[{"id":48380,"date":"2024-12-14T04:15:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-14T02:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/?p=48380"},"modified":"2024-12-13T15:47:53","modified_gmt":"2024-12-13T13:47:53","slug":"rethinking-sas-history-curriculum-an-open-letter-to-minister-siviwe-gwarube","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/14\/rethinking-sas-history-curriculum-an-open-letter-to-minister-siviwe-gwarube\/","title":{"rendered":"Rethinking SA\u2019s history curriculum: An open letter to Minister Siviwe Gwarube"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Dear Minister Siviwe Gwarube,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>I hope this letter finds you well. I am writing to you with a deep and sincere concern regarding the way in which the history of South Africa is being taught in schools today.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As the Minister responsible for shaping the educational landscape in our country, you hold the power to influence how future generations understand our country\u2019s shared past, and how they view one another. It is for this reason that I urge you to reconsider how we are teaching the history of our country, particularly the period of colonisation, conquest, and the birth of modern South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the current curriculum, European colonisation is presented as a narrative of unprovoked, inherent evil, with the Dutch, British, and other colonisers depicted as the sole perpetrators of the systemic exploitation and oppression of African peoples. While these actions and their consequences are undeniably tragic, I believe that this one-sided portrayal does a disservice to both our history and our ability to heal as a nation. By neglecting the broader context of history, which includes the similar actions carried out by pre-colonial African kingdoms, we risk fostering division, resentment, and a distorted understanding of what truly transpired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>South Africa\u2019s history of conquest, empire-building, and state formation did not begin with the arrival of Europeans in the 17th century. Rather, these processes have been a consistent part of human history for millennia, across all continents, cultures, and peoples. This is why the present approach to history education – one that isolates European colonisation as a uniquely evil occurrence – becomes problematic. By framing history solely through the lens of white colonisation and apartheid, we exclude the broader pattern of conquest and empire-building that was the order of the day, not only in Africa but in every corner of the globe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is therefore not only necessary, but urgent, that we reconsider how we teach our children about the history of this country. I propose that we adopt a more balanced approach – one that presents the full history of South Africa, considering both the indigenous conquests by African kingdoms and the subsequent arrival of Europeans. This will allow for a deeper, more complex understanding of the forces that shaped the South Africa we know today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Zulu and Pedi Kingdoms: Conquests within Africa<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To begin with, let us examine the rise of two of South Africa\u2019s most prominent kingdoms: the Zulu and the Bapedi (Sekhukhune) kingdoms. These two kingdoms are often celebrated as symbols of African pride, resilience, and unity. They are lauded for their ability to resist European colonisation, and their histories are integral to the broader narrative of African resistance to foreign domination. However, what is often overlooked is that both the Zulu and Bapedi kingdoms came into existence through conquest, violence, and the subjugation of other peoples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Take the example of Shaka Zulu, the founder of the Zulu Kingdom, and one of the most well-known figures in South African history. Shaka’s rise to power was marked by extreme violence and the expansion of his kingdom through the forced displacement and destruction of smaller neighbouring communities. The Mfecane or \u2018Crushing\u2019 was a period of immense upheaval in southern Africa, which began during Shaka\u2019s reign. The Zulu expansion resulted in the forced migration of many communities, including the Ndwandwe, Mthethwa, and Qwabe peoples, who were either defeated in battle or displaced from their land. Thousands lost their lives, and entire communities were destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Shaka\u2019s conquests were not the exception, but the norm in pre-colonial Africa. In fact, many African kingdoms grew through violent territorial expansion. Conquest, empire-building, and the subjugation of other peoples were widespread practices throughout Africa long before the first European ships arrived on the southern tip of the continent. Shaka\u2019s successors, including Dingane and Cetshwayo, continued the legacy of conquest, further expanding the Zulu Kingdom by force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Similarly, the rise of the Bapedi Kingdom under King Sekhukhune also involved the conquest of neighbouring groups. Sekhukhune’s kingdom expanded through violent means, subjugating smaller groups. Like Shaka, Sekhukhune employed military might and forceful diplomacy to bring various groups under his rule. This is a critical aspect of South Africa\u2019s history that is often overlooked in contemporary discussions, yet it is essential to understanding the broader patterns of power struggles that have always shaped the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we examine the histories of the Zulu and Bapedi kingdoms, it becomes apparent that these empires, which are often presented as noble and pure, were built on conquest and violence. This is not to diminish their significance or the accomplishments of these kingdoms, but to highlight the reality that these kingdoms were, in many ways, no different from the European colonisers in their methods of empire-building. The primary difference lies in the race of the people involved in the conquest – European colonisers were white, while the leaders of the Zulu and Bapedi kingdoms were African. This distinction in skin colour should not be the sole factor in determining whether or not a conquest is deemed just or unjust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Inconsistency of History Education<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is both illogical and inconsistent to celebrate the conquests of the Zulu and Bapedi kingdoms while simultaneously condemning the conquests of European colonisers. Both were acts of empire-building, both resulted in the subjugation and displacement of other peoples, and both involved the use of violence. The key difference is the race of the conquerors, but why should race alone determine whether an act of conquest is considered just or unjust?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we uphold African kingdoms like the Zulu and Bapedi as models of pride and resistance, while condemning European colonisation as inherently evil, we are not only presenting an incomplete picture of history, but we are also contributing to a false dichotomy between \u201cgood\u201d Africans and \u201cevil\u201d Europeans. This dichotomy is dangerous. It risks fostering a mindset that views white South Africans as the inheritors of a legacy of theft and exploitation, while portraying all Africans as innocent victims of history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The consequence of this one-sided approach to history education is that it has created a racialised narrative in which white people are demonised for actions that were, in fact, part of the global order of the time. While European colonial powers did indeed introduce uniquely exploitative and racist ideologies, the practice of conquest and empire-building – especially in Africa – was not limited to Europeans. The African kingdoms that we now view with admiration, such as the Zulu and Bapedi, engaged in similar practices of domination and subjugation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By focusing exclusively on the wrongs of European colonisation without providing a broader historical context, we risk perpetuating hatred and division. (I use the word ‘wrongs’ because it’s the closest term, but upon reflecting more deeply and considering the historical context, can we truly call it wrong, or was it simply the way things were done at the time? Societies often conquered others, and this was a standard practice. It can only truly be deemed wrong when viewed through today’s lens, as humanity has made significant progress in how power is acquired and exercised). We risk painting one group of people as inherently evil and the other as inherently good, creating a foundation for racial resentment rather than mutual understanding. This approach not only distorts our history but also perpetuates a dangerous and reductionist view of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Need for a Balanced History Curriculum<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Minister, what South Africa needs is a revision of its history curriculum. Learners must be taught that the history of our country is far more complex than the simplistic narrative currently being presented. They need to understand that European colonisation was not an isolated phenomenon but part of a broader pattern of empire-building that was common to all human societies. They must be taught that the Zulu and Bapedi kingdoms, like European colonial powers, expanded their territories through