Diary: Republicans: Building a Culture Apartheid State

I have a good friend, a musician. He spent three months touring in Apartheid South Africa in the late 1970's. He was very conflicted about working in South Africa during that time. Was his going to play music there a tacit acceptance of the Regime? He thought so, however he also thought that by going and performing his own small acts of protest, he could do something positive. He went and it turned out to be a good decision for him personally -- was it a wise choice for the main act and the promoters, probably not.

He met many amazing black South Africans, from musicians to maids. He would not let them call him "Master" or "Boss" and he insisted on calling them by their first names and they his. Along with handshakes and hugs -- these were his acts of protest.

I bring this up because he and I spoke yesterday and he is starting to see similarities between the spirit of South African Apartheid and the spirit of Republican actions and ideology -- they are practicing Cultural Apartheid.

Apartheid is an Afrikaans word that means apart-hood. Apartheid was an official system of forced and rabidly enforced racial segregation in South Africa from 1948 to 1994. The foundation of this system was racism and fear of the native, predominate culture. Not only were Black South Africans discriminated against, South Africans of Indian decent and other "non-whites" were collaterally affected.

That the present Republican oeuvre has racist underpinnings is no longer an academic or debatable topic. However, race is just one of the many issues that Republicans are basing their Apartheid on. They strive for apart-hood on many cultural issues that the "natives" (probably you and me) agree are either socially settled or should remain personal and private. As a result of this a majority of this country have become "Black" in their eyes.

We are the "Kaffirs" of Republican Cultural Apartheid.

We Women.

We Non-Christians.

We Disabled.

We Downtrodden.

We Homeless.

We Un-Insured.

We Artists.

We Students.

We Gay and Lesbian.

We Hispanics.

We Veterans.