Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa

Like a lot of people my age, opposing Apartheid was the moral equivalent of fighting fascism at the time. With divestment campaigns and protest marches on college campuses around the country, we did what we could to bring about the end of that system. After 1994 with victory won, we walked away and turned our focus on other things. One doesn't have to agree with Ms. Mercer's libertarian views to recognize that something went seriously wrong in South Africa when we were no longer paying attention. Those of us who did our part in ending Apartheid need to pay attention again to help put down the monster we had a hand in setting over the people of South Africa. We owe Ilana Mercer a great debt for sounding the tocsin.

There is much valuable information here, information and insight rarely seen in the news. Mercer has the first hand, inside point of view. She lived in SA during apartheid. It would be better if she were not quite so full of herself, but then, she would not be Illana!

Woohoo!!
Ilana, thank you for your book "Into the Cannibal's Pot". This book is not what South Africa could be, should be or hoped to be, this is just as it is in reality -- a mess.
I lived in South Africa for most of my life, nearly 50 years. Now, at the age of 70, I have given up hope and decided to leave to start a new life somewhere else. It is not easy to leave friends, family, and loved ones of all creeds and colors behind. I hope America and the rest of the world read this book learn the lessons it contains.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

"Into the Cannibal's Pot" is an excellent read. Many thanks to the author for telling the truth about our country, South Africa. Your research and knowledge are simply beyond compare.

Americans who understand that their constitutional freedoms remain preserved through the courageous sacrifices, and the vigilance, of a well informed, well armed, law-abiding citizenry are appropriately anxious about the future of their republic and the survival of their Second Amendment rights.

Read this book and get involved in the battle to preserve your present, and re-establish your lost, freedoms.

Into the Cannibal's Pot is a superbly written and important work without equal. Ilana has an insight that goes beyond merely seeing things first hand. The truth conveyed in this book is a beacon of light for all who know injustice as the evil it is. The many lessons here should inspire all of us. A courageous effort no doubt.

The language is somewhat pedantic but Ilana sure has a precise handle on S A politics. I agree with everything she says and it should be a wake up call for all Americans. Majority rule is not the panning out the way it was intended. Politicians live in the lap of luxury while the majority of people live in squaller. Not that giving to the poor will necesssarily help, they need a change of mindset. How that is to be achieved is another matter. I don't believe it will come in the next 100 years or so.

This book is well researched, makes a strong (if depressing point), and is well worth the effort for serious scholars. The new goverment in South Africa gets away with appalling racist practices, but is not held accountable by world opinion. Colour is a bigger issue in this devided country than even under the dark days of apartheid. The author points this out with clarity and sharp wit.

The writer has clearly researched into the topic she discusses. While the content is at times disheartening to read, it is still written in a style that is engaging for the reader and I personally found the book difficult to put down! I would suggest that this book can be read by anyone, as it has relevant content for the world at large, but it would be of particular interest to people from Africa or the 1st world. While some of the arguments may be viewed as unpopular or not quite politically correct, it voices concerns that some people may want to say but fear to say to other people.

"When South Africa was governed by a racist white minority, it was scorned by the West ... Now that a racist, black majority government controls the country ... it's the toast of the West." Classical liberal columnist, writer and former South African Ilana Mercer deconstructs the new democratic South Africa, a country where government corruption, rape and murder are all in a day's work. Scholarly and readable, Mercer gives a detailed account of the country's history, from the early days of the Dutch settlers, all the way through to Colonial rule, apartheid and beyond to the nation's current state of being dismantled from the bottom up, quickly becoming in the authors words "another Islamist friendly, failed African state."

Continually correlated with past and present day America, as the title suggests the book carries with it a lesson. A clarion call if you will to anyone who respects the rule of law and the basic principles of liberty. She illustrates how with relative ease a society can wither away, or in South Africa's case be hacked to pieces with a machete.

"Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa" tells the true story of South Africa not the sugar-coated, multi-cultural utopia the Western liberal media and their conservative counterparts will have you believe.

"When South Africa was governed by a racist white minority, it was scorned by the West ... Now that a racist, black majority government controls the country ... it's the toast of the West." Classical liberal columnist, writer and former South African Ilana Mercer deconstructs the new democratic South Africa, a country where government corruption, rape and murder are all in a day's work. Scholarly and readable, Mercer gives a detailed account of the country's history, from the early days of the Dutch settlers, all the way through to Colonial rule, apartheid and beyond to the nation's current state of being dismantled from the bottom up, quickly becoming in the authors words "another Islamist friendly, failed African state."

Continually correlated with past and present day America, as the title suggests the book carries with it a lesson. A clarion call if you will to anyone who respects the rule of law and the basic principles of liberty. She illustrates how with relative ease a society can wither away, or in South Africa's case be hacked to pieces with a machete.

"Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa" tells the true story of South Africa not the sugar-coated, multi-cultural utopia the Western liberal media and their conservative counterparts will have you believe.

The author paints a bleak picture of Post-Apartheid South Africa (and America’s future): Soaring crime (the rape capital of the world), corruption, a decaying infrastructure, affirmative action on steroids, and lawlessness. The once prosperous SA is on the path to become just another poverty stricken African country.

I wanted to see what impact this economic collapse has had on the country’s GDP, since the end of Apartheid, so did some Internet research (numbers were not provided in the book). I was surprised to see that the GDP has grown considerably since the end of white rule. The data, from the World Bank, indicates GDPs of $136 billion in 1994 and $350 billion in 2013. This is in conflict with the entire narrative of “Into the Cannibal’s Pot.” I searched my Kindle book with key words such as “GDP” and “Gross Domestic Product” to see whether I had missed the author’s explanation as to why the GDP has grown in a country that is falling apart, but found nothing. This is the reason for my 4-star rating of what I had initially considered to be a 5-star book. Perhaps I’m just missing something.

I worked in the U.S. "intelligence" community for three decades. I received this book on a Saturday morning and did not put it down until Sunday afternoon, because I never stopped reading it. This astonishing and powerful book paints in great clarity the steady (and entirely unnecessary) deconstruction of the America we grew up in, and it explains how South Africa became the first model for this deconstruction. The book clarifies the causes of our civilization's death, and places them with astounding skill in their historical, political, ideological and personal contexts. It is a perpetually fascinating book -- often amusing in its insights -- and, bottom line, a breathtakingly concise and brilliant and unequaled examination of the murder of our civilization. We will heed its warnings or cease to exist.

I read this a few years ago and unfortunately the cycle of violence has even gotten worse. The plight of the white S. African is even more perilous, along with stability of the Country. I remember the farm evictions in 1999 occurring in Zimbabwe, then the trend went to farm murders, and I thought well okay, that's just Zimbabwe. Now with the govt. of Jacob Zuma, the farm murders and takeovers are happening in S. Africa. Truly amazing. I guess this should not be surprising seeing that Zuma and Mugabe share the same philosophy of racist, kleptocratic, authoritarian rule. The S. Africa that Ms. Mercer knew will never return unfortunately.

The modern West is dominated by Politics of Guilt. Where once there was focus on universal rights and liberties, today the managerial welfare states obsess over special entitlements (now mistakenly called "rights") for particular "disadvantaged" or "underprivileged" victim groups. While the urge to redress past wrongs is fine in principle, elementary logic dictates that it cannot be accomplished by perpetrating new wrongs.

Mercer makes no apologies for the apartheid. She doesn't hold back in describing its violations of many economic freedoms, natural, political and personal rights. Yet the current tyranny of the majority violates them ALL. Murder statistics indicate that more South Africans die per week under "democracy" than had died in government detention over the four decades of apartheid (p.1). Blacks and "coloureds" also find themselves victimized, but the violence against white Anglos and Afrikaners is just about institutional. "Kill the farmer" is chanted by the ruling party officials, and white farmers die; the officials shrug it off as just a bit of harmless fun. Particularly vile is the phenomenon of gang rape, which has its own colloquialism: "jackrolling" (p.16).

Mercer makes a brief mention of her own family's fight against apartheid, but this isn't a book told from a personal perspective and playing on emotions. Instead, Mercer is standing up for principles that were once the foundation of the West. No more, it seems. Instead of liberty and justice for all, South Africa got a tyranny of the majority. The ANC, whose beliefs are a mélange of tribalism and Communism, doesn't mind in the least - but shouldn't the West? If it is "racist" to point out when a majority-black government systematically violates the lives, liberty and property of its non-black subjects, how about when it does the same thing to its own, black citizens? Should anyone get a free pass on human rights, just because they were colonized or mistreated in the past?

ANC's racism is not just hateful, it is also stupid. Mercer quotes hard data to show that BEE is destroying South Africa's economy (Chapters 2 and 3), that murdering Afrikaner farmers is lowering food production and ruining the farmlands. SA was once able to feed itself, and the standard of living of its black majority was much higher than in all other African countries. Now it imports food (p.79), and its economy is falling towards Zimbabwe.

Ever cognizant of patterns and principles, Mercer documents the plight of the Boers with an eye on how the dismantling of South Africa's state and society - both Western structures - could likely be replicated in the West itself (Chapters 5 and 6). Multiculturalism, politics of guilt, "reverse" discrimination, all these things have already eroded the principles of equality before the law, natural rights and limited government. It doesn't matter if the conflict is racial, ethnic or religious; the same pattern of subversion can apply anywhere. Yesterday it was Botswana, today Bosnia, and tomorrow it could be Belgium.

Take, for example, the "Islamic Declaration" of the late Bosnian Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic, which Mercer quotes (p. 195) in a chapter on South Africa's experiences with Islam. Izetbegovic, revered as a statesman and philosopher throughout the Muslim world, wrote of the impossibility of coexistence between Islam and non-Islamic governments, and advised that Muslims ought to mount a takeover as soon as they become sufficiently numerous. But to point this out is "Islamophobia," and against the law in some European countries.

