Critic slams ‘mustfall, pro-transformation movements

Various #(Something)MustFall and pro-transformation movements were issued a scathing indictment this morning, after an Area man and member of AfriForum blasted the group’s manifestos as “unnecessary and moot”.

52-year-old Johannes Botha, a passionate builder and online commenter, today slammed the groups in a brutal refutation, citing statistics that show that South African society is “transformed and representative of the demographics of the country”.

“We hear all these ridiculous claims being thrown around that our country, universities, society and the media still have issues of transformation that urgently need to be addressed, but it’s all lies,” he explained, finishing off his last beer and poking the coals of his braai. “But if you just look more closelier at the country, you’ll see I’m right.”

He explained at some length between glasses of Klipdrift.

“Just look at our universities – they are filled with black people! We look at the cleaners and gardeners and people who sweep up the halls and wipe up the vomit from when Johan junior has had a couple too many - and are they white? No! Just because these okes don’t have ludicrous, high-paying jobs from their dads doesn’t mean we can start to pretend they don’t dominate the economy.”

He continued his stunning dissertation, pausing only to check if 49-year-old domestic worker Thembiswa Mhlanga could hear him from the kitchen.

“It gets worse, just look at the townships and – Thembi?! THEMBI?! KAN JY VIR MY HOOR??? - sorry, just look at townships and prisons. These so-called academics and ‘critical thinkers who have studied this problem for many years and in great detail’ say that society is unequal – but blacks are represented more in society than oppressed whites, in places like jails or low-income housing zones. This kind of reverse racism is disgusting.”

“Then we need only look at employment statistics: if you’re a middle-class white person and you want to go work in a low-wage workhouse making Nike shoes and export trinkets for 17 hours a day, guess how much of a chance you have? We need to start admitting that there are just some places where black people have an unfair advantage over us poor whiteys.”

Stopping momentarily to ensure the inter-leading glass door to the servant’s scullery was properly closed and locked, he went on.

“Then there’s the media – I mean come on, black people are in the news all the time! These ridiculous students complain that there is an absence of black voices and stories in the traditional and digital media, and then they get all picky and angry just because a lot of those stories are about crime and corruption?” he brilliantly noted, sotto voce. “Sometimes I look at the country and think that, hell, there’s so much transformations going on it’s laaike flippen’ Michael Bay is the president.”

He shook his head gravely and tutted.

“Me and all my friends – some of my best ones are black, you know? - agree: Nelson Mandinga is probably sitting in a retirement home in Kunu in abject shock at how his rainbow nation is filled with racist ignoramsuses who are completely out of touch with the history, current affairs and problems of our country. For shame!"

LAXAppeal: why 197SAX is a failure

I have mulled over writing this piece – a critical review of the infamous University of Cape Town annual rag, SAXAppeal, and its place in the South African sphere of satire – for some time now. Alas, events conspired against me (the digital version was only made available online for download two weeks after print, so tough shit if you live outside of Cape Town; and it would seem my email to the SAXAppeal editor has been unanswered for weeks now – meaning that this entire controversy was irrelevant and dated by the time it reached me in Hermanus) and so it went unwritten – until I stumbled across older copies of the satirical publication in a coffee shop.

Reading previous editions and this latest one (entitled 197SAX) and seeing the glaring, stunning disparities between them made me change my mind. After all, it’s no secret to readers of this blog and those who know me that I have deep, deep love of the artform: satire has the power to shine a light on ridiculous topics and subjects in a way that traditional media or critiques cannot; unburdened by ‘factuality’, honed with wit and steeped in irony, the biting, scathing tone of satirical ‘journalism’ is what makes people like John Oliver and Charlie Brooker respected less as comedians and more as purveyors of quality reportage that not even ‘real’ newspapers can compete with.

SELLING SAX

For those of you who don’t live in a place where work starts at 9am, every year students at the University of Cape Town dress up (or down) and take to the streets of the Mother City to sell SAXAppeal, a satirical, humourous Uni rag that contains a variety of pieces – both funny and critical – that shed light and levity on student life.

