On Mandela's death

The recent death of Mandela has affected me more than I expected, and from talking to others, this is a shared experience.

While I am obviously sad at the death of an amazing human being, it's made me think a lot about my place in South Africa. I have always dismissed the idea of any other country becoming my home, and feel out of place in other countries. Unfortunately that hasn't led me to feel at home in South Africa. At times I feel like a foreigner here, but at the same time, like I have something that falls in between a duty and a desire to be here. This feeling has led me to not live fully in place during my time overseas, and contributed to the ending of one of my most significant relationships.

I am not entirely sure what this has to with Mandela's death, all I know is, as I lay in bed crying at the news, I was crying for myself as much as for the event. Mandela represented an ability to get the work done that needs to be done in South Africa (and of course the world). That he should die at a time when there is still so much to be done, and no clear leaders to continue his work contributed to my unsettled feelings over the last days.

It feels like we have lost one of our most inspiring, strong and good allies. It makes me realise how much there is to do, and worry about my own ability to do the work that is needed. In South Africa, it makes me realise how much easier life can be in other countries, where I am not faced by my privilege and otherness (real or perceived) everyday, and don't wrestle with my place in the world as strongly. It brings in to focus the fact that my place in the world will not easily allow me to feel at peace wherever I am.

I have linked my own life so strongly with the work for environmental justice, and as a result have inextricably linked the narratives of the struggle for environmental justice and the struggle for freedom from Apartheid. How can I question whether my parents did enough to bring down Apartheid ideology, when I live a life that so clearly shores up and contributes to the environmentally destructive day to day routine of civilisation?

So while the news channels run 24/7 coverage of the unfolding of the death of a great man, I sit with a lap full of questions and unease. I am interested to see where both lead my country and myself.

Another corporate smut fest

I'm doing the Walk the Talk tomorrow. It's a variety of lengths (I'm doing the 8km walk with Spencer, my dog) and proceeds go towards a community project - last year they built a bridge out of recycled plastic over a swampy part of Emmarentia Park.

I went down to get my race number and was not too surprisingly disgusted by the corporate detritus coating anything solid. One could be forgiven for thinking the event is not much more than getting together a crowd of people (consumers) and advertising at them for half a day. I guess we have to get out from behind our TVs at sometime, and heaven forbid we should actually do something that doesn't in some way contribute to the take make waste system.

This tendency for companies to think they have the right to invade every aspect of our life with their whinging pleas for us to buy things we don't need seems to be growing. Like a cancer. And increasingly we think that doing something good must start with getting "benevolent" companies on board to bank roll the event. If we stopped supporting these companies in any way, many of the problems these sorts of events aim to address would fade. End the corporate welfare system, and support people and planet directly.

I'm still looking forward to walking 8km tomorrow with Spencer and the broader Joburg community. I will try and keep the real reason for being there in the front of my mind.

Disclosure: I have health insurance with Discovery, the headline sponsor (read: most guilty) of Walk the Talk. I would love to start a crowd funded health insurance fund for myself and my community. Next project.

Nuclear's death gasps

I'm getting pretty tired of hearing the nuclear argument. A friend recently sent me the same old argument. It's here, below my reply:

As a footnote to it. The author ends on an interesting note - that we need to choose our poison when it comes to energy. I think that is a good point. There is another option however. Don't use electricity. My choice.


Oh man so old.

• Most people who are against atomic power want renewables, not gas or coal.
• We don't want anyone to die. Not less people to die.
• Financially, nuclear is MUCH more expensive, if you take into account waste and decommissioning and insurance. I say if here, but there isn't really an "if" when it comes to the costs. The only if is whether it is taken into account or not.

These arguments are the last dying gasps from people desperately trying to earn a last fading buck before they have to shut up shop and start engineering solar panels.
Pathetic really.

