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I think Affirmative Action serves a noble purpose when a nation is trying to heal great inequality. It helps to more quickly integrate people and create a more fair distribution of wealth. Such measures have been used with positive results in South Africa as well as in the US following segregation. There does come a time, though, when a nation would do well to eliminate the measure, after it has done its job. After a long period of time, such legalities only serve to highlight and reinforce the differences they were trying to heal. There is still great inequality within South Africa. Although there are people from all backgrounds doing menial jobs and those with power positions, they are not yet truly equal with regards to access. The violence and insecurity that persists there speaks to the fact that it is a nation that has not yet healed its wounds. I’m not sure, then, that they are ready to eliminate such measures as AA.
This is just one opinion, though, and there are lots of ways to look at it! Keep talking it through!

From Kayla:

(reposted from WFR blog)

Ms. McKeown, I will try to answer your question to the best of my ability.

Are Frikkie and Tengo truly friends?
Can you be friends with such a power difference, especially when one exploits that difference as does Frikkie?

As Mr. Romary has explained to us before, the Boers just believe that their servant is their best friend, but in reality, their servants are forced to work for them.

Frikkie probably believes that Tengo is still his friend, even though they are miles apart. Tengo himself probably believed this when he was living on the farm. But drastic changes occurred in Tengo, most of them in his mind. The way he thinks and what he believes in is different from before. His eyes have opened up to see the situation he’s in and how his people are being treated. On page 136, Tengo realized that he had never been able to accept how the oubaas treated his family and that ’someone like him must just accept what was thrown to him because he was black’.

Now that Frikkie is a soldier and is trained to think that blacks have become a nuisance and must be under control (on pg 121, Frikkie says, “They’ll still make plenty of trouble for us.” His uncle also agrees and says, “You can’t reason with the black mind. Force is the only way we’re going to keep them under control”), there is no way that they can be friends, thinking the way they do. Frikkie has been taught to think that the blacks need to never be on the same level as him and Tengo has learned that the blacks cannot accept the way they are treated any longer.

In this situation, they cannot possibly be friends, as their beliefs, attitudes, and thinking is different.

What a well-reasoned response to such a deep question! Last year, students concluded that they were indeed friends. There are certainly many examples from the book that would suggest this. I agree with you, though. Where there is a difference in power and where that power is exploited, there can not exist friendship. There can be friendliness, but not friendship. I also believe, though, that there can be differences in power that are not exploited between people, making friendship possible. It is this that we need to learn to do more often.

Thanks for responding!

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