The Narrative Goes on but Is Forever Changed:
A Correlation Between Jessica Stern’s Personal Recovery, Curiosity and the Recovery in South Africa with Respect to Sexual Violence
Jessica Stern has studied and describes, through books and lectures, an undercurrent of sexual exploitation that lives in Pakistani and Afghani society. In several interviews, Stern relates the sexual abuse against young boys within the Pakistani Madras and the overwhelming concern among Pakistani parents concerning this sexual abuse by clergy. While interviewing American soldiers who have returned from Afghanistan, Stern is provided with accounts of a common practice, among the Afghan soldiers, called “Thursday Night Man-Boy Love Night,” in which groups of soldiers canvas the streets in search of young boys to gang rape (Stern video). Many of the American soldiers interviewed were invited along and while they declined the invitation, they also did not report the incidents to authorities or to American reporters. The circumstance rings similar to Stern’s personal experience with sexual violence and the subsequent strategy of denial that was adopted by her own family members. While wide spread sexual violence potentially denotes and leads to a continuum of a socially violent society, such as the terrorist homelands Stern studies, on an individual basis, it can have more positive outcome, as it has for Stern.
The terror that Stern experienced re-identified itself as interest, eventually leading her into an obsessive curiosity of the minds of terrorist and finally into creating a personal narration of her own experience with sexual terror in her book, Denial: A Memoir of Terror. In her words, “[she] turned fear into curiosity” (video) and in this recent personal narration Stern writes:
Some people’s lives seem to flow in a narrative; mine had many stops and starts. That’s what trauma does. It interrupts the plot. You can’t process it because it doesn’t fit with what came before of what comes afterward. A friend of mine, a soldier, put it this way. In most of our lives, most of the time, you have a sense of what is to come. There is a steady narration, a feeling of “lights, camera, action” when big events are imminent. But trauma isn’t like that. It just happens and then life goes on. No one prepares you for it. (Stern)
In terms of its relationship to a person’s past, Stern is correct. In terms of its relationship to what comes after, I argue that it is intrinsically interwoven into a new narration whether denial, repression or any other form of coping skill is used. A traumatic event may seem singular in terms of its physical synchronic placement within the narrative. The traumatic event, however, contains timeless and infinite strands of residue that will thereafter be forever present in the future narratives of the victims.
In Stern’s case, the interruption of trauma is directly connected with her career choice and the eventual writing of her own narrative. All individuals are faced with some level of trauma at one point in life, be it rape, natural disaster, oppression, death of loved ones, terminal illness etcetera. The lives of all these individuals will inevitable be altered in some degree following the unfortunate event. In my case, extensive travel as a child redefined my own narrative multiple times. In each location, a certain traumatic event erupted around me, pushing me to reprioritize what was important to me and to make decisions thereafter that have been directly derived from the event itself. One event in particular brings Stern’s investigation of widespread social sexual abuse full circle for me, as a lesser personal trauma steered my own narrative into one that involves, among many other narrational reactions to it, research into contemporary sexual violence in South Africa.
For a two-year period, I lived in Johannesburg, South Africa with my mother, my ten-year-old brother Adam and five-year-old sister Alex. My mother had developed a production company and had acquired the funding she needed for a film, which was unrelated to the tragic Apartheid reality that surrounded us. Accustomed to fitting in to different social environments, I lived the two years surrounded by good people, despite the government’s demands of with whom I should befriend and where it should take place. At this time, as beautiful as this country was, uprising was seeping in. Black guards searched our bags and purses and bodies before entering the malls. Car bombs went off daily in townships, police stations and government centers. At the time, there were three million whites and thirty-three million blacks. The inevitable was obvious. However, the residue that Apartheid would leave behind was not yet fathomable.
My mother had hired Lucy, a young black woman, to help around the house. Having lived with my mother for three years, there was a close relationship between the two as well as with my siblings. Adam and Alex felt a certain comfort in playing with her and teasing her about certain religious ceremonies that she undertook daily. One such ceremony involved propping her bed five feet off the ground onto cinderblocks. Every night Lucy slept with fifty lit white candles underneath the bed believing that this would keep ghosts away. Lucy was family.
One night, while we were out to dinner, three black males, who afterwards raped Lucy one at a time, robbed the house. My mother demanded that Lucy stay inside the main house, a circumstance that officials would find highly illegal. Somehow, the previous owner of the house found out about this living situation, began some of his own investigation into my mother’s past, and discovered a previous script she had written on Steven Biko. From this point on, I remember my life in South Africa only in flashes. My mother’s money was frozen by the government, her home taken away, her visa and passport confiscated and “they” wanted her to go somewhere for “questioning.” My siblings and myself were taken to a friend’s home in Durban where we were hidden and silenced during persistent knocks and strange faces looking through the windows.