conquest, violence, and subjugation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is not an attempt to justify or excuse the actions of European colonisers, nor is it an attempt to undermine the histories of African kingdoms. On the contrary, it is an effort to provide a more accurate and nuanced understanding of our history – one that acknowledges the complexity of human behaviour and the norms of the time. It is crucial that learners understand that the practices of empire-building, though harmful, were not exclusive to any one group. This knowledge will enable future generations to view the past with a greater sense of empathy, understanding, and critical thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Furthermore, presenting history as a complex and interconnected web of events will allow us to move beyond racial binaries and the harmful stereotypes that perpetuate division. By teaching the full story of our past, we can empower learners to recognise that no group is inherently good or bad, but that history is shaped by the actions of people, societies, and institutions, all of whom were products of their time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>History Education and Race-Based Politics<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the most concerning consequences of the current history curriculum is how it feeds into race-based political narratives. Political parties like the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) thrive primarily on rhetoric that is anti-white and based on race, feeding off the resentment and division that is perpetuated through the current historical education system. These parties leverage the one-sided narrative of history to mobilise support, often casting white South Africans as the enemy and framing them as the sole perpetrators of injustice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A revision of the history curriculum could play a critical role in weakening the grip of race-based political parties that thrive on division. By presenting a more accurate, comprehensive picture of South Africa\u2019s past – one that acknowledges both the colonisation of African peoples and the empire-building that occurred within the continent – it is possible to foster a new consciousness among the South African people. This consciousness would be rooted in the understanding that the complexities of history are not defined by race but by the human actions of conquest, power struggles, and the pursuit of resources, which transcend skin colour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The path forward for South Africa cannot be one that continues to divide people along racial lines. To truly move forward as a nation, we need a shift in focus – from racial narratives to a focus on how we can rebuild, reconcile, and create a better future for all. The history curriculum plays a key role in shaping that future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Importance of an Inclusive History for Reconciliation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Finally, Minister Gwarube, revising the history curriculum is not merely an academic exercise; it is a vital step toward national reconciliation. A more balanced understanding of South Africa\u2019s past will allow us to break free from the divisions of race and begin to address the deeper structural issues that persist in our society. If we continue to teach history in a way that reinforces racial divides, we risk perpetuating a culture of resentment and conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Teaching history in a way that acknowledges the complexity of both African and European conquests will allow us to confront our shared past without resorting to simplistic moralising. It will give South Africans the tools to understand the forces that shaped our country, and it will provide a foundation for moving beyond the racial divides that continue to shape our politics and society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Minister Siviwe Gwarube, I urge you to take the necessary steps to revise the history curriculum so that future generations can grow up with a more accurate, nuanced, and inclusive understanding of South Africa\u2019s past. By doing so, we will not only heal the wounds of the past, but we will also lay the groundwork for a more united and reconciled future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thank you for your time and consideration. I look forward to seeing the steps your ministry will take in this important regard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sincerely, <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Tiego Thotse<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dear Minister Siviwe Gwarube, I hope this letter finds you well. I am writing to you with a deep and sincere concern regarding the way<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":129,"featured_media":48362,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[255],"class_list":["post-48380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Rethinking SA\u2019s history curriculum: An open letter to Minister Siviwe Gwarube - Daily Friend<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/14\/rethinking-sas-history-curriculum-an-open-letter-to-minister-siviwe-gwarube\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rethinking SA\u2019s history curriculum: An open letter to Minister Siviwe Gwarube - Daily Friend\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear Minister Siviwe Gwarube, I hope this letter finds you well. 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It whispers, \u201cIf I cannot have what they have, neither should they.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It hides in the shadows of fairness, pretending to seek justice and equality but leaving destruction in its wake. Imagine a small village where one farmer prospers more than the others. He rises before dawn to tend his fields. He experiments with new seeds and techniques. Over time, his hard work pays off, and his harvests flourish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At first, the neighbours admire him. But as his success grows, so does their envy. Whispers start: \u201cWhy should he have so much more than the rest of us?\u201d The whispers turn to anger. The villagers, convinced his success must have come at their expense, demand that his land and tools be taken and divided among them. They march to his fields, seize his tools, and claim his crops as their own. For a moment, they celebrate their new-found equality. But without the farmer\u2019s knowledge, diligence and hard work, the fields wither. The tools rust. The harvest fails and the village is poorer than before. Yet the people feel a grim satisfaction. The successful man has been brought low, and no one is better off than anyone else. Envy, lurking in the shadows, has claimed another victim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This story mirrors what has happened in South Africa. Envy has become a guiding principle in much of our politics and policymaking, not to inspire progress but to punish success. During Jacob Zuma\u2019s presidency, billions of rands intended to uplift South Africa\u2019s poorest citizens have been looted, redirected into luxury lifestyles, and wasted on corrupt deals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These funds, meant to provide clean water, reliable electricity, functioning schools and decent healthcare, were stolen from the people who needed them most. Communities were left to crumble, their hopes stolen along with the money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yet Zuma retained the loyalty of many of those he harmed most. Like the villagers in the story, his supporters were convinced that his wealth was a victory for the group; a way to punish the elites or the so-called oppressors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Tragedy of envy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Zuma\u2019s rhetoric painted him as a man of the people, unfairly targeted by conspiracies and enemies of transformation. His personal enrichment was reframed as an act of resistance. This is the tragedy of envy: it blinds people to the harm being done to them, as long as it satisfies their desire to see others brought low.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The story of the farmer also echoes in South Africa\u2019s broader policies. Black Economic Empowerment (BEE), for instance, was designed to address the injustices of apartheid, but has largely failed to deliver.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Like the villagers seizing the farmer\u2019s tools, BEE policies often focus on redistributing existing wealth rather than creating new opportunities. Businesses are burdened with compliance requirements that favour a connected few while discouraging investment and innovation. The result is an economy that stagnates, leaving the fields untended and the harvests sparse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The same destructive logic underpins South Africa\u2019s labour laws. These laws, rooted in a suspicion of employers, make it costly and risky to hire or manage employees. This punishes small businesses, which are forced to limit growth or shut down entirely, and locks millions out of formal employment. Instead of encouraging prosperity, these laws assume that success must come at someone else\u2019s expense and seek to limit the assumed plunder and the very success that creates jobs. As in the story, the tools rust, and the fields are left barren.