When I launched ActionSA I spoke about the idea of the good, law-abiding and hard-working majority in our country, the people who form the majority and yet have been silenced by our politics.
No event could capture the essence of this notion more than the Clicks saga that unfolded this week.
The vast majority of South Africans recognise that the adverts were deeply insensitive in a country that lives with the pain of racial inequality from our unjust past. Most South Africans, would not deny that the adverts demeaned black people by advancing the idea that black identity is inferior to white identity.
As someone who has worked for 38 years in the haircare and beauty industry, particularly trying to advance the idea of pride in black beauty, there is no doubt that these adverts were horrific and required accountability.
Instead what we, the reasonable majority of people in South Africa, witnessed was anarchy. The EFF’s decision to close down Clicks stores, intimidate shoppers and workers and damage property was no less counter-productive than the adverts themselves.
What we must learn to understand as the majority of our country, is that neither the designers of those adverts nor those who violently close stores, speak on our behalf or serve our interests with their actions.