Nor is the situation in South Africa purely black-and-white. Mercer notes the dissent of the Zulu and their conflict with the Xhosa-majority ANC. She also quotes reliable statistics that the country's black majority was far less than enthusiastic about ANC rule prior to 1994. "Perhaps most blacks, no less than most whites, realized that being disenfranchised in a functioning state was preferable to being masters in a failed one," Mercer concludes (p. 224). The only thing worse is being disenfranchised in a failed state. That way lies extinction. The stupid insistence of the West on an Anglo-American style of democracy in heterogeneous societies such as Bosnia, Iraq or South Africa only breeds violence and destroys the legitimacy of the state in question.

Mercer is a classical liberal, who values the natural rights of life, liberty and property. She shares the conviction of America's Founding Fathers that unrestricted democracy is hostile to these values, as politics quickly deteriorates into the have-nots helping themselves to the property of the haves, using the ballot box instead of bullets. Of particular interest is her distillation of Hans-Hermann Hoppe's argument from "Democracy: The God That Failed" in Chapter 7 (p. 228-29). It would be entirely academic, were it not for the real-life example of South Africa.

While it is true that the Afrikaner minority ended up surrendering and accepting majority rule with no safeguards - which was in effect a betrayal by its leadership - it has to be noted, as Mercer does, that a significant contributor to this capitulation was the ostracism by the rest of the Western civilization. Afrikaners refused to fight the entire world. As a result, they are slowly being wiped out. Isn't the world that forced them into this situation at least somewhat responsible for remedying it?

Given that the West was pushing the strongest for unrestricted majority rule, there is little hope it will somehow reverse course and demand a stop to the ANC abuses. Some Afrikaners may find a future elsewhere and emigrate, as Mercer ended up doing. But four million of them? The West doesn't want them - their very existence upsets the "progressive" applecart. If they stay under the present government, they will share the fate of Rhodesians. Secession is a legitimate option, but one that would be opposed both by the ANC and the West. Does that mean the Afrikaners ought to perish? Many European nations seem to have lost the will to survive. If the Afrikaners choose to fight for their rights, Mercer may someday write a sequel - an inspirational, instead of a cautionary tale.

Review by Andrew Lewis
This book by Ilana Mercer is a very powerful, full of challenges to the status quo and
of observations born of painful experiences. For many it may be too difficult to handle.
Ilana Mercer was born in South Africa, the daughter of a Jewish Rabbi, who has become an activist libertarian in America. The objectives of her book, Into the Cannibal's Pot - Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa are basically two: 1] is to point out the failures of the ANC rule in South Africa compared to Afrikaner and apartheid rule and 2] to show that the flaws carried to extreme in South Africa are present in America. Her message - the extremes can happen here.

While Mercer emphasizes the politics of race and the uncontrolled LEGAL immigration, she also stresses the importance of culture, religion, guilt and mental toughness.
The communist domination of the ANC could not have been possible without the aid of the American left and the United States government. The US government provided the ANC with instructions for mass demonstrations, the promotion of violence and manipulation of the new constitution to defranchise large segments of the population. Majoritarian democracy in South Africa is tribal tyranny inspired by the US Department of State.

Crime and violence in South Africa are promoted by an incompetent civil service, manipulation of crime statistics and suppression of media reporting. Americans do not appreciate the slaughter of the Boer farmers and their families or the deliberate promotion of hate as justification for violence. Suppression of Christianity has opened the door to Islam and Muslim terrorism. The recent kidnapping of girls in school in Nigeria, points out the Muslin threat.

In America, much black on white crime is not acknowledged by the media. More often the charge of racism is made against whites without provocation or justification. Agitators promote hatred against whites. The suppression of truth in history and replacement with attitude forming "education" are common practices in South Africa as they are in America. Guilt is a major problem that needs to be addressed.

Statistical inequality of race distribution has become de facto proof of discrimination in American courts. Competence, merit, culture, ethnicity and loyalty no longer matter. The result has been discrimination against the individual, merit and the white race, especially males. One of Mercer's observations that shocked was the revelation that legal immigrants from the third world are given preference for subsidy and jobs as minorities, over loyal American citizens.
Mercer points out that emphasis on tribal dominance has resulted in illiterates occupying government positions in South Africa. Dumbing down requirements for admission to schools, has resulted in unearned degrees, the access of incompetents to jobs and the disenfranchisement of the Afrikaner.

In November 1996, Proposition 209 in California passed. It prohibited affirmative action in the state based on testing. The academics in California university system changed the rules to admit minorities who lacked bona fide credentials. The entrance requirement became a reduced content test and a biography both of which were then considered. Furthermore, the courses were dumbed down.

The academic world has become inflated and student volume is needed to justify state support of the university. Student loans are not the concern. Graduating students without skills or knowledge has become a practical necessity.

If you think, affirmative action does not affect you, think again about the air traffic controllers and mortgage defaults that required bank bailouts. Where previously, air traffic controllers required college training, the FAA recently decided that people with a high school diploma should be able to qualify.

The "liars mortgages" were put together knowingly by banks to extend credit to those who were not credit worthy. When they defaulted on their mortgages, it became an international financial crisis. Those mortgages were extended to those who never were credit worthy, that is how affirmative action affects the national economy and your financial future.

An affirmative action government official openly stated that "all whites are racists" and blacks are not. Despite the fact that some American blacks and others call for extermination of the white race.

In an editorial, The Wall Street Journal accused Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., of trying to politicize the Federal Reserve and to establish diversity czars to enforce quota hiring in all federal agencies.
Diana Furchtgott-Roth, an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute cited concerns about racial quotas and costs. "The chief concern is that you're moving from a situation where discrimination [based on race] is prohibited, which is well and good and that is established law, to a situation where there are quotas in the workplace," she told FoxNews.com, contending that the law would extend the provisions to contractors and subcontractors - a situation that could lead to quotas in the private sector. "And those are two very, very different things."

While many sought to free blacks from perceived and imagined white oppression, black on white animosity extends to immigration. The American government was not only involved in defranchising white Afrikaners from participation in the South African government, but also in blocking the entrance of white Afrikaners into the US or Canada as refugees.

The book raises many issues of a profound nature. Mercer is a gifted and great author. She needs recognition and admiration for her effort on behalf of America. I have the greatest respect for the author's courage and ability to stand for the truth. She deserves 5 STARS.

Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South AfricaDo you love liberty? Most people believe they love liberty. But few understand how dependent liberty is on maintaining the institution of private property. Ilana Mercer shows how the loss of the institution of private property in South Africa has resulted in a bad apartheid system turning into nothing short of a "hell hole." Our mainstream media has been silent on what has transpired in recent years in South Africa since apartheid. The truth is that it isn't only whites who are now losing the right to life, but blacks and whites are facing increasing levels of murder, rape and other violent crimes in Post apartheid South Africa. Take away a persons right to keep what she or he has obtained honorably and you take away the right to life itself! Moreover, Ilana helps us understand that the connection between property ownership and liberty transcends national boundaries. The right of property ownership was a basic reason for the American Revolution in 1776 and it was one of the few reasons for government itself to exist. But now in America as in most nations in 2012, instead of protecting that basic "inalienable right" of human beings, the government itself has begun stripping its citizens of their right to life starting with taxation and other methods of "legal" theft. The message is clear to me as an American. The direction away from free market capitalism to socialism will end with increasing loss of the quality of life and life itself, not just for a few Americans but for the vast majority of us. If you care about your inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as declared in the American Declaration of Independence, you won't want to miss reading this book.

Ms. Mercer's masterful and detailed research relentlessly pursues the unleashed democracy of the Rainbow Nation. The facts outlined in logical factual analysis reveal a truth few are prepared to confront. The Calvinist Puritans of the South African Apartheid Government relinquished power in 1993 and ceded to justice and liberty. Unrestricted democracy with no protection for minority groups heralded cronyism, corruption, black empowerment via affirmative action, the steady unraveling of social structures and ultimately a lawless society terrorized by crime. Unimaginable gruesome brutality is a common occurrence, particularly in the ethnic cleansing of the white South African farmer. The spread of Islam in South Africa and, indeed throughout Africa, has only served to exacerbate the horrors of the "Dark Continent". America's uncontrolled spread of multiculturalism is accordingly treated with misgiving and foreboding. Ms Mercer presents a tragic, powerful picture of her "democratic" homeland in the fervent hope that America can avoid equal disaster.

Rhona Karbusicky - Researcher/Librarian

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in obtaining a less polished but faithful description of the political development in South Africa with the events that led up to the abolishing of apartheid, the introduction of majority vote, and the deteriorating situation for South Africa in general and for the white Boer community in particular.

While not being a Boer herself Ilana offers a valuable third-person perspective of the development and the pitiful situation for this brave white minority that is suffering from severe hardship and whose needs have been ignored by international humanitarian organizations despite the slow but steady ethnical cleansing, while at the same time the once munificent country is engulfed in corruption and poor administration.

The only part I had difficulties to agree with was Ilana's unreserved support for Israel and its handling of Palestinians(being the daughter of a rabbi, I can understand Ilana's sense of kinship with Israel and its cause).

All in all, the book is elaborate and very well-written. It is instructive to find that Zimbabwe served as a warning example to South Africa, which in turn serves as a warning example to both the US and to Europe. With a rapid demographic change on both continents the current situation for Boers in South Africa might serve as a blueprint for the situation white populations in the US and in Europe might face a few decades hence.

