Nice. I mean, if you gotta be a refugee, then that is definitely the way to go, right?
Just for the record, though, that is not how refugees normally arrive in the United States. It’s usually a little tougher than that. OK, a lot tougher. Sometimes the journey of a refugee – let’s say that refugee is from Central America - involves traveling hundreds of miles on foot through extraordinarily dangerous territory under conditions that I’m guessing may have caused those white South Africaners to throw a temper tantrum right there on the spot.
Nobody told us this was going to be so terribly unpleasant! We thought there would be tea!
I’m just saying that normally we don’t send jets overseas – or across the border – to pick up folks waving distress handkerchiefs who claim to be in trouble and then fly them back here at our own expense so they can go about the business of resettling themselves into a better life. But then, most refugees aren’t white, so I guess that kinda settles that.
Oh, and most refugees aren’t from Elon Musk’s homeland. So there’s that too.
Thankfully, this flagrant misuse and abuse of the term ‘refugee’ has been flagged by the Episcopal Church, which has strenuously called out this above-and-beyond-the-call-of-duty act of white privilege for what it is. And then they said they would have no part in it. I’m not Episcopalian, and I’m not exactly a model Christian, but God bless them. Each and every one. From NPR:
“In a striking move that ends a nearly four-decades-old relationship between the federal government and the Episcopal Church, the denomination announced on Monday that it is terminating its partnership with the government to resettle refugees, citing moral opposition to resettling white Afrikaners from South Africa who have been classified as refugees by President Trump's administration.
“The announcement came just as flights with Afrikaners were scheduled to arrive at Washington Dulles International Airport, outside Washington, D.C. — the first batch of entries after Trump declared via a February executive order that the U.S. would take in "Afrikaners in South Africa who are victims of unjust racial discrimination." The South African government has stridently denied allegations of systemic racial animus, as has a coalition of white religious leaders in the region that includes many Anglicans.”
Just for clarification, there is no such thing as a white South African refugee. And the Episcopal Church is well aware of that fact. Because there is nothing that a white South African needs to be refuged from. Ain’t nobody racially oppressing white people in South Africa, once the home of apartheid and one of the most brutally racist countries in the world by law. Meaning that in South Africa during the apartheid era, being a racist white person was basically just a white person following the law. But a Black person opposing that law, like Nelson Mandela or Stephen Biko, was considered a criminal and therefore either harshly punished (Mandela) or murdered (Biko).
And how’s this for being oppressed?
South Africa's wealth distribution is heavily influenced by race, with white South Africans historically and currently holding a disproportionate share of wealth. In other words, the more things have changed, the more things have stayed the same, as far as white folks staying on top.
So then what exactly are those 59 white Afrikaners fleeing that is so horrible? Excellent question. And as soon as I have an answer, I’ll let you know. ‘Cause right now I got no idea.
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Absolutely, there are no such people who are "White South Africans ."