All faiths used violence
Pope Benedict, in trying to argue that religion should not be spread by force, failed to say that the Catholic Church, indeed Christianity, has been guilty of this.
Strife between Catholicism and Protestantism, and the use of force to maintain orthodoxies by the rack, burning and warfare, are an unedifying history.
But the last pope at least apologised for the Crusades. Has Islam ever apologised for its conquests? Perhaps it should contemplate the bloody struggles of Shia and Sunni.
All have sinned, and all should acknowledge this as the beginning of fruitful discussion and abatement of fanaticism. — Peter Titlestad, Pretoria
Zapiro’s cartoon showing the pope as the “Holy Goat” was an intentionally incendiary distraction from the point he was trying to make that religious justifications of violence are unacceptable.
While presumably wanting to assert the principle of religious tolerance and respect, the cartoonist shows no respect for Christianity.
Here’s another example of a “politically correct” intellectual elite priding itself on its pluralistic relativism, but not living according to its own ideals. — Pastor Felix Meylahn, Port Elizabeth
As an Anglican, I doubt I am alone in finding this cheap schoolboy joke offensive in a major newspaper. You would not (and should not) publish such cartoons against the Jewish or Muslim faiths. — H Carman
Faith exhorts us to forgive. I forgive you for the cartoon. — Noreen Ramsden, Durban
I am not a Catholic, but if you wanted to respond to the pope’s criticism of Islam, you should have made fun of him, not the most sacred Christian doctrine of the Trinity. I will not buy your newspaper again and I will ask my congregation to do the same. — Raoul Comninos, Cape Town
‘Pope Benedict XVI is more dangerous, although far more discriminating in his bigotry, than weapons of mass destruction,” writes Madeleine Bunting (September 22). Perhaps we Jews, Muslims, homosexuals, women priests, Buddhists and rock’n’rollers should just gas ourselves and save him the trouble. — Anthony Court, Pretoria
I find caricatures of the Holy Trinity deeply offensive and insist on an apology to me and all Christians. — Derick Jordaan
You did precisely the same as you accuse the pope of doing — offending religious sensibilities. — Jacobus (a priest)
Zapiro will one day stand before the very God he has ridiculed to give answer. And he won’t have press freedom to defend himself. — R Butler
The joke is that many of the pope’s fiercest Muslim critics would strongly agree with him on homosexuality, Buddhism, the role of women in religion, same-sex marriage, rock music and cloning. In fact, it seems they see eye to eye on every issue except Islam. — Alex Myers, Cape Town
The article by Abdulkader Tayob (September 22) proposing “a genuine dialogue over values in all our societies across the artificial barriers that our cultures and nations have imposed” is a balanced and well-considered opinion.
Such a debate should be encouraged by the M&G, rather than enforcing your militant secularist agenda on your readers. — JL Neels, Jo’burg
Tutu’s name not misused
Rita Marley and Africa Unite have never used Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s name in vain, as stated by the headline on Kwanele Sosibo’s article of September 15.
Marley was appointed a patron of the Desmond Tutu Emerging Leadership Programme (ELP), an initiative of the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre, in a signed document by ELP CEO Clem van Wyk on August 1 this year.
On August 18 Marley and Tutu handed out awards at the Desmond Tutu Emerging Leadership Awards Dinner in Cape Town. On September 5 Marley, The Bob and Rita Marley Foundations and Thirty-Three Productions held a press conference in Johannesburg announcing the Africa Unite initiative to take place throughout South Africa next February.
The press release mentioning Africa Unite’s association with the ELP was approved by Van Wyk on September 1.
The first Africa Unite and Marley knew about the ELP separating from the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre was in your report. Africa Unite will now investigate its relationship with the ELP. — Candice J Yusim, Thirty-Three Productions, Inc, North Hollywood, US
Aids: Be cruel to be kind
Your exposé on public hospitals is accurate. In six years working in Gauteng public hospitals, I’ve seen the decline as we struggle to combat Aids.
But in every struggle there are heroes. With every blood specimen they retrieve, with every contact with Aids/TB patients, doctors and nurses on the frontline risk their lives. They work under trying conditions and for ridiculous hours — some doctors work 30-hour shifts.
To rub salt in their wounds, health workers pay to do their jobs. The health department does not subsidise health workers’ insurance or exorbitant council fees.
Yes, we owe compassion to all the sick, but this should not cloud our judgement. Our resource constraints demand that we prioritise spending. Money should be allocated to treating society’s ills through moral regeneration, prevention, education, circumcision and poverty alleviation.
Many see Aids as a means of ethnic cleansing — a thousand black deaths a day and you solve crime and unemployment. Aids is the new apartheid, and we overcome that by changing perceptions.
