Reddit mentions: The best south african history books

Mid thirties, white male. I was 14 when apartheid ended.

1.) Our country refers to itself as the rainbow nation. On TV this means people of all ethnicities and all backgrounds jumping around and dancing and waving their arms in the air. In practice, to me atleast, this is reflected in the amazing degree to which most people who interact in South Africa get along. All the different "groups" show great patience and restrain, despite personal frustration, as a collective effort to move forward. As an example, in most of the truly big social atrocities like the genocide against the native americans, the australian aborigines and the jews in Germany, the victims were not around afterwards, and as such forgiveness and self forgiveness might be much easier. In South Africa, victims and perpetrators lived side by side for many years. It took a lot of restraint and it will keep going for a long time. I think younger people, who were born after apartheid ended have a hard time figuring out how to feel about it. To what degree to adopt the feelings of their parents and to what degree to explore the new country that is forming around us.

2.) Sporting emblems, like the national flower "the protea", and "the springbok". Nelson Mandela is probably the most unifying emblem.

3.) The dominant language in South Africa is english. Zulu and Xhosa are both spoken by more people as a first language, but English drives the national debates, business and education. Languages are often seen as mapping on races perfectly which is a pretty big mistake. This unfortunately leads to some misguided policies around languages.

4.) Our constitution is one of the most friendly ones when it comes to minorities. South Africa is home a growing number of immigrants from other african countries. Their is tension between unemployed people in South Africa who feel that the immigrants take their jobs. I believe this is the case in all countries in the world, so nothing new here.

5.) The original french people who came to South Africa fled for their religion. It was a pretty far out place to come to so I reckon people held their religion close to their heart. The african people, as far as I understand, are to a very large extent christian, while to some extent entertaining the non-christian religions of their ancestors, sometimes, in parallel. Our constitution protects all religions. Im not sure all are welcomed equally, although I strive for this.

6.) One of the biggest challenges to our national identity is our government. It is an extremely polarising force. The general ineffectiveness, cronyism and corruption force staunch supporters to turn a blind eye and everyone else to be very upset, and patient at the same time. In the next 10-20 years the children of today will hopefully not feel a particular historic allegiance to the current government, and be willing to evaluate them on their merit.

7.) South Africa was colonized by the Dutch and the British. A large number of immigrants came from France and Germany. There are also a large number of Portugese, Greek and Italian people as well as Jews. Indian people, as well as people of Malay background are also prevalent. South Africa has the biggest Indian population outside of India. South Africa has a long history with Zimbabwe and Namibia as neighbours. South Africa has a very strong history with the UK. We were a colony and fought a big war against the British at the beginning of the 20th century. The bravery and genius of the afrikaner people in this war is seldom discussed and many liberal afrikaans south africans mistakenly feel that they need to disown this wonderful part of our history in order to distance themselves from what came 60 years later with apartheid. For a great book that helps to illustrate this war form a first hand account of a 17year old boy you should read Commando. It is a great way of understanding the mutual respect that the people of these two countries had for one another.

Ok, enjoy and good luck! As you can see South Africans are very proud of our country and we love talking about it :)

There are far too many to describe one as "the best", but here are some of my favourites.

The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes is a well deserved winner of the Pulitzer Prize. A combination of history, science and biography and so very well written.

A few of my favourite biographies include the magisterial, and also Pulitzer Prize winning, Peter the Great by Robert Massie. He also wrote the wonderful Dreadnaught on the naval arms race between Britain and Germany just prior to WWI (a lot more interesting than it sounds!). Christopher Hibbert was one of the UK's much loved historians and biographers and amongst his many works his biography Queen Victoria - A Personal History is one of his best. Finally, perhaps my favourite biography of all is Everitt's Cicero - The Life and Times of Rome's Greatest Politician. This man was at the centre of the Fall of the Roman Republic; and indeed fell along with it.

Speaking of which, Rubicon - The Last Years of the Roman Republic is a recent and deserved best-seller on this fascinating period. Holland writes well and gives a great overview of the events, men (and women!) and unavoidable wars that accompanied the fall of the Republic, or the rise of the Empire (depending upon your perspective). :) Holland's Persian Fire on the Greco-Persian Wars (think Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes! Think of the Movie 300, if you must) is equally gripping.