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perhaps the most dangerous manifestation of envy is expropriation without compensation (EWC). Like the villagers demanding the farmer\u2019s land, proponents of EWC believe that taking property from one group and redistributing it to others will create equality. But property rights are the cornerstone of any thriving economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Without them, investment dries up, productivity collapses, and hunger follows. EWC does not uplift the poor; it ensures that everyone suffers equally, leaving South Africa poorer, hungrier, and more divided.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Brink of ruin<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Envy has brought South Africa to the brink of ruin, but there is a way forward. As Helmut Schoeck argued in <em>Envy: A Theory of Social Behaviour<\/em>, the antidote to envy is aspiration. A society that celebrates success rather than punishes it can inspire growth, innovation, and prosperity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>South Africa must reject the politics of resentment and embrace policies that protect property rights, reduce burdens on businesses, and reward effort and ingenuity. Only then will the fields be tended again, the tools put to good use, and the harvests restored.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Envy destroys, but freedom builds. The choice is ours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image: <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/users\/gdj-1086657\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=6279957\"><em>Gordon Johnson<\/em><\/a><em> from <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=6279957\">Pixabay<\/a><\/em><em>]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Envy is a quiet but powerful force. It whispers, \u201cIf I cannot have what they have, neither should they.\u201d It hides in the shadows of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":140,"featured_media":48379,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[267],"class_list":["post-48378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How South Africa is being destroyed by envy - Daily Friend<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/14\/how-south-africa-is-being-destroyed-by-envy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How South Africa is being destroyed by envy - Daily Friend\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Envy is a quiet but powerful force. 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major impediment to SA\u2019s growth, wellbeing \u2013 IRR"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Crime is one of the biggest drags on economic growth and a serious obstacle in the way of South Africa reaching its full potential, says the Institute of Race Relations (IRR).<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Both elements are addressed in the latest paper in the IRR\u2019s <em>Blueprint for Growth<\/em> series, which examine impediments to economic growth and offer solutions to overcoming them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The latest paper \u2013 <em>Solutions to SA\u2019s Crime Crisis to Boost Growth <\/em>\u2013 lays out the current situation, noting that South Africa is one of the world\u2019s most violent countries, with high levels of interpersonal violence. It shows how crime is a quantifiable drag on growth, costing South Africa up to 10% of GDP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a <a href=\"https:\/\/irr.org.za\/media\/crime-key-impediment-to-growth-2013-irr\">statement<\/a>, senior IRR researcher and writer, and author of the new report, Marius Roodt, notes that, along with the serious economic consequences, crime takes a devastating personal toll on South Africans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBehind each recorded murder, rape, or assault, there are people and families whose lives and futures have been ruined. Getting crime under control in South Africa is not only an imperative for economic growth, but also vital if we want South Africans to simply be able to live their lives to the fullest, in safety,\u201d says Roodt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The paper proposes a number of solutions, including legislative reform and allowing greater private sector involvement in finding solutions to the crime crisis. In addition, the paper calls for more policing devolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Says Roodt: \u201cSouth Africa is far too diverse to attempt to centralise policing. The type of policing you need in Kakamas is different from what you need in Alexandra in Gauteng. Decisions cannot be made in Pretoria but need to be made closer to where communities are.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Evidence from the Western Cape LEAP programme seems to indicate that where these officers are deployed they have made a positive impact on crime, notes Roodt, underscoring the argument that devolution must be the focus of any broad reform of policing in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cDevolution won\u2019t even need significant legislative reform; much devolution can already be done within the current framework,\u201d Roodt says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cGetting crime under control is vital if South Africa is to reach its potential and policing reform will be a key component of this. It is something that can no longer be delayed,\u201d Roodt concludes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read the full report <a href=\"https:\/\/irr.org.za\/reports\/the-irr-blueprint-for-growth\/the-irrs-blueprint-for-growth-solutions-to-sas-crime-crisis-to-boost-growth\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Crime is one of the biggest drags on economic growth and a serious obstacle in the way of South Africa reaching its full potential, says<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":34545,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[198,2],"tags":[],"coauthors":[94],"class_list":["post-48377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dispatches","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Crime major impediment to SA\u2019s growth, wellbeing \u2013 IRR - 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President Cyril Ramaphosa\u2019s response is exactly what would-be poisoners would have wanted.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today is the deadline for all spaza shops who wish to continue operating to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.polity.org.za\/article\/govt-urges-spaza-shop-owners-to-register-businesses-before-deadline-2024-12-12\">register with their respective municipalities<\/a>. This requirement is over and above the usual company registration and business permits that are required in the ordinary course of formal operation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Spaza shops have been part of the informal business landscape for decades. It is where millions of people buy affordable groceries and household items. Thousands of entrepreneurs operate these shops, forming the backbone of the township economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In September 2024, out of the blue, hundreds of people \u2013 primarily children \u2013 began to get sick, and a couple of dozen died, after consuming food bought from spaza shops and street vendors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All of the reported incidents that I have seen involve foreign-owned spaza shops. And all of them involved either <a href=\"https:\/\/pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/compound\/terbufos\">terbufos<\/a>, an organophosphate insecticide used in agriculture, or a mystery contaminant. These contaminants were discovered not only on the outside of food packaging, but inside packets of chips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What changed? Did spaza shop owners all over the country suddenly decide to get reckless with food safety? Did they plant the poison inside the chips packets? Did they suddenly decide, all at the same time, that killing customers makes business sense?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Or is there another explanation for the sudden increase in outbreaks of food-related poisonings involving foreign-owned spaza shops?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Official story<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>President Ramaphosa, in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=fZgMZMHi5yQ\">addressing the issue last month<\/a>, said that problems were not limited to foreign-owned spaza shops, but were widespread. He spoke of food-borne illnesses, although it wasn\u2019t about biological pathogens such as listeria, botulism or salmonella, but about food poisoned with agricultural chemicals. He said that investigations did not suggest a deliberate campaign to poison children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The problem, he said, is that shop owners store prohibited insecticides that are used to control rodents in townships right next to foodstuffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Why they all started doing that in September, he left as a homework exercise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When Johannesburg officials and police raided spaza shops eleven days later, they <a href=\"https:\/\/www.trtafrika.com\/africa\/food-poisoning-south-africa-spaza-shops-raided-shut-down-18236663\">targeted only foreign-owned shops<\/a>, and discovered \u201cexpired food items and non-labelled goods\u201d, but no poisoned packets of chips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Instead of issuing fines, which one might expect in such cases, they shut every single one of the raided spaza shops