Stalin, a Georgian, used the Cossacks to clear the Russian Steppes of Peasants and start the State Farm System. What is important is not that Stalin was from Georgia; but that a disastrous public policy was begun. Pol Pot drove all of the educated people into the, Killing fields of Cambodia, in order to start a new order in his country. No, these stories are not in Ilana's book. There is no relationship between the Blacks of America and the Blacks in South Africa in "Into the Cannibal's Pot" either; however, there are distinct similarities between the policies of the US, South Africa, and old style Communism throughout the reading. Just as Communism eventually destroyed the prosperity, health, and peaceful lives of its citizens,the same policies are at work inside both the United States and South Africa with the same results occuring. Many citizens are noticing the similarities, Russia in the eighteen hundreds produced and exported numerous products, under socialism, it became an importer country. Both South Africa and the United States were export nations, up until a few years ago. Now both are import nations. Ilana points to the "WHY" If you want to understand `why' buy this book.

I bought this on recommendation from my significant other, who met the author through her blog.

This book is nothing less than a total demolition of not only multiculturalism, but of representative democracy in the Westminster, winner-take-all style. It blows up every myth about Nelson Mandela and the ANC like those purveyed in the film "Invictus." For instance, Ms. Mercer details how the Afrikaner government of 'Old South Africa' offered to release Mandela from prison in exchange for his renouncing violence. Mandela refused. She details how the ANC has pursued a campaign of 'land reform' (theft) since the end of apartheid, and how it has allowed the society and institutions of the most powerful nation on the continent to decay through neglect, prejudice and cronyism. Small wonder that the Afrikaners are leaving 'New South Africa" while they still can in ever greater numbers. Despite the fact that the nation depends heavily on the Afrikaner-owned commercial farms, the ANC continues to slowly wipe out these farmers through campaigns of terrorism, squatting, legalized theft and violence, while limiting the gun rights of the farmers, retarding their ability to defend themselves. The Founding Fathers here in America may have been on to something by requiring property ownership for voting rights, as the unpropertied, as Ms. Mercer points out, will simply use the government to help themselves to the possessions of the propertied.

No less important is her exposition of the politically correct 'multicultural' phenomenon here in the United States. She covers the utter cowardice of both major political parties, making them complicit in watering down our culture, and particularly our education system. She also points out the insane neoconservative and neoliberal policies of "mandating multiculturalism and mass Third World immigration at home, while pursuing a monoculturalist Manifest Destiny abroad."

She also covers the fate of Rhodesia after South Africa withdrew its support under pressure from the West, and other unfortunate incidents where the West has suffered self-inflicted wounds.

An absolute must-read for anyone interested for an intellectual basis, viewed through the lens of one who's experienced it on a horribly personal level, to refute the liberal push for egalitarianism and multiculturalism. Go buy it. Now.

We are living a baffled time where the democratic system is sacralized as the only possible way to politics, where the multiculturalism is the norm and the criticism and discordance voices are almost criminalized. In this context the Ilana Mercer's book is not only a testimony of courage but also an essential work.
I have no words to manifest how happy I am for read such an intelligent and fantastic work. Ilana Mercer is a brave woman telling the truth that so many people comfortably ignore. My country, Brazil, has a lapse of people like her and would be wonderful see a translation of Ilana Mercer's book into Portuguese to improve our critical sense about the reality we're living right now in Brazil and all around the Western World.
Here in Brazil we don't have the immigrant problem just like the USA and Europe, indeed we export illegal immigrants, unfortunately. But we're importing the welfare state pattern and the "affirmative politics" that are killing USA and Western Europe. I'm pretty worried about my homeland because it's obvious that the crisis experimented by the USA and Europe will arrive in Brazil and others countries which are blinded by the fake prosperity brought by the Welfare State and the so-called "affirmative politics".

Let's really learn the Ilana's lessons.

I just finished reading "Into the Cannibal's Pot" by Ilana Mercer. It's an interesting, perspective-shifting read!

Until recently, I've been on the opposite side from Ms. Mercer on Afrikaner-related issues. As a graduate student at Duke University, I had the privilege of studying and traveling with a former General Secretary of the SA Council of Churches and staffer of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. At his invitation, I spent 3 months in Cape Town working with Congolese and Burundian refugees. I learned plenty during my three months working for the Methodist Church of Southern Africa, and remain extremely grateful for the experience.

Looking back on my time in South Africa, I now recognize a common theme - a simmering, palpable disdain shown by some colleagues and acquaintances toward all things Afrikaner. I didn't know any better, so I shared in that disdain. Ms. Mercer's compelling account of life as an Afrikaner farmer in the new South Africa makes me wish I'd been more assertive in listening to the Afrikaner perspective. I simply cannot fathom how fearful life must be for many Afrikaners today. I suspect I would have done all I could to protect my fragile civilization if confronted with the violent chaos of the new South Africa.

Thanks to Ms. Mercer for writing so strongly and convincingly on life in the new South Africa. I'm looking forward to picking up a copy of her earlier book "Broadsides".

Eye opening.

While I support freedom for all, the fact is violence has gone up dramatically in South Africa since the end of the apartheid regime. While one can argue whites shouldn't have colonized South Africa, it doesn't follow that whites do a worse job of governing.

In the Disneyesque-Hollywood version of events, the evil, white racist Apartheid regime was replaced by the African National Congress and "democracy," and everyone got to live happily ever after. Author Ilana Mercer writes a well-documented book. "Into the Cannibal's Pot," on how this fairy-tale ending is not so, and also explains why the happy ending did not occur. Obviously, in any political change, some people would benefit more than others - thus, one would not expect a white Interior Ministry policeman from the old regime to keep his status. However, author Ilana Mercer documents that the downsides of the new South Africa are quite widespread: "From the 1940's to the 1990's, life expectancy for blacks soared from thirty-eight to sixty-one years! Since the dawn of democracy in 1994, life expectancy has plummeted by nine years. Crime has reached crippling levels (Page 178)".

Ilana Mercer is the daughter of an outspoken opponent of the old Apartheid rule which, as she notes, violated individual rights of liberty and property of people, although the government did function in terms of economic development and basic "law and order" - albeit without "equality". An orderly transition to some type of (perhaps bicameral) power sharing between Whites, Coloreds, Asians, and the various Black Tribes, with checks and balances between majority rule and minority vetoes founded on the basic principles of individual rights and rule of law, might have worked. Instead, the keys to unchecked power were handed over to the leftist African National Congress which valued one-party rule, black racist demagoguery, and "equality" over the maintenance of ordered liberty (old fashioned "classical liberalism"). The result is that, tragically, South Africa is slowly following her neighbor Zimbabwe into emulating the worst aspects of African tribalism. Throughout the book, author Ilana Mercer is careful to illustrate the lessons of South Africa for other Western nations, and to America, in particular, where state-mandated racial categories have become ubiquitous. I highly recommend this well-researched book for those interested in South Africa or the consequences of abandoning individual rights to the unfettered rule of the mob.

Ilana Mercer's, Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa, is an unusual book.

Yet it is unusual in the best sense of the word.

At once autobiographical and political; philosophical, historical, and practical; controversial and commonsensical, Cannibal succeeds in weaving into a seamless whole a number of distinct modes of thought. This is no mean feat. In fact, its author richly deserves to be congratulated for scoring an achievement of the highest order, for in the hands of less adept thinkers this ensemble of voices would have fast degenerated into a cacophony. By the grace of Mercer's pen, in stark contrast, it is transformed into a symphony.

Mercer is a former resident of South Africa. She is intimately familiar with her native homeland in both its apartheid and post-apartheid manifestations. Yet it is precisely because she is all too well aware of the latter that she is now one of its legions of emigrants.

It would be a mistake, however, to conclude from Mercer's flight from South Africa to the United States that she had ever been any sort of champion of apartheid. Not only has she never supported these (or, for that matter, any) racially-themed institutional arrangements; with its affirmation of "natural rights" and "individualism," Mercer's "paleo-libertarianism"--a variant of the classical liberal tradition--positively precludes any such sympathy.

Still, as she amply demonstrates, not by any social indicia does "the New South Africa" even remotely approximate the old as far as quality of life is concerned. As is more often than not the case with revolutionary-like innovations, the transition from apartheid to democracy has visited upon the residents of South Africa--especially its white residents, the Afrikaners--all manner of evil that, ostensibly, were not envisioned by those legions of Westerners for whom "change" of any kind can only be a benefit.

For one, far from being "the post-racial" idyll to which the abolition of apartheid was supposed to lead, the ruling African National Congress--the party of Nelson Mandella--is no less "committed" to "restructuring society around race" than was their "apartheid-era Afrikaners." There is, however, one critical difference between South Africa under majority black rule and South Africa under minority-white rule: "more people," Mercer informs us, "are murdered in one week under African rule than died under the detention of the Afrikaner government over the course of roughly four decades."

Mercer's verdict upon the New South Africa is blunt and decisive: "Dubbed the `Rainbow Nation,' for its multiculturalism, South Africa is now, more than before, a `Rambo Nation'" (emphases added).

Indeed. The first chapter of Cannibal is a gripping--and grisly--account of the scourge that crime has become in post-apartheid South Africa. While her discussion is not utterly devoid of numbers, Mercer refuses to reduce the victims of barbarism to statistics. Her eschewal of abstractions in favor of concrete details, however ghastly they may be, is both admirable and effective. Mercer's treatment of this subject compels the reader to reckon with the stone cold fact that the thousands of white farmers who have been brutalized since the end of apartheid, like those who have mercilessly preyed upon them, are flesh-and-blood human beings.

Mercer relays the heart wrenching episode of the Williams family. After the Williams lost their twelve-year-old daughter Emily as she stumbled upon an armed robbery in progress at a friend's house while traveling to school, her parents decided that their country had become an intolerable place to remain. They have since relocated to the United Kingdom.

