Black South African Janitors Humiliated By White Racist Students

In a perfect world, at least what I envision as perfect, people of different races and religions would live together in harmony. No one race or religion would dominate another. But unfortunately, that's not how it is today. Sadly, there are religions trying to dominate the world, and racism still exists in every land across the globe and what we some people do to maintain domination over others is often despicable.

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Take four white university students in South Africa back in 2007 who violated four black, middle-aged janitors on campus by forcing them to do humiliating things , and videotaping it to boot. They are now on trial and will be sentenced and fined for their actions. Although they are not expected to be jailed it is thought that they will be fined £3,000.

The Afrikaner students, Roelof Malherbe, Schalk Van Der Merwe, Danie Grobler and Johnny Roberts, seemingly made the video in protest of the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein's policy of racial integration in the campus housing. You might recall that the Afrikaners descended from the mostly Dutch settlers who arrived in Africa in the mid 1600s.

What the students forced the four employees (3 women and one man) to do was similar to a form of hazing (initiation) that is often given to students of the university, and is childish at least,

The staff were allegedly forced to drink full bottles of beer and perform athletic tasks.

It's what they did to them at the end of the video that is more than unforgivable.

A white student urinates on food, and then shouts 'Take! Take!' in Afrikaans. The university employees are then forced to eat the dirty food, which causes them to vomit. Lawyers for the four former students - Roelof Malherbe, Schalk Van Der Merwe, Danie Grobler and Johnny Roberts - said although it appeared as if the food had been urinated on, a 'harmless' liquid had been squirted from a bottle.

Whether they actually urinated on the food or not, is irrelevant. The fact is that these four youth made them think it was urine and forced these adults to humiliate themselves.

There was appropriate outrage, and two of the students (Van Der Merwe and Malherbe)were banned from the university (the other two had graduated) and the men's residence hall in question was closed.

All four pleaded guilty. Closing arguments commence tomorrow.

I'm not sure a fine will change someone's racist tendencies, but perhaps they will think twice about harming another person because of the colour of their skin. The problem is that this kind of hatred is taught to young children, and it takes a strong, enlightened soul to break free from those shackles of hate. Until we learn to love and respect everyone, we will continue to live in turmoil.