they’ve been known to make people commit suicide in the most brutal manner possible right in public places."

For those of you wanting to copy-paste this onto their own website without my permission, please study the image below.

Pic (my edit) made of Commons images and Head by Alex Neman. Yes, I know the hand is the wrong way round. Jesus, give me a break.

Artist now confirmed as “true genius” after dying

The life’s work of painter, artist, novelist and poet Edward Rosterford is being hailed as “irrefutable genius” this week, following his death in a terrible road accident last weekend. He was 34.

Since the news of the artist's tragic passing - which police suspect could have been suicide - tributes have been flooding in from across the world, mourning the “lost master” as “one of the true experts of his trade.”

“Now that he is gone, I can really see the poignant weight of his works," said one fan at the large memorial held in Rosterford's memory. "When he was alive he was a bit of a prick, really, and I never really liked anything about his writing, but I think death is quite becoming of him. I think this new phase is making his works blossom quite nicely in a way that being alive could never really do for him."

The work, which was once branded “useless,worthless trash that only a total moron would ever pay money for” is now being auctioned off, with chief pieces fetching as much as 12 million rand.

"His style is very hot on the market now," said auctioneer and arts expert Maika Sithall-Hupp. "If we look at the central, seminal pieces in his body of work, such as Rain and Gilded Dream, we can see pertinent themes of the artist battling to having his work noticed. Exposure, a series of oil paintings on canvas, shows the evocative disparity and bitter irony of never being paid for one’s art, while suffering from the elements in a shoddy apartment that the portrayed character can’t afford to have heated. In effect, the artist seeks two kinds of warmth: the warmth of love, of recognition, of celebrity for what is most dear to him, and the warmth of a radiator that is keeping him alive in the dead of winter. So we see the visual representation and human embodiment of the cruel play on words of 'Dying for Exposure'."

Other art experts agree.

"Where before his the major pieces of his oeuvre, such as Impassioned Passing and Inner Turmoil were just random colours mashed up and tossed haphazardly onto canvas, this major break-through in his career brings to them a new context of reception," said gallery owner Jake Henderson. "Gone are the blase brush-strokes and careless composition - instead, we see masterpieces that not only define a generation, but could make me very rich indeed with a much lower royalty payout.

These and other stunning works by the late and great Rosterford will be showcased all weekend at the De Bruin's ArtHouse Gallery, alongside the dreary talentless bullshit made by other artists currently still alive.

World taking Apocalypse news surprisingly well

Global surprise reigns this morning, after people of all ages, religions and creeds are taking the news of the imminent threat of Earth’s total and utter obliteration by a Near-Earth asteroid very well, saying that “even though we’re all doomed, it’ll also kill everything and everyone we hate.”

“When you read about the end of the world in sci-fi novels, you are met by scenes of unutterable violence and horrifying chaos,” said editor of the BBC Lyon Touhus. “But even after yesterday’s announcement that a giant, 50km-wide meteorite is burning an unstoppable path towards our planet, there has been very little unrest, simply because I, just like thousands of others like me, am glad that all those contemptible bastards I’ve met in the course of my life are coming to a fiery, painful end.”

Many thousands now freely admit that, thought the spectre of death is a frightening one indeed, “at least all those arseholes we know will die in as excruciating a way humanly possible.”

“It brings me comfort,” said one South African resident Jakes Mhlala, “Whenever I think of how terrifying the end will be, I just remind myself that Jacques Eksteen, that fucking total dickhead who called me and my family ‘a bunch of black baboons’, is going to get torn limb from limb by an inescapable wave of fire and death, finally meeting the end he so rightly deserves.”

Mhlala added that “it could be even sweeter.”

“When I get sad and blue because everyone and everything I know will be killed in a firestorm of pain and suffering, I just think of how that narrow-minded fucktard might have some kind of final-days epiphany and come crawling back for my forgiveness,” he explained. “Then, after I and the dozens of others he has mistreated in his retrogressive, sadly-not-aborted life refuse to forgive him, he goes home to his empty, loveless house, broods for a long time in the dreary silence that only the unloved can know, and slowly works up the courage to kill himself, because he's too much of a soulless, cowardly shitstain to face the end that will consume us all.”

Mhlala added that “the body would probably only discovered days later” and might even be "half-eaten by his pet dog or cat, the one thing he thought would never betray him."

“And even then, no one will give a shit. Because he was such a cunt.”

Many other people have added reasons to be happy that the world is screeching to a halt.

“Yes, all the goodness and happiness in the world will come to an abrupt and terrifying end,” said another man, “but so will everything else that makes this decades-long road of unhappiness and misery we’re dictionary-bound to call ‘life’. Just think: a world with no more crime, no more murder, no more environmental destruction. No more vapid, meaningless listicles on Buzzfeed, no more trivial bullshit like ThoughtCatalog. No more comments section or News24. This isn't hell. It's a new utopia."