The reader is also introduced to people like Rene Burger, a young and promising medical student who was kidnapped and gang-raped at knife-point by three degenerates at a "well-patrolled" hospital where she was taking classes, and Sheldon Cohen, who died in front of his young son after being gunned down by three predators.

Mercer identifies others--including a not inconsiderable number of her own relatives--who have suffered unspeakable violence at the hands of South African thugs. She also definitively establishes that to no slight measure, this crime epidemic is motivated by an animus toward whites, a deep seated racial hatred that is both encouraged and, particularly in the case of the legions of white Afrikaner farmers who have been forced from their lands, sanctioned by the African National Congress.

In keeping with the subtitle of her book, Mercer is at pains to spare her adopted country--America--from the destructive folly that engulfed her native homeland.
Cannibal has been woefully underappreciated. A not inconsiderable number of otherwise astute reviewers seemed to have missed its main significance. This work is not primarily about "diversity," "democracy," "egalitarianism," or "collectivism." And it is certainly not about any conflicts within the Jewish community or Israel (Mercer is herself a Jew who remarks upon the role that South African Jews, including her father, played as critics of apartheid, as well as the role that Israel assumed as a stalwart ally of the Old South Africa). Cannibal isn't even a book about inter-racial conflict.

As I read her, Mercer is more concerned with reminding us that such "political abstractions" as "democracy" are nothing more or less than conceptual devices, ideals that we have distilled from our own culturally and historically-specific traditions. In other words, political institutions are not inanimate objects that can be moved about at will; rather, they are long-settled, if never perfected, habits or customs that have been centuries in the making.

Thus, it isn't just so-called "affirmative action" and Third World immigration at home over which Mercer sounds the alarm. She is at least as concerned over the doctrine of "American exceptionalism" that is now the reigning orthodoxy that informs America's view, not just of herself, but of her role vis-à-vis the world. Actually, it is with a remarkable degree of clarity and concision that Mercer reveals the inextricable intellectual link between America's domestic prescriptions and her foreign policy. This link, she convincingly argues, is the fiction--"nonsense on stilts," as Jeremy Bentham would have said--that America is a "proposition nation," the only country in all of human history to have been founded upon a bloodless, lifeless, abstraction.

It is hard not to be impressed with Mercer's skill at preserving the integrity of the thread that unites her analysis of the flawed metaphysical underpinnings of contemporary American orthodoxy with the nit and grit of the everyday reality of South Africa. Not only is a discussion of "American exceptionalism" germane to any critique of democratic South Africa; considering that the United States figured prominently among the nations of the world in agitating for a shift from apartheid to democracy in South Africa, no critique of the New South Africa would be complete without an examination of the prevailing ideology of "American exceptionalism."

With its view of America as the one and only country on all of the planet to have been erected upon a "principle" or "ideal"--a proposition--the logic of the doctrine of "American exceptionalism" leads inexorably to the conclusion that other countries too can be made, with sufficient time and pressure, to transcend the contingencies of time and place from which they have derived their identities. In other words, since America, the "proposition nation," is supposed to be a "democracy," it is America that is supposed to remake the rest of the world in the image of Democracy.

Mercer astutely, and forcefully, identifies this not just as a fiction, but a particularly invidious fiction at that, for "American exceptionalism" has had disastrous effects for Americans, South Africans, Middle Easterners, and, for that matter, anyone else upon whom it has been imposed.

This book is immensely important. It is just as engaging. However, for all of its virtues, it is not immune to criticism.

Throughout the pages of Cannibal, there is a discernible tension between, on the one hand, the thrust of Mercer's main argument and, on the other, some not insignificant nods that she makes in the opposite direction. This tension never finds resolution.

Mercer meticulously, even flawlessly, substantiates her thesis that the New South Africa is as corrupt as it is oppressive. Yet her relentless critique of the innumerable ways in which the ruling African National Congress has ruined her beloved country is underwritten by an equally scathing critique of the philosophy that informs these ruinous policies. Although she never calls it by name, this philosophy is what others have called "Rationalism."

Rationalism is an intellectual disposition with a pedigree stretching back at least as far as Plato. But beginning in the modern era, during the Enlightenment especially, it assumed a robustness that its ancient and medieval counterparts never could have anticipated. Although it admits of variations, what unites most expressions of modern Rationalism is the conviction that Reason supplies moral "principles" or "ideals" to which all people at all times have access. From this perspective, the morality that Reason establishes is as comprehensive and universal as is Reason itself.

Wherever and whenever one utopian scheme or another has been tried, this rationalistic conception of Reason and morality, whether overtly or covertly, to some degree or another, has attended it. Of this, Mercer shows a keen awareness, for her critique pivots upon the West's folly of supposing that non-Western peoples can, at will, organize their societies around the same "political abstractions" to which the West has grown accustomed.

At the same time, however, Mercer's commitment to "paleo-libertarianism" leads her to invoke "natural rights."

It is between her denunciations of Rationalism and her affirmation of "natural rights" that the conflict exists, for as conservative theorists from David Hume and Edmund Burke onward have noted, the popular doctrine of "natural rights" is the product of the Rationalist mind.

"Natural rights" are supposed to be rights that all people have just by virtue of their humanity alone. What Mercer and other adherents of the classical liberal tradition refer to as "natural rights" their contemporaries of other political persuasions--and in some instances, libertarians themselves--call "human rights," and their predecessors described as "the Rights of Man." Propositions affirming such "rights" are invariably treated as if they were axiomatic, and "the rights" themselves as if they were dispensations from either nature or God.

I see at least two objections to Mercer's inclusion of "natural rights" talk in Cannibal.

First, the notion of "natural rights" undergirds the fashionable--and, as Mercer brilliantly demonstrates, fundamentally wrong-headed--idea that democratically arranged institutions alone secure liberty and justice. It is, if you will, the Mother of all contemporary "political abstractions." As Burke said, against "natural rights" or, as he put it, "the Rights of Man," "there can be no prescription; against these no agreement is binding; these admit no temperament, and no compromise: any thing withheld from their full demand is so much fraud and injustice."

Between abstract, universal "natural rights" and concrete, particular cultural traditions there can only be an adversarial relationship.

Secondly, Mercer needn't reject "natural rights" in order to see her argument through. But neither does she need to affirm them. Her case in Cannibal doesn't depend upon her saying anything at all about them. We would do ourselves a good turn here to turn once more to Burke.

Burke did not deny what he termed "the real rights of man." Yet he believed that when attending to the arrangements of civil society, such talk of abstractions that are supposed to exist in advance of civilization are entirely superfluous. In his Reflections on the Revolution in France, Burke wrote: "Government is not made in virtue of natural rights, which may and do exist in total independence of it; and exist in much greater clearness, and in a much greater degree of abstract perfection: but their abstract perfection is their practical defect" (emphasis added). In politics, it is "the civil social man, and no other"--i.e. not man in some "natural state"--with whom we must concern ourselves. "If civil society be the offspring of convention, that convention,"--and not something that is held to transcend all convention--"must be its law" (emphasis added).

These criticisms that I offer arise not from any distaste on my part with Cannibal. To the contrary, they are the function of my affection for it. And the allusions to Burke--"the patron saint of modern conservatism"--are apt for more than one reason.

Not only does Mercer, like Burke, emphasize the importance of the cultural pre-requisites of a flourishing political order over rationalistic, universalistic abstractions; like Burke, Mercer succeeds in intertwining the personal, the political, and the philosophical into one compelling argument.

Yet there is one final reason to call on Burke while assessing Mercer's Cannibal.

Burke had famously said that the only thing that was necessary for evil to triumph was for good men to do nothing. Though Mercer is not a man, sadly, she is in much greater supply of that "manly virtue" that Burke prized than are many--even most--male writers today. Burke unabashedly identified the wickedness of the French Revolutionaries for what it was. Similarly, Mercer courageously, indignantly, exposes the evil that is the African National Congress and its collaborators. In fact, her book may perhaps have been more aptly entitled, Reflections on the Revolution in South Africa.

It is tragic that Ilana Mercer was all but compelled to leave the country that for much of her life was her home. Yet South Africa's loss is America's gain. As her work makes obvious for all with eyes to see, the richness of Mercer's intellect is as impressive as the soundness of her character.

Into the Cannibal's Pot is mandatory reading for all who care about truth, justice, and liberty.

She is a modern day George Carlin with the vocabulary of Nietzsche and eyebrow raising perspective of Winwood Reade! Stellar writing and truly hard hitting insight into the truth of what happened with the political demise of South Africa. A must read.

Apartheid ended in South Africa and everybody lived happily ever after. Not quite. Ilana Mercer's book gives us the hard realities of the new South Africa and they are quite unpleasant.

The American media will never tell the truth about human rights atrocities taking place in South Africa, as they censor similar events here in the US. The history of America is somewhat similar to that of South Africa and our future will be the same if we stay on the current path.

Into the Cannibal's Pot gives us hope that disaster can be averted. All educated Americans must read this book.