Perhaps my favourite history book, or series, of all is Shelby Foote's magisterial trilogy on the American Civil War The Civil War - A Narrative. Quite simply one of the best books I've ever read.

If, like me, you're interested in teh history of Africa, start at the very beginning with The Wisdom of the Bones by Alan Walker and Pat Shipman (both famous paleoanthropologists). Whilst not the very latest in recent studies (nothing on Homo floresiensis for example), it is still perhaps the best introduction to human evolution available. Certainly the best I've come across. Then check out Africa - Biography of a Continent. Finish with the two masterpieces The Scramble for Africa on how European colonialism planted the seeds of the "dark continents" woes ever since, and The Washing of the Spears, a gripping history of the Anglo-Zulu wars of the 1870's. If you ever saw the movie Rorke's Drift or Zulu!, you will love this book.

Hopkirk's The Great Game - The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia teaches us that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

I should imagine that's enough to keep you going for the moment. I have plenty more suggestions if you want. :)

I took a class on African Religions, so I can help on the Yoruba side!

For a quick primer, pick up Stephen Prothero's God is Not One. It's an introduction to World Religions type book, but it's a great read and he includes an entire chapter specifically on Yoruba.

For more mythology, pick up Osun across the Waters by Muphy and Sanford It's a great history of the Yoruba pantheon and how they crossed to the Americas. Osun has some fantastic myths attached to her.

For a really fun read that's a little off topic, pick up Karen McCarthy-Brown's Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn. It's an anthropologist's conversations with a Vodou priestess, with descriptions of the ritual (Vodou is a daughter religion to Yoruba - they share a lot of the same ideas and gods), and every other chapter is a short story written by the author that explores some of the history and themes of the tradition. Her descriptions of the various orishas/lwas are really fun reading.

At the start he had some good ideas, and some righteous causes, but as time went by, his policies were about as Marxist as Hayek.

Mugabe's government were always making regular pronouncements about converting Zimbabwe into a socialist society, although they didn't take concrete steps in that direction. In contrast to Mugabe's talk of socialism, his government's budgetary policies were conservative, operating within a capitalist framework and emphasising the need for foreign investment

Mugabe's administration expanded healthcare and education, and—despite his Marxist rhetoric and professed desire for a socialist society—adhered largely to conservative economic policies, as stated above.

At the start of his reign, there was massive expansion in education and health spending. In 1980, Zimbabwe had 177 secondary schools, but by 2000 this number had risen to 1,548. During that period, the adult literacy rate rose from 62% to 82%, one of the best records in Africa. Levels of child immunisation were raised from 25% of the population to 92%. In 1980, Zimbabwe had 177 secondary schools, but by 2000 this number had risen to 1,548. During that period, the adult literacy rate rose from 62% to 82%, one of the best records in Africa. Levels of child immunisation were raised from 25% of the population to 92%.



However, later on, a new leadership elite were formed, who often expressed their newfound status through purchasing large houses and expensive cars, sending their children to private schools, and obtaining farms and businesses. To contain their excesses, in 1984 Mugabe drew up a "leadership code" which prohibited any senior figures from obtaining more than one salary or owning over 50-acres of agricultural land. There were exceptions, with Mugabe giving permission to a General to expand his business empire, resulting in him becoming one of the Zimbabwe's wealthiest people. Growing corruption among the socio-economic elite generated resentment among the wider population, much of which was living in poverty.

In other words, he literally formed new bourgeoisie.

Not only that, but his ZANU-PF party formed their own businesses, often using public funds as venture capital. Yeah, that's right, they stole money from the poor to make themselves rich. Remind you of anyone ??

Add that to his homophobia, and there's a pretty clear case against him being anything remotely leftist, never mind a Marxist.

It's a tragedy too, considering how well he started.

I'm not aware of any academic histories that have the wide scope that you are after, but there are a few introductory texts that do attempt it. Shillington's History of Africa is the most famous one. It stretches way back to the first written accounts from Greek expansion, but is particularly interesting for trying to provide an African perspective of the colonial period.

Africans and Their History has a similar scope, but also extends way back into pre-history and the beginnings of human evolution. I haven't read it myself, but I believe it is well-written.