Survival experts now say that for the handful of survivors this new, torn-apart world, though a horrifying apocalyptic wasteland filled with roaming cannibals and murderous radioactive freaks fighting tooth and claw over the scarce resources left on the hellhole once known as our home, it will have its good aspects.

"Sure, it'll be bad," said doomsday prepper Jake Henderson. "With nuclear winter, flesh-eating tribes of deformed subhuman savages, mass epidemics of once-extinct diseases, death, chaos and endless suffering, it won't be a picnic. But every once in a while we'll remember that Kim Kardashian is no longer something that people talk about. We'll recall there is no Twitter for misognists to send women death threats for simply airing an opinion. And we'll breathe a sigh of relief."

"And best of all," he added. "No more terrible satire."

Pic: NASA, Public domain

TV setting unrealistic standards for our children.

The Broadcasting Standards and Complaints Commission of South Africa (BSCCSA) has today issued a scathing indictment of South African digital television service provider DSTV and its aired content, saying that the programs and show content that make up the majority of their viewing schedule are setting “totally unrealistic standards” for the youth of South Africa.

“Just flip on the TV and you’re immediately bombarded by violence and crime or drowned in vapid, celebrity-centred stupidity,” said one concerned parent from the South African Families Association. “It used to be manageable, but now with such a ceaseless flood of these kinds of moronic themes and entertainment values, however will our children even start filling the massive shoes that are being put before them?”

Children everywhere have agreed.

“They’re right,” said ten-year-old Vincent Christians. “Every time I turn on the TV and see Kanye, Jersey Shore or anything on the History Channel, I feel like society expects me to be this ignominious moron who is obsessed with sex and money and fame. I mean, the bar is set pretty low already – I have to write Matric exams, for godssakes – but this is ridiculous. However will I lose my fundamental human respect and dignity and descend into the abhorrent, abyssal chasms of hell from whence these overwhelmingly narcissistic brain-dead fucktards come?”

Girls, too, have shared similar sentiments.

”I’m trying my best,” said teary eyed Jessica Barleson. “I put on makeup and short skirts and try to be as much of a loose skank as possible, but the pressure is incredibly overwhelming. I fear I’ll never become even half the meaningless sex object that society is pushing me to be.”

Meanwhile, the BSCCSA has backed this protest movement 100%, saying children should be exposed to “realistic standards of sex, violence and shallowness”.

”Our young boys across the country couldn’t possibly be this violent or lacking in profundity and reasonable intellect, no matter how much class they skip or how many times they ask bitches to suck their dicks,” the broadcasting standards watchdog said in a statement this morning, “and our nation's sluts and airheads will never be able to stoop to the desperate rape-culture lows that are so widely spread today."

"If we don’t change society so that they can grow up knowing it’s perfectly fine to be only a shallow, self-centred asshole, or just a partially disgusting skank, they risk growing up with all kinds of insecurities and inferiority complexes. We want our children to feel happy saying, 'I'm just a detestable open-legged skank and that's totally alright' or 'I'm only a slightly brain-dead partially sex-obsessed shallow cretin and that's good enough for me.”

However, many parents are fighting the dangerous tide of television influences, and say they are raising their children so that they know they can be whatever kind of narrow-minded stain on humanity they desire.

”I tell our son, ‘my boy, you don’t listen to this TV nonsense. If you feel pressured by society to call a binnet a 'dumb slut whore', it’s perfectly fine to just call her a 'useless bitch',” said Joburg-based father Mike Sogynyst. “I just want to make sure he grows up being true to his own feelings.”

Why Charles Darwin is Satan (not just a theory!)

A guest post by Cardinal Johan Eksteen

My dear Brothers and Sisters in Our Lord Jesus Christ, I think it’s about time we had a serious talk. Recently, it has come to my attention that a dangerous book is circulating our society. A book filled with lies and drivel. A book that has brainless monkeys on a slow journey to become fully intelligent beings in it. Yes, I think we all know what book we’re talking about.

No, not the 2014 Guide to Ministerial Cabinet Members in South Africa.

I’m talking about Charles “The Insane Doctor” Darwin’s On the Origin of the Species.

The scientific community wants you to believe this piece of Satan’s handiwork. Schools want to teach it to our innocent children. God-hating atheists want you to think it’s holy writ. But I’ve read it. And I think it’s time we debunked this heap of putrid half-truths for what it is.

• It’s just a theory

  First of all, it’s just a theory. That’s why it’s called the “Theory” of evolution. Words don’t lie. A theory is a theory, no matter how you or a generation of white-coated buffoons want to define it. And while most scientists - apparently 97% of them – believe that it is an irrefutable account for the man’s roots and history, remember that we’re talking about a community in which that same 97% of followers believe in so-called “climate change”. And this last fact brings us neatly to our next damning point.

