Reflection On Apartheid By:Jaely Manso Perod:2

Apartheid was a very horrible event that happened in South Africa.This horrible event tells me that not everyone has human rights were they can say or do what they want to do.Forced to keep their mouths shuts and forced not to say how they feel.Taken away all their rights.It also tells me that not every country is abiding by the UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS !They ignore the declaration of human rights so they can end up getting what they want thinking their are no consequences to their actions which is not true.They treat people horrible under apartheid but they don't care who they hurt or who they need to step on to get what they want or to get the power they want.In conclusion this is what apartheid tells me about human rights and the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights.


Next apartheid relates with some of the same actions that happened during the holocaust.In apartheid blacks and asians and coloureds (people of mixed race) were tortured and treated insignificantly.They were poorly treated some people died , some of the people died during some aggressive protesting.Most of the time they tried to keep peaceful protesting so they could get their point across to people.The people that were treated unfairly wanted to fight for their rights.They didn't want to be judge by their color or their ethcitiy.In the holocuast many people were also tortured as in aparthied.Many people were also killed by police as in aparthied as to holocaust.In apartheid during protest some people would die and in the holocaust when Hitler would give speeches his secret police would kill anyone with their sharp shovles if the spoke against him.Also in both occassions people were sent to prisons.In 1953 the public saftey act and the criminal law amendment act passed which let them give fines imprsonment and whippings for penalites for protesting against or supporting the repeal of a law.In one of the cases group sharpeville refused to follow the law and the goverment went into state of emergency.Lasted 156 days leaving 69 dead 187 wounded.In apartheid if you were in protests you would get arrested.And in the holocaust they had death camps which were like prisons except you either work in the death camps and if your not good enough to work and are badly injured most likley they the s.s people would kill you.The most horrible thing that both of these invents did was they killed people unfairly over something they chound'nt control and even if they chould control what their color or race is it still wouldn't make it right to kill these people.They were treated unfairly based on skin and ethic backgrounds which is terrible.In the end these were two tragic events that can relate in many ways and that hopefully don't happen again.


Continuing if humanism was the idea that all indiviuals mattered then this probably wouldn't have happened.When apartheid happened it was basically saying that whites were above everyone in South Africa and that they chouldn't be mixed with blacks, asians ,coloureds (people of mixed race), that theyserved them.They chouldn't be seen together.They had seperate bathrooms , differen't stores, differen't drinking fountain the list goes on and on.This just made things worse.Causing hate between some blacks, asians, coloureds(people of mixed race) towards whites .Other black, asians, coloureds (people of mixed race) and white people came together to fight for freedom and justice and to put a stop to apartheid.They even had little passbooks that blacks, asian, and coloureds (mixed race) had to carry saying were they lived and their names ,job occupation, date of birth, age and many other things.If during apartheid we vauled humanism this would have not have happened we would of said "It doesn't matter your race or color where all the same" and everyone would have been equal!All in all this is why humanism is denied in apartheid.


This horrible event makes me feel horrible.It makes me feel the goverment was weak and was weak because it let other human beings hurt each other phiscally and mentally for something they chould'nt even control their skin color and race!They let polices and other people kill other people just so they wouldn't fight back.It makes me so ANGRY to think that someone would kill someone so they wouldn't say how they felt , that they would kill these people just so other people don't act up.To imagine that chould have been me or someone in my family to be killed for just being spanish or for being to dark or to lite in skin color makes me relaize what they did was wrong and it shouldn't be done ever again.It's just so horrible and it's so sad to think that people thought it was ok , that they deserved what they got when they honestly didn't.I don't think anyone should be treated differently at all menaing by color , ethcity or shape or size and its up to us to make sure it doesn't happen.Just the feeling of it , it feels bad and you got to ask yourself is it worth it? how would I feel if I was them? and if you truely know whats right you'll know what to do.

In conculsion these victiums were treated horribly wrong.When I ask myself Do I have sorrow or pity for these victiums of aparthied? I answer to myself yes.Reason being they didn't commit a crime , they didn't kill anyone , steal anything and they were treated as if they did.They were look down upon for no reason , tortured and killed , treated unfairly.For what reason????? just for skin color , I just hate this idea of segeration. Most of my friends are spanish or black or some differen't ethic background and if i lived in South Africa and this happened to my friends it would probably really hurt me.Espically knowing the conditions of these people, knowing what happened to them.I would probably stand by thier side and fight for their rights and their freedom because I would know its the right thing to do.All these actions of apartheid were never justified at all.Anyone that is cruel and or anyone that is unfair with someone for no reason is unjustified.We in the world have many historcal events to learn from and hopefully they dont end up happening again and we learn from these mistakes.