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This is the difference between individuals and organizations. At no point did the author attempt to "respect" or "open a dialog" with the KKK as an org. (I'd argue his talks were aimed at individuals.) Instead, he opened a respectful dialog with individual Klansmen.

The LGBTQ rights movement shows us the same thing. Look at how politicians who used to advocate discrimination modified their stance when family members came out to them. It didn't stop institutions from discriminating against LGTBQ rights directly, but enough brothers, mothers, sisters, sons, best friends, etc. coming out on a one-on-one basis eventually took the wind out of some of the institutional discrimination.

The idea that a group of people are less than human because of a particular characteristic is what enables this kind of institutionalized hatred. However, if we open enough one-on-one respectful dialogs across the lines that propose to divide us, the institutions that support those divisions will lose their support and melt away.

There is a long way to go. Racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. are rampant not just in the western world, but globally, and institutions reinforce these boundaries daily. However, with enough mature dialog by individuals, we can wear down hatred with respect.

I hope this doesn't come across as trivializing what you say (if so that's not my intent), for the AoEII players here it's basically the difference between a Monk-rush (where you convert enemies one-by-one and let them turn on each other) and a direct attack. Both are valid strategies - the choice, which to choose is more related to the in-game economics, so not really applicable here. But one shouldn't underestimate the effect it has on the wider 'KKK brotherhood' (or whatever they call themselves) when even a Grand Dragon gives his rope to a black man.

One thing though, I recommend everyone interested in this topic to watch the documentary about D. Davis on Netflix: Accidental Courtesy. It shows other (AFAIK failed) dialogs with other extremist groups, particularly a Neo-Nazi as well as rather extremist members of the BLM movement. Other examples, particularly Jews befriending Neo-Nazis, seem to show a pattern: You really have to be a member of the centrally hated target to be able to convince members of such extremist groups. Almost like how antidotes work - a black person can be the antidote to KKK while Jews can be that for Neo-Nazis. Maybe BLM members need to talk with white policemen and vice versa?

I'm thinking, as long as it's not someone whose group you really hate, there's always a central pillar left that keeps your belief system up. "Oh well, I guess black people can be pretty smart, but still, those Jews are what's the real danger to society, so I'd better stick to the plan."

> There is a fine line between collaboration and dialogue.

I think this is a very important point that a lot of people don't quite get.

For example, I am a pacificist. When I tell this to people, they sometimes assume I would stand aside and do nothing if a loved one was threatened with violence.

In fact, the opposite is true: I would act aggressively and assertively (or I hope I would).

Pacifist != Passive

Acting with compassion for those who hate you does not disarm your ability to aggressively support and defend your rights. Really, in such a case, one should strive to be increasingly effective.

The author of this article found a point of leverage that was effective in achieving his goals. I don't think I'd call what he was doing "dialogue," even though talking was part of it.

> The author of this article found a point of leverage that was effective in achieving his goals. I don't think I'd call what he was doing "dialogue," even though talking was part of it.

Exactly. It's like using the feather as a replacement to the sword, figuratively speaking. It's essentially brainwashing people, but in a positive sense of the word, i.e. washing out tribal thoughts that are cancerous to a wider open society.

> For example, I am a pacificist. When I tell this to people, they sometimes assume I would stand aside and do nothing if a loved one was threatened with violence.

This seems like an own-goal, as the popular perception of pacifism is just that: never using violence. I recommend not using the term on yourself, as it paints the wrong picture in people's minds. If you define pacifism as "only using violence in defense of self or loved ones", then that's totally compatible with getting a concealed carry permit and carrying a gun in public– not exactly most people's idea of pacifism.

The error is in equating "doing something" with "using violence".

A cryptic response. Besides running away (which is often not possible) what other options are there?

Perhaps somewhat inaccurate wrt a direct threat against family, but this image comes to mind:

http://www.greanvillepost.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Tia...

> If you define pacifism as "only using violence in defense of self or loved ones"

I never defined pacifism that way. It seems you are falling exactly into the trap I talked about. There are always options other than violence. They are not always good options, but neither is violence.

Aggressive and assertive action is not the same as violence.

Can you please give a concrete example of what you are talking about? As I've said: you can't always escape a threat. What "aggressive and assertive action" will you take if some crazy person tries to cave your head in with a cinder block? (This has happened to me.)

Three times in my life, people have tried to kill me. Sometimes you can't escape. Sometimes you can't negotiate. And you can't count on others to arrive in time and use violence to save you. Sometimes, the choice is simple: fight or die. Do you disagree with this statement? If not, do you think the right thing to do in those situations is to die?

