Sunday, 26 January 1987: My Dry White Season

University of Botswana Environmental Science computer room.

For the past few days I’ve been reading a book by South African novelist, Andre Brink, titled A Dry White Season.  It’s the story of Ben Du Toit, a 50ish Afrikaner and secondary school history and geography teacher in a Johannesburg suburb who is married with three kids.  As the back cover of the book explains, “Ben Du Toit is an ordinary, decent, harmless man, unremarkable in every way – until his sense of justice is outraged by the death of a man he has known.”  Ben’s friend, Gordon, is black and a janitor at the school.  Ben is helping Gordon’s oldest son, Jonathan, pay for his education until the young man becomes radicalized during the Soweto uprising of 1976.  Jonathan is detained by the police and eventually dies in custody.  Gordon starts conducting his own investigation of the circumstances surrounding his son’s death.  Then he too is taken by the police and eventually dies, supposedly a suicide.  Ben feels that a judicial inquest will uncover what appears to be impropriety by the police but it doesn’t.  So he begins to question his entire life and his values and turns on the system.  I’m only half-way through the book and anxious to learn how it turns out.

Published in 1978, A Dry White Season, by South African author André Brink, was shortlisted for that year’s Booker Prize.

It’s easy for me to identify with Ben’s outrage.  Having been around so many “uninvolved” white people in South Africa, I recognize the callous obliviousness of Ben’s family and friends.  Anyone who lives in South Africa eventually has to choose sides or, in most cases, remain aloof.  To do the latter is essentially choosing sides by default because, as Eldridge Cleaver supposedly said, “There is no more neutrality in the world. You either have to be part of the solution, or you're going to be part of the problem.” 

Even a foreigner who has been involved in South Africa as much as I have finds it difficult not to take sides.  Foreign news people claim to remain objective, but whom are they kidding?   A brief conversation with an ABC cameraman in Cape Town last month certainly brought that home to me. 

I suppose I could eventually publish something admitting my biases, and feel that what I had to say might make a difference to the outcome of the South African struggle in some small way.  But I don’t feel that what I have to add will make an iota of difference to the outcome.  Of course, I can continue to be an observer, a witness to history as I’ve sometimes said.  I suppose that would be a reasonable course to take, although I find it damn frustrating and emotionally exhausting to maintain that position.  And while my heart may be with the forces for peaceful change, I feel those forces may, in the end, be irrelevant.  As for the forces for violent rebellion, my heart (though not necessarily my reasonable mind) may be with them too, but I am simply unwilling to give my life for their cause.  As a citizen of the world, their cause is mine, but as a stranger in a strange society that is not mine, I choose not to intentionally put my life and freedom in jeopardy. 

Sometimes when I’m feeling critical about South African whites who are playing it safe, I wind up thinking about my own countrymen.  Would they handle the situation any better if they were the ones in the hot seat?  South African whites are often accused of clinging to power and exploiting non-whites in order to maintain their privileged lifestyle.  Is that any different from what the American middle and upper classes are doing vis-à-vis the rest of the world?  I see the problem as one of attitude.  Just as Ben’s wife tells him to forget Gordon because there is nothing he can do, Americans routinely forget about the rest of the world for the same reason, or so they say.  I think they basically don’t give a shit because they are too wrapped up in their own pursuit of creature comforts and materialism.  Yes, I know.  I’m just a counterculture hippie who never grew up.  Jerry Rubin and Rennie Davis put on three piece suits and drove BMWs, so what’s wrong with me?

Did Jerry Rubin sell out or simply become a realist?

 

I’ve been disgusted with the values of my society for a long time.  My experiences in South Africa along with working and living in Botswana have made me even more so.  I see so much of white middle class Americans when I look at white middle class South Africans that it’s frightening.  And I’ve learned how easy it is to live a rewarding life without a lot of material stuff here in Botswana and not feel wanting.  Hell, I have my ice cubes, my cold Castle Lagers, my electric fan, good ethnic food options, great books to read, and my jazz cassette tapes.  What more do I need?  Sure, I blow money on travel and photography, but I suppose it’s all relative.  The point is that I can earn enough money teaching here and doing something that may make a contribution to the developing world without feeling I am sacrificing material happiness. 

About 20 years ago, my generations was really hard on our parents’ generation for their crass materialism.  In a way, though, I can understand the feelings of the older generation.  My father was a teenager during the Great Depression and sometimes went to bed hungry.  He often didn’t even have a nickel to get home on the Boston subway.  He was accepted to Boston College but didn’t have the money to attend.  So, should I fault him now because he enjoys driving his Cadillac? 

No, it’s my generation that makes me sick.  Most of us were never hungry.  Mother always drove us everywhere.  If our parents couldn’t afford to pay for our college, scholarships, loans or (in my case) good summer jobs generally covered it.  But now look at us – Yuppies!  Oh yes, we don’t call it materialism; it’s good taste.  It’s required by our position in life and other assorted nonsense.  Or, we have to earn big bucks in order to give our kids every opportunity.

It really bothers me to have to admit that some of my friends back in America fall into this category.  How can I identify with them anymore?  What do we now have in common except the past?  I’ve been writing to them all these months and now I think that it’s better that I don’t share this with them if I care about keeping their friendships.

Right now I don’t feel like I even want to go back to Denver at the end of the school year.  I don’t want to have to deal with being nice to friends when I feel so much anger and alienation toward American society.  What can I say to them except provide them with vicarious experiences that they probably can’t appreciate not having been here?  I know I must have changed during the past 10 months.  Shit, maybe I think too much!