Boerehaat is anAfrikaans word that means "ethnic hatred ofBoers" orAfrikaners as they became known after theSecond Boer War.[1][2] The related termBoerehater (English:"Boer-hater" or "Boer hater") has been used to describe a person who hates, prejudices or criticises Boers or Afrikaners.[3][4]
These terms were initially applied toBritish people perceived as prejudiced against the Boers, in the context of political conflict between the British and the Boers in southern Africa which culminated in the British defeat of the Boers in the Second Boer War. Accusations ofBoerehaat have subsequently been made by numerousAfrikaner nationalists[citation needed] to exploit historical British prejudice against the Boers for political gain. They have applied the termBoerehater to anyone who criticised them or opposed their interests in the Cape Colony, includingEnglish-speaking white South Africans,dissident Afrikaners andblack South Africans.[citation needed]
Boerehaat is anAfrikaans word meaning hatred of theBoers,[1] orAfrikaners as they became known after theSecond Boer War.[2] The related termBoerehater (English:"Boer-hater" or "Boer hater") has been used to describe a person who hates, prejudices or criticises the Boers, or Afrikaners.[3][4]
Anti-Boer sentiments among the British were recorded as early as the 18th century. Boers were frequently portrayed inBritish literature andeditorial cartoons as uncivilised and cruel,[5] with many of these depictions being used in order to obtain the support of the British public forannexing the South African republics during the Second Boer War.[2][6]: 34 [7] The English termBoer-hater was used in a political context in the BritishCape Colony as early as 1889, referring to individuals who opposedCape Dutch interests, the use of their language inParliament in particular.[8]
Anglo-Irish politicianJames Bryce, writing about the attitude ofuitlanders (English-speaking immigrants) towards the Boer authorities in the independentSouth African Republic during theWitwatersrand Gold Rush following the discovery of gold in 1886, states: "English became the general spoken tongue not only of Johannesburg, but of the mining districts generally. Hearing nothing but English spoken, seeing nothing all round them that was not far more English than Dutch, though English with a half-colonial, half-American tinge, it was natural that the bulk of the Uitlanders should deem themselves to be in a country which had become virtually English, and should see something unreasonable or even grotesque in the control of a small body of persons whom they deemed in every way their inferiors."[9]
Animosity between the British and the Boers intensified in the run-up to theSecond Boer War fought from 1899 to 1902, and continued thereafter.[6]: 169–173 [10] OneBritish soldier sent home a letter detailing his hatred of the Boer forces:"The Cape Dutch and Boers are a dirty treacherous lot and as soon as the Transvaal is subdued and the beggars (those that survive) trek farther out of our way the better. We do hate them down here like poison. The rascally dirty varmints, they must be exterminated; the country swarms with them and their dirty compatriots theGerman JewThe sight of them and their mean tricks is enough to make the mildest mannered man a demon. God pity the poor white or black under them when they have the power.[7]
During the war,Lord Kitchener began a policy of putting all Boer civilians in the South African republics inconcentration camps, with 27,000 of those interned dying primarily due to infectious diseases. This resulted in a long-lasting legacy of bitterness towards the British from Afrikaners.[11] The British won the war, but persisting anti-British sentiments contributed to the rise ofAfrikaner nationalism and the pro-AfrikanerNational Party became the ruling party ofSouth Africa from 1948 until 1994, theapartheid era.[6]: 33–34 [12]
The Afrikaner Nationalist is not an individualist. His whole sense of identity is bound up with conforming to his own homogeneous in-group. He tends to conform in religious worship, in unquestioning allegiance to authoritarian figures, in political ideology and in exaggerated loyalty to his in-group. Criticism of his attitudes is interpreted as an attack on the autonomy of his group (Boerehaat). He is terrified of losing his Afrikanerhood and his whiteness. Threaten these and he feels that his very self will cease to exist, and will therefore cling to them with passionate intensity.