> "For example, I am a pacifist. When I tell this to people, they sometimes assume I would stand aside and do nothing if a loved one was threatened with violence. In fact, the opposite is true: I would act aggressively and assertively (or I hope I would). Pacifist != Passive"

It sounds as if people are confused because you are using the word pacifist incorrectly. Pacifism means that you believe violence is never the answer. Look at a list of definitions:

Pacifism: the belief that any violence, including war, is unjustifiable under any circumstances, and that all disputes should be settled by peaceful means.

Pacifism: opposition to war or violence as a means of settling disputes

Pacifism: an attitude or policy of nonresistance

Pacifism: opposition to war or violence of any kind

Your position may be reasonable, but it isn't pacifism.

Of course pacifism means violence is never the answer. And that is exactly what I meant. I also believe that pacifism doesn't stop me from acting aggressively and assertively. I fail to see how my position is not "pacifism."

>And many white South Africans remain somewhat ambiguous, at best, about the evil it wrought

A lot of people involved with South Africa are ambiguous about that. The white government and people made the country much richer than it's surrounding black governed countries and the problem at the borders were always stopping too many africans moving from the surrounding countries to SA rather than visa versa. I had a coloured girlfriend from Jo'berg for a while and she was ambiguous too - no love for apartheid but no desire to live in one of the black governed counties either.

The white government and people made the country much richer than it’s surrounding black governed countries

I think you’ll find that South Africa’s enormous mineral wealth did much of that. And until the 1960’s or later, the surrounding countries were also white governed. If anything, the money wasted by segregation and the deliberate suppression of human potential[1] held the country back, and is the cause of many of the problems it faces today.

I had a coloured girlfriend from Jo'berg for a while and she was ambiguous too - no love for apartheid but no desire to live in one of the black governed counties either.

As I alluded to in GP, many mixed-race (“Coloured”), and Indian people were co-opted by the apartheid system, and indoctrinated to feel superior to black Africans, and inferior to whites, as a part of a well-executed divide-and-conquer programme. It isn’t surprising that a visceral fear of blacks is pretty pervasive in many, considering how much effort was explicitly put into making them feel that way.

[1] It was logically inconsistent that many racists claimed that blacks were naturally inferior, yet simultaneously sought to deprive them of opportunities to succeed or fail on a meritocratic basis. One wonders if they really believed their own propaganda.

> I think you’ll find that South Africa’s enormous mineral wealth did much of that

I never thought this argument rang true. Many countries with great mineral wealth are quite poor and dysfunctional, and many with little such resources are wealthy and successful anyways.

I don't agree with the apartheid racial theories, but it does seem plausible that the white side inherited and followed a successful and long-established culture of good governance (well, at least good for themselves...). Meanwhile, the transitions out was abrupt enough that the culture of the government was removed and replaced with a different culture that was less experienced with government.

I suppose in an ideal world, a gradual transition which gave plenty of time for the majority blacks to absorb the same government culture would work better. I know that isn't so easy to do in an environment where there has been such strong discrimination and racism for decades, though. And there's quite a bit of truth to the argument that it's easy for the side that's on top to want their transition out of always being on top to be slower.

I never thought this argument rang true. Many countries with great mineral wealth are quite poor and dysfunctional, and many with little such resources are wealthy and successful anyways

Agreed. I was replying to a point about South Africa being richer than its “black governed” neighbours. In fact, all shared a similar colonial history and achieved independence within a similar time period, and they were, in fact, all white ruled till relatively recently. The difference between them was the vast mineral wealth in South Africa. Ignoring this would be the same as comparing, say, Yemen and Qatar, wondering why the one is poor and the other is extremely wealthy, and deciding that Qatar’s success comes down to it being a Sheikhdom.

The transition to democracy probably did happen more suddenly than planned, because the assasination of Chris Hani by a right-wing extremist in 1993 brought South Africa to the brink of civil war, and the apartheid government pretty much lost control at that point.

And the problem with the civil service was even more pernicious than inexperience-there were multiple Bantustans that were deeply corrupt, and their civil services had to be integrated into the newly created provinces bringing the rot with them. Coupled with the ultimately self-destructive apartheid Bantu Education system, it’s no wonder that the government struggled to cope.

You are completely right, but as you condemn the ideology you need to also give a way out (hopefully not a humiliating way out) to those who have been indoctrinated (or those who have gotten used to dehumanizing the "others"). The subject of the article seems to have succeeded in this.