When crises arise and the tumult threatens us in the deceptive ease of our "modern" world we find ourselves awash in and bombarded by the pounding din of the incessant PC diatribe courtesy of the institutional prostitutes and their mealy-mouthed media mongrels. Without Ilana Mercer's courageous, straight-shooting and astute narrative synthesis of Into the Cannibal's Pot Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa, the shocking facts behind the current, ramshackle ANC fiefdom's dismantling of the once orderly and prosperous South Africa would continue to remain firmly enshrouded in the reprehensible double-speak and orchestrated confusion of those powerbrokers who are busily auctioning off our freedoms, our nations and our very souls one by one. Ilana Mercer's fearless insight is refreshingly spot-on in a growing world of intellectual cowards and turncoats. Into the Cannibal's Pot takes no political hostages of either the Apartheid past or the neotribalist present. I am all too familiar with her story. I have lived with it for twenty one years, having resided in South Africa from 1991 at the start of "democracy." Unlike other Americans doomed to the daily soma-in-a-Dixie-cup of a CNN broadcast I have lived first hand through the release of Mandela to the current, unbridled ANC plunder, national decay and rumblings of genocide under the "New" South African brand of chaotic, "democratic" neotribalism. Ilana's piercingly honest assessment and current analysis of the tenuous, moral, political, social and racial climate of the New South Africa boldly rips the phony pc loincloths off of the current crop of Africa's blood-soaked kleptocrats and Western-ized political "sock-puppets". Into the Cannibal's Pot is not for the faint-hearted but for those who truly desire a greater understanding of the evil forces at work in one of the worlds most celebrated new "democracies" and on the African continent as a whole. Her alarming comparative analysis between the developing South African crisis and the future of America society as it contends with a rapidly changing social demographic is brilliant and masterfully done. Into the Cannibal's Pot is an accessible, must-read for every American interested in the future of the nation. Ilana Mercer's insight and analysis is a clarion call from the watchtower of liberty to any and all who love their country and who wish to preserve their freedoms.

By Cuan Elgin (South African author & political analyst)

I read this book with a mixture of glee, dismay, heartache and righteous anger. Gleeful that Ms Mercer gives the pseudo-intellectual-liberal political peanut gallery their long-deserved come-uppance; dismayed to read of America's steady descent into the dark abyss that my own country, South Africa, currently plumbs; heartsore at the travails of the embattled Afrikaner-Boers in their own Beloved Country, and angry at the political and racial naivety of the mainstream "liberal" media, here exposed in all its uninformed, infuriating superficiality.

Ms Mercer's book is incisive, entertaining and a must-read for those who wish to know the true nature and outcomes of "multi-cultural Marxism.".

Far from finding the promised pot of gold at the end of the African-style "liberal democracy" rainbow, the "Rainbow Nation" is now staring into a seething cannibal's pot. Those who sold South Afrikaners "down the river" or as the book title implies, plunged South Africa's good people "Into the Cannibal's Pot" must read it, and weep...

Imagine if we were lucky enough to have someone magically travel back through time from some unimaginably devastated future to calmly, bravely and articulately warn us that we must change our fatal ways in line with reality while we still can in order to save ourselves, our civilization and our own great-grandkids. Well, we are just that lucky to have such a magical messenger in our midst, in the person of the brilliant and talented Ilana Mercer, by way of her fascinatingly horrific, well documented and superb "Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa." Still, she gives us hope, because knowledge is power, if we will only find the courage to use it, a Ilana-Mercer caliber of courage.

Ilana Mercer (nee Issacson), self-described Wandering Jew (South Africa to Israel to South Africa, then on to Canada and America), Zionist advocate, and libertarian commentator, has written a courageous book: INTO THE CANNIBAL'S POT - Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa. From the striking cover inward - a huddled, traumatized white women, her naked body covered with black hand-prints - Mercer's well-documented work, at once autobiographic and analytic, comes like a bolt of lightning in the night. She describes in savage detail all the destructive consequences of Black majority-rule in contemporary S. Africa. Saturation black-on-black and black-on-white crime, robbery and rape, brutalization and murder; vicious and systematic anti-white economic and political discrimination, "affirmative action" to the Nth degree; pervasive ethno-political corruption; and an accelerating genocide directed against the rural, White, Boer population. All of which have transformed a formerly prosperous and (relatively) peaceful country into yet another Black-ruled African descent into hell. Mercer also deals effectively with the Western liberal (i.e., Jewish) media smother of the anti-White atrocity that is South Africa today and, in a most interesting chapter titled "Why Do WASP Societies Wither?", largely though not quite entirely explains the global Anglo-Saxon surrender of power - in SA, western Europe, and America - in terms of self-destructive Christian universalism and guilt. Which she then contrasts with the Heroic Defense of Western Civilization being conducted by that Zionist fragment of world Jewry currently camped out in Palestine. On America's dime.

"Largely though not entirely" because, at least vis a vis the SA catastrophe, Mercer does make a few admissions about the leading role of Jews - including, not to put too fine a point on it, her father and herself - in bringing down the White regime. That's putting it mildly: several other Black-ruled African pestholes have recently issued whole sets of postage stamps commemorating the numerous radical Jewish activists who spearheaded the destruction of Anglo-Saxon rule in Africa (JERUSALEM POST online, 3/1/11). As to the ongoing legal/illegal immigration and group-entitlement disaster in America, which will soon reduce Whites to a shrinking minority in the nation they created, Mercer implicates only the victims. For those wishing a more nuanced understanding of the debacle, this reviewer (who, the reader should know, was recently deported from Ilana's blog) recommends that students of ITCP graduate to even more profound works: Revilo Oliver's THE JEWISH STRATEGY, Kevin MacDonald's CULTURE OF CRITIQUE, and the essays and broadcasts of William Pierce.

Ms. Mercer writes a chilling warning about the white victims of post-apartheid South Africa that the liberal-leaning mainstream media refuses to tell us. I recommend this book for every American as a caution. Liberals will whine about racism but the truth is all here for all to see. They just can't handle the reality.

Being a South African who was adult during the "bad" ol" times, I found that it was partisan and often inaccurate. Whilst I hold no brief for the last government, the present one leaves much to be desired. In some ways we carry the burden of having being governed by St. Mandela, so the world denies us a process of time. Power corrupts. Here as in any other oart of the world. Obama cd not keep his initial promises. Nor can the ANC. Tragic, however, that the scandalous corrupt are never brough to book. Mds. Mercer should try on a pair of non-partisan glasses and have a closer look!

the store Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa (Paperback)
Chapter six of this book is a rant. Mercer on Islam is like Hitler on the Jews and the Communist Party on capitalism. In one instance she quotes a 'wag' on Islam but neglects to mention that it is herself ! She selectively quotes from the Old Testament but neglects the many racist, tribalistic, pornographic and genocidal parts of this most Unholy work.
She inaccurately states that in 1948 500,000 Jews were expelled from Iraq, Morocco, Yemen and Egypt. Never happened that way at all. Israel actively recruited Jews from the first three Arab countries over several years by all manner of hook and crook including agent provocateur tactics. See Prophets In Babylon:Jews And The Arab World by Marion Woolfson. Only in Egypt in the aftermath of the Suez invasion by the UK, France and Israel were a very few thousand Jews expelled.
Naturally Mercer never mentions the 750,000-950,000 estimated Palestinian Arabs who were expelled from late 1947 (after the illegal UN partition) to mid-1948 to create what is now Israel.
As a secular Jew I am offended by Mercer's absurd whitewash of the lengthy Christian history of anti-Semitism or more accurately anti-Jewish behavior (since the great majority of Semites in the world are Arabs). Charley Reese, an old fashioned libertarian, had a syndicated column for many years in which he routinely debunked the anti-Islam nonsense. Many of these columns are now archived at Lew Rockwell.com under Reese's name. Check them out.
Mercer repeatedly quotes from her Dad, Daddy as she calls him, as the great authority
on Arabs and Islam. Daddy waxes indignant at King Hussein's 1970 slaughter of the Palestinians, strongly supported by the US and Israel, which Mercer neglects to mention
as she does the unprovoked Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 which took 20,000 lives
or Sharon's subsequent support of the Lebanese Fascist militia in their mass murders at the two Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut. Of course Daddy is quite indignant over Syrian slaughters during the same time period. And of course at US-Israeli proxy Mubarak's massacres of Islamicists in Egypt ! Of course Mercer opposes the toppling of this same tyrant by the victimized Islamicists.
Israel's two basic laws, the Right of Return, and the Jewish National Land Laws, are racist to the core. I can fly there tomorrow and become an instant citizen while an Arab whose family roots go back a thousand years cannot.
Mercer seems to actually believe that a 'God' exists who 'gave' Palestine to One, Chosen People only ! Canaanites, Phoenicians, Chaldeans, Philistines, Babylonians and many more tribes never existed in her worldview nor did the alleged numerous ancient Hebrew slaughters of such people. Personally I was relieved to read Israeli Professor Shlomo Sand's The Invention Of The Jewish People and find out that I wasn't related to such folks.
On Judaism read Jewish History, Jewish Religion by the late Israel Shahak, a survivor of Bergen-Belsen, who became an ex-Zionist after witnessing Israeli atrocities during its 1956 invasion of Egypt. Our recently late best man of Letters, Gore Vidal, has the foreword to this great monograph.
Mercer quotes Amos Oz, who typically has it exactly wrong on the cause of Arab attacks on Israel, the almost half century Occupation is the cause, the attacks are the consequence. As was true in German -Occupied Europe.
The Arabs started the slave trade and after a few centuries the Europeans took it over including some Jews. So what ? Are we supposed to refight the Crusades again ?
Mercer's Daddy neglects to mention that the anti-Israel sentiment was created by Israel and its none too bright American supporters who tried to wipe out of existence the very name of Palestine and the Palestinians including over 400 former Palestinian towns and villages in what is now Israel.
South African state censorship of a Muslim tract is regarded as "mild" by Mercer !
As is door to door proselytizing by Christians in Muslim homes. No intimidation there, eh ?
Shahak gives numerous examples of Hebrew writings by Rabbinical authorities that are every bit as offensive or even more so than the Muslim tracts that Mercer selectively quotes.
There are over a million or more Israelis living permanently here in the USA. If Israel is such a great place, why are they here ? Why did Mercer leave ? Mercer neglects to mention that many heavily Jewish entities from The New Republic to the Ayn Rand Institute strongly supported Bush 2's lying war and only distanced themselves after its failure became apparent. Many of these folks like Peikoff, Rand's last remaining supporter and legal heir, wanted a far more comprehensive war on Iran.
Most people know that the Serbs committed genocide in Bosnia on the Muslim population
but Mercer quotes a Serb extremist from the ultra-Right Chronicles who portrays the Serbs as victims ! Black is White, Peace is War, Up is Down, Down is Up !
Other partisan Israeli agit-prop sources from Alan Dershowitz are cited as sources along with obscure rightist publishers in Tennessee.
Mercer must be tongue-in-cheek when she refers to US crusades against tyranny and terrorism as the US supports tyrannies all over the world including Israel's Occupation of the Palestinians and America has long been the leading terrorist state with Israel coming in a close second.
Ron Paul, whom Mercer supports, has been a leading Israel critic but stepped into it when he said the 'Arabs' received much more US aid than Israel. Turns out that Paul was counting US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and US aid to Pakistan as 'aid to Arabs' !
Mercer could well be right in her central thesis on the Communist ANC, which has always been very close to the South African Communist Party. But her howlers in Chapter Six do not inspire confidence.
As Al Blue noted here Mercer does not inspire confidence given her mind-boggling disinformation on this chapter alone.