During the apartheid era, the Afrikaners dominated in number of voters, politics and civil service, while English-speaking white South Africans dominated economically.[6]: 87–88, 93 The Afrikaners separated themselves from the rest of the population, both black people and English-speaking whites.[6]: 33–37 In 1971sociologistHeribert Adam writes "the historical friction between the English and Afrikaans-speaking populace is gradually being replaced by class contradictions within the two groups."[14][15] Historical friction was revived and exploited by the rulingNational Party for political gain however.[6]: 173 In 1973 Edward Feit, professor ofpolitical science at theUniversity of Michigan, writes in theAmerican Journal of Sociology: "Recent political campaigns have shown that the old bogey ofBoerehaat still has its charms for an Afrikaaner majority."[14][16]
The National Party, under the leadership ofB. J. Vorster, appealed to the emotions of Afrikaner voters by depicting English-speaking white citizens as being guilty ofBoerehaat.[17][18] The National Party and its political mouthpieceDie Burger waged a "Boerehaat campaign" during aby-election inOudtshoorn in 1972, depicting theirUnited Party opposition, once supported by the majority of English-speaking voters,[6]: 117 asBoerehaters, and won.[19][20][21][22] TheNationalists also used the term to censure members of theProgressive Federal Party opposition party formed in 1977.[23] After interviewing various South Africans including government officials during the early 1980s, American historianOtto Scott writes: "This sort of xenophobic solidarity perceived the opposition as Boer haters."[24]
White South African critics of apartheid, such as liberal politicianAlex Boraine and Afrikaner anti-apartheid activistBeyers Naudé, were labelled unpatrioticBoerehaters by Nationalists and the Afrikaans press in an attempt to discredit them. White dissidents were also associated with therooi gevaar ("communist threat").[4][25][26] South African poet and writerGuy Butler was called aBoerehater by Afrikaners for his promotion of English-language literature and his opposition toAfrikaner nationalism and the National Party.[27][28]
English-speaking film critics were more lenient towards Afrikaans-language films lest they be accused ofBoerehaat. According toThe Star film critic Robert Greig, "An apology situation developed with the English-language newspapers who tended not to slam Afrikaans films because they didn't want to be accused ofboerehaat (Boer-hater)." According to film criticBarry Ronge, "The cries ofboerehaat come from the industry itself when they feel they are not getting 'support'."[29]
In 1995ANC politicianZola Skweyiya was accused ofBoerehaat byDie Burger for disrespecting the Afrikaans official language inParliament.[30] In 1998Jaap Marais, Afrikaner nationalist leader of theright-wingHerstigte Nasionale Party, described the post-apartheidTruth and Reconciliation Commission as an exercise inBoerehaat.[31]
In 2011 South African politicianJulius Malema was found guilty ofhate speech in theHigh Court inJohannesburg for repeatedly singing the anti-apartheid protest song "Shoot the Boer" at political gatherings. Civil rights organisationAfriForum accused Malema of inciting violence against white South Africans, citing the ongoing spate offarm attacks (the literal meaning ofBoer is "farmer"). Judge Colin Lamont ruled that Malema's singing of the song in apost-apartheid South Africa was "derogatory, dehumanising and hurtful" to the Afrikanerminority group. Lamont said "People must develop new customs and rejoice in a developing society by giving up old practices which are hurtful to members who live in that society with them."[32][33]
In an incident reminiscent of the National Party'sBoerehaat propaganda campaign during apartheid, ANC deputy presidentCyril Ramaphosa urged disgruntled residents of theLimpopo province to vote in the2014 general election otherwise "the Boers will come back to control us".[34][35][36]Freedom Front Plus leaderPieter Mulder described his remarks as "primitive scare tactics" and "racist and polarising".[37]
SociologistMichael Neocosmos notes that critics of the ruling ANC can similarly be labelled as "standing outside the state-defined national consensus", with for examplead hominem accusations ofracism and disloyalty replacing accusations ofBoerehaat and communist sympathies which are hard to defend.[38]
whenever English speakers objected to living in a racial zoo designed to protect the mythical purity of Afrikaner nationalists, they were accused by their masters of giving way to Boerehaat (hatred of the Boers)
After the war, the Boers became known to the world as 'Afrikaners'.
Someone who hates Afrikaners and tries to harm or prejudice them
aBoerehater, someone who hated Afrikaners
English images of the oppressive, uncouth Afrikaner dated back to the eighteenth century and, as Todd Lee has shown, the war in South Africa brought these images before the public in quite dramatic ways through fiction and the political cartoon, genres which caricatured the Boer male as criminal, dull-witted, and brutal.
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