And yet... The new rulers are far less effective than the Apartheid government. The cost of bad government is so influential it's nearly hard to imagine.

I strongly suspect the moral accounting does not favour your position in the long term, the same argument is expressed here but in the abstract since this is of course an emotive subject.

http://lesswrong.com/lw/kn/torture_vs_dust_specks/

It moves!

The new rulers are far less effective than the Apartheid government

Are they really?

Access to water, sanitation, electricity and housing are far better than they were under apartheid. The AIDS epidemic which started in the last years of apartheid has been tamed through decisive government action. Despite a stubbornly high unemployment rate, blacks have made major economic strides. The macroeconomic situation is more stable than it was in the last years of apartheid. Even crime, as measured by the murder rate, has actually dropped.

And the apartheid government was hardly a paragon of competent economic management, running up massive debts to keep itself going, and to wage war on its neighbours and oppress its black population.

There are serious issues: education (a legacy of terribly educated teachers perpetuating their ignorance) and public healthcare are awful, and high level corruption represents a risk to the economy, but the idea that the apartheid government ruled benevolently is pretty much discredited everywhere except the darkest corners of the internet.

PS. The biggest difference between the apartheid era and the democratic one was just that: in 2016, during local elections the ruling ANC was kicked out of power by voters in some of the largest cities in South Africa. It went quietly and respected the will of the people, with no squads of secret police murdering opponents of the ruling party. Could you have said the same about the apartheid government?

We are talking about something very big.

It's bad enough this is an emotive political subject, but it's also a complex one. If I can continue to harp on my 'dust mote' fable. The life expectancy was 64 under the previous regime, and is 56 in the current one.

Some back of the envelope arithmetic.

8 years x 40 million = 320000000 person years.

Let us call that, assuming the higher life expectancy: five million dead.

That's the cost of bad government. Silent. Insidious. Real.

Now it's complex, because you'll say: "It couldn't be helped, we don't really know if the previous regime would have done better", and I'll agree with you. Then it becomes subjective because nobody can really know the answer and it's impossible to test.

I strongly suspect improper rule has led to at least several million avoidable deaths.

As I see it, if a government does 99/100 things right, but 1/100 things wrong, and those 1/100 things have a greater impact than the other 99... I think you see what I'm getting at. Good intentions, some gains morally, it's all kind of worthless if the big things aren't got right. To use a Comp Sci analogy, governments have their own version of Big O notation.

The AIDS epidemic started under the apartheid regime (not directly their fault of course),and was the reason for the drop in life expectancy. It is also moving up again with the provision of ARVs. Furthermore, infant mortality is dropping.

I suspect that your "dust mote" analogy holds, but in the opposite direction to the one you assume: the quality of life has gotten materially better for the vast majority of people (coming off a low base), but worse, or stagnated for those of us SA'ns well-off enough to frequent HN.

Some thoughts.

I suspect that when a government is unable to scale its ability to govern, the statistics become dopey.

This doesn't imply a conspiracy necessarily. It could be for instance that if people stop reporting crime, that either the crimes are not occurring or that people's faith in the government to provide effective policing is undermined.

This makes a government's statistic's office an unreliable narrator even if every person is not corrupted and competant at their job.

Semi-related: I feel a faint thrill of unease at this reasoning because of the broader notion - that any society going into reverse wouldn't be sensible to what was happening: things would just gradually get weirder. Nobody would know why. A society suffering from Alzheimer's disease. It would just get worse with the ability of society to possess executive function dropping off at a similar rate to the ability to physically function. Eventually people would be looking upon the ruin wondering what the fuck happened.

Second thought.

Although no expert on SA's economic infrastructure I do know one thing which is at odds with your portrayal. Escom is the almost exclusive provider of electric power, still owned by the SA state IIRC. It has not added any electrical generation capacity to the grid since Apartheid. Their facilities are also badly run down.

How can you claim then, that more South Africans have access to electricity? Were white people hoarding all the electricity and now it is more evenly distributed? It seems more likely that more people would have obtained access in name only.

> quality of life has gotten materially better for the vast majority of people (coming off a low base), but worse, or stagnated for those of us SA'ns well-off enough to frequent HN.

I concede it is possible I have obtained a biased version of reality from those South Africans capable of net access.

I'd suspect though that most right wing South Africans would have left 20 years ago, so the people left in SA must be the more Liberal and Left of center portion of the population, or those unable to leave. If this is true, and we believe that political character is mostly hereditary (I do), then the bias may lie in the opposite direction.