For three weeks we stayed here while my mother tried to find a way to communicate with the American Consulate without the South African officials discovering her first. Finally we received word that three tickets had been acquired. A pickup truck was backed up to the backdoor of the house and the three of us crawled in and lay flat as he drove. An hour down a bumpy dirt road, the truck came to a stop in front of a convenient store. He calmly told us to get out and hide in the store. He would be back. I grabbed Adam and Alex by the hand and pulled them in. There was an ice cream coffin case down the last aisle. We walked directly for it and sat on the floor behind it – out of view some someone peering in, but in full view should they walk around.
Minutes later we heard a car pull up on the dirt road and stop just outside the door. I turned on my knees and looked. There was a short red-faced man with not much hair, getting out of a clean metallic sedan. Twice as fast, I sat down. I put my hands across their feet and pulled in the stragglers. Not seeing us, the man left. We heard the motor start and we heard him take off, dragging his wheels sideways. Minutes later, another car pulled up. Our hearts raced faster still. My mother’s friend peaked around the corner, “Common kids.”
After a long ride in silence, we saw our mother’s face and heard her voice for the first time in weeks. She had instructions for us, she had advise for us and her tone was serious and terrifying. She handed me three passports, three tickets and a list of phone numbers. She hugged us and said, “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. I will call as soon as I know something.” With that, we were on our way to safety, but leaving our mother behind.
What happened after this is another story and with it another set of changes. It is within the context of the previous narration that I want to explore for one moment. Traumatic events force a change on individual views concerning many things. They often set determination in an unexpected direction. For Jessica Stern, her rape created a determination to figure out the societal mindset that leads individuals to be terrorists. It created a determination to explore and document her personal trauma as well. For myself, my own experiences in different African countries, witnessing different social and economic conditions as well as differences among the opinions and attitudes of black groups within Africa - as well as in comparison to regions in the United States - has propelled a certain thirst for additional knowledge.
Recently, I have looked into returning to South Africa. I want to thank those who gave up their time and the little money that they had, to help us return to America. I want to thank them for their part in helping to hide and aid my fugitive family despite their own possible repercussions. But one person that I know I will most likely never see again is Lucy. After her rape and our eviction, she went back to Soweto and what happened to her then, her own recovery progress, her life after has always been on my mind. I have always harbored a certain amount of guilt for not being able to take her back home with me. The feeling is beyond the fact that it would have been legally impossible and that she most likely would have refused anyway. The guilt is not so much that I didn’t bring her, but that I left her behind.
In my research of this post-apartheid country, as I consider a short visit, I am constantly drawn to information on violence and rape, which has escalated in South Africa since my departure. With Lucy in the back of my mind, fuelled by her terror and not knowing anything regarding her own recovery process, I look for some sort of concrete explanation or cure to this horrifying state that this beautiful country is in. However, I have found no resolution in my search; I have found only blame – blame on Apartheid, blame on race, blame on patriarchy, blame on the women, on the men, on the government, on the officials – and no adequate resolutions but only excuses and more blame as to why recent programs and laws are not working.
Since the time I was in South Africa, both physical and sexual violence has become normative and to a great extent, it is accepted and not challenged (Outwater 135). The transition from apartheid to a democratic society was accomplished without sufficient attention paid to the effect that long-term oppression would have on its people. As a result, the transition is often “associated with escalating violence” (137). South Africa has become one of the most violent countries in the world and targets its own people. It is argued that this interpersonal violence is a lingering effect from the racial ideology of apartheid, a consequence of “decades of apartheid state-sponsored violence” (139). Violence, as associated with rape, is higher in South Africa than anywhere else in the world. In 2001, Drum magazine reported that a “woman is raped every 26 seconds in South Africa,” and also that “child rape has gone up by 64% since 1994” (Posel 135). Along with the rape comes the physical violence or the threat of physical violence. Violence and rape against women is “perceived as socially acceptable to all ages of both sexes” (Outwater 140). There is also a strong taboo against discussing sex or sexual intimacy. The taboo holds strong in the communication between mothers and children as well. While the mother may want something different for her children or may understand some risks involved with sex and HIV/AIDS, the mother child conversation is most likely never to take place. Yet, the silence in the home must cease.
HIV first appeared in South Africa in the early 1980s and began to spread rapidly in the 1990s (143). There are now over five million people infected with HIV. The massive number of rapes and the subsequent spread of HIV are reversing any related improvements made by the post-apartheid government. Life expectancy was in the mid-40s at the middle of apartheid and grew to reach the mid-70s by the end. This number has now been reversed (143). The lack of formal education, the lack of sex education, the patriarchal system that continues and forces the women, children and elderly to stay at home while the male continues in the apartheid initiated migrant work and the lack of resources available to women work to ensure that this epidemic will get worse before improving.
In one study, one hundred and twenty-two Zulu-speaking mothers were interviewed and while they understood a lot about HIV and AIDS, two-thirds still believed that the disease was curable with a doctor’s attention. In Transki, seventy-five percent of girls between grades 5 and 7 had had sexual intercourse, with knowledge of reproduction and benefits of condom use being very low (146). These two examples are the norm for the majority of South Africa. While it would seem that widespread condom use would be beneficial, many groups still disapprove of sex-education and the distribution of condoms in schools (147). Furthermore, many women have reported the threat of physical violence from their partner if they mention the desire for condom use.