This year, however, it would seem that a fit of puritan progressive wrath has swept through the editorial team: decrying their history as “problematic”, “sexist” and “elitist”, this year’s production has focused (almost entirely, but we’ll get to that in a bit) on serious pieces aimed at “a new narrative…. to amplify the voice of the students… pushing boundaries and challenging the status quo.” In a single word – stamped incessantly in bold, scary red through its pages – they’re looking for “controversy”.

“Today, when people think of SAX Appeal, they think of drunk, scantily-clad students selling an equally explicit magazine. A magazine that has been filled with blatant misogyny, racism and discriminatory statements, a magazine created by an overwhelmingly white editorial team, a magazine with no meaning or substance.”

And by throwing the baby out with the bathwater, controversy is what they’ve found.

BUT IS IT SATIRE?

Sitting in that coffee shop, paging through old editions of the ‘zine, it suddenly struck me how very much SAXAppeal had changed. The contrast is stark: a side-by-side comparison with any of the editions pre-2016 (or should that be ‘pre-woke’?) shows quite clearly how this fundamental shift in editorial vision has changed the publication.

Where before I could expect funny and unapologetic illustrations and articles that took on topics as varied as space, sex, sport, religion, homophobia, and how to use a condom, the latest pages are stripped bare of anything resembling satire. In the over 100 pages of content that the 197SAX brought me, I’d say that maybe 8 articles or images echoed the self-aware, self-deprecating humour of the previous writers.

The definition of satire is not, of course, fixed. While it is intended to be humourous, the main aim is social criticism – but a key marker of any satire is irony. Sarcasm, exaggeration, comparison, analogy, and a whole host of other tactics can be deployed, but the key here is that there exists some kind of an irony between the writing and the subject matter.

The most historic examples of the genre, like ”Johnathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal show that a biting, dark irony in the writing is what drives the art and how powerful it can be.

And yet it is this core idea that is sorely missing from the pages. Instead, a croaky, dry, humourless husk of “political correctness” (the mot du jour bandied about by critics on social media) is what greets you: but worse yet, this Politically Correct don’t-wanna-offend-anyone mantra has pervaded the publication to the point where the satire and jokes are explained or countered with disclaimers, author’s asides or outright explanations of why they’re just joking and we shouldn’t take it seriously.

“But maybe that’s the point?” I asked myself. “Maybe their shift in vision is aimed at introducing critical thinking and serious reflection into the student body? Maybe giving up laughter is the price we pay for a more equitable society?”

And yet I can’t believe that, because as serious and reflective as the included pieces are, they, too, are treated with this opt-out mentality: right at the very beginning of the publication, in stark, BOLD letters, says:

“Or even the authors themselves.” If the new SAX wants to be like the politically-minded, outspoken older SAX, then why the spineless vacillation?

But before I generalise with brush strokes too broadly, I want to critically review the “satire” contained within.

ALLERGEN WARNING: CONTAINS SATIRE?

With titles like “Dear White Boys”, “White South Africans”, “Ableism” and “Your Forgotten Privilege”, you can guess that this year’s edition wasn’t exactly packed with light-hearted chuckles. But before you’ve even given a peek at an article, readers are treated to a Trigger Warning-esque disclaimer in glaring red giving us an ALLERGEN WARNING that this mag contains SATIRE, CRITICAL THOUGHT and CONTROVERSY. Immediately following is a glossary of terms that will get you up to speed with how much of a privileged, problematic asshole you are, and then finally, a lovely condescending piece explaining how to “read” SAX and her “satire”.

Well, undeterred, I checked my privilege thrice, said a dozen “Hail bell hooks” and dove right in. After all, I’ve seen satire used to amazing effect in subversive themes: Key and Peele, Dave Chapelle, and dozens of other comedians have used irony and humour to shed light on serious ideas and make you think about your beliefs. Excited to see how SAX would use this as a tool to educate and inform us on controversial ideas, I scrolled down.

But as a satirist, I was wholly disappointed. With only 8 too-short-but-sweet satirical pieces peppered intermittently between heavy pieces on race, gender and privilege, there isn’t much in here that justifies the huge SATIRE stamp they overuse. (There’s lots of passable slam poetry, if that’s your thing).

The first, The State of the Nation Address, is a strong piece of satire taking the perspective of President Zuma. It’s filled with hard-hitting irony and snarky, dark jokes such as “I congratulate Miners Shot Down on winning an International Emmy. Maybe one day South Africans will see it” and “I have once again focused exclusively on the interests of the middle class, and neglected the important issues of land redistribution, affordable quality education and inefficient service delivery. Maybe those issues will make it into next year’s speech.”

