The ‘Coloured’ DA Vote

If I can have a shot at it:

‘Coloured’ is the current manifestation of centuries of identity-construct manipulated by a parade of regimes and hegemonies that all imposed and enforced their manifestation of realised culture, the peak of human development and essentially the centrality of Whiteness to all that is right and good in the world (not absolutely, but I’m making a different point) on the Indigenous or First Nations in this part of the world - loosely enough grouped under this moniker assigned to a flourishing example of irrepressible diversity under oppression.

Presumably I don’t have to elaborate on the tone of the existence of ‘Coloured’ people to date, but enough that Die Gat in The Castle remains one of the most horrible ways for anyone to die, and did active business of ‘dealing’ with a non-compliant slave, Khoi, San, or anyone who didn’t concur with the world-view that informs on much of what confronts Indigenous People, faced with disregard and disdain. There was the non-human status of slaves, the murder of the Khoi, the hunting of the San. It would take much to list the scourges that have been deliberately visited on ‘Coloured People’ - Alcoholism, Drug Addiction, Forced Removals, Job restrictions, Unqualified for Ownership, Culturally Inferior, Behaviourally Unstable, with a penchant for Licentiousness and a clearly displayed Weak Character.

Arguably the clearest expression of this is the ongoing destruction of the ethos and spirit of District Six, the pinnacle of ‘Coloured’ co-existence and hegemony in the Western Cape, where ‘Coloured’ people found themselves unworthy of occupying even that part of Cape Town, certainly less worthy than White people for whom their homes were bulldozed and them strewn across the Cape Flats and eventually all over the world. It was stated. The area was declared a slum, and was to be re-developed for the exclusive use of White People.

Sounds like I’m listing reasons for why ‘Coloureds’ would NOT go ‘All Lives Matter’, but only if you don’t consider what options people had for survival. It is my belief that the impact of The Benefits Of White Adjacency was a constructed, manipulated option driven like one of the aforementioned scourges, in the ongoing eradication of a People ( grouped closest under Indigenous) that have ever manifest the counter-argument to all the debates about the ‘end justifies the means’ morality of the One World, One Village representation of the modern evolved. Successive occupiers, rulers and governments have decried a lack of the homogeneous when always had been the eradication of hegemony. And White Adjacency was The Strategy

One could now go into an even longer listing of how it has unrolled over time to eventually culminate in the evil that was Apartheid, but maybe enough to just use that crime against humanity as a relatable reference.

To whit (and I’m deliberately losing the parentheses to reference the ‘previously disadvantaged’ bulk of ‘Coloured’ People) Coloured People could live an assigned situation and their lives would be , if not quite that of White people (status quo such a word of bias in South Africa) certainly bearable , and even profitable in service to White people. So, besides it being the law of the land , you could sustain a certain lifestyle ( in many cases barely sustain, but again, not the point here) by servicing that rank expression of White Supremacy - lest we forget, a White child had a higher social standing than any adult POC, and all the power that goes with that. Negotiating servitude and second-class citizenship came with a proficiency at dealing with White Adjacency. One of the (obvious) key concerns for Whiteness was the threat of Blackness ( the eventual resistance to White hegemony). One of the key services of White Adjacency has always been the propagation and maintenance of the importance of Whiteness, a sort of White Lives Matter approach, but tied with the apron strings of White Supremacy. Hence, Whiteness took the Lion’s share, constructed its own explanation, and then demanded a complete commitment to that.

Yes, you had a choice. You could buy into that or you could suffer the consequences (it’s at this point that the conversation about gangsterism starts , but not here)

So, an aptitude for fake bowing and scraping, a false obsequiousness, a grand pretense became racial characteristics in this horror-show. For it’s only White People NOW who would be reluctant to capitalise on being able to lawfully assert their supremacy - then, terrible people comfortably housed and flourishing thought little of the men and women that seemed purposed for the concern and maintenance of their ‘status quo’. People who relished being racist. Horrible people. Who did terrible things

And even them , they had the power to make your life a nightmare. Have you arrested, fired or disregarded simply because they didn’t like you.

The point is, for survival, legally, socially, politically, existentially, you name it , Whiteness had to be more superior. The biggest challenge to that was Blackness. ‘Coloured’ people were assured they were not Black - a ‘benefit’ clearly enforced - and that, considering their adjacency/dependency, an attack on Whiteness is indirectly an attack on them. The DA propagates that ‘wisdom’ that an attack on them is an attack on Whiteness (hence a propensity for defending colonialism, diminishing racism, and maintaining as a mouthpiece for privilege) and since White Adjacency centres on a clear signalling of a capacity for assimilating Whiteness, ‘Coloureds’ have to be demonstrably anti-Black. Consider, letting someone into your environment, even in service, makes you vulnerable to your enemies. What better security than someone who considers your enemy theirs, and keeping that understanding in the forefront.

Compliant ‘Coloureds’ have always been the ace up the sleeve of the DA. People who have learned well their purpose and reached their specific achievement. The disregard that they and their party have for those who don’t fit into their continued appreciation of White Adjacency’s vision for ‘Coloureds’ can only be ignored if not reflected in the numbers who turn out for them. People who turn up not to vote for them. To vote for who the White people vote

and only the really naive will think I’m wilding.

It is planned though