Cry, the bleeding nation!!!

There is something lopsided occurring at the very foundation of Africa. The roots are reeking of immorality that will surely spread to the veins of this giant tree and then this tree will collapse. Or will it?

In 1948, Allan Paton penned a book that spoke of the treacherous and gruesome nature of Apartheid. This system so ensnared the African that he was made prisoner in the land of his birth to this day.

It dehumanised the native physically, mentally and most significantly, morally. To the extent that, visiting pain and torment on the weaker sex has become a matter of course in this part of earth that was baptised the rainbow nation.

Just last week, the world sat up to the news that a question in the national leavers' drama exam asked students to direct a rape scene. They were asked to describe how they would get an actor to maximise the horror of the rape of a baby, using a broomstick and a loaf of bread as props.

That the Department of basic Education facilitated a system that permitted that particular mandatory question to see the light of day is in itself a pregnant statement. It gives birth to very alarming statistics

Over 60,000 people are raped in South Africa every year; 1 in 4 men admit to having raped; South Africa has the highest incidence of rape in the world; in most instances, the rapist and the victim are known to each other; rape occurs in mainly poor communities that are dotted all over this nation.

There is a large body of work on the subject of rape. Almost all of it speaks of rape as a weapon of war; a weapon used to subjugate a people; a weapon used to demoralise and dehumanise men; a weapon used to spit in the face of all that is right. A weapon so fierce that it silently wreaks the very fabric of any society.

The last time I checked, South Africa was at peace, or so it seems.

Poverty, in the land of gold, has brought forth a society that fears its own shadows. The gated communities serve to wall in the rich from cardboard homes that encircle them. 

These cardboard homes are the breeding ground for violent, hungry and angry boys and men who are preying on the week and defenceless. Their favourite weapon of choice is rape.

The temptation is to blame poverty or their history that is steeped in mindless violence or the continental gap between the rich and the poor or peer pressure or some twisted notion of a rite of passage.

There is something inherently wrong in a society where every minute of every day is a witness to someone, somewhere being raped: where a nine month old child is raped by her mother's boyfriend: where a 17 year old girl is raped and disemboweled: where two and three year old girls are plucked from the security of their doorsteps, raped, murdered and dumped in a public toilet. There is something wrong.

The truth of the matter lies in the words of James Allen:  Circumstances do not make the man, they reveal him. Take any of those men and boys and land them in Delhi  Saudi Arabia, New York, Kampala or even on the moon; once the opportunity presents itself, these men will let lose that which is ingrained in them and that part of the world will bear witness to the most horrendous form of rape known to man.

To paraphrase that lawyer in the book made famous by Allan Paton, all that is wrong must be placed at the soul steps of all those men and boys.

Until that time when the perpetrators of this violence sit down, reflect and rein in the devil in their veins, the rainbow nation will continue to bleed.

Allan Paton titled his book, Cry, the beloved country. From that place where we are all destined, he must be holding his head in shame as he pens his next book, Cry, the bleeding nation!!!