On 8 April 2013 09:31, A Friend wrote:

Just saying …

Feed: Co.Exist
Posted on: 05 April 2013 04:01 PM
Author: Ben Schiller
Subject: Forget Fukushima, Nuclear Power Has Saved 1.8 Million Lives

Chernobyl. Three Mile Island. Fukushima. All horrible accidents, but is the cost in lives far less than if those power plants had been burning coal? Following Fukushima, many people turned their back on nuclear power. Governments, such as Germany’s, decided to halt plans for new stations or phase out existing ones. Critics were happy to say the disaster proved what they’d been saying all along: Nuclear is too dangerous, and we don’t need it. But exactly how dangerous is nuclear really? It depends on how you look at it. In absolute terms, nuclear is as risky as hell. We would never conceive of building something like a nuke station, if we didn’t have to. But comparatively speaking? That’s perhaps another story. From 1971 to 2008, 4,900 people died as a result of nuclear power. A new paper by two researchers at NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies calculates the damage if we hadn’t had nuclear power for the last several decades, and what damage might be caused if we don’t embrace the technology going forward. Pushker Kharecha and James Hansen estimate that 4,900 people died as a result of nuclear power between 1971 and 2009, mostly from workplace accidents and radiation fallout, but, they said, 370 times more people (1.84 million) would have died, had we generated the same power from fossil fuels. The scientists’ figures are based on estimates of mortality caused by particulate pollution, which killed 1.2 million people in China in 2010, according to a recent report. And it gets worse. They say burning natural gas to replace nuclear power will result in at least 420,000 deaths by 2050, and 7 million more if we replace it solely with coal. Burning natural gas to replace nuclear power will result in at least 420,000 deaths by 2050. Aside from immediate health impacts, Kharecha and Hansen’s point is to show that we really can’t do without nuclear if we want to keep climate change within manageable boundaries. They believe that renewables won’t supply the scale or dependability to replace nuclear, if we want to stay under a 1 degree C global temperature rise (above preindustrial levels). "Achieving these targets emphasizes the importance of retaining and expanding nuclear power, as well as carbon-free renewables, in the near-term global energy supply," they say. The paper says nuclear power prevented 64 gigatonnes of CO2-equivalent greenhouse gas emissions in the period to 2009 and would prevent 80 to 240 gigatonnes by 2050, depending on the replacement. Kharecha and Hansen’s paper is likely to annoy (perhaps too mild a word) opponents of nuclear power who tend to exaggerate the actual evidence of harm. The best science shows that the long-term fallout from major nuclear accidents has been more modest than advertised. The paper states: ..no deaths have been conclusively attributed (in a scientifically valid manner) to radiation from the other two major accidents, i.e. Three Mile Island in March 1979, for which a 20-year comprehensive scientific health assessment was done, and the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident. Meanwhile, a United Nations study of the 1986 Chernobyl accident, the worst in history, found that 43 people died, including 15 first responders. Kharecha and Hansen’s point is not to minimize these deaths, or nuclear’s larger risks or costs, but to put them in comparative context. Rail against nuclear, if you want to. But when it comes to energy, you have to choose your poison.

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Love, Respect, Action.

Why insurance companies are bad

They work against community. If you know anything about me, you'll know that that would be a sure-fire way to piss me off. Building, supporting and nurturing community is one of, if not the, most important way we can make the world a better place.

Insurance companies start out badly on this account. The whole premise behind them is that we should not trust or rely on each other, but should rather buy security and peace of mind. So instead of looking out for each other and resolving our problems together, we rely on someone who we've never met before on the end of a phone, and internet banking.

I found an even better example of their assault on social cohesion yesterday. Apparently they won't insure household contents if more than 2 people live in your house who are not family relations. Way to breed a little mistrust and resentment assholes.

I hope they don't mind that I see everyone as my brothers and sisters. Now just to decide whether I want to get rid of all my stuff, or start my own community based insurance scheme - anyone in?

Eating jobs

Walmart recently entered SA to much fanfare and consternation. Capitalists licked their jowls and trade unionists protested. Some people celebrated cheap prices and wider range, while some worried about their jobs. 