down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poisoning theory<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dr Cloete van Vuuren, an infectious disease specialist from the University of the Free State, doesn\u2019t buy the explanation that it\u2019s merely about poor food safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He noted that the deaths occurred very quickly, which suggests that the victims ingested substantial doses of pesticide, which is unlikely to happen after accidental contamination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhat seems to be happening here is food that is contaminated with poison, with an organophosphate,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/sundayworld.co.za\/news\/spaza-food-is-being-deliberately-contaminated-ufs-specialist\/\">he told <em>Sunday World<\/em><\/a>. \u201cContamination is accidental if it happens in small amounts, and you would have a case here and there. In this instance, we have a huge number of children simultaneously being poisoned in certain places over a wide area and they are exposed to very high doses of organophosphate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He added: \u201cSpaza shop owners won\u2019t poison their customers. The concern here is that there are outside forces involved. People argue that most spaza shop owners are foreigners and people do not want foreigners to trade. They poison their stock, children get poisoned and their shops close. That might be an underlying explanation. It is unlikely that the doses that the children are exposed to, and the number of deaths is purely accidental. This is not a medical food-borne outbreak. Somebody is deliberately contaminating food that is sold at spaza shops to discredit spaza shops to get them to close. Police need to investigate this.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Pull the other one<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Is Van Vuuren\u2019s story more farfetched than the president\u2019s claim that these incidents were just accidental and weren\u2019t targeted at foreign-owned spaza shops?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People have been selling and using dodgy pesticides forever. All you need to do is ask around, and you\u2019ll soon get your hands on a bunch of nasty poisons like terbufos or aldicarb (colloquially known as \u201cTwo Step\u201d, for the number of steps a poisoned animal supposedly takes after consuming it). Although it is illegal to sell these poisons to consumers, and they are not registered for domestic use, they are routinely used for the control of pest animals. Burglars also use them to poison dogs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And yet despite widespread availability for decades, we are to believe that spaza shops only started mishandling these substances a few months ago?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pull the other one. I don\u2019t believe it. The targeted poisoning theory is almost certainly correct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Bureaucratic mess<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The government\u2019s reponse, absurdly, involves requiring all spaza shops to register with their municipalities in less than a month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Although the deadline is today, the registration campaign is an entirely predictable (and predicted) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sowetanlive.co.za\/news\/2024-12-06-spaza-owners-say-deadline-too-tight\/\">bureaucratic mess<\/a>. Last week, it was reported that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ewn.co.za\/2024\/12\/07\/over-51-000-spaza-shops-registered-in-sa-so-far\">51,000 spaza shops had been registered<\/a> so far, but there are hundreds of thousands of spaza shops, tuck shops and general dealers in the country. (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesslive.co.za\/bt\/business-and-economy\/2024-12-08-tiger-brands-eyes-growth-through-spaza-shops\/\">Tiger Brands alone<\/a> deals with 91,000, and plans to add 150,000 more to its network.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Department of Small Business Development will helpfully deploy a national online registration platform by January 2025, a month after the registration deadline. Nobody appears to have noticed the problem with this arrangement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An organisation representing foreign shop owners has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msn.com\/en-za\/news\/other\/extend-deadline-by-six-months-foreign-spaza-shop-owners-plead-with-ramaphosa-for-more-time\/ar-AA1vwNJ5\">begged the government<\/a> for a six-month extension of the deadline, which seems entirely reasonable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Illegal immigrants<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While legal immigrants in possession of a business visa, an asylum seeker certificate or a refugee certificate would be permitted to register their shops and maintain a business licence, that does not apply to foreigners on work, student or tourist visas, or to business owners who employ illegal immigrants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That said, it would be fairly trivial for an illegal immigrant to set up a fronting arrangement with a South African citizen to bypass all this bureaucratic nonsense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ramaphosa has directed a wide range of inspectors, including police officers, military health services members, environmental health inspectors, members of the National Consumer Commission, and labour inspectors to visit every one of the hundreds of thousands of shops to check that rules and standards are being met.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The only likely result of this inspection blitz is a temporary boost in employment numbers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ramaphosa might say it has nothing to do with foreigners, but every government action so far \u2013 and some of the statements of other members of cabinet, <a href=\"https:\/\/explain.co.za\/2024\/11\/13\/spaza-shop-food-poisonings-tragic-deaths-new-regulations-and-xenophobic-backlash\/\">like Gayton McKenzie<\/a> \u2013 made it clear that the main target is shops owned by foreigners. Deputy President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/politics\/2024-12-06-listen--dont-register-shops-for-illegal-foreigners-cautions-mashatile-as-deadline-looms\/\">Paul Mashatile has said<\/a> that government wants South Africans to own most shops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is also not the first time that the government has acted to <a href=\"https:\/\/groundup.org.za\/article\/police-shut-down-immigrant-owned-shops\/\">arbitrarily close shops<\/a> operated by foreigners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Why? If South Africans were better at running these shops than foreigners, they would already be running them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anti-immigrant groups like Operation Dudula and Put South Africans First have also been vocal on the matter, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yahoo.com\/news\/photos-show-lesotho-minimarket-owner-145638406.html\">have been implicated<\/a> in spreading fake news about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Rising prices<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While foreign nationals who own township shops have <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msn.com\/en-za\/news\/other\/foreign-nationals-owning-shops-weigh-in-on-the-food-poisoning-deaths\/ar-AA1vcbtJ\">spoken out on the apparent poisoning campaign<\/a>, over 1,000 shops have already been closed nationwide, at last count.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All the closures will reduce competition in the market. All the red tape will raise costs. I can\u2019t imagine this ending without violence and vigilante action against more foreign-owned shops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The inevitable outcome will be less choice and higher prices for the consumer segment that can least afford food inflation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If the targeted-poisoning theory is true, and I believe it is, then the true villains in this story will get away with their deadly crimes. Not only does the government appear to be too spineless to tackle them, preferring to pander to the rising tide of xenophobia, but by acting against the victims, they have given the real criminals exactly what they wanted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We are not led.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image: Legal immigrant Hadidja Mgoqi stands in front of her Kraaifontein shop, which was arbitrarily closed by the SA Police Service in 2018, without a court order, ostensibly because unnamed \u201ccommunity leaders\u201d objected that it was too close to a rival shop. Photograph: Vincent Lali, GroundUp, used under CC BY-ND 4.0 licence]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Food at spaza shops is likely being poisoned. President Cyril Ramaphosa\u2019s response is exactly what would-be poisoners would have wanted. Today is the deadline for<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":48374,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[96],"class_list":["post-48373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Government took the foreign-owned spaza shop bait - Daily Friend<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/13\/government-took-the-foreign-owned-spaza-shop-bait\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Government took the foreign-owned spaza shop bait - Daily Friend\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Food at spaza shops is likely being poisoned. President Cyril Ramaphosa\u2019s response is exactly what would-be poisoners would have wanted. 