the store Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa (Paperback)
Chapter six of this book is a rant. Mercer on Islam is like Hitler on the Jews and the Communist Party on capitalism. In one instance she quotes a 'wag' on Islam but neglects to mention that it is herself ! She selectively quotes from the Old Testament but neglects the many racist, tribalistic, pornographic and genocidal parts of this most Unholy work.
She inaccurately states that in 1948 500,000 Jews were expelled from Iraq, Morocco, Yemen and Egypt. Never happened that way at all. Israel actively recruited Jews from the first three Arab countries over several years by all manner of hook and crook including agent provocateur tactics. See Prophets In Babylon:Jews And The Arab World by Marion Woolfson. Only in Egypt in the aftermath of the Suez invasion by the UK, France and Israel were a very few thousand Jews expelled.
Naturally Mercer never mentions the 750,000-950,000 estimated Palestinian Arabs who were expelled from late 1947 (after the illegal UN partition) to mid-1948 to create what is now Israel.
As a secular Jew I am offended by Mercer's absurd whitewash of the lengthy Christian history of anti-Semitism or more accurately anti-Jewish behavior (since the great majority of Semites in the world are Arabs). Charley Reese, an old fashioned libertarian, had a syndicated column for many years in which he routinely debunked the anti-Islam nonsense. Many of these columns are now archived at Lew Rockwell.com under Reese's name. Check them out.
Mercer repeatedly quotes from her Dad, Daddy as she calls him, as the great authority
on Arabs and Islam. Daddy waxes indignant at King Hussein's 1970 slaughter of the Palestinians, strongly supported by the US and Israel, which Mercer neglects to mention
as she does the unprovoked Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 which took 20,000 lives
or Sharon's subsequent support of the Lebanese Fascist militia in their mass murders at the two Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut. Of course Daddy is quite indignant over Syrian slaughters during the same time period. And of course at US-Israeli proxy Mubarak's massacres of Islamicists in Egypt ! Of course Mercer opposes the toppling of this same tyrant by the victimized Islamicists.
Israel's two basic laws, the Right of Return, and the Jewish National Land Laws, are racist to the core. I can fly there tomorrow and become an instant citizen while an Arab whose family roots go back a thousand years cannot.
Mercer seems to actually believe that a 'God' exists who 'gave' Palestine to One, Chosen People only ! Canaanites, Phoenicians, Chaldeans, Philistines, Babylonians and many more tribes never existed in her worldview nor did the alleged numerous ancient Hebrew slaughters of such people. Personally I was relieved to read Israeli Professor Shlomo Sand's The Invention Of The Jewish People and find out that I wasn't related to such folks.
On Judaism read Jewish History, Jewish Religion by the late Israel Shahak, a survivor of Bergen-Belsen, who became an ex-Zionist after witnessing Israeli atrocities during its 1956 invasion of Egypt. Our recently late best man of Letters, Gore Vidal, has the foreword to this great monograph.
Mercer quotes Amos Oz, who typically has it exactly wrong on the cause of Arab attacks on Israel, the almost half century Occupation is the cause, the attacks are the consequence. As was true in German -Occupied Europe.
The Arabs started the slave trade and after a few centuries the Europeans took it over including some Jews. So what ? Are we supposed to refight the Crusades again ?
Mercer's Daddy neglects to mention that the anti-Israel sentiment was created by Israel and its none too bright American supporters who tried to wipe out of existence the very name of Palestine and the Palestinians including over 400 former Palestinian towns and villages in what is now Israel.
South African state censorship of a Muslim tract is regarded as "mild" by Mercer !
As is door to door proselytizing by Christians in Muslim homes. No intimidation there, eh ?
Shahak gives numerous examples of Hebrew writings by Rabbinical authorities that are every bit as offensive or even more so than the Muslim tracts that Mercer selectively quotes.
There are over a million or more Israelis living permanently here in the USA. If Israel is such a great place, why are they here ? Why did Mercer leave ? Mercer neglects to mention that many heavily Jewish entities from The New Republic to the Ayn Rand Institute strongly supported Bush 2's lying war and only distanced themselves after its failure became apparent. Many of these folks like Peikoff, Rand's last remaining supporter and legal heir, wanted a far more comprehensive war on Iran.
Most people know that the Serbs committed genocide in Bosnia on the Muslim population
but Mercer quotes a Serb extremist from the ultra-Right Chronicles who portrays the Serbs as victims ! Black is White, Peace is War, Up is Down, Down is Up !
Other partisan Israeli agit-prop sources from Alan Dershowitz are cited as sources along with obscure rightist publishers in Tennessee.
Mercer must be tongue-in-cheek when she refers to US crusades against tyranny and terrorism as the US supports tyrannies all over the world including Israel's Occupation of the Palestinians and America has long been the leading terrorist state with Israel coming in a close second.
Ron Paul, whom Mercer supports, has been a leading Israel critic but stepped into it when he said the 'Arabs' received much more US aid than Israel. Turns out that Paul was counting US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and US aid to Pakistan as 'aid to Arabs' !
Mercer could well be right in her central thesis on the Communist ANC, which has always been very close to the South African Communist Party. But her howlers in Chapter Six do not inspire confidence.
As Al Blue noted here Mercer does not inspire confidence given her mind-boggling disinformation on this chapter alone.

Mercer packages a great polemic to be sure, and plays race cards well- the cover is an example: tender, piteous white maiden, threatening hands of the black "cannibals" playing over her white flesh... Sweet.... But the picture is not as it seems upon closer examination and the purported "lessons for America" aren't all they seem either. Now let's get down to bidniss and examine some claims made by Mercer:

1) White South Africa Did Not Relinquish Power In The Name Of "Justice" And "Liberty" But From Calculated Self-Interest.

Are we really supposed to buy Mercer's claim or insinuation that white people are really "yielding" their dominance in the "interests" of "justice and liberty?" It sounds suspiciously pious, a bit too good to be true.

In fact, white South Africa preserved the core of its dominance with the deal cut in the 1990s. The commanding heights of the economy (and a significant swathe of the middle range), most of the productive land, most of the finances, most of the technology control, most of the key pillars of the economy- from diamonds, to agriculture, to mining, to manufacturing, to the essential military formations and hardware, etc etc remain firmly in white hands. The deal was cut because (a) maintaining the burdensome apartheid system became too expensive, (b) the system was too embarrassing internationally, and (c) economic changes made rigid application of numerous system controls untenable.

By the 1990s white leaders in SA had to ask some hard questions. Why deploy an expensive, massive security apparatus to beat in the heads of people trying to bathe at some beach, or poor people erecting dismal shacks on the fringes of some area arbitrarily deemed "white"? What worked in the 1950s was by 1990 untenable. But if it could still have worked, white South Africa would have kept right on with apartheid. There was scant regard for "justice and liberty" on many counts back in apartheid days. Mercer would have us believe that white people piously had a "change of heart"? Such a noble narrative no doubt plays well with the "white faithful" but the reality is less flattering. The white elites in SA that "relinquished" power made the mistake of not insisting on a broader basis for black rule that took in more variety - essentially favoring the socialist oriented ANC - a "quick fix." Nevertheless the core of white prosperity was preserved, and it was inevitable that whites would lose much of the privileged positions they had enjoyed during apartheid. They would have to compete with cheaper, more productive black labor for many jobs for example, rather than being sheltered by the "color bar."

2) Likewise White America Did Not Eliminate Its Apartheid System Merely In The Name Of "Justice" Or "Liberty."
Mercer applies her narrative of noble white people to America- ever so pious white people giving away stuff in the name of "justice." Really? Such narratives play well with both white liberals (it makes them feel good) and white right-wingers (who seize on it to pump up a picture of white goodness and generosity to the "ungrateful" coloreds). But the reality is a lot less flattering to the white propaganda narrative. White America largely eliminated its own OUTWARD apartheid system because:

(a) economic changes made rigid application of numerous system controls untenable- the labor shortage and economic expansion of WW2 for example undermined racist barriers in some ways

(b) the system became too embarrassing internationally in the face of stinging Soviet exposure during the Cold War (the Soviets often pointed out American hypocrisy to talk about "democracy" while denying an important slice of the population full voting rights). America also was embarrassed by her apartheid policies when dealing with Third World nations she wished to get resources, trade, military basing rights and other things from. For example, historical documents shows Sec of State Dean Rusk lamenting how Jim Crow hurt the US internationally, and US President Eisenhower inviting African diplomats to the White House in apology because they were treated insultingly in segregated Washington, or even the leader of the "Free World" President John F. Kennedy urging DC/Maryland white realtors to ease up on their racist practices which were creating ugly diplomatic incidents (Klarman 1994).