I caught a glimpse of what Walmarts entry into SA might mean yesterday. On the way to the station, we drove past the Timbercity in Lakeside. Timbercity is a South African hardware chain store. A few years ago a Builders Wharehouse (a Walmart subsidiary) opened up about a kilometre and a half up the road. The writing was on the wall for Timbercity and all the people who worked there. My phone automatically capitalises Walmart, it doesn't recognise Timbercity. Builders Wharehouse has the support of Walmart and all that comes with. They can stay open late and on weekends and not worry about initial loses, they have a much bigger range than Timbercity and they will soon be a monopoly. Already my friends in Joburg talk about going to Builders and not the hardware store. I don't think this consolidation of the market place is good for society. The invisible hand of the market will ensure there are less jobs and the jobs there are are McJobs (compare the concept of a job to a livelihood). 

What can you do about this? Unless you're an activist, and it's your life's work, not much. Perhaps you could hit capitalism where it hurts though. Never enter a Builders shop (there are a bunch of different types) without a shopping list, and never leave with more than is on your shopping list. What do you think?

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To put a human face on all this. I was walking my dog on Zandvlei, near where I lived at the time. The dog ran into the vlei near the bridge and went after a duckling. A man saw it happen, and didn't see the duckling reappear. He told me that he thought my dog had killed it. Not in an angry way, more just sad. I saw he had a Timbercity shirt on, and recognised him from there. 

He walked off, I scolded my dog and stood looking out over the vlei in the direction of the beach and water slides where the duckling had been. Pretty soon I saw the duckling bob back to the surface and join its (my long range duckling sexing skills aren't what they used to be) parents. I was happy. 

I had to go into Timbercity later that day and saw the same guy. I told him the duckling had survived - he was really happy. I hope he has managed to find a job somewhere else now. 

Hope

It started with a conversation about a platform shop. As we pulled out of Cape Town Station he said it would be great if we could just quickly buy something from the shop, if only they had an entrance on the platform. Sweets, something to drink or a newspaper. Then they would make a killing. I said "but then the people would get free access to the train, and they'd have to control it". Silence. Me problem solving: "What about a small window. Then people could just say what they wanted, pay for it and it gets passed through the window." Satisfied silence?

As we approach De Doorns, we stop and wait for police to clear striking farm workers off the tracks. The police on board ask us to close the blinds in case people are throwing stones. For a moment, me and my camera phone feel like a member of the Bang Bang Club. Somehow sharing a tense moment gets the conversation going again. He tells me about a farmer he met who sends grapes from that area all over the world. He is angry at others eating grapes when South Africans can't. I am too.

The dry Karoo landscape silences mirror our conversation like the distant mountains. A political mountain approaches. We talk with disgust of Jacob Zuma and Nkandla. He tells me about meeting Ramaphosa "...before NUM. Before he changed his jacket. When he used to run side by side with Biko". I'm fleshing out my academic history with these gems, scattered like the sheep across the landscape. We both agree that education is the key. He tells me how he would put money into teacher training colleges if he were Zille and uplifting schools like Langa High to be more like Rondebosch Boys Prep. Langa High was the only high school for Africans in Cape Town when he was young. My dad went to "Roast Beef and Pork Sausages".

Train and electricity warning signs alert non-existent drivers that they will soon cross our path on the dusty roads. I tell him I want to mentor young people and how I think that that is so important. I don't mention her, but I'm proud of my mums work when he agrees with me that it is important in overcrowded schools. He tells me he worked for the Western Cape Government. I'm proud to explain my work, but tell it from the peoples side, not the environments. He is a proud PAC supporter. Robert Sobukwe said there is only one race, the human race, as we cross a river. The PACs downfall was accepting money from a white Australian woman. It shouldn't have been. He's angry because of that. Mandela didn't have a mandate from the ANC or the people of South Africa to negotiate. Mandela sold us out, and he's not too impressed with the little man, Tutu, either.

He didn't start talking about the grape farmer once we had passed the striking workers. What he told me was that when he went to school in Fort Beaufort (because there was only one high school in Langa for Africans) he used to hate taking the train. He said that with passion, and his bottom lip quivered. There used to be a shop on the platform, and only the white people could go inside. The black people were served through a small window on the side.

As the Karoo succumbs to sunset he says "I'm glad I could speak to you, Glen." I say, "I am too, Sky." I think how glad I am there wasn't a free coupe. He goes to get water to take his pills.