Someone else has mentioned The Scramble for Africa, by Thomas Pakenham, which deals specifically with the period of European imperialism between about 1860 and 1910. It's probably worth while taking a look at it just because offers insight into what Africa was like when Europeans found it. Also, it's probably worth reading because it is just really rare to find a history that is so griping, despite being so ambitious.

Similar to the above, the many of he great river explorers between 1600 and 1900 wrote accounts of their journeys that form the only primary sources that we really have (although, there are certainly earlier accounts of Northern Africa and the Horn). Stanely is quite famous, but he is a product of his time. He is entertaining, and includes all sorts of interesting diagrams and charts, but he regards the native people with a fair bit of ridicule. Mungo Park's Travels is probably the most readable, and he was writing a full century prior to Stanely, prior to the racism of the Imperial era, and in a continent much freer of European involvement.

If you like fiction, Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart gives an African perspective of tribal lifestyle as it was before colonisation.

The homelands weren't about international pressure. They were part of Verwoerd's grand vision of separate development long before international pressure became an issue. The idea was that the groups in SA were at different levels of development, and that it was in everybody's best interests to continue separately on their path of development. That was the humanitarian argument for Apartheid that Verwoerd made and many people were convinced. He was a very good orator.

It's true however that the Bantustans were too small to sustain their populations and that Whites were too greedy, effectively taking 87% of the land. But what you perhaps didn't know, was that very early on (in the 1920s if I remember correctly) the ANC was in principle willing to accept Separate Development (Apartheid) if black people were given enough land.

If you're curious about my source for most of this info: http://www.amazon.com/The-Afrikaners-Biography-Reconsiderations-Southern/dp/0813922372

Africa: A Biography of the Continent by John Reader

1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles C. Mann

Both cover some of the same concepts as GG&S, but in a much more rigorous fashion. Both are better reads with a less self-congratulatory tone and much more interesting information. GG&S is a kids book compared to these works, which is fine because GG&S is a great introduction to these sorts of concepts. Now you can get down to reading the good stuff.

Joseph Lelyveld’s book Move Your Shadow, a book about apartheid-era South Africa, has a chapter describing the laws classifying everyone in the country as black, white, colored, or Asian, and the administrative system to make sure everyone stayed in the appropriate box. So if, for example, you were officially “colored” but you wanted to be reclassified as “white” (a change that would affect where you were allowed to live, who you were allowed to marry, and whether or not you could vote), there was a formal system for deciding whether or not to grant your wish.

The official definitions of these racial categories, and the kind of language courts used to justify their decisions to place someone in one category or another... it would all be the stuff of comedy, except it had such a drastic impact on so many people’s lives.

See also the book When She Was White, about a girl born to white Afrikaner parents who was classified as “white”, “colored” and “black” at different points in her life.

The South African legal system had to put itself through contortions to decide things like this because ultimately, their racial classifications weren’t founded in any natural biological categories. People weren’t classified as “black” because their skin color was darker than some particular color standard; they were classified that way because... they looked like the kind of people the ruling class wanted to keep at the bottom of the heap.

In my opinion the best book about the conflict is this one: https://www.amazon.com/South-Africas-Border-War-1966-89/dp/1909982016/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1500700478&sr=8-10&keywords=south+african+border+war

The documentary is great and there is an English version. I haven't been able to find it. If anyone can find it, please post it here. I would greatly appreciate it!!!!!!!!!!!!

Diamonds, Gold, and War: The British, the Boers, and the Making of South Africa by Martin Meredith is much more than military history, but it does give a great account of the British/Boer conflict. The entire book is great, and his other works on Africa are also very much worth picking up. His book on Mugabe is a really quick, deft, and concise look at the dictator and is one of the great although tragic stories of Africa in the last 50 years.

I could never get into Cry, the Beloved Country. I really liked Kaffir Boy, about a little boy growing up in the Alex Township in the 70s and 80s. It's an autobiography but it flows like fiction.

For the history I read a straight up textbook, which was really dry but very informative. When I moved to SA I felt like I knew more about the country's long-term history than most of the people I met, which mattered about as much as encountering a Romanian who was an expert on 1600s America. I read the first edition of A History of South Africa. The link is for the 3rd edition but the 1st edition is what my library had. The 3rd edition is now $0.01 if you're in the US so I guess there's another new edition out.