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Western civilisation \u201cback\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>With so much emphasis on the profound insights of local transgender activist Max du Preez (\u201cbigot\u201d) toward the end of last week, you may have missed something that happened in Paris on Saturday night: Notre Dame reopened.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This wouldn\u2019t have been to du Preez\u2019s taste \u2013 too many white men you see, and not enough London English, blue-haired, power hirsute, pro-Palestine ethical bitches bossing the proceedings, or even ushering folk to their chairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it did appeal to many tastes, and to these and their extensions the return of this magnificent cathedral, restored using traditional, rare stonemasonry and carpentry at a cost of around $900m suggested that, finally, Western civilisation was back. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You hear that a lot lately. \u201cBack\u201d presupposes that Western civilisation was on holiday, or convalescing from some dreadful infirmity, but unfortunately, it is gone, extirpated, murdered by the people who were charged with its safeguarding \u2013 some of whom were Emmanuel Macron\u2019s guests for the event. With the exception of the US President-elect, the Saturday gathering included notorious EU climate scammers, lockdown trots, and the forever war faithful: to the best of my knowledge, none of those activities are included on Notre Dame\u2019s famed Rose Windows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These foolish claims only had a few days to delude before two immediately isolated, but upon closer inspection inexorably linked, events evidenced that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Murder<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The first involved the murder of a US healthcare executive. Brian Thompson was attending a conference in New York when an assassin casually walked up behind him and started firing. Thompson died in hospital and America\u2019s most urgent manhunt in recent memory was launched.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But people following the case\u2019s announcements started noticing something else: in unfolding corners of the internet, there appeared to be unbridled joy at the executive\u2019s murder. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Soon that joy had a face \u2013 that belonging to one of America\u2019s worst writers, Taylor Lorenz, whose commitment to quasi Joker-ism as an acceptable form of government was well documented before this occasion. She was thrilled at the relatively young man\u2019s death and was determined to substantiate it by claiming that \u201chis industry killed hundreds and thousands of Americans every year by affording them access to healthcare\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Fears that the killer would be this generation\u2019s DB Cooper were struck down on Monday when suspect Luigi Mangione \u2013 a young American of Italian lineage \u2013 was arrested in Pennsylvania on Monday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The second incident involved a young woman from the United Kingdom called Lily Phillips. After some apparent consideration, Ms. Phillips, ordinarily a webcam performer, decided to attempt the world record of having sex with 100 men in one day. When she had done what she did, she became \u2013 for some inexplicable reason \u2013 sad, and complained that all she\u2019d had to eat during the attempt was a Yam Yam and a sandwich.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This deprivation troubled her more than the possibility she might have caught the clap or worse (during an interview after the performance, she asked: \u201cIs that how you get Aids?\u201d).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Impossibly daft<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s easy to be enthused or disgusted by Lorenz\u2019s commentary. She\u2019s impossibly daft, and very much aligned \u2013 most of the time unwittingly \u2013 to destructive societal changes which have denied young male Americans like Mangione much more than just necessary healthcare authorisation codes. The West has deliberately weakened these people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Their own cultures have betrayed them, thrown them to the wolves by projecting them as potential college frat rapists, smeared them as boasting racial privilege and therefore they must live in perpetual surrender and atonement. Simultaneously, it has transferred heightened recognition onto people like Ms. Philips, who is feted for her expression of sexual congress. Such imbalance is proof enough that Western civilisation no longer exists, and its impostor is some kind of a socially engineered grievance algorithm with a Zendesk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Young men in Mangione\u2019s profile can\u2019t find jobs in the US or in the UK. They can\u2019t get on the property ladder. They are the last in line for subsidy, but the first in the event there\u2019s a restructuring, or mass culling of personnel. At university their heads are filled with expensive rubbish \u2013 like how good Obamacare is \u2013 and they spend much of their adulthood trying to pay off student loans while learning to accommodate the 75% spike in health costs the supposedly brilliant Obamacare welcomed in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Unless they agree to believe in the worst they\u2019re told about themselves, their prospects are limited to them excelling at things like addition. So, if one were to caution the correct response, it would probably be that if cheering death is awful, then feigning surprise is wildly dumb. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Notre Dame<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The re-opening of Notre Dame occurred in the same city that only months ago featured a wretched, mechanical pale horse galloping on its river, and a gluttonous if transgender-visible interpretation of the Last Supper \u2013 why the organisers didn\u2019t just go full Mandingo and get Ms. Lily Phillips from the United Kingdom to perform an act featuring the South Sudan weightlifting team on the grounds of Versailles, I cannot tell you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perhaps they thought it would be too vanilla, perhaps they\u2019d like a few more years for their countrymen to digest what happened in 2020, when the teacher Samuel Paty was decapitated by an extremist, and what it really meant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, all this supposed paragon of Western civilisation could say was \u201cne regarde pas en arri\u00e8re avec col\u00e8re\u201d, or \u201cdon\u2019t look back in anger\u201d \u2212 a response they aped from their cuckolded fellow travellers, the UK. Whatever was is no longer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image: <\/em><em><a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/users\/edmondlafoto-7913128\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=6661150\">edmondlafoto<\/a> from <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=6661150\">Pixabay<\/a><\/em><em>]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With so much emphasis on the profound insights of local transgender activist Max du Preez (\u201cbigot\u201d) toward the end of last week, you may have<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":48372,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[305],"class_list":["post-48371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Is Western civilisation \u201cback\u201d? 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In South Africa, he wrote a weekly column for Business Day, then later Biznews.com. 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The recommendations based on this study were passed by the council on the same day, 5 December, that the SLP was signed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said: \u201cThis is a big step towards improving the quality and reliability of the service through a legally binding agreement, and I am very pleased that we managed to get this finalised this year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He added: \u201cTaking charge of Metrorail is especially important for lower-income households, who would save an estimated R932m a year if trains were working as they should.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to GroundUp, rail activist organisation UniteBehind said that while the SLP \u201cmarks progress\u201d, it fell short of what was needed for PRASA to fully meet its constitutional and statutory obligations to commuters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cDespite PRASA having had over a year to finalise it, the plan lacks enforceable commitments, timelines or measures that would enable it to function as a road map for improving commuter rail services,\u201d said UniteBehind executive director Zukie Vuka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image: PRASA, <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=137760669\">https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=137760669<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After court action, threats of an intergovernmental dispute and more than a year of negotiations, the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (PRASA) has finally signed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":48370,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"coauthors":[94],"class_list":["post-48369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - 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Offensive or repugnant expression must be unambiguously tolerated. But \u201cfree speech absolutism\u201d is a peculiar, and new, phenomenon that neither the common law nor the contextually understood principles of liberalism endorse.