(c) The system became too costly, not simply as regards the inefficiency of maintaining separate white and "colored" facilities (though the "colored" ones were markedly inferior and seldom "equal"), but that the political climate after WW2 brought new demands, lawsuits, strikes, boycotts, sit-ins etc that raised the costs of the US apartheid system. Another part of this also was the growing importance of the black vote to Democrats in certain areas- which added further pressure for concessions, and raised the costs of American apartheid to a level where whites were forced to make concessions.

The combination of these factors was much more potent than pious white "heart changes." White liberals in the US like to pat themselves on the back for noble action on civil rights but the reality may not be so noble. It was economic pressure brought on by changes before and after WW2, and continual embarrassment and exposure of white hypocrisy internally and internationally, that made the most impact. This does not deny that SOME whites were interested in dismantling outward American apartheid in the name of "justice"- there were many such honorable whites, but the a great deal didn't give a damn about black people, except as they were exposed, inconvenienced, embarrassed, and/or could gain some advantage in the marketplace from blacks (such as through cheap labor, or blacks as buyers of white goods and services).

Fact is that in America large segments of white people, (there are exceptions) including white people in the supposedly more "enlightened" North, fought tooth and nail for decades to deny black people basic civil rights, and basic access to free markets. They fought tooth and nail to block blacks from getting jobs, moving up in the economy, obtaining housing, etc etc. As in South Africa, many white American unions worked mightily to blockade blacks and other minorities - from cleverly written discriminatory contracts, to hate strikes, to outright murder when blacks sought so-called "reserved" jobs. The pattern repeats itself with other non-whites such as Asians, as the mass pogroms, murders and discriminatory laws against Chinese and Japanese on the West Coast attest. In many cases, white America had to be exposed and embarrassed to make even minimal concessions, or as also in South Africa, saw the edifice of white greed crumble due to economic change and market pressures (WW2 in the US for example). Much more could be said, but the bottom line is that various pious narratives of noble white people, when measured against the brutal facts of history, are on some counts highly dubious.

3) Contrary To A Barrage Of Self-Serving White Propaganda, White People Have Not Been "Swamped" By "Affirmative Action" And Furthermore The Main Beneficiaries Of "Affirmative Action" Quotas Are White. Mercer demonstrates that she knows little about the United States situation, though she presumes to be delivering "lessons for America." Five points are applicable:

--Whites The Main Aa Gainers- For one thing, most beneficiaries of "Affirmative Action" (AA) quotas in the US are white- specifically white women. AND in the past there were "white only" quotas for over a century benefiting white people.

--AA Programs Began With White Unionists- Second, AA quotas in America (lets not even count "white only" privilege for 2 centuries above and beyond that) originated as a benefit for WHITE union members in the 1930s discriminated against for belonging to a union. US Courts recognized that merely pleading with discriminators to "please stop" was meaningless and implemented "cease and desist" procedures with teeth, including making people who had been denied promotions next in line when promotions opened up. White unions, some of the most bitterest opponents of black opportunity, had no problem with such supposedly "unjust" court procedures when the beneficiaries where white. But when a black man denied promotion showed up for legal remedies then such things became "unfair" and "reverse discrimination." Ironically unions have been leaders in systematically denying black people job opportunities in the US as in South Africa. They are a telling demonstration of white hypocrisy and double standards.

--AA Quotas Not Responsible For Black Gains- Third, if Mercer knew anything about the US, she would know that AA quotas are not responsible significantly for black economic advance. As CONSERVATiVE scholar Thomas Sowell repeatedly shows, most US blacks had ALREADY pulled themselves above the poverty line, BEFORE quotas in the 1970s. Before AA quotas there was a rising trend of black income, and growth in managerial and technical jobs- with the post-WW2 expansion of the economy lifting all boats. Black college gains are primarily a result of things like the post-war GI Bill which allowed tens of thousands to go to colleges (despite opposition and sandbagging by white southern regimes) not AA quotas of universities. Such quotas exist but they are minor factors to black advances in education. Equal opportunity laws and court decisions certainly helped along these rising trends for blacks, but equal opportunity laws like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not mandate quotas (quite the contrary actually), and such trends were ALREADY in place before the laws, and long before AA quota "remedies" in the late 1960s- like Nixon's 1968 "Philadelphia Plan."

--AA Policies Weakly Enforced- Fourth, aside from quotas even enforcement of non-quota equal opportunity laws has been hampered by deliberately low budgets and staffing imposed by assorted politicians, as under the Reagan regime. The EEOC for example has a 2 year plus backlog of cases- hardly the express vehicle of employer oppression claimed by white propagandists in some quarters.

- - "Reverse Discrimination" A Minor Problem For Whites- Reverse discrimination against whites in the workplace has occurred but it is minor according to credible studies of the issue. See for example the detailed analyses of Blumrosen (1996) . And the biggest cause of "reverse discrimination" lawsuits are not whites against blacks but- wait for it- white men against white women. But of course, few would know this from the white propaganda barrage against those "colored" supposedly "swamping" white people, and "taking white jobs" via "quotas." Detailed audits of employment discrimination show blacks were much more likely to be discriminated against than white men and likewise national surveys, and exhaustive reviews of discrimination complaints show relatively few whites have experienced reverse discrimination. (Ore 2005, Blumrosen 1996)

It should also be noted that even where AA "quotas" gained a foothold, from their very inception whites have throttled and limited them, using tactics ranging from lawsuits to behind the scenes bureaucratic subterfuge. When a 1970s lawsuit exposed discriminatory practices in the 1970s San Francisco Police Department for example, white bureaucratic controllers issued a new civil service eligibility promotion list, creating a huge batch of white captains, a supposedly "non-racial" move designed to clog the promotional pipeline to that rank for years, and thus eliminate numerous black candidates- effectively spiking or hampering their promotions (Dulaney 1996, Black Police).

--Blacks Do Not Rely On "Quotas" To Much Extent For Higher Education- AA in "politically correct" places like universities has in SOME cases discriminated against whites. But the fact is that blacks do not rely to any significant degree on AA quotas for access to higher education. As already noted above, the GI Bill has been a much more significant factor in opening up such access than "affirmative action." In addition the alleged numbers of blacks "swamping" white people are rather minor.

4) Multiculturalism" And "Diversity" Has Actually Been Profitable For White People Despite Some Abuses.

---"Diversity" And "Multicultural" Oft Serves To Make White People Feel Noble And Enlightened Not Guilty.

Multicultural initiatives are not necessarily anti-white- in fact some have been very useful in creating a more accurate narrative of history and policy- much better than previous segregationist or "manifest destiny" propaganda in various places and school textbooks well into the 1960s. And "multiculturalism" does not necessarily create "white guilt." There have been abuses but there is a flip side. Some "multicultural" initiatives promote white self-esteem and self-congratulation. Whites feel noble for "progressive" measures that removed the Jim Crow apartheid system, and other measures to help blacks get a stake in the system, like opening up democracy via gasp- actually allowing black people to vote! Imagine that!

--"Multiculturalism" Is A Good Way For White People To Fob Off Restive Minorities With Chump Change While The Core Of White Hegemony Is Preserved.
Another benefit of "multi-culturalism" to whites is that it allows questioning minorities to be fobbed off with chump change- a small grant here, a "diversity coordinator" job there, token hires someplace else. "Beads for the natives" if you will.. that warm the hearts of the gullible.. This keeps them quiescent and ensures that more fundamental questions about the power structure, and the systematic networks of white privilege are not effectively raised. This is an old pattern going back to some of the "War on Poverty" programs when small-potatoes grants, jobs and programs were dispersed, "cooling off" unrest and/or criticism of discriminatory white privilege. In some cases it even helped split minority coalitions into petty recipients squabbling with one another over petty funding that ultimately served as a more effective lever of control than snarling dogs, ranting racists and blasting fire hoses. White people also get paid as they fill diversity jobs and administer diversity programs.

Likewise white liberals who think "diversity" is cool are busy implementing seemingly non-racial barriers that HURT "diversity." The numerous zoning laws and other restrictions that suppress the supply of housing for example has been very effective in "ethnically cleansing" assorted white neighborhoods (and associated things like schools) of "undesirable" minorities. Who needs dynamite or fire hoses anymore? Whites can create "black free" zones, all the while appearing cool, progressive and into "diversity." It's the best of both worlds.

5. Mercer does a service in exposing the disgraceful behavior of some blacks in South Africa as regards rape of their own women.
A common complaint is that rapes of white women are taken more seriously than rapes of black women. This cuts both ways. Black female rape victims who are much more victim in SOuth Africa are not taken seriously enough EITHER by blacks. Mercer exposes the callous treatment accorded these women. Even as regards SA president Zuma, the black victim's sexual history was deemed fair game, but Zuma's previous sexual history was treated much more gently. Mercer exposes this black hypocrisy. Mercer is also correct in noting that rapes of white women have gone up in SA but these are still far below what black women suffer on a daily basis. White women are the best protected of all women in SA. Still, one raped woman, is one too many.

Rape of "native girls" was widespread by white South African males. They had relatively little to fear in the way of punishment. The laws of the apartheid state, and the pre-apartheid regime made the "rape of black women less of a crime, less punishable, and of less consequence than the rape of white women." (Graham 2012, State of Peril). South Africa has a high number of reported rape cases according to some reports but relatively few of the victims of these assaults are white. Its black women who are suffering horrendously. Rape levels in SA remain high, but one historian (Graham 2012, State of Peril) argues that there has been little statistical evidence of any "epidemic" of rape against white women, who are the best protected of all women in SA. Rape was a major but hidden social problem under apartheid. The white apartheid regime did little to address it, and the new black bosses are likewise doing relatively little.