• The community is a bunch of godless fibbers

  All science is a is a school of thought. It’s a collection of beliefs about what the world is. That’s all. So when you choose to blindly follow science, you’re choosing to simply follow an age-old system of ultra-strict rules and doctrines. Worse yet, they don’t even have faith. How can you have faith that what you believe is the Truth? Because of test tubes and experiments?

  To this, I ask: “which is more stunning proof: a series of methodical and repeatable observations by fallible men (thankfully, not many woman are leaders in the community; that much we have in common at least), or the awe-inspiring, breath-taking miracles of God? The titration of two substances X and Y to give precipitate Z, or the Ten Deadly Plagues that Our Merciful and Heavenly Father visited on the Egyptians, as factually documented in all historical accounts since the Roman era? The choice is obvious.

• It’s just an old book

  The book they all read and believe is old. How old? Who knows. Maybe even as much as a hundred years old. Maybe even older. Things were different back then. But times have changed. Are you going to believe an outmoded, obsolete book, or the holy, timeless decree of God Our Saviour as written , translated, retranslated, adapted, revised, and reviewed by a series of unknown authors?

• Just look at Charles Darwin. Look at him.
  
  
  

  He’s an old, white bearded guy, delivering his rules and laws from some faraway land – rules which were first fomented many hundreds of years ago. Are you going to believe a bunch of commands and ‘facts’ just because a benevolent Grandfather figure handed them down over generations to us?

• It’s homophobic

  Evolution, as it currently stands, hates the gay community. If two gay men want to pass both of their genetic material onto a child, bigoted science tells them it’s impossible because of ‘primary sexual characteristics’ and ‘the intricacies of sexual reproduction’ and ‘same-sex human sexual reproductive incompatibility in evolutionary theory’. We don’t do that. Well, not any more. Gays wanna hook up? Fine by us. Gays want to have children? Go ahead! In our loving, accepting community – especially now that we’ve apologised for at least some of our heinous so-called ‘crimes’ that we committed centuries ago – gays can do what they want. Except, you know, get married.

• You can’t even see evolution!

  If evolution really exists – if its timeless and eons-long process is really there, guiding Mankind and all other species down its course – why can’t we see it? Why isn’t it active today, performing wondrous acts of Evolution on a daily basis? Why hasn’t evolution of anything been visible since the book was written? It’s damning evidence – almost as damning as the question “why are there still monkeys around today if we’re all supposed to evolve?”

• It’s repressive

  What is Evolution, after you strip away all the colourful promises and flattering pretences? I’ll tell you: it’s just a bunch of laws and texts that tell us what to think and what to feel and what to believe. If you don’t believe them and their ‘ineffable scientific method’, they shun you, belittle your beliefs, and oversimplify the basic tenets of you arguments to make you look like a moron or someone who simply can’t understand the simplest facts about the world. Would the church ever do such a thing?

• As an Origin story, it’s total nonsense

  Have you read this garbage? “We come from monkeys?” “Over millions of years we slowly became modern humans?” Who would believe such fruit-of-the-tree-of-knowledge-less, talking-snake-less drivel? Who could even hold for just a moment the preposterous idea that the world is older than 6000 years? Who could ever doubt for even a second that everything – from ferns and grapes to whales, modern man and the mighty rhinoceros – was made in just seven days? Hell-bound tricksters and rascals, that’s who.

Well, folks, I hope you can now see why this baseless book of buffoonery is something we should all be wary of. Join me next week, when I disprove The Big Bang Theory and the entirely of Quantum Physics (quarks and gluons! What absolute rot!)

Until then, remember to eat the symbolic flesh of a long-dead human man who killed himself to make himself forgive all sins past, present and future that came about because two people he made (one from the rib of the other, or not, depending on which part of the Bible you read) in a debatable order of species creation ate an apple that gave them the knowledge of understanding why eating the apple was such a big No-No in the first place.

Pics: Public Domain.

Samsung fanboys hit back at gay Apple CEO

Iphone 6 not the only thing that’s totally bent, says corporate press release.

Unsurprising controversy today, after thousands of Samsung customers and fanboys struck back at the news that Apple, Inc CEO Tim Cook is reportedly gay, saying that their CEO was gay way, way before Apple, and that their gay is “faster and better and cheaper”.

“Apple fans are living in the 18th century,” said one man, who on more than one occasion made sure that we understood why the Galaxy Tablet was superior in every imaginable way to the iPad. “I mean, your CEO is gay? Well, whoop-dee-doo. Our CEO was gay all the way back in 2010, and now he’s a transqueer cybernetic Rocky Horror sex robot with a plasma cannon for a dick.”

