Brittany
Anderson
9 January 2012
Title: forgiveness.
In class, we talked about forgiveness. Its so strange how such a vague concept
can be so powerful. I found a quote earlier this week after our first talking
circle by an unknown author, "The first to apologize is the bravest. The first
to forgive is the strongest. The first to forget is the happiest." While I believe the first two are true
on a personal and social level, I don't necessary think that forgetting makes
one happy. I think that taking this
quote and applying it to South Africa and the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission, especially the portion about forgiving and apologizing, rings
true. While I love living in the US, I
think that a lot has been lost by our "amnesia" of the past; things, such as
health care, that South Africa is succeeding at that are considered basic needs
are lacking in populations within US. I think that South Africa's ability to
say "Look, we as a nation fucked up, but we can only move forward from here,"
has really helped the nation heal and the formation of the TRC played a huge
role in that.
When people like the brigadier, whose name was not important, applied for amnesty for 40+ cases put before the TRC, I think something like TRC can't even help. He even admitted he wasn't sorry. He was doing his job. His job got put before his morals and his values and can't apologize for that. It doesn't make sense to me why he would be able to even apply for amnesty...Okay, well I can see why he would be able to apply for it, but realistically, I'm wondering, did he really think that he would be granted amnesty on all of the cases? I was appalled...but then I found the above quote later that day that got me thinking about the brigadier, and others from the video. Where would South African people be with the concept of Ubuntu if these people (mainly men) were not granted the same rights that others were? Lost.
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