However, it’s only 22 pages later that we’re treated to a second helping. Ameera Conrad’s Dear White Boys uses the stereotypical Plumstead-living, Mumford and Sons-consuming White Boy to dig at the idea of privilege and prejudice relating to your skin colour. A White Boy myself, I’d have to admit that I was kind of disappointed: is this the worst my skin colour can earn me as a stereotype? I was thinking that my premature baldness, tiny dick and rich father giving me a small loan of a million dollars would have Trump’ed these relatively benign traits, but each to her own I guess.

But it is right here that we start to see the cracks appear in SAX, thanks to tensions between their editorial mandate of Attacking Prejudice and Privilege and SAX’s mission as a comedic outlet. If we should be less prejudiced and steer away from stereotypes, then how can they turn a blind eye to the jokes in this piece that Muslim boys are misogynist and that Black Boys only want to fuck white girls? While satire can be an effective weapon in combatting stereotypes and educating readers, I don’t believe that the goals of humourless PChood and SAX’s vision this year are at all compatible. Satire *is* problematic. And that’s exactly what makes it so powerful and entertaining.

MAY CONTAIN TRACES – BUT ONLY TRACES - OF SATIRE

A few pages later, we’re treated to the shining example of the entire magazine: Pierre de Vos’s delightful, cheeky, self-deprecating and moving column looks back on the irony of learning under violent figures (“a torturer and a murderer”) from South Africa’s colonial history, and the fact that these monuments still stand in their places of reverence today. It’s a great piece that reveals how 197SAX’s vision could have been fulfilled without ditching the old humour and sharp writing.

But straight after that, we are shown how the goals of new leadership and the paper’s old identity do not gel. The next piece, a board game parody entitled MeNOPOLY, is a scathing indictment of the ANC’s actions and betrayal of their central tenets and vision. It acerbically pokes fun at how cronyism can infect a noble movement. But, again, in a quest not to offend, a clunky, awkward Disclaimer is tacked on, effectively making the joke completely redundant:

And this is 197SAX’s problem: that they’re afraid to commit to making a joke (even one that would otherwise perfectly meet their goals). In the next example, You’re Not That Liberal (Shannon Krausey, Nicole Dunn and Mikhail Moosa), that favourite White Liberal stereotype is the centre of focus. But rather than letting the joke speak for itself – the irony that the beliefs of this stereotype are self-contradictory and ridiculous though parodic quotes – they stop mid-joke and explain why this brand of liberalism is left wanting.

This is a huge disappointment. These kinds of White Stereotypes have been done so, so well: from Hard Eddy’s Gaaide To Laaif, Anton Taylor’s Jozi Shore, The Wayan Brothers’ White Chicks, or our local Tiger’s Guide, it’s incredible that such a huge opportunity was squandered. Apart from failing to recognise that “liberal” is a description and not a prescription (it’s a No True Scotsman fallacy - you can show liberal values without being liberal – ie egalitarianism or libertarianism), the tone comes across as a bossy mom telling you why you aren’t good enough.

It’s also around the same time that 197SAX shows its one-dimensional flatness. The next satirical piece up is “White Tears”, and – you guessed it – it’s about white people. But rather than being purely satirical, it’s really just a bunch of things that people say that - depending on context – may or may not be worthy of ridicule. Had this been fleshed out more – Christ, has no one watched Safferland’s incredible Tiphany’s (with a pee-aych-why) Guide to Sandton Survival? – it could have been a fantastic and biting piece that dismantles and ridicules first-world problems.

And while Shesus* writes a rather splendid piece called Feminism and Christianity pt3, the power of her irony is again undone by the incessant use of SATIRE trigger warnings and editorial disclaimers stating that :

Finally, the last in a too-sparse offering of laughs, the “News25” parody. It’s probably as close as any of the pieces come to Poe’s Law, that extreme of “wait, is this a joke or actually real, I can’t tell” (you know, unless the entire 197SAX was some ultra-subversive Poe’s Law parody of MustFallism and the progressive left – in which case I’m fucking blown away, well bloody done, mate, you got me). I’m not sure if merely recreating the hateful slurs of News24 actually says anything clever about society, but hey, I love me a good Penny Sparrow reference. If I could, I would bus in a dozen more.