Cook came out to the global media last week, writing that he had spent “many years lost and confused – perhaps even as lost and confused as an Apple Maps 6 user.”

Since the furore erupted on social media, many Samsung customers have banded together in a united response, firing accusations that allege that Cook is doing it just for the social image.

“Only a totally blind consumerist sheep would believe that being Apple-Gay is in any way progressive,” said another online commentator. “Our CEO was doing all the gay shit that Apple did, like, six years ago. Also, he’s waterproof.”

Many have aired similar sentiments, stating their lack of surprise that Apple has produced another thing that is totally bent.

“Apple’s homosexuality is just so outmoded,” said one. “Hell, he’s probably only doing it to show off that he’s gay. That’s what Apple is all about. It’s about the brand, not about efficiency or power. He probably doesn’t even know what true gayness is. I mean, in all likelihood he sat in a line for seventeen hours at 5am in the morning just to come out the closet, and now he only carries around the label because everyone knows how popular it is to be gay these days.”

Since the controversy erupted, many of Cook’s ex-boyfriends have revealed telling details of their past affairs with the CEO.

“I think all these people are right,” said one man who asked not to be named before taking the envelope full of cash we slid across the table. “When Sam and I were together, I remember his memory wasn’t all that great, he took terrible pictures, and forced me to use Apple software for all my media.”

He did, however, admit that their sex life had been 100% virus-free.

And despite many people saying that sexual orientation should actually not be any of your fucking business or mean anything in a business context, Apple has stood by their CEO, saying that they fully support the announcement and that it "puts the 'gay' in 'game-changer'".

"To all our valued Apple customers and fans, we want to reiterate our unhesitating support and love for the gay community," they said in a lengthy statement. "If you are gay or suffer discrimination or prejudice because of your sexual orientation, just remember that, no matter how endless surprising it is for all of us, you're a human being who is capable of running a business and achieving enviable success. You know, just like normal people."

And despite this fan-boy divide and endless war, this gay revelation has reminded both sides of the fence of a very important lesson.

"We should never use hurtful words to label someone because of something that should essentially be inconsequential," they said. "Unless, of course, we're talking about those faggots at Nokia or Sony."

Pics: Samsung CEO from user Fetx2002, and Apple CEO from Valery Marchive (LeMagIT) - both wikimedia commons.

ISIS launches “most successful recruitment videos yet”

Following on from previous successful recruitment strategies and PR tactics, fundamentalist Jihadist group ISIS has today announced the launch of their most successful series of calls to anti-West, anti-Imperialist arms yet.

“All those scary bomb videos and grunts training with ak47s and rolling in the dust, leopard-crawling under barbed wire and past burning tyres, these only go so far,” said head of the pro-Islamic-caliphate movement Thea Rorrist. “If you really want to instil a burning, irrevocable hatred for all things American and its deluded, privileged, detestable citizens, then you have to go that extra mile.”

As such, ISIS is delighted to announce the release of American Idol Season 426 and America’s Got Talent Season 283. It has reportedly been a resounding victory.

“I was watching TV the other day when [the ISIS recruitment videos] came on,” said one American man. “After just four minutes of that pretentious, exploitative ‘it’s my dream’ crap, and all that shallow, deluded narcissism guided by a desire to be worshiped by thousands for being what is actually a talentless shmuck, even I, a God-fearing, rootin’, tootin’ Texan, was denouncing the hedonism of my culture and calling for the death of all American men and women.”

Media analysts agree.

“If we look closely at the hateful, pro-extremist-Islam propaganda, we see tropes designed for maximum effect,” said Television studies lecturer Harold Cress.

“Every four seconds, we are battered with stirring, nationalistic music and endless images of waving American flags. You know, scenes more patriotic than an exploding, bible-clawing, red-white-and-blue Bald Eagle shooting laser beams out of its eyes and ejaculating furiously on a pile of nukes and Chevy trucks emblazoned with the words ‘democracy’, ‘liberty’ and ‘freedom’.”

These images were enhanced by other hate-mongering tactics.

“Then they add little inserts, like the glaringly knee-jerk emotional shallowness of having an obviously-ineligible four-year-old child singing Home of the Free for the AW-factor, and the talentless douche judges who have even less singing or acting ability than those they scorn and deride, not to mention the sickening product-placement. Really, it makes my machete-hand very twitchy indeed.”

In spite of some controversy over the images, ISIS remains steadfast that these depictions of American culture are far less horrific than than they how the West portrays their particular ideologies.

“Hell, the media might give us a bad rep, but at least we don’t belittle people and destroy their hopes and dreams before we behead them," said Rorrsit. “We like to think we’re a little more respectful than that.”

ISIS would like to thank CNN, BBC and Sky News for giving them an audience of millions of readers, listeners, and viewers on dozens of different channels, formats and social media platforms to spread their messages and videos across the globe.