6) Whites Have Not Been Unfairly "Muzzled" From "Speaking Out" About Race. To The Contrary, There Is No Shortage Of White People Venting, Ranting And "Speaking Out."

--Mercer and assorted supporters insinuates that white people are no longer able to "speak out" due to "political correctness" and a media "blackout" that "muzzles" them, or covers up black misdeeds. But this is simply not so. The Internet is awash with white opinion in countless venues- from discussion forums, to blogs, to Youtube videos maintained by whites. Where is this so-called "muzzling"? White South Africa has for decades manipulated media with unending propaganda to picture themselves as virtuous upholders of "civilization" as compared to the backward darkies. That has never stopped and South African media has no shortage of white "free expression."

--Far From "Favoring" Blacks The White Media Has Often Been Slanted In Its Coverage To Portray The Most Negative Aspects Involving Blacks.
And in older media like print books and magazine articles, white people have not been "muzzled" at all. In the US, the 1980s and 1990s for example saw a vast outpouring of books and articles against "political correctness" "liberals" and the pathologies afflicting blacks. Black crime, out of wedlock births, etc. etc. were, and have been well reported, and sneeringly commented on. None of it is "hidden" by "the media." In fact, credible scholars of "the media" have noted how it continually plays on white fears and double standards- showing whites engaged in similar activity as blacks in a more sympathetic or neutral light for example.

Time and time again, white media have seized on the most sensationalist black imagery to reinforce the image of the feckless, threatening, primitive negro-- like the bogus, but suitably lurid "stories" of "baby rapes" during 2005's Hurricane Katrina. Books like Welfare: Race, Media, and the Politics of Antipoverty Policy.- 2007-Martin Gilens) expose much of this detail. White media had a field day with numerous "black criminal" stories- from the Central Park Joggers, to OJ. In short, blacks have received little special treatment from "the media"- to the contrary. All this continues today, in more muted and coded form than in the past, but still in place. Where is this mysterious "muzzling" of white people the faithful cry so piteously about? Likewise the misdeeds of prominent black figures like singer R. Kelly, mayor Barry of Washing ton DC, Al Sharpton, or Detroit's Kilpatrick are well known and have been extensively covered by the liberal white media. The alleged media "coverup" charged in white racist lore is sheer fantasy and outright hypocrisy

--White Right Wingers Have Themseves For Years Been Playing "The Race Card" In The Media And Milking Racial Tension And Imagery.
And white right-wingers for decades have been milking anti-black sentiment among whites often using "coded" references and campaigns. Yes there was a "southern strategy" and it was based on race as detailed works on the Nixon era show. This is but one example. The "coded" references of American politicians on a number of fronts are another example. White right-wingers hypocritically cry about how the "liberals" are playing race cards, when they themselves have been milking "race cards" about "the culluds" profitably for years.

7) Is "Diversity" Really A Vast Oppression Of Economic Oppression Against White People? Mercer's Broad Brish Claim Is Dubious. To The Contrary, Well-Armed Whites Control Most Of The Levers Of Wealth In South Africa And Are Comfortably Off Relative To Blacks.

Mercer claims that `Diversity' is a euphemism for racial retribution administered mostly by guilty white liberals in universities, corporations, and government. It is a thoroughly collectivist notion that condones punishing the current generation of white males for the sins of the past. It's most extreme form is practiced in post-Apartheid South Africa racist labor laws that have created `The world's most extreme affirmative action program'. Some of the policies in place by the new black regime is unproductive socialism that penalizes the productive, but how much of the job loss of SA whites is due to an evil "diversity" or "affirmative action"? Mercer's arguments are not quite convincing.

-- Whites Comfortably Situated Overall. And Are Not Facing "Genocide."
For one thing whites are very comfortably situated in South Africa. They control most of the wealth, dominate finance, technology and the most lucrative economic sectors, and are among the best armed civilians per capita in the world. There have been several instances of violent crime against whites but in overall perspective they pale besides the greater violence wreaked on blacks every day. Comparatively speaking whites are much better able to fend for themselves than most blacks, and suffer much lower rates of crime.

It is also true that some lower tier whites have lost their long privileged places in the economy- places they secured because their "color bar" locked out free market black competition. But overall, whites are fairly well situated. No Zimbabwe will happen in SA. Whites are too rich, too important to the economy, and crucially, too well armed. Mercer is upset that whites have lost their PUBLICLY privileged positions of old, but said whites still retain a comfortable position and are not facing the hysterical "genocide" claimed in some quarters. Furthermore SA is not Zimbabwe with its limited resource base but a major player on the world stage in terms of gold, etc. White Western elites are not willing at all to see that go- hence claims of "genocide" against whites are simplistically overblown.

-- The "Extreme" Affirmative Action Is Partially Normal Political Spoils, Partly The Removal Of Less Productive Or Competitive Whites Who Were Sheltered By Apartheid Color Bars.
The "extreme affirmative action" program lamented over by Mercer is also questionable. First some of what she claims to be "unjust" affirmative action is simply what happens when another political party takes office- it distributes SOME spoils to supporters. White people in the US do it all the time-just read about the white political machines in urban America. This is old fashioned politics. Second a substantial proportion of less competitive, less productive whites were sheltered with privileged "color bar" sinecures under apartheid- with the end of that artificial shelter, it is inevitable that black alternatives fill the gap- whether in terms of less expensive labor, or more productive labor. Why should a company keep paying inflated white union benefits and wages when cheaper, more productive or motivated black labor can get the same job done?

Mercer does not discuss such data in detail. In fact the removal of apartheid revealed South Africa's dirty little secret. Mercer paints a picture of virtuous, productive white people, but the end of color-barism showed that many whites were not all the virtuous workers she touts, but too often, a sheltered, protected pampered class. In the US there are now numerous white South African immigrants and one sees them hustling on the job or to find work. Many Americans have little sympathy. Their response is: "You are no longer in your little sheltered race cocoon. Get out there and hustle like the rest of us Yanks. Welcome to the club."

-- Short-Sighted Black Quotaism Will Harm Long Term Prospects If The *Most Productive* Whites Go, But Normal Democratic Spoils And Normal Use Of Cheaper More Productive Black Labor Meant Some Whites Would Inevitably Be Losers.
Does this mean that SA's "affirmative action" policies above and beyond the 2 factors above are the best ones? No. There is a level beyond normal political spoils and economic efficiency where "quotas" are counterproductive. SA will find this out as more skilled workers leave. For now leaders are short-sighted about the need to retain the most productive whites. SA will pay the price in future years. Likewise the blacks who run today's SA are making a mistake when they refuse to rein in political cronyism and allow normal democratic spoils to hurt productive business or activity. Black regimes are also making a serious mistake by not reining in government spending and cronyism. Every politician rewards cronies but they key is restricting and limiting such rewards. SA's willingness to do so is much open to question, In any event, when the whole picture is considered, Mercer's insinuation (or that of her supporters) that most white job losses are due to "affirmative action quotas" is dubious.

Even if there were no black animosity in today's South Africa and blacks loved all white people, that still would not mean that (a) politicians would not reward their supporters as in any democracy and (b) economic efficiencies would not cause the use of cheaper more productive black labor. There two things are inevitable. It does not all boil down to Mercer's simplistic complaint about "affirmative action."

THE BOTTOM LINE

Mercer says many true things about today's South Africa and rightly condemns the corruption and incompetence in many black quarters, And yes there has been a Western media spin re a pious "Mandelaism." But her narrative is also stretched and distorted in some other places. It mirrors similar "white virtue" narratives in the United States, much of them also distorted and sometimes outright bogus.

Her "undeserving blacks" narrative on "affirmative action" is a case in point. Given the loss of the artificially protected "color bar" economy in SA, it was inevitably that a significant slice of whites would see job losses as cheaper, more productive black labor filled the long suppressed free market. This has noting to do with "political correctness" or "reverse discrimination." It is plain Economics 101. Read Tom Sowell's "Economics" series. Similar things happened in the US in the southern textile industry. Civil Rights laws pried open the cosy job protection rackets of whites, and black employment made significant gains, as mill owners discovered cheaper, similar or more productive black labor could get the job done without paying any "white tax." White job losses thus are not all due to the simplistically claimed "quotas." or "reverse" discrimination.

It is interesting that Ayn Rand lovers who tout "free markets" start to complain when unleashed "free markets" take away cosy, coddled white protections. Suddenly, things become "unfair" when black people begin to get a piece of the "free market" action. Such hypocrisy is also seen among some libertarians who are all for "liberty" but oppose mechanisms that would create a playing field "liberty" for ALL citizens- hence some oppose even the minimal public accommodations provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Such things still mark right wing and libertarian approaches, making Mercer's "lessons for America" less useful than they might have been. This book is a well written polemic, with valuable insights on today's South Africa and the ruinous nonsense in SOME quarters brought on by black rule, but its sometimes "white innocence" narrative as noted above is also a bit self-serving. Read in combination with other more empirically based works.

...until I saw that the author was both heavily jewish and a follower of ayn rand (purposely not capitalized). Much of the South African civil rights movements were led by jews (Slovo, for example). Additionally, the crux of Western societal destruction is a pervasive movement called Critical Theory which started in Columbia University by zionist jews from the Frankfurt School. It has been successfully injected into our society to create political correction. To note, ayn rand (aka alissa rosenbaum) is a destructive agent promoting selfish individualism instead of a cohesive society thru her "literary" meanderings called books. She was yet another cold war agent from the USSR pretending to hate communism.