 Which path will we choose to peace and prosperity? THE April 1954 inaugural conference of the Federation of South African Women adopted the Women’s Charter, 14 months before the adoption of the Freedom Charter in June 1955. The Women’s Charter declared: "We do not form a society separate from men. There is only one society, and it is made up of both women and men. As women we share the problems and anxieties of our men, and join hands with them to remove social evils and obstacles to progress." To some, the reference to men as "our men" may seem strange given the reality of patriarchy then and now. To me, it appears that the authors of the Women’s Charter appreciated that the struggles against patriarchy and racial domination were inseparable. They also understood that women and men shared the common bond of humanity, on the basis of which men and women would engage in the struggle against patriarchy and white minority rule. The authors of the charter, more importantly, also said: "We shall teach the men that they cannot hope to liberate themselves from the evils of discrimination and prejudice as long as they fail to extend to women complete and unqualified equality in law and in practice." The delegates who gathered in Kliptown in 1955 must have drunk gallons of milk from these women’s fountains of wisdom before they adopted the Freedom Charter in which they declared: "S A belongs to all who live in it, black and white." For me, this is not just about a sense of common ownership. What is more important is that all South Africans, black and white, must also have a sense of belonging because, whether we like it or not, we have a common destiny. All of us must feel we belong here, not only in terms of legal formalities but also in substantive and emotional terms. But one of the things we must confront is the fact that we do not always feel we belong here. This is partly caused by the fact that, in our post-apartheid setting, we occupy three spaces. Before 1994, black and white people occupied the same apartheid-colonial space but did not have the same sense of belonging because of racial discrimination. In the post-apartheid space, blacks and whites have a partial sense of belonging for reasons that are too numerous to mention. For the purposes of this article, what matters are feelings of alienation born out of attempts to construct a non racial or post-racial space. The third space is sparsely populated because, contrary to our desires, reconciliation has yet to become the dominant reality in our post-apartheid democratic order. It is in this space that Judge Colin Lamont presented his judgment in the Afri Forum, TAU SA, Julius Malema and African National Congress (ANC) hate-speech matter. What Lamont had to consider was whether the struggle song, "Dubula iBhunu" – Shoot the Boer, is hate speech. In his judgment, Lamont said: "The message which the song conveys, namely destroy the regime and ‘shoot the Boer’, may have been acceptable while the enemy, the regime, remained the enemy of the singer. Pursuant to the agreements which established the modern South African nation and the laws … promulgated pursuant to those agreements, the enemy has become the friend, the brother. Members of society are enjoined to embrace all citizens as their brothers." Lamont then said: "It must never be forgotten that in the spirit of ubuntu, this new approach to each other must be fostered. Hence the Equality Act allows no justification on the basis of fairness for historic practices which are hurtful to the target group but loved by the other group. Such practices may not continue to be practised when it comes to hate speech." A few sentences later, Lamont avers that the song, Dubula iBhunu, is hate speech. There is very little that I do not have a problem with in this judgment. Before I continue, let me say up front that not all of us are the fools AfriForum assumes we are. The song is a red herring. The target of the hate-speech trial was not the song. It was ANC Youth League president Julius Malema. The hate-speech argument is beautiful wrapping paper for an ugly gift. It is because of this cynical abuse of the judiciary that the judgment will probably achieve the opposite of the reconciliation that Lamont and AfriForum claim they are seeking to promote. Because of my political background, my objectivity will probably come into question. But we must not stop there. We must question the objectivity of a judge who refers to "members of the ANC who were involved in violence, euphemistically referred to it as the struggle". First, there was nothing euphemistic about the evil of apartheid and the struggle as a response to it. Lamont betrays an attitude towards the struggle in general and the armed struggle in particular, which suggests that this is not a judge from whom we should have expected an impartial judgment. It is, therefore, not surprising that he invokes the principle of ubuntu opportunistically and selectively. In relation to the meaning of the song, there was room for the application of the principle in support of a conclusion opposite to the view that the song is hate speech. I call it a view because there is very little evidence that Lamont relied on all the evidence that was made available to him. This would have included an interpretation of the song that takes into account the fact that its meaning is constituted also by the fact that people have, on many occasions, sung the song without harbouring murderous thoughts. But it seems Lamont was persuaded that the song would create a climate for genocide. The cultural genocide that was perpetrated by colonialism and apartheid obviously matters very little to him. I say this because his seems to be a very narrow conception of what constitutes a minority. He forgets that what he calls a minority is, in fact, a numerical minority. This numerical minority — I am getting tired of repeating myself — is a cultural majority, and it is that majority’s worldview that is still the dominant cultural reality in post-apartheid SA. Given the catch-all definition of hate speech in the Equality Act, what I have just said is probably hate speech too. The judge says the version of the hate- inciting song that was recorded by Minister in the Presidency Collins Chabane sounds like a lullaby and is, therefore, not as threatening as Malema’s warlike chant. Here is free advice to the ANC: Comrades, get in touch with a philharmonic orchestra to make sure that, in future, struggle songs are sung like an adagio in a 19th-century European concerto. That said, we must not abandon the reconciliation project. There are two ways in which we can achieve this toenadering. First, it will be achieved when we stop singing songs that cause hurt to others. Second, it will be achieved when we create conditions for this to happen. While I do not believe that all versions of the song, Dubula iBhunu, constitute hate speech, it is clear that we must have a conversation with each other about which of the two routes I have suggested above will help us become a peaceful, non racial and prosperous society. Matshiqi is research fellow at the Helen Suzman Foundation. -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. 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