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Michael Morris and I sparred intellectually last year around the question of the limits around free expression. I <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2023\/08\/10\/flags-and-threats-a-liberal-rumination-on-the-limits-of-free-expression\/\">would<\/a> recommend <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2023\/08\/16\/mistaking-the-malema-risk-a-reply-to-martin-van-staden\/\">reading<\/a> that <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2023\/09\/07\/julius-malemas-threats-of-force-and-the-liberal-orders-rules-of-the-game\/\">series<\/a> of <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2023\/10\/02\/to-see-liberty-thrive\/\">articles<\/a>, some of the ideas of which appear here again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Hitler-as-victim<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I recently attended a three-day gathering of classical liberals and libertarians in Midrand. Two of the first lectures at this conference concerned some of the \u201cbasics\u201d of liberty. The first addressed the question of harm and consent, and the second the question of free speech.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The second speaker \u2013 whom I shall not name because I am forced to repeat their arguments in summary form and do not wish to misrepresent them \u2013 ably defended their own preference for free speech absolutism. What they had to say comes down, in my view, to the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Individuals have agency. They might receive inputs, like speech or marketing by others, but they must and do ultimately decide for themselves whether to turn those inputs into action. Those who speak or market to these individuals, no matter how repugnant they might be, are not responsible for what the latter decide to do with the information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In other words, if Person A tells Person B to kill Person C, Person A has simply exercised their freedom to express themselves and are not liable in any way for what Person B decides to do with the instruction. Person B can ignore Person A. The ball is entirely in Person B\u2019s court, because Person A has not acted violently (the key liberal trigger for legal sanction) towards anyone. If Person B does decide to try to, and perhaps succeed in, killing Person C, the latter or their families may only hold Person B liable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The first speaker eagerly endorsed the second speaker\u2019s approach, and there is much validity in this conceptualisation. It is coherent and, on its face, satisfies liberal principle. It is however never a view that I have shared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During the question-and-answer session, I posed the following hypothetical scenario to the speaker:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Imagine that there is an amateur painter from Austria with dreams of world domination. The painter, through power of charisma and populist appeal, rises to high government office. There, sitting behind a desk and never having conducted themselves violently towards anyone, they instruct subordinates to invade and conquer neighbouring countries and exterminate a notable portion of the civilian population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The painter never participates directly in these violent scenarios \u2013 only expresses themselves around the planning and implementation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Suppose, then, that the painter is after some time apprehended and arrested, or even killed, by those who oppose his expressions. In this scenario, would the apprehenders or neutralisers be guilty of violating the liberty of the amateur painter-turned-head of government?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To his credit, the speaker was able to bite the bullet and answer that yes, in fact, those sent to arrest or kill the amateur painter would be guilty of depriving the painter of their liberty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am not prepared to accept a socio-legal paradigm where it is those who hypothetically arrest or kill Adolf Hitler that are the guilty parties, with Hitler merely being a victim <a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2023\/04\/06\/cancel-cancel-culture-not-so-fast\/\">who was cancelled<\/a> for his \u201coffensive speech.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Such a paradigm is so basically repugnant to every human sensibility and only justifiable in the extreme reaches of abstraction where the mind of no normal person ever reaches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It should be obvious to everyone, and is obvious to most, that if anyone bore primary responsibility for the Holocaust and Nazi imperialism in Europe, it was Hitler and his top echelons of leadership, not the millions of German soldiers, sailors, and airmen who were following instructions. The latter were guilty of many crimes to be sure, but this all occurred downstream from Hitler and others\u2019 decision-making.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Schemes of action<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Expression cannot always be severed from action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me<\/em> is a very important lesson to continue to teach children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it is unwise, and simply false, to pretend that the principle is not complicated when Person A says, \u201cI am going to take these sticks and stones to break your bones!\u201d or tells Person B to \u201ctake these sticks and stones and break Person C\u2019s bones!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Something else, beyond mere speech, is going on here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Person A is not merely expressing themselves. They are threatening or inciting violence against Person C. This turns their \u201cmere speech\u201d into a part of a scheme of action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is a bewildering proposition to tell Person C that they must wait until their bones have already been broken before they make take reciprocal steps against Persons A and B. This is a wild proposal to put to Person C, let alone to society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Person C, upon learning of Person A\u2019s design, must be (and in my view, is) allowed to take the directly or indirectly violent steps necessary to neutralise Person A and B. Certainly if Person C has <em>already<\/em> caused violent harm through threats or instruction, they are arrestable or even killable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The common law recognises this principle, even if modern law is reluctant to see it through in light of political sensitivities. But while the law recognises that \u201cthe threat itself is the crime,\u201d the proviso that the reasonable person must regard the threat as <em>sincere<\/em> is important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Liberal principle also recognises the unworkability of free speech absolutism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Liberalism emphasises the importance of defensive force. People are and must be allowed to defend themselves, their loved ones, and their property, from violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This we all seem to accept. But what does this mean?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, if we are to take the position of free speech absolutism on its face, no person may take any defensive action until the tangible, direct violent harm from their attacker has already manifested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is only <em>after <\/em>they have begun shooting at you that one may shoot back. (Even if their first shot killed you\u2026)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is only <em>after <\/em>the punch has landed on your nose that one may shove the assailant back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It is only <em>after <\/em>the intercontinental ballistic missile has vaporised a city that the launch platform of the missile may be targeted and destroyed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Before the shooting starts, before the punch lands, and before the missile hits, only ideas, propositions, and intentions have become manifest, but harm has not yet resulted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is not how liberalism\u2019s political theory reacts to schemes of action involving violence, because it does not satisfy liberalism\u2019s key demand of <em>actually<\/em> protecting liberty and property. If one must wait for one\u2019s liberty or property to have already suffered violent harm \u2013 perhaps fatally \u2013 before one may respond, one does not truly have a right to defend oneself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Threats and aggression<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of course, \u201charm\u201d is not the standard of measurement here. Violence (aggression, coercion) and the threat thereof are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Every day people say and do things with harmful consequences. A medical aid might deny a claim for healthcare coverage. A foreign spaza shop owner might outcompete their native peers. A gossip magazine might ruin the reputation of a prominent person. One might even yell \u201cFire!