So put away those ARVs and start changing perceptions. We need to be cruel to be kind. — Dr Frank Sibanda, Emmarentia
US spray used on TAC
In regard to Zukile Majova’s article (September 1), SWAT Deftac has manufactured pepper sprays since 1994 without one instance of death or injury. Our products have CSIR approval as being safe for use on humans.
The active agent in our pepper sprays is oleoresin capsicum, the food-grade extract of chilli peppers. Certain policemen I know use our spray to add “bite” to their braaivleis. There are no harmful side effects and/or health risks for pregnant women or those with HIV. If that were the case, such people could not eat chilli.
The police used an American product called First Defense on the TAC protesters — not our spray. — Rob McCallum, MD, SWAT Deftac
Debate with me, Kirby
Robert Kirby attacks me for supporting nuclear power (September 15) and challenges me to declare my interests.
I’m a professional engineer with physics and engineering degrees who has spent 16 years in industry, and seven years in university energy research. Since last December, I’ve worked part-time for the PBMR Company, and have declared this at every public meeting I’ve addressed.
I am an environmentalist who supports nuclear power as the cleanest and safest energy source, and I write and speak in my private capacity.
I challenge Kirby to a public debate on Koeberg and Chernobyl. At this, I would be happy to show the public every cent I earn — if he will do the same. — Andrew Kenny, Noordhoek
DA broke its promises
In response to your article on the Western Cape local government minister’s intervention in the City of Cape Town (September 22), I would point out that the law gives the minister the right and powers to determine a municipality’s system of governance.
The Act has been in force for several years and these powers have been exercised by various provincial ministers. The DA has never objected in the past; it should not object now merely because of its lust for power and desire to protect the salaries of its members and small allies.
In its manifesto, the DA said it is committed to using the executive committee system so that power is not centralised in one person. “Executive mayors tend to minimise the ability of residents of a municipality to influence its decision-making processes. This will ensure that all residents are represented in the key decision-making bodies,” it said. Why is it breaking its promises to voters?
Also, driven by an agenda of entrenching white privileges and marginalising the poverty-stricken coloured and African majority, it is failing to govern in a unifying manner. Whites and males overwhelmingly dominate the mayoral committee when we are trying to build a non-racial and non-sexist Cape Town. There is one African in a 13-member committee in a city where 40% of people are African.
Committee members have repeatedly clashed with Helen Zille about her desire to control everything and to be in the limelight at their expense. The DA stopped the Sakha Ikapa cleaning programme, resulting in rubbish piling up in townships. Zille has continuously undermined the 2010 World Cup programmes, and has treated city managers with callous disrespect. The DA constantly claims to have uncovered corruption, yet no case has been tried and led to a conviction. It has redemarcated the sub-councils along apartheid lines and appointed mostly white males to chair them.
The committee reflects only 51% of the city’s councillors — 60% voted against the DA. The overwhelming majority of coloureds and Africans voted for the ANC and the ID, yet the committee excludes them.
The executive committee system will ensure that the DA, ANC and ID jointly govern Cape Town — a key first step in building a united, non-racial, non-sexist prosperous city for all its people. — Matthew Parks, ANC deputy secretary, Dullah Omar (City of Cape Town) region
No Stalinism at UKZN
So who is the “Stalin” of the University of KwaZulu-Natal (September 15)? Is it the ukzndaba editorial team? Or the university executive?
Before he wrote this article, David Macfarlane knew that it was neither of these. I told him that:
Photographer Sally Giles supplied the information for the article, photo and caption for the ukzndaba piece. She told Macfarlane she airbrushed Fazel Khan out of the photo, but he gave this scant prominence in his article. Ukzndaba had no knowledge of Khan’s involvement in the documentary.
The campus newspaper relies heavily on staff sending in stories and photos. We have never had any reason to doubt the veracity of articles or photos before, and had no reason to do so in Giles’s case.
When I pointed this out to Macfarlane, he sympathised, saying that any publication could find itself similarly placed.
The ukzndaba editorial team made no decision that Khan should not appear in ukzndaba. Proof that the editorial team is not seeking to “sideline” staff members who were involved in the strike, or who are critical of the executive, lies in the fact that, in the past two issues, we have run an interview with Kesh Govinder, another strike leader, and Robert Morrell, whose controversial views on transformation are well known to M&G readers. — Deanne Collins, acting publications manager, UKZN
Legalism
Lilian Horak (Letters, September 22) should read up on Christian teachings regarding repentance, restitution, grace and forgiveness before judging or minimising what Adriaan Vlok has done.
Our unforgiveness blocks God’s grace, prevents us from receiving inner healing and prevents reconciliation.
Legalists — usually self-righteous — demand acts of penance, as distinct from God’s requirement of repentance.
Such perfectionists are never satisfied with voluntary acts of restitution. This shows that the real problem is within themselves, in the form of anger and pain that they need to take to the Lord. — Eleanor Poulter, Durban