That most media sources bias would be in that same direction nearly goes without saying. Western media trumpeted a great victory after Apartheid after all.

Final thought:

For what criteria would you concede being mistaken? Mine is simple: if South Africa experiences significant increases in real wages and life expectancy goes up, then it is successful.

I put to you that since AIDs should be fatal to those without access to expensive drugs, and infant mortality likely is dropping as you said you should expect an uptick in life expectancy over the next few decades.

Were that not to occur, then something is wrong.

I know some people believe the tentacles of the former regime have gotten stronger over time but this seems conspiratorial to me and I've never heard a fleshed out explanation for why that ought to be so.

It could be for instance that if people stop reporting crime, that either the crimes are not occurring or that people's faith in the government to provide effective policing is undermined.

The murder rate is used as a proxy for the overall crime rate, precisely because murders are more likely to be reported (plenty of citiations available for this). And the murder rate has dropped since the end of apartheid.

How can you claim then, that more South Africans have access to electricity? Were white people hoarding all the electricity and now it is more evenly distributed? It seems more likely that more people would have obtained access in name only.

It is well known that the apartheid government overinvested in generation capacity in the 1980s and a lot of capacity had to be mothballed. Of course, the opportunity cost caused by this failure of central planning is less visible than the later failure by the post-apartheid government to provide for expanded capacity. Furthermore, electricity-hungry aluminium smelters were built to soak up excess generation capacity. So yes, in a sense, it was hoarded by the apartheid government.

I wonder how electricity access can be provided “in name only”. It would suggest a vast conspiracy that an ostensibly incompetent government would be hard-pressed to execute.

if South Africa experiences significant increases in real wages and life expectancy goes up, then it is successful.

Life expectancy is ticking up already.(http://www.mrc.ac.za/Media/2015/1press2015.htm)

>According to this Rapid Mortality Surveillance Report 2013, issued by the council’s Burden of Disease Research Unit, South Africa’s life expectancy has escalated to 62 years in 2013 – a staggering increase of 8.5 years since the low in 2005.

Also real wage growth has been “rapid” in post-apartheid South Africa. (https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2016/12/31/Rea...)

I'd suspect though that most right wing South Africans would have left 20 years ago, so the people left in SA must be the more Liberal and Left of center portion of the population, or those unable to leave

This is an interesting point, and a bit of a sidetrack, but my experience with adult SAn emigrants indicates that they tend to be in a bit of a time warp, reflecting contemporary attitudes at the time of their departure. I expect that many were pretty much centrist or even somewhat liberal at the time of their departure, but white South African society has shifted towards a less racist position while many expats are insulated from this, and thus appear to unreconstructed apartheid apologists today.

> only after it realised that it was utterly alone and isolated and almost universally reviled, and the collapse of world communism meant that it wouldn’t be shielded by its erstwhile allies

I am confused by this sentence. At least, in Europe and US, it was the right-wing parties that supported South Africa's apartheid regime. In Sweden, it had the staunch support by the right-wing Moderate Party led by no other than Carl Bildt. And here's more on the US-ZA ties: http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/19/apartheid-amnesia/

That’s what I meant. It was viewed as an ally against communism by the Reagan/Bush and Thatcher governments. With the collapse of communism, there was no reason for them to continue to support the apartheid regime.

I see! That makes sense. Thanks for the clarification.

I don't think this comparison holds up. There's a not-so-fine-line between co-operating with a racist government for scraps of power, as these ostensible leaders did; and trying to communicate with, and understand individuals.

It should be noted that the isolation of apartheid South Africa became almost unbearable on an individual level, and it touched the lives of everyone in the country. No international sport (important in white South African culture), no cultural exchanges, no direct flights to much of the world, no British television shows even. South Africa was removed from the Commonwealth. Attempts to break the boycotts by "rebel tours" were met with vandalism and protest. Individual South African sportspeople were treated as villains. That excludes the economic sanctions that drove the apartheid state to bankruptcy. The line between individual, and regime was blurry, because it was known that the apartheid state was voted into power by white South Africans and they had the power to vote it out (as they eventually did).

The world decided that apartheid was immoral, and gave it no quarter.

Apartheid is much more complex than just pure racism and much is tied up in the history (and especially the mythology) of the Afrikaans.

As for your question if white South Africans would have seen the light is an interesting question. Certainly the international isolation added to the pressure to change, but Apartheid would have collapsed anyway as demographics doomed it. A good example is Algeria where French rule was always doomed given the demographics on the ground.