–– Tim Cantrell

The audio version of this article is available here: YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

Recently, one astute analyst of South African news went beyond the usual reporting to identify competing ideologies.  Since our national crime and violence have been recently exposed on a global stage, what’s at the root of such ugly fruits? 

Turns out that a 1961 book still exerts an enormous influence on the Ramaphosas and Malemas of our day (just as it did on the Gaddafis, Mugabes and many other tyrants), a kind of Marxist ‘Bible’ for many – entitled, The Wretched of the Earth, by French psychiatrist, Frantz Fanon.  

Thanks to Fanon’s influence, hate and crime (or utterly failed policies like BEE or Eskom) can be justified as long as they are done in the name of liberation.  Instead of believing that mankind is universally evil and needing to be civilised, we’re told man is basically good but oppressed, so Western civilisation must be deconstructed and rebuilt by the liberators.