BUT MATT, YOU’VE MISSED THE POINT!

… I hear you cry. “This is about CRITICAL THINKING. Who cares if it’s CONTROVERSIAL? It’s just SATIRETRIGGERWARNING. You haven’t even spoken about the serious, hard-hitting content in the rest of the magazine!”

Well, I’ve thought about that, and quite frankly if 197SAX is a project aimed at serving marginalised voices and repoliticising the students, I would say it’s too filled with awkward contradictions and small hypocrisies to be called a success.

In its opening, it denigrates magazines like Cosmopolitan and Heat. I don’t disagree – I’ve never like them; but then, they’re not my aimed at my demographic. They aren’t written for me – and besides, attacking a publication and dismissing everything they publish as mindless or irrelevant is fallacious. It would be like me saying “don’t buy SAX, it’s fuckin’ garbage”. Content should be judged on its own merit, and not prejudiced by where it’s published.

Then we have the awkward space of cultural appropriation and “marginalisation of lived experience in sex workers” to deal with. The former comes around once a Halloween, but often those brandishing the tar and feathers forget that the very concept of Halloween – right down to the costumes, masks, trick or treating, and candy – was ALL ‘appropriated’ from various cultures and systems of belief, going all the way back to Paganism and Wiccan beliefs. The same goes for “Mexican” sombreros or dreadlocks : Sombreros originate from 13th century Spain, and are thought to have been brought across by the Mongols before that; dreadlocks appear in a variety of cultures, societies and religions across history. No culture is pure, and any culture that tries to exist in a vacuum withers and dies. Just look at the Afrikaans (if you’re feeling butthurt, just remember my surname).

The latter is slightly more jarring. One of SAX’s first articles, written by the erudite and ‘woke’ Caitlin Spring, Selling Sax, throws itself on the altar of next-level liberal ultra-correctness, likening the act of selling a magazine on the streets (if you’re scantily clad, that is) to a heinous act that mocks and spits on the mistreatment of sex workers.

Now, I’m not sure what kind of massive leap of the imagination it took to make this tenuous, ridiculous link, or the selective vision that ignores the massive body of counterexamples and themed dress-ups and says, “yes, every woman selling SAX in the past few years has been dressed like a prostitute”, but if woman wearing heels and short skirts is being attacked, then isn’t that policing what women can and can’t wear? How is this massive jarring dissonance – between their apparent beliefs about being ‘woke’ and their policing women’s bodies instead of attacking legislation and politicians – be accepted? How is this hypocrisy not self-damning?

And that’s not even taking into account some of her more ridiculous claims: “As long as some men rape, all men are potential rapists”. I’m not even going to justify that with a rebuttal, except to say she is stupid, so therefore I’m going to treat all women as potentially stupid. Let’s just hope a minority doesn’t commit a crime: that might make things racist up in here.

And what about Nigel Patel’s The Decolonial Sex Project? This so-called “intersectional intercourse over colonised cocks” states in no uncertain terms that “your Tinder preference for white people is racist” but ALSO that “when you fetishise bodies of colour you participate in… racist throwback”. So you’re racist either way, I guess.

Let’s not forget Nicole Dunn’s The Holy colonial Spirit, which argues that secularity and shunning Christianity is a necessary part of the project of decolonisation (I would agree, but I think that it’s a wood for the trees argument that still doesn’t evaluate the existence of a conventional Creator). Doesn’t this contradict Conrad’s earlier demand that “when you speak to Brown Girl, don’t say ‘you’re too educated to be religious?’”.

And what about Dan Corder’s claim in Dress to Oppress that Harry Potter, Star Wars and Game of Thrones are ‘not black enough’ and that you shouldn’t try to express your love of fictional characters through cosplay or dress-up parties because it’s so problematic. Add this to Jordan Pickering’s inflammatory white guilt and self-effacement through “if you’re a white South African, you are either a racist or you’ve joined the same lifelong recovery program” (White South Africans). No, fuck you very much Jordan, because I don’t make it a habit to casually smear an entire ethnic group.