If anyone wants to read about African military operations by someone who lived through them firsthand, you really need to read Eeben Barlow and his Military and Security blog.

He's got a new book coming out that looks absolutely fantastic:

Composite Warfare: The Conduct of Successful Ground Force Operations in Africa

>Composite Warfare presents African soldiers and scholars with a true African ‘Art of War’. As a continent, Africa presents her armies with a vast, dynamic and multidimensional operating environment. It has numerous complex and diverse ethnic, religious, cultural and tribal interests and loyalties, along with many multifaceted threat-drivers coupled to varied and infrastructure-poor terrain plus vast climatic variations. The continent is, furthermore, characterized by numerous half-won conflicts and wars fought by incorrectly structured, inadequately trained and ill-equipped armies. For many reasons, these forces have difficulty adapting to the complex, demanding and rapidly changing environments they do battle in. Similarly, the armies have difficulty in decisively defeating the various threats they face. Many of these problems stem from the fact that numerous modern-day African armies are merely clones of the armies established by their once-colonial masters, their Cold War allies or their new international allies. Many of the principles and tactics, techniques and procedures they were – and still are – being taught relate to fighting in Europe and not in Africa. Some of these concepts are not even relevant to Africa.

>This book is intended as a guide and textbook for African soldiers and scholars who wish to understand the development of hostilities, strategy, operational design, doctrine and tactics. It also illustrates the importance of nonpartisanship and the mission and role of the armed forces. Officers, NCOs and their subordinates need to, furthermore, understand their role in defending and protecting the government and the people they serve. They additionally need to know how to successfully accomplish their numerous missions with aggression, audacity, boldness, speed and surprise. The book provides the reader with valuable information relating to conventional and unconventional maneuver. It also discusses how African armies can, with structured and balanced forces, achieve strategic, operational and tactical success. It covers the role of government along with operations related to war, operations other than war and intelligence operations and how these operations, operating in a coordinated and unified manner, can secure and strengthen a government. Composite Warfare draws on the author’s experiences and lessons in Central, Southern, East, West and North Africa where he has served numerous African governments as a politico-military strategist, division commander, division adviser, battalion commander and special operations commander.

Fascinating stuff from a true professional. Highly recommended for anyone interested in looking beyond a US-centered narrative.

Postcolonial land restitution and redistribution schemes in former settler colonies are a related but somewhat special case to the ones indicated above. In the cases of Zimbabwe and South Africa (the ones I know best) there are two issues at work: first, figuring out what the original title to the land was; second, figuring out whether or not that title was uprooted in a way one might consider "just." John Weaver talks about this in The Great Land Rush and the Making of the Modern World 1650-1900 (2003), a very valuable book if you haven't read it. The case of Zimbabwe arguably went south so quickly because the colonial-era landholders dragged their feet on redistribution to the point that they became the first target for Mugabe when he came under pressure from rural agitation. He could paint them as the problem, and people would agree with him, because they were always the problem, right? The redistribution was handled haphazardly and with very little concern for accuracy or proper claims determination as you know, with a lot of big estates handed over to cronies who might sublease parts or simply do nothing with them. A fair bit of land was however put in the hands of families, but they did not have the inputs or the institutional support to make the land produce, even if they had the knowledge. South Africa's been a better case so far, but everyone eyeballs Zimbabwe for differing reasons. Jocelyn Alexander, The Unsettled Land (2006), is essential reading for the fraught history of land in Zimbabwe since 1893. She's got another study coauthored that's coming out this year, on the Fast Track program itself. You can also see Ian Scoones, ed., Zimbabwe's Land Reform: Myths and Realities (2010) for some more specific discussion. Cherryl Walker and a variety of others are working on the issues surrounding land in South Africa, which I also study (the 1800s alienation end, not the restitution end) but I don't want to belabor that literature here. It's a moving target.

[Edit: Added links.]

Between early 1960s and late 1980s, Cuba launched a number of 'external' operations, ranging from 'de facto private enterprises' (like those by Che Guevara in the DR Congo and Bolivia), through 'development support of progressive governments' (like in Algeria of the mid-1960s), via 'deployments of advisors' (like in former South Yemen of early 1970s, Syria of 1973), to 'military interventions' (like in Angola of 1975-1989, and Ethiopia of 1977-1984).

