Anti-Integration/Pro-Segragation Video from The University of the Free State, South Africa

I can barely concentrate enough to write about this video. I’m so angry that things like this still go on in our world. It’s disgusting. As much as the University of the Free State and the individuals belonging to the Reitz hostel try to downplay this, it has become impossible not to garner unwanted media attention. Especially with YouTube and Facebook, blogs across the world, good luck.

At the University in the Free State, young [white] men from the Reitz residence made a video “initiating” the black cleaners coming to work at their hostel. I learned about the situation in an article in the Toronto Star. (A link is posted below.) The video really speaks for itself, though it’s in the South African (Afrikaans) language. A picture is worth a thousand words. It has made its way across the internet, of course. (The YouTube link is posted below.)

In this “information age” something like this can’t be kept quiet. Thank goodness! It is more than necessary that we know what is happening. I know what racism feels like. I know what it’s like to be thought of as less than everyone else around you because of how you were born, something you have no control over. I know what it’s like, even though you have all kinds of schooling, diverse friends and a wonderful family, to be thought that your opinion doesn’t matter; that you don’t matter and nothing you can say will make a difference.

I usually don’t like to talk about these things. They hurt me. But I feel as though it’s more than an obligation, it is my moral duty to help these voices be heard. I believe that we are all equal, that skin colour doesn’t play a part in the person you can be. But I also know that this belief isn’t held by everyone. That you can be denied a job because you aren’t white or Christian. That, as shown in the video, you can be made to drink urine and forced to participate in a video that is a protest against integration.

No matter what these people do, segregation won’t last forever. Slowly, the whole world will be made to see that every person, no matter their colour on the outside, is the same within. The global fight may not be won in my generation, but as saddened as I am to see videos like this, it is fortunate that it affects so many people, of all races, in such a strong way.

My blood is as red as yours.


You Tube Linkhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8N-h8anSuE

Toronto Star Articlehttp://www.thestar.com/article/345955

You Tube Posted Response to the Videohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNjJpxWaseE

University of the Free State Websitehttp://www.uovs.ac.za/

An Italian Straw Hat

An Italian Straw Hat is a ballet (yes, a ballet) running at the Four Seasons in Toronto. It was the funniest ballet I’ve ever seen. If you want to try out ballet and you’re not sure about it, go see An Italian Straw Hat. The characters are interesting and hilarious. The music is beautiful and energetic. There are love triangles and all kinds of suggestive positioning. It opens with a woman sitting on a man’s face!! I’d love to see it again.