Their hypocrisy is even more obvious when you consider that Spur – which they lambasted in their opening editorial as “People with a taste for Cultural Appropriation” – has an entire, full-page in this edition. They might say they don’t get to pick advertisers, but they must also understand that these things undermine their very message. It would be like me writing a damning article about tax evasion and my newspaper taking a full-page advert for Mossack Fonseca or Jimmy Carr’s upcoming comedy tour.

Indeed, their narrative is further undone where they employ weasel words and readily accepted ideas without a statistical basis. Merely writing that “classism, misogyny, and trans*-antagonism…. Is rife in our tertiary institutions” does not make it true, and while I’m not enough of an idiot to pretend they don’t exist on campuses (across the entire world) I’d never presume to state they’re a rampant, out-of-control scourge that unilaterally defines all higher education.

TOO MANY SHORTCOMINGS

As a political project, I would also say that 197SAX’s new mission has a dire lack of critical self-awareness. Much content – as it stated in their magazine – is sourced from the organisations this school of thought supports, such as several universities’ charters of FeesMustFall movements. Now, in and of itself, this isn’t a problem. But having been on the ground at the Rhodes University fees protests and seen some of the (to borrow a word) “Problematic” behaviour and attitudes of these organisations, I would say that a free platform to disseminate their views without the CRITICAL THINKING they’re so sure they practice is truly dangerous.

By their nature, these student movements are not democratically elected. There is no set, universal mandate. There are no policy documents or membership criteria that can control and discipline aberrant behaviour or violent acts of so called “members”. Their demands and powers are, in effect, unlimited and subject to sudden, erratic change. Factionalism is rife. Hijacking by subversive political groups is too common. Without a clear leadership structure, how can university administrators, politicians or journalists critically engage with the movement? And how can we protect journalists who are – as at Rhodes University – harassed and told to stop filming, stop tweeting, forced to delete tweets and reportage from their phones, or asked to leave a university hall and cease all reporting in a public space? Looking at the track record of petrol bombings, riots and incinerated university buildings and vehicles, we can see that being careful and thorough with our beliefs – instead of morally smug and self-righteous, claiming we are ‘woke’ with some hidden, members-only knowledge that believers are under no expectation to share with those who question them (see pg78, Educating the Intolerant for more details – you know, “go do your readings” because “it’s not my job to educate you”) – is singularly crucial to uphold the central tenets of our shaky democracy.

In oversimplifying and abandoning their ways as ‘racist, elitist, sexist dude-bro tacky mom jokes’ they’ve missed a golden opportunity to introduce new concepts and debate ideas in a way that people can understand and empathise with. To say that there isn’t good content or ideas in this edition would be in bad faith (I enjoyed the interviews, especially with McKaiser), but the entire publication just comes across as aggressive and inflammatory.

197SAX is a fundamentally flawed failure, given its incessant polarised views. It claims to be the voice of students, of enlightenment, of a new narrative of freedom and equality, but really, all it does is judge and seek to control people, to shame and guilt them into self-flagellation and apologies: to tell them what to think and what to feel and what to wear and who to love and how to do it.

This year, SAX sucks.

If you’d like to support SAXAppeal, SHAWCO and RAG in their noble efforts to raise funds for underprivileged youth, please, check out their website and make a donation. if you want to read it for yourself, please purchase and download a copy of 197SAX.

Social media legal ‘experts’ to get Honourary Degrees

Citing the vast quantities of insightful expertise and legal opinion being offered incessantly on social media websites Facebook and Twitter, universities across the world have today announced their decision to confer thousands of Honourary Doctorates in Law to what they’re calling “the true legal geniuses of our time.”

According to Law Faculty Deans worldwide, what is most surprising of all is how these amazing and legally-literate opinions have all been produced after seemingly little to no prior study of the law, at any level.

“When we look back at some of the most popular and controversial legal cases of our time – the O.J Simpson trial, the Oscar Pistorius case, the Michael Jackson hearings, or even back as far as the Jacob Zuma inquiries – what we notice again and again is a wave, a veritable flood of thousands of social media users giving paragraphs-long and technically sound legal insights into these nuanced and complex cases,” said Dean of the Witswaterstrand University Law Faculty, Iona Gavel.

