Racist, Homophobic and Obviously Discriminatory Ethical stance by Students (Rhodes)…?

When arriving at Rhodes, one of the first things to do is to establish relationships with other first-years, the people you are going to hang out with for the rest of your varsity life. This is a lot more difficult, and ‘picky’, than it seems.

Compared to other South African universities, Rhodes is known for its cultural diversity and its open-mindedness; as a first-year girl in my residence, Sibongile says, “Rhodes is very liberal, tolerant and conducive for everyone.” However, when looking at some of the posts on the Activate forum and hearing comments from others, this seems to be far from the truth. Rhodes is not the ideal post-apartheid wonderland that it appears to be, but rather, it is plagued by homophobia and racism.

Former SRC president, Ricardo Pillay, admits having witnessed homophobic behaviour at Rhodes, with students calling homosexuals “queer” and “faggots”. Another student, Jenna Collett, in response to derogatory comments directed towards homosexuality, spoke about her own experiences as a lesbian: she had to make out in the Rat’s bathrooms to avoid the disapproving looks and gossip, but also disgusting comments such as, “‘Yes girls! Do it again’,” or “I can set you straight”, which belittles and reduces her relationship to pornography. She adds, “believe me, kissing someone you are interested in, in a shitty, vomit covered bathroom is not the ideal venue for a meaningful connection.” She also points out the other problems that homosexuals have to deal with, such as verbal and physical harassment, sometimes even rape. There have been other incidents where homosexual men have been thrown out of Friar’s for kissing.

Speaking of our beloved Friar’s, not only have there been homophobic incidences, but some students have also expressed their anger towards the silent discrimination that goes on at the door. There have been cases where black students have been refused entrance or have been given trouble, while the bouncer will let the next white person in line, inside. I have even heard a similar personal account from someone, where she was turned down at the door, only for the next person – white, of course – to be let in.

So much for the broad smiles in the ‘colourful’ pictures advertising Rhodes’s diversity. I think that these examples of blatant hatred of the ‘other’ truly illustrate the side that Rhodes does not want to show. It is easy to turn a blind eye on these issues, however, ignoring them is not the solution either. As students, and especially first years, we need to challenge these fears of what is different.

However, the issues of accepting people who are different than yourself, are more complicated than it seems. It is not always an issue of skin colour or gender preference, but more an issue of cultural clashes. When speaking to Sibongile, I found out that, according to her, “people prefer sticking to their own kind.” She explains that it is a personal choice: people don’t want to explore another race, gender or culture, “it is too much admin.” She thinks it might be out of fear of the family’s reaction, external pressures and “it’s just too complicated”, because of the differences in values and up-bringings. Jadine, another first-year, adds, “you can’t be with someone who doesn’t have the same belief system as you; the relationship won’t work.”

Another problem with the students’ mentality, and more broadly, South Africans, is that we define people through stereotypes and are still not familiar with the idea of cultural hybridisation. As the article “Coconuts and Oreos” clearly expresses, we have set ideas of what it means to be ‘black’, ‘white’, and more generally, ‘homosexual’ or ‘heterosexual’ or anything else for that matter! It doesn’t help saying that we ‘accept’ diversity, yet we still regard homosexuals as different to us or define people by the colour of their skin; for example, are such comments as “I’m not racist but I wouldn’t consider going out with a black person”, or vice versa, truly accepting different races or diversity in general? I don’t think so. Finally, to quote OUTRhodes “labels are for boxes”; so we must stop trying to fit people into our own little realities, but rather, let’s try to understand theirs.