While scholars and social workers may nitpick over the actual cause of this sexually deviant society – sexual violence as stemming from apartheid racism, from apartheid patriarchy, from post-apartheid laws unleashing restrictions on porn and sexually graphic material in advertisement (Posel 120), to monetary and power struggles between the new government and grass root struggles (Britton 154) – improving conditions is priority right now. Doing so requires careful stepping, no matter who is being addressed, as the nation is in a highly sensitive recovery mode, and will be for some time to come.
In 1999, South African born Charlize Theron began running two-minute ads on South African television. In one of her opening lines, Theron said, “Hey, all you South African men, here’s a question for you – have you ever raped a woman? (Moffett 132). This was the first time that rapist, or potential rapist, had been publicly addressed in South Africa and the Advertising Bureau of Standards banned the ads soon after (132). Consumers were complaining that the ads were “stereotyping them as ‘either being involved in rape or being complacent about it’” (132). In 2004, President Thabo Mbeki “publicly attacked anti-rape campaigner Charlene Smith” claiming that her “efforts to educate South Africans about rape were racist” (133). The quick judgment to assume racism over gender oppression is all too prevalent and the fact that Smith’s efforts to critique rape lead to backlash, from “the highest elected public official in the nation,” demonstrates how paralysis in recovery takes shape (133). “Sexual violence is an instrument of gender domination and is rarely driven by a racial agenda” (134); however, with apartheid wounds still raw, and with the fact that the large majority of rapes are perpetuated by black men (because the majority of the population is black), the accusation of racism is often immediate and the idea of gender inequality is secondary.
With this wall up and with the wall that society puts up to its own demise, getting South Africa back on the right track appears difficult, if not presently impossible. Outwater, Naeema Abrahams and Jacquelyn Campbell argue that if the common citizen can change things at the level of the common citizens and, perhaps an opportunity for change lay within their Ubuntu beliefs. Eighty percent of South Africans are part of the Bantu language group and Ubuntu is a “philosophy, or way of life that is the spiritual foundation of many African Societies” (Outwater 136). At its core is the belief that one is only in existence through the relationship with others. The individual is defined by the relationship; therefore, if the relationship changes, so do the individuals involved. While this belief kept the oppressed of South Africa united and strong during apartheid, it is argued that it may, through the minds of its younger generation, enable the continuance of physical and sexual violence and the spread of HIV, seeking “to spread the infection so as ‘to die together’” (144). It is a license for sexually violent freedom and a way “to share the burden” (145). These youths are misguided, contorting a faith in their favor, just as many of the terrorists do that Jessica Stern interviews. However, Bantu cultural literature states that one who manifests Ubuntu “is one who is kind, helpful, not quarrelsome, slow to anger, generous, helpful to others, cooperative and courageous” (136). The basic principles of Ubuntu need to be revisited and revitalized in the hearts of many South Africans.
With all this, plus the massive amount of additional information I have gathered on the challenges in health care improvements and the continued uphill battle to make South Africa the place that its people deserve, I am not deterred from my wish to go back, but more determined. If I had never been there in the first place, or if my experiences had been different, my desire to go back now might be different as well. While the prospect of the return is exciting, my realization of what Lucy’s life was most likely like after my departure, is a depressing one. I will probably not see her again, and honestly, part of me hopes I don’t. I remember her spunk and her laugh and her excitement at just being alive. That is how I want to remember her. But what I saw in Lucy was not preserved for her alone. It was everywhere and I want that spark to come back for these people. Stern’s idea that “trauma happens and then life goes one” is definite, but how it will go on and what new shape life will take, no one can tell for certain. Trauma’s effect on the narrative pertains to nations as it does to individuals. South Africa will continue, its people will go on, but the narrative of the country is forever changed as Apartheid’s residue continues to make its way through every facet of society. The amount of positive change that the country incorporates into its new narrative will largely depend upon its level of vulnerability and on its own resilience. Unfortunately, not everyone, not every country for that matter, has the strength and perseverance or Jessica Stern.
Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu
a person is a person through other person
Works cited:
Britton, Hannah. "Organizing against Gender Violence in South Africa." Journal of South African Studies 32.1 (2006): 145-63. Print.
Moffett, Helen. "'these Women, They Force Us to Rape Them' Rape as a Narrative of Social Control in Post Apartheid South Africa." Journal of Southern African Studies 32.1 (2006): 129-44. Print.
Outwater, Anne, Naeema Abrahams, and Jacquelyn C. Campbell. "Women in South Africa: Intentional Violence and HIV/AIDS: Intersection and Prevention." Journal of Black Studies 35.4 (2005): 135-54. Print.
Jessica Stern. Ecco Books. Youtube. You Tube. Web. <http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQzfmTxyXR8>.
Posel, Deborah. "Sex, Death and the Fate of the Nation: Reflections on the
Politicization of Sexuality in Post-apartheid South Africa." African Arts 75.2
(2005): 125-53. Print.
Stern, Jessica. Denial: a Memoir of Terror. New York: Ecco, 2010. Print.
