No+more+beer+or+crime+talk+at+braais,+Andrew+Donaldson,+S+Times

Sunday Times, Johannesburg, 11 March 2007
=No more beer or crime talk at braais=


 * Andrew Donaldson**//, Eish!//

A psychology professor at the University of the Free State, Dap Louw, has urged South Africans not to develop “Learned Helplessness Syndrome” — a condition characterised by powerlessness and incapability — in the fight against crime.

Neither, he adds, should we see ourselves as the “criminal skunk” of the world. Many other countries in transition are just as lousy as us, and they include Russia, Estonia, Cambodia and Poland.

Louw, a renowned criminologist, told a recent symposium on violent crimes: “A positive national self image should be promoted to combat the cynicism, distrust and depression that disempower South Africans to actively participate in fighting crime.

“We can do something about it instead of just talking about it around braais.”

Much of what Louw said we could do was hardly new: poverty alleviation and social upliftment should form part of crime-prevention strategies; victims of crime should be empowered; communities need to be more involved in anti-crime programmes; and so on.

But what was startling was Louw’s suggestion that we stop drinking. He believes that the role of alcohol in crime continues to be under- reported, despite the fact that some 60% of all crime is already attributed to alcohol.

Which begs the question, if we can’t drink beer and bitch about crime around the braai, what can we do there?

Sing //De la Rey//, of course. And here the madness continues. Some of my friends think I need help in understanding the deep significance of Bok van Blerk’s drinking song and subject me to emotional and heartfelt lectures about exactly what it means to be an Afrikaner nowadays. These are terrifying experiences, full of ranting and screaming.

As I wipe the spittle from my face, I pretend to be intensely interested in their comments, none of which are suitable for reprint here, but instead I’m planning my escape route — for this is the sort of rhetoric one hears before they bring out the tar and feathers.

Thank heavens then for nine-year-old Son-Isha, the little singing sensation who has hopped so adroitly onto the Boer bandwagon with her own drinking song, //De la Rey Moet ’n Meisie Kry// — which, when you think about it, is excellent advice for the old general (in a make-love-not- war kind of way).

Son-Isha has landed herself in hot water for singing in the Cenotaph Hall at the Voortrekker Monument, while wearing traditional Zulu clothing. This has so enraged the archly conservative Radio Pretoria that it has banned her.

Her manager-mom can complain until she’s blue in the face that the station’s behaviour is ridiculous and that her daughter “is just a little girl doing what she loves for the country”, but I welcome this controversy for it momentarily diverts the mob’s attention from my impetuous outbursts, and I can continue with my plans to flee to the frozen wastes of Canada disguised as an elk.

The 94.7 Highveld DJ, Julio Garcia, has also helped in this regard. He has been reported to the Broadcasting Complaints Commission for a parody song suggesting that De la Rey fought for the other side. It included the lines, //“De la Rey, De la Rey, sal jy die Boere kom vry/Want jy is gay, De la Rey?”//

Which, roughly translated, may well go to the heart of Son-Isha’s concerns.

It also boosts suspicions that it was more the simple rhyming consideration behind the choice of General De la Rey as the subject of a song than anything else.

Garcia has since apologised for his misunderstanding of the Afrikaner. However, I doubt that this is enough.


 * From: http://www.sundaytimes.co.za/article.aspx?ID=408470**

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