\u201d in a crowded theatre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are all examples of \u201charm\u201d \u2013 and harm is a perfectly natural, normal component of social life. I shudder at the thought of how a society would look if harm were to be completely eliminated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But not one of these are examples of violence, or violent harm. Violent harm occurs when the liberty or property of another is non-consensually violated. Consent is key, which is why being fired from a job or having a medical aid claim denied cannot amount to \u201cviolence\u201d as many on the left might claim it is, nor can yelling \u201cFire!\u201d in a theatre whose owners allow such theatrics be regarded as violent. <em>Volenti non fit iniuria<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And a sincere threat against the liberty or property of another ought to be \u2013 is, I submit \u2013 a <em>mala in se<\/em> (something criminal by its very nature), because it forms part of a scheme of action. Whether this scheme works out or not is perhaps a mitigating or aggravating factor at trial, but cannot extinguish the impermissibility of the threat <em>per se<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Liberty is always under threat, whether by amateur painters from Austria or by red beret-wearing Teletubbies from South Africa. We should start taking it seriously enough to defend it even from those who \u201cmerely\u201d threaten it. This is not a \u201cliberty\u201d (what a perverse thought!) that they have nor one we should recognise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[Image: <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/users\/jarmoluk-143740\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=2775447\">Michal Jarmoluk<\/a> from <a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=2775447\">Pixabay<\/a>]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Free expression is an incredibly important part of the edifice of liberty. Offensive or repugnant expression must be unambiguously tolerated. But \u201cfree speech absolutism\u201d is<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":48368,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[115],"class_list":["post-48367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Hitler-as-victim and free speech absolutism - Daily Friend<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/12\/hitler-as-victim-and-free-speech-absolutism\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hitler-as-victim and free speech absolutism - Daily Friend\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Free expression is an incredibly important part of the edifice of liberty. Offensive or repugnant expression must be unambiguously tolerated. 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Martin also serves as the Editor of the IRR\u2019s History Project and its Race Law Project, and is an advisor to the Free Speech Union SA. He is pursuing a doctorate in law at the University of Pretoria. For more information visit www.martinvanstaden.com.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.martinvanstaden.com"],"url":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/author\/martin\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48367"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=48367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}},{"id":48365,"date":"2024-12-12T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-12T02:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/?p=48365"},"modified":"2024-12-11T21:36:14","modified_gmt":"2024-12-11T19:36:14","slug":"defying-new-morality-laws-could-cost-iranian-women-their-lives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/2024\/12\/12\/defying-new-morality-laws-could-cost-iranian-women-their-lives\/","title":{"rendered":"Defying new morality laws could cost Iranian women their lives"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Execution, long jail terms and big fines for \u2018promoting\u2019 nudity, unveiling or improper dressing have come into force in Iran in terms of new laws intended to promote the \u201cculture of chastity and hijab\u201d, according to <em>The Guardian<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Women could face the death sentence or up to 15 years in prison if they defy the new compulsory morality laws due to come into effect this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In addition, Iranian authorities have announced their intention of setting up \u201chijab clinics\u201d to treat women defying the law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Article 37 of the new law also stipulates that those promoting or propagating indecency, unveiling or \u201cbad dressing\u201d to foreign entities, including international media and civil society organisations, could face a decade in prison and up to \u00a312,500 in fines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Those whose conduct is considered by the authorities to amount to \u201ccorruption on Earth\u201d could be sentenced to death under article 286 of Iran\u2019s Islamic penal code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The Guardian<\/em> reports that, according to Amnesty International, this legal provision in effect meant that women and girls sending videos of themselves unveiled to media outside Iran or \u201cotherwise engaging in peaceful activism\u201d may be sentenced to death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Iranian journalists, activists, clerics and human rights lawyers have expressed outrage over the law, which they say will legitimise the increasing restrictions on women in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Saeid Dehghan, a human rights lawyer at the Parsi Law Collective, is quoted as saying: \u201cNearly all provisions of this law contravene fundamental principles, such as article 9 of the Iranian constitution, which prohibits legislation that undermines citizens\u2019 freedoms even in the name of national sovereignty.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe [new] law stipulates lengthy prison sentences for those persistently opposing mandatory hijab and encouraging others to do the same. Citizens opposing mandatory hijab face punishments, such as long imprisonment or even execution, which are grossly disproportionate to their actions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The law came into place two years after nationwide protests rocked the country after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, jailed for not wearing her hijab correctly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Over the past two years, Iranian women have been publicly defying the strict dress code. Last month, videos of a young Iranian student stripping to her underwear, reportedly in protest at the strict dress code, went viral across social media. She was later taken to an undisclosed psychiatric hospital in the capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image: <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/@onetnya_?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash\">andri onet<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/photos\/woman-wearing-blue-hijab-scarf-oucFDKkHi4Y?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash\">Unsplash<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Execution, long jail terms and big fines for \u2018promoting\u2019 nudity, unveiling or improper dressing have come into force in Iran in terms of new laws<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":48366,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"coauthors":[94],"class_list":["post-48365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site 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– subduing\u00a0free\u00a0speech | TDF special\/FSU with Simon Lincoln Reader"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>In this Daily Friend Show Special Sara Gon interviews DF contributor and fund manager, Simon Lincoln Reader, about the bizarre and chilling clamping down on free speech in Britain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Britain - subduing\u00a0free\u00a0speech | TDF special\/FSU with Simon Lincoln Reader\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/JuWXQvEFCvc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@DailyFriendSA\"><\/a><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@DailyFriendSA\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this Daily Friend Show Special Sara Gon interviews DF contributor and fund manager, Simon Lincoln Reader, about the bizarre and chilling clamping down on<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":48364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"video","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[74],"tags":[],"coauthors":[97],"class_list":["post-48363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-video","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-podcasts","post_format-post-format-video"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Britain - subduing\u00a0free\u00a0speech | TDF special\/FSU with Simon Lincoln Reader - Daily Friend<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, 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coming showdown over racial quotas: To defy or comply"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>For the ANC, the key metric of how well the party is doing and the progress it is making towards its nirvana of the National Democratic Revolution is whether company ownership and employment patterns match the racial and gender breakdown of the country\u2019s population.