In sense of availability of well-substantiated, authoritative and balanced publications, Che's adventures around Latin America are probably the best-covered topic. However, when it comes to 'Cuba's military performance', and then 'in Africa', I do not know about one, authoritative, 'single point of reference' for all the affairs there. Only the Cuban intervention in Angola can be described as 'well-covered', and that in Ethiopia as 'reasonably well-covered'. Most of the coverage of other of Cuban 'externals' is within realms of 'legends, myths and rumours'.

The most authoritative and balanced publication I know about is the much-ignored The Cuban Intervention in Angola, 1965-1991: From Che Guevara to Cuito Cuanavale. It's expensive to get nowadays, but worth every pence for anybody with serious interest in this topic.

There are slightly more of well-supported publications about Cuban reasoning, decision-making processes, and politics in regards of specific of their externals in Africa. Foremost between these is Piero Gleijeses' Havana, Washington and Africa, 1959-1976. Although not 'perfectly balanced', it's something like a 'must read', 'impossible to beat' in regards of authoritativeness, and in regards of topics it covers (from Algeria to Angola).

Various books and articles by Ethiopian historian Gebru Tareke are offering reasonably good coverage of Cuban operations during Ogaden War of 1977-1978. Good example is his article The Ethiopia-Somalia War of 1977 Revisited.

A cheaper and simpler to read ('to the point') alternative would be Wings over Ogaden.

Hope, we can expect much more in this regards over the coming years, then Cuba played a much more important role in many African conflicts of the 1970s and 1980s than is generally known.

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amazon.com.au

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amazon.com.mx

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> I can see that wines were coming in from other parts of the Soviet union. but South Africa?

Aha, so the cracks even begin to appear in the narrative of the dedicated bulgaro-afrikaner shill! Yes that's right, your cover is blown, I'm onto you.

Errr... As /u/thefoolwhofollowshim notes, at the time the South Africans were being crippled by worldwide boycotts, sanctions and embargoes. But only 'worldwide' in the sense that nobody wanted to get caught, not out of any genuine sense of solidarity.

Everything had to be done under-the-table, and therefore at reduced price. Which was convenient because the Bulgarians wanted to buy cheap, and under-the-table.

I mean, we later found out the South Africans were secretly cooperating with the Israelis to develop their nuclear weapons, is it so absurd they would also secretly cooperate with the Bulgarians to develop a reasonably priced Cabernet Sauvignon?




^(OK fine, there isn't really have any actual evidence of this. But if there was any evidence, it wouldn't be a conspiracy theory would it?)

John Reader's Africa: A Biography of the Continent is the book I turned to when I decided that I didn't know enough about the place. It's a good foundation on which to start towards a number of Africa-related topics. I'd recommend starting with something like that, then branching out to more specific locales, time periods and events.

Obviously there's Arabic but there's a bunch of other scripts : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_systems_of_Africa

There's no such thing as "truthful history" because history is always viewed through a prism, but I've heard good things about John Reader's Biography of the Continent:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/067973869X/ref=pd_aw_sim_sbs_14_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=ZC56YTYN2PH4VYTDAQCT&dpPl=1&dpID=51vnkPaUS6L

The Scramble for Africa by Thomas Pakenham

Fantastic book on the colonization of Africa. Impartial, well written and thorough.

Just did a quick search on Amazon and found this:

http://www.amazon.com/Africa-Biography-Continent-John-Reader/dp/067973869X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1416807357&sr=8-2&keywords=history+of+africa

It looks like a good overview of the entire continental history (both North African and Sub-Saharan), and it's not written like a textbook. That's usually a plus in my opinion.

I might actually pick it up myself as my knowledge of the continent isn't too strong.

Starting at $1.22 used doesn't hurt either.

I am a fervent atheist, but that is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. Many of Africa's problems stem from outside exploitation of its people and resources, and yes, much of that exploitation, through colonization, was initiated under the banner of "saving" Africans by introducing Christianity to Africa. And radical Islamic regimes haven't exactly improved the lives of many Africans either. But outsiders would have plundered Africa whether they had the excuse of religion or not, because greed exists independent of religion.