“Who would have known that so many hundreds of people, with little – if any – legal training or university knowledge of the Rome Statute, Constitutional Law, Due Process or even Crimen Injuria would be able to produce such lucid, confident, and not-at-all-pulled-out-their-arses legal commentary?” she said. “Often, at just a single glance at the case in question, they can instantly tell if someone’s guilty. Hell, I wonder why we even have universities or law faculties.”

However, many of the soon-to-be Honourary Doctors of Law are remain humble.

“It’s quite simple [how we did it],” explained mechanic and part-time understudy of famed Civil Law Barrister Judge Judy, Ree Parenjin. “You just look at the facts that they’ve reported in the newspaper and on my twitters, think about it for a few seconds, and the truth of the whole issue becomes immediately clear. Some people have an issue with what we say, but really there are some kinds of justice that are better and faster. Ag, some of these old judges have spent so much time in dusty libraries and boring classrooms reading cold, dull so-called ‘precedents’ that they no longer understand what justice is.“

And now, citizens everywhere are looking forward to the promise of a better, more efficient legal system.

“Oscar Pistorius was obviously guilty,” said Parenjin. “In a brighter future, we won’t have true justice delayed or cheated by pesky appeals processes or irritating subminimum standards of Reasonable Doubt. Oscar, those blerrie rhino poachers in the Kruger [National Park], and even corrupt ministers: they’ll all get the death penalty or life in jail, straight.”

Legal experts can’t wait.

“I look at some of the sentences and legal process changes these guys want, and I have to say I’m excited,” said Gavel. “I mean, what could possibly go wrong?”

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.”

“Go fuck yourself” now a legally-permissible argument

Citing the sheer overwhelming number of deserving articles, posts, statuses, opinions and stories posted every minute all over the internet, Supreme justices, advocates and judges at every level of the Legal System have today allowed full legal permissibility and support of the argument that someone should “go fuck themselves”.

According Justice Eric Secutioner of the Supreme Court, the decision was made after many hours of hard,vigorous debate, when one Justice sneakily checked her phone and saw a tweet from part-time “singer” Steve Hofmeyr proclaiming that blacks were the architects of apartheid.

The Supreme Court roll clearly records the events, showing that Justice Annabelle Torrends rolled her eyes and said aloud, “oh, go fuck yourself”, which was shortly followed by her passing around the phone. Other justices then gave various renditions of “just kill yourself” and “choke on a fat one, you fucktard”, eventually agreeing that “go fuck yourself” would be permissible as it made no allusion to homophobic slurs and did not constitute a death threat.

“It’s important to be progressive with these kinds of things,” they explained.

Legal experts now say that this “Go Fuck yourself” legal rebuttal is based in powerful legal precedent, in the form of the Reasonable Person measure.

"Look, when you post shit like this on Facebook and Twitter, it’s clear that any reasonable person would tell you to go fuck yourself,” said legal expert Lawyer. “Or rather, as we say in legal circles, ‘describe to you in graphic detail how to use your genetalia to go commit auto… autoerotica? autosexual something? Eroti… er, whatever fucking yourself is in Latin.”

People across the country have voiced widespread support for this new introduction.

“When I see a dumb post on Facebook or Twitter, I think, geez, I could easily debunk this using a rational and critically-analytical approach, showing the logical inconsistencies and rhetorical weaknesses of the poster’s argument,” said one internet user, “but what with the time and energy it would take to do this, and the likelihood of him actually reading the response with genuine interest and taking to heart my central criticisms and suggestions and ultimately changing his flawed way of looking at the world, it’s honestly just easier and saves more time and effort to simply tell him to take two Viagra, bend his cock under his balls and through his gooch-hair and stick it right up his own ass.”

Other online commentators said that the decision would be well received in the online community.

“Sorry to offend, but in my books dickheads and arseholes tend to be indistinguishable and quite inseparable on the internet,” said another. “So why not also in actual real life with the human body? Go figure.”

Pic of judge (my edit) by maveric2003

The top ten most drop-dead sexy dictators of all time

Let’s face it: when it comes to making the world stop in its tracks, there are just some men whose badboy, counterculture devilish charm, wit and looks make us weak at the knees more than other men could even dream! Now, thanks to the tried, tested, flawless and sciencetifically perfect method of online personality quizzes, we have the top ten, drop-dead dictators. Let the countdown begin!