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is no sign that the ANC is in the mood to compromise on this. The party is a lot more about distribution than growing the economic pie, and it is prepared to trade off economic growth for distribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But the ANC might have over-reached with the passage of the Employment Equity Amendment Act, signed by President Cyril Ramaphosa last year. The Act is due to be implemented in January next year. There is likely to be a showdown soon afterwards, when the Minister of Employment and Labour, Nomakhosazana Meth, comes up with the racial employment quotas she wants companies to implement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Act, when in force, will allow the Minister of Employment and Labour to decree racial and gender targets for each economic sector. Companies with more than 50 employees are covered by this law and will have to come up with plans to meet the new government targets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A failure to comply with the Act allows the state to impose ruinous fines, which could push some firms into bankruptcy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And non-compliant firms are barred from doing business with the State.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last week Sakeliga urged its more than 12,000 members to defy the new law, if they think this is in their best interests. \u201cBusinesses should prepare for maximum achievable non-cooperation with the irrational, harmful, and unconstitutional act for as long as it takes to have it scrapped or rendered practically impotent.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cSakeliga encourages business-people to remain firm and not make any changes to their employment policies for the sake of the Employment Equity Act.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sakeliga CEO Piet Le Roux said there was no need to immediately rush to comply with the Act, as the Minister has yet to state what employment targets will be implemented for each sector. When more is known about the ministerial requirements and racial quotas, Sakeliga will go to court to challenge the legislation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Watershed<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This must be a watershed. For the first time since 1994, a business body has stood up and urged defiance of legislation that is fundamentally against the interests of its members. In contrast with Sakeliga, big business in the country, which is close to the government and objects to little, has kept its silence about the Act. It tends to go along to get along and steer away from confrontation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another business association, the National Employers’ Association of South Africa (NEASA) which has 7000 small and medium-sized business members, shares Sakeliga\u2019s views that the Act is unconstitutional, but says non-compliance is far too risky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sakeliga points out in its statement that, \u201cthe (Employment and Labour) department and state in general lacks the capability and resources to police employers at the scale required.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Even if that is the case, NEASA\u2019s Chief Executive Gerhard Papenfus says that defiance might expose employers to unnecessary prosecution. NEASA\u2019s approach, \u201cat least for the time being,\u201d is to comply with the reporting requirements, \u201cbut to never deviate from the principle of appointing on merit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>NEASA says at some stage the new regulation will be challenged on a constitutional basis as it infringes on the basic right of businesses to conduct their business in a manner that they deem fit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When they report under the Act, NEASA says companies should give reasons why they cannot comply with the targets due to a host of reasons, including the rising financial pressures on payroll, skills shortages, and the heavy investment that would be required in training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That might force the ANC to see the big trade-off: more affirmative action in the workplace in exchange for less investment and the heightened risk of firms going out of business. There is the wider economic cost that many companies might ensure that they do not take on more staff and remain below the threshold for compliance with the Act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Loss of capacity<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The damage from the ANC\u2019s vision of employment equity has been amply demonstrated in the public sector. It has resulted in major loss of capacity as a result of \u201ccadre deployment\u201d, and today the state is increasingly dysfunctional. A ministerial insistence on hiring could easily drive companies into operational inefficiencies and bankruptcy. Frequent changes in racial quotas can only create further uncertainty and discourage investors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is the additional problem that the implementation of racial quotas would be illegal in the home countries of some foreign companies. That would be a real investment-killer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The most benign outcome might be that the Department of Employment and Labour imposes racial quotas but accepts reasons why a company cannot implement these and takes a soft approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last year the Department reached a deal with the trade union Solidarity on the implementation of the Act. Under a deal brokered by the International Labour Organisation, race cannot be used to determine who is hired, fired or promoted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Race also cannot be used as the sole consideration in employment equity plans. How the department will balance this with its plans has yet to be seen. Significantly, the ILO has also said that affirmative action can only be used as a temporary measure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ANC is very unlikely to back down on what it sees as central to its empowerment cause. It sees advances on this front as key to it upholding its ideology and defending itself from criticism from its left and more populist flank: the Economic Freedom Fighters and uMkhonto weSizwe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So a variety of groups will join Sakeliga and NEASA in resorting to lawfare through the courts. Anthea Jeffery, the Head of Policy Research at the Institute of Race Relations, who has written extensively about the legal aspects of employment equity and empowerment, says the Act is seriously flawed and inconsistent with various provisions of the Constitution, including the core value of \u201cnon-racialism.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Prohibits unfair discrimination<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She also points out that the equality clause in Section 9 of the Constitution, Section 9, prohibits unfair discrimination on racial grounds. And while a third clause calls for a public administration that is \u201cbroadly representative,\u201d it makes it clear that this cannot trump other needs such as the effective use of resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This provides a good basis for Constitutional Court challenges, but as is the case generally with the law, it can take a very long time for things to happen. One positive aspect of the Employment Equity Amendment Act is that it has galvanised a very motivated opposition to racial quotas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Perhaps merit can ultimately triumph over racial preferences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><em>Note:<\/em><\/strong><em> A number of the reports in the IRR\u2019s <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/irr.org.za\/reports\">Blueprint for Growth<\/a><em> series were used in writing this column. This includes the report on <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/irr.org.za\/reports\/the-irr-blueprint-for-growth\/the-irrs-blueprint-for-growth-breaking-the-bee-barrier-to-growth\">Breaking the BEE Barrier to Growth<\/a><em> by Dr Anthea Jeffery.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>[Image:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/users\/peggy_marco-1553824\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=1013594\">Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke<\/a>\u00a0from\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/pixabay.com\/?utm_source=link-attribution&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=image&utm_content=1013594\">Pixabay<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If you like what you have just read, <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/dailyfriend.co.za\/fund-us\/\">support<\/a><em> the Daily Friend<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For the ANC, the key metric of how well the party is doing and the progress it is making towards its nirvana of the National<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":48357,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"coauthors":[95],"class_list":["post-48356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinions"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.0 - 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