Economic exploitation has historically caused many more problems in Africa than religion. This Wikipedia article sums up part of that history pretty well. I recommend this book as an interesting read on the subject of the (mostly) post-slavery exploitation of Africa by colonizing nations (and greedy corporations).

A History of South Africa by Leonard Thompson is a good general history of the region. It covers from the first human inhabitants to the late 1990s.

Amazon link

The british did a shit ton to end slavery.

http://www.amazon.com/Scramble-Africa-Conquest-Continent-1876-1912/dp/0380719991

> African countries can't prosper without white intervention, Apartheid wasn't so bad in the grand scheme of things, it was harder to develop in Europe

At no point was it said nor eluded to that African countries can't prosper without white intervention. Only that trends indicate that African countries struggle to prosper if they were not an ex-colony of a more technologically developed civilization.

> I mean let's delve into some of these views that you call truth..

Let's

> Climate: Africa is supposedly the hottest continent. 60% of it is desert. Forget the Sahara, Botswana and Namibia are largely desert countries. Very dry, very hot in summer, very cold in winter. So I'm not too sure where this idea of Europe having a harsher climate comes from. Yet it is supposedly "truth".

Desertification has only taken hold of 40% of the African landmass, not 60%.
Source: Africa: A Biography of a Continent. Logic dictates that it makes no sense for more advanced civilizations to seek colonies in Africa if their own continents were far more fertile in natural resources.

> English is not an African language, yet in South Africa you won't get far if you can't speak it. Does that mean the other African languages are inferior? No.. it simply means that our society does not give the freedom and room for the African to prosper in his own way. In SA, the more white you act, the further you'll get.

Language was never brought up as part of the original discussion put forward. Besides which, this argument is weak, English is an international standard used to govern the world's institutions. This is not Africa-specific. Furthermore, the English spoken in South Africa is South African English, along with the other 11 official languages of which 75% are Bantu languages. Would you prefer Africa to be isolated from the rest of the developed world by enforcing ?

> So in terms of states, the question is.. can we mock African states for struggling to adapt to a world that tells them to not be African?

No one is mocking anyone. Again, this is only a factual discussion. Emotions are not allowed here.

> Suffering of Africans: I don't think you or the other commenter fully grasp the dehumanization that Africans underwent. Think of your pet (if you've ever had one) and then consider that there was once a time when your pet was treated to a higher standard than some black Africans.

No one is denying the historical struggle of Africans but what does this have to do with the original discussion? Many humans have been subjugated throughout history, Africans are not exclusive to struggle. Refer original discussion.

> We live in a world where bullying is known to be mentally scarring. Now imagine what happened to Africans under colonialism and apartheid.. to be treated as if you are fundamentally and inherently lesser. And then you have the nerve to call that a 'holiday'?!? How do you even contrast such atrocities? And of course when they're contrasted, it's the black struggle that's made to seem lesser.

This has already been compared and contrasted. The point being made here was that Apartheid was far less dehumanizing than say the Rwandan Genocide, Soviet Forced Labour Gulags, Nazi Concentration Camps to name just a few. In light of this comparison Apartheid could be seen as a holiday in contrast.

> The reason I was so unwilling to discuss with the other commenter is because I'm tired of having to convince people that I am just as human as they are. That my blackness does not make me lesser.

No one is saying that you are less human for being black. The point being made is ...the realisation that the multicultural, rainbow experiment has failed and people are now turning to tried and tested governance strategies. We know that very homogeneous societies can work really well. We have not figured out how to deal with highly diverse societies because long term they tend towards instability.

> When people discuss this kind of stuff here, it's never from a human aspect. It's never "post-colonial African states fail because any human would struggle to find success under those settings" .. it's always "post-colonial African states fail because of blacks"

Failed post-colonial states could be made up of neon green one-eyed man-girls, the fact remains that they are failed post-colonial states no matter what the people look like that live in them.

> Even in this day and age, in 2018.. you still, as a black human, have to fight to try convince people that you're just as human as they are.

This strikes at the heart of the issue. You needn't convince anyone that you are human, I have only seen people being treated with dignity and respect, on this sub and on the street, both black and white. It is only those that have to fight to try convince people that reduces the inherent human respect that already existed. Those that fight for no valid reason (ie. you are not being subjugated nor dehumanized) create their own undoing.

I trust this clarifies.