1. Kim Jong-Il

   

   That sultry stare, that manly chin… North Korean Heartthrob and Supreme Leader Kim Jong-Il is so hot it’s a crime against humanity. While not the highest scoring contender, his creativity and charm are more than a match for most men – even if those who try to compete are imprisoned and forced into labour camps. A country worships him, and merely his presence makes millions hungry for a bite; and we can see why.

   
   
   

2. Bashar al-Assad

   

   A bit of a Jealous John, but that is what defines him! Look at his worldwide celebrity: he ardently defends his political views, finds innovative ways to interrogate criminals, is to people what Buzzfeed is to online content, and has his very own secret police force that can watch you at all moments of the day. Whether, you’re surfing the web or writing a blog, you’ll always know this guardian angel is looking over your shoulder.

   
   
   

3. Idi Amin Dada

   

   Even though this iconic badboy military ruler was the Ugandan president for only eight years, thousands still remember Idi Amin Dada’s ineffable wit and charm. His intelligence makes him a definite keeper – but he takes eighth in our list because of his jealous tendencies. You can try tame this black panther is you want, but just be careful: nearly half a million people can tell you that kitty has claws.

   
   
   

4. Gaddafi

   

   "Public Enemy No. 1”? “The Mad Dog of the Middle East"? We don’t know about that, but he has us foaming at the mouth. Woof, woof, arrooo! Who let the dogs out? Libyan style-king and supreme ruler (of fashion!) Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi scores a solid seventh.

   
   
   

5. Allatoyah Ali Kha

   

   That beard! Just look at it! What is more rugged, more undeniably sexy, than a man in a beard? Nothing – except a man who takes charge and isn’t afraid to face societal wrath for his beliefs. For just ten minutes in a dark room with this sagely love master, we’d also ban music or denounce homosexuality as a Western disease!

   
   
   

6. Ho Chi Minh

   

   He’s courageous, tenacious, loving, and not scared to take what is rightfully his. Most people wouldn’t execute thousands and thousands of people over a Land Reform program, but badboy Hot Cheeks Minh just doesn’t play by the rules. Even at five, he's a keeper.

   
   
   

7. Omar al-Bashir

   

   This Sudanese President ended a civil war and was thought to be a noble and fair man – perhaps he can help bring peace to all the ladies who must be at each other’s throats for a little piece of action with the Bash Master? What is it about Masterminds of ethic cleansing and mass genocide that just make us feel so naughty? It’s that guilty feeling you get doing something you know you shouldn’t!

   
   
   

8. Josef Stalin

   

   Leader of a people, progressive thinker, revolutionary icon and total master of photoshop (who is Lenin anyway?), this Ruskie Hunk will make you want to overthrow the bourgeoisie and Great Purge your heart of every other man you’ve ever had eyes for and throw them in Gulag where all the inferior male specimens are kept.

   
   
   

9. Adolf Hilter

   

   You knew this one had to be here somewhere. Adolf Hitler (or should that be “Adonis Hit-me-baby-one-more-time-ler”?) is to breath-taking tyrants what black culture was to Miley Cyrus and what shitty adverts were to Andy Warhol: the source, the muse, the OG Mac Daddy. Effective, passionately committed, bold in the face of his critics, and great with animals, Adorable Hitl-ey is a keeper, whether he is painting you watercolours of Vienna’s picturesque sights, holding your hand, or helping you kill yourself so that you can be together forever outside of a hateful society that doesn’t understand or accept your illicit love.

   

   *Unfortunately he doesn’t take Number One because of a lot of controversy surrounding his past - especially his stint with Amphetamines during that dark, dark spring of 1942. Some things we just aren’t comfortable with

   
   
   The one you’ve all been waiting for! Here it is ladies!
   

10. Mao Zedong

    

    The Republic of China will never forget him – and neither will you. Look at that soft, adorable face! Look at his thirst for power! This buxom badass is not afraid to speak his mind – whether its defending his views against parents who think he shouldn’t follow his dreams or indiscriminately sentencing millions to death, Zedong wins us hook, line and sinker. oh, and what about “Zedong”, you ask? Well, let’s just say it’s Mao-ssive.

