If South Africa is Atlas Shrugged, what must whites do?

South African columnist Andrew Kenny, writing in the Spectator in April, closed with this despairing note:

[I]t seems to me that Zimbabwe is the best comparison we have; and if you want to see the future of South Africa, it might not be a bad idea to look at the present in Zimbabwe.

If, as I’ve suggested previously, political conditions in Zimbabwe, and to a lesser extent in South Africa, represent a racial version of Atlas Shrugged, then where in this tale of societal destruction is the John Galt-led strike by the capable, in which they withdraw from their oppressors and cease to support and maintain the system that lives off their abilities even as it demonizes and crushes them? Responding to the Kenny article, a commenter at the American Renaissance news forum proposes just such a plan.

The only question left is, what now? What are white South Africans going to do? What can we do to help? To do nothing is to court the disaster you describe. My idea: White businessmen organize and present an ultimatum: cease the persecution or we will leave. [Emphasis added.] Needless to say, before the ultimatum is delivered, assets must be secured outside South Africa and and personal escape routes must be in place.

As one poster said the other day, Russia must be persuaded to start taking white refugees. Australia is another option. America perhaps, but they must be informed of the fight that would await them here.

It does seem remarkable, considering that Atlas Shrugged has been one of the most popular and influential books of the last 50 years, that no one has ever attempted to do in the real world what Ayn Rand’s fictional heroes do in theirs, namely, to call the leftists’ (or, in the case of South Africa, the black leaders’) bluff and say: “Stop attacking and leaching off us, or we stop putting our productive energies into your system and keeping it afloat. You need us far more more than we need you.”

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 16, 2005 12:28 PM | Send