Commentary: I am in love with Jack

I am in love with Jack. Scrumpy Jack. It's this garishly green pub down the street from my house in Cape Town, South Africa. During the day, you'll find a bunch of white male drunks raiding the free popcorn and beer taps, which is probably typical of any pub open at noon.

Around dinner time, the clientele drastically changes. The drunks stumble down the road to their quaint Capetonian cottages. A veritable mix of students, young and "mature" adults, and local riff-raff quickly take over the pool table and bar stands. Oh yeah, these new merry-makers are black, white and coloured--South Africans of both African and European descent.

The first time I entered Scrumpy Jack, I was shocked by the racial and socioeconomic diversity of the clientele. On a typical night at Scrumpy Jack, you'll find Leo, the coloured bartender, playing pool with some local white students. In the corner, a small group of black urbanites order another round after hearing it's my American friend's 21st birthday. Granted, Scrumpy Jack is not the epitome of Capetonian bar dynamics, but it's certainly typical of the kind of progress South Africa has made in the last ten years.

From an era of extreme rights violations to a future of bona fide democracy, South Africa has managed to accomplish the impossible.

Its constitution is the most inclusive and progressive in the world, granting protection from discrimination and government intrusion on the basis of multiple grounds, including HIV status, gender expression, religion, disability, race and sexual orientation. It also grants a range of "soft," or positive rights, which in practice has been difficult to implement, but the foundation for a burgeoning democracy couldn't be stronger.

This sort of mentality is tangible in the creation of a special judicial court that deals with issues of discrimination and intimidation. Just last month, a coloured man was awarded a settlement from a downtown club for being denied entrance by the bouncers. This was the first case in the new court, and South Africans applauded the judicial statement that discrimination of any sort will not be tolerated.

This case takes on greater significance considering that the coloured man was denied entrance to a prominent gay club. No one seemed to care that this was a "gay" incident. The only concern was that the man had been discriminated against.

South Africans hope that the future is grounded in a strong memory of past atrocities. At the writing of the new constitution, black, white and coloured leaders recognized that the only successful post-apartheid South Africa is one that recognizes the equality and dignity of all citizens, not just black Christians. Muslims, Jews, Hindus, sexual minorities, homeless persons, HIV positive persons and every other possible minority in the Rainbow Nation is not only accorded full citizenship (as in the United States), but the respect for their humanity.

Unfortunately, the United States never learned from a history of oppression, from the atrocities of slavery to the indignity of civil rights violations in the last 140 years. Arab South Africans would never be "profiled" at airports; gay South Africans do not have to defend their human worth; Arab South Africans are not inexplicably interned; minority-language speaking South Africans do not have to fight for access to adequate education.

A continent away, the United States chooses to deny that a considerable percentage of blacks live in poverty because of a history of brutal oppression. The United States chooses to trust that affirmative action is an adequate band-aid for future improvements.

Most remarkably, the United States chooses to believe there are a few racists "out there," and as long as no one is explicitly racist, we've made progress. The United States refuses to call a spade a spade--racism is racism and it's rampant in our nation's policies and social hierarchies.

And what's more, the United States--its government and citizens--refuse to believe that discrimination is discrimination, persecution is persecution, regardless of specific issue. No level of discrimination or persecution can be tolerated in a society that values freedom and equality.

South Africans value nothing higher than freedom and equality; and their history requires them to talk about discrimination and persecution every day of their lives, regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation or ethnicity. How long are we going to pretend that we no longer need these conversations in the United States, a country devoted to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

Christopher Scoville is a Trinity junior. His column appears every third Thursday.