    
    
    

    All Pics: wikimedia commons. Ratings from wwwfollowland.com. Picture of Hitler from Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S33882 / CC-BY-SA. Picture of Mao Zedong from Richard Fisher

Man sentenced to 40 years in G'town student digs

A large helping of justice was served this morning, after Judge Hugh Harsofukt sentenced 32-year-old serial killer and notorious armed robber James Steele to a life sentence in a 4-man Grahamstown student digs.

According to report by the court published last week, the singular awfulness of most student digs which house the students of Rhodes University make them ideal for the punishment and incarceration of hardened criminals who are beyond rehabilitation.

"Recent studies of these so-called 'student digs' show that usually they have more bars and locks and also worse living conditions than most maximum-security prisons," said police constable and author of the study Eric Fuller. "If we just lock the house from the outside, they'll never get out, and we'll save thousands in taxpayers' rands."

Fuller added that the fact that they had to pay exorbitant rent to live in such cramped squalor would "really suck, man."

However, the decision has not been without its share of controversy, with leading Human Rights Watch groups, organisations and activists condemning the move outright as "immoral, inhumane and draconian."

"With their water shortages and lack of quality, blackouts, dirty floors, communal bathrooms, cramped living space, sink full of unwashed dishes and that digsmate's puppy yelping and yapping all night in the other room when you're trying to get some goddamn sleep, only someone morally bankrupt and totally sadistic would hand down such a severe punishment," said head of Rights for Prisoners John Hendricks. "Even getting kicked in the balls for all eternity would be more lenient."

He went on to add that the likelihood of the inmates' milk being slowly and sneakily swigged away to nothingness was just "totally lank uncool bro".

"Besides," Hendricks added, "there's a 95% chance that the prisoner's mates will break in and set him free after taking all the laptops and stuff."

In spite of the activists' harsh criticisms, Judge Harsofukt has remained steadfastly unmoved and stands by his decision.

"The only way to teach such a heinous and despicable character that his aborrent actions have dire consequences is to force him to live in such inhuman conditions," he said. "If that means that his socks get stolen every time he does a load of washing, his communal dinner is too-salty spaghetti bolognaise every two days, and he has to suffer the montly ballache of dealing with awful landladies and the municipality water bill, so be it."

However, he did say that he would never include university residences in the sentencing procedures, citing the guy next door to your room who keeps loudly banging his girlfriend every night next door and tuesday's Braised Club Steak as "too vicious a punishment for anyone regardless of their atrocities."

"What kind of sick, twisted bastard do you think I am?"

Muse and Abuse donates laptop, hard drives, passports to local charity

In a surprise move at the Thursday 2O March Milner Street giveaway charity bonanza, held during broad daylight at exactly 1:10pm, Muse and Abuse's chief writer, reporter and Editor Matthew "Not actually that funny" de Klerk donated most of his prized possessions, including keys, a watch, a laptop and three hard disks containing the only backups of his four years of University work, newspaper articles and personal writing, music and photographs, to two men (who clearly wished to remain anonymous) from a Charity for struggling Probably Ex Convicts.

Muse and Abuse now joins over 400 other donors since January of this year who have donated their laptops, wallets, iPods, mobile phones, cash, and other easily-hockable and valuable items to similar charities in Grahamstown. Like Muse and Abuse, many of these donors also stored the charity donations in locked, secured and alarmed houses shortly before the handover.

The recipients of the items were endlessly happy.

"We could not be more pleased," they said probably over a beer gloating to friends at the ease of the charity giveaway. "Even though we probably live in squalor or desperate socioeconomic circumstances that force us to accept such donations."

The Charity Drive, which probably took no more than a few minutes, was joined several minutes later by members of both the Grahamstown South African Police Service and Hi-Tech Security, who called the event, "Business as usual", before adding that there was "an almost zero percent chance" that the satisfied customers would bring the items back for a refund or whatever.

"Students are just so generous and giving in our town," said Captain Howard Ahrwelukin and Sergeant Noah Tardat-Hall.

De Klerk, however, was just glad he could do his part.

"Most people might think me bitter," said the esteemed writer and philanthropist. "Most people would think me angry. Most people would think me disappointed. And in fact, most people would be absolutely fucking correct."

Those looking to make a donation should adopt a laissez-faire attitude toward personal security, or live on Milner Street.