The Theory of Everything (lol)

It's not every day that one has the chance of writing the theory of everything.

This has nothing to do with Quantum Physics or the origins of Man.  

It's just that I have been thinking about a few separate ideas that kind of percolated in different spaces, and resulted in an idea that suddenly popped out of the oven, a truly novel idea, that could potentially explain a lot about what's really going on.  

Is it true? Does it reveal great truth about a potential conspiracy theory of how we got where we are, and where we might be going?  Maybe. 

A while ago I read about the "Trickle Down" theory of economics, or Reaganomics as it is sometimes called, and how it essentially states that if you give money to the rich, in the form of actual bailouts and tax breaks, they would thrive, and employ more of the people. They were attempting to create more jobs by rewarding and coaxing the rich into greater wealth in the hope that they would hire more people. 

This has been the method used by countries all over the world, and especially in America,  in the bailout following the economic meltdown of 2008. 

The rich pay less tax than they did in previous decades and it was intended to stimulate the economy, to Jump, start it, as the talking heads would say. 

Nick Hanauer, a really wealthy American gave a talk at  TED titled  "Rich people don't create jobs" in which he clearly explains the flaw in this argument. How giving a rich person more wealth doesn't result in him hiring more people, or increasing the size or output of his factory. It doesn't even get the rich to consume more. Only a massive, liquid middle class can do this. And if this middle class had money and went out to buy TVs and Cars, the factories would need to be bigger to cope with the demand and they would hire more people and in doing so increase the size of the middle class. Its a circle of dependence that does not begin with the wealthy. 

This was one of the ideas that had been percolating in the primitive brain. 

In South Africa, the topic of the day is, the winding down of, well, pretty much everything. 

After the fall of apartheid, the whites, and other "well off" communities could be found at Braais (barbecues) lamenting the decline of just about everything in our beautiful country. 

With rolling blackouts, load shedding, and a power generation system that has, out of desperation begun to burn diesel to produce electricity instead of coal. 

(Bearing  in mind that we have huge coal reserves, and are meant to be burning coal) 

Not to mention that the price of electricity has spiralled into the stratosphere. 

The education system is in crisis. 

The healthcare sector, that is hugely wasteful and ineffective. 

We are bombarded on a regular basis with the catastrophic failures in all the utility and service delivery sectors.  

Corruption is rampant and if I went on, listing the woes and this could become a book, instead of a one-page blog. 

The one size fits all explanation that appears to fit all is BEE. 

Black Economic Empowerment. 

This policy introduced by the government, when they came into power was intended to right the wrongs of the past in a gentle and meaningful way.  

We had a huge imbalance in the fact that all the wealth, land and infrastructure was in the hands of a small privileged minority. Whites mostly. (and a few others). And the only way to redress the situation without taking away this wealth and redistributing it forcibly was to use a gentle hand and steer the process along a long curve to a point of equilibrium.  

It was decided that all companies would hire previously disadvantaged individuals in positions of power. And in doing so they hoped to shift the balance and spread the wealth across the nation.  This process would inherently involve choosing Black over White. In jobs, at Universities, in Government contracts, and on the ground. The whites would feel marginalised and would accuse the system of practising reverse racism. And this was something that every thinking person had to accept up front. 

It was after all the price of peace.  

In practice, the system was putting its best people out to pasture. 

The best teachers and the best technicians and scientists were being sidelined to make space for the fresh new BEE candidates. These newbies weren't the best farmers, or industrialists, or mine bosses, or the best of anything. They were BEE appointments. 

This led to the inevitable decline in industry and tourism, and education and roads, and pretty much everything.  This led to a sense of entitlement that the country belonged to the BEE candidates and that there was not much room for excellence or ingenuity or hardworking competent people who came from "privileged" often moneyed backgrounds. 

Most look at the failing education system, and the failing economy, and pretty much the failing everything and assume that this is proof that the system, designed to rectify the wrongs of the past had utterly failed. That the new government had "thrown out the baby with the bathwater",  and all was indeed lost. 

This is the popular view if you attend one of the braais, and one might live ones entire life believing this. 

But there is another point of view and this is where my idea comes in. 

What if this is not a failed plan? 

What if this is the plan?  All of it. 

It's clear that if BEE did not exist, this country would look, pretty much like it always did. 

We would have the ruling empowered whites and the struggling starving masses. 

The streets would be clean, and the electricity grid brilliant, and our health care and education systems would be the envy of Europe and America. And nothing would have changed. 

Post-apartheid, this was simply not an option. 

The public would not stand for it and we would see bloodshed. Probably lots of it.  

If you accept this reality, then you are at least agreeing with the basic need for some form of BEE. 

When BEE was put in place, what if it was indented to create a black middle class. 

Its sole purpose was to create a middle class that consisted of previously disadvantaged communities. 

They didn't need to be competent,  or the best person for the job. They just needed to exist and enjoy the privilege of their position. 

If you have to have poor roads, spotty wasteful power, watered down education, sucky hospitals, and arrogant novo-rich who have a chip on their collective shoulders, and feel entitled, then so be it. 

What if you were prepared to burn it all to the ground in pursuit of the goal. 

The really poor, suddenly had access to the vote, protection under the law, fair labour laws, social grants, free education, bursaries, fast track through the corporate world. 

The poor were given hope, to achieve the South African dream. They could be, anything they wanted to be.  In the previous regime, they could, and did,  work hard, but they could never be white. 

Now they could be anything they wanted to be and their children would have the chance to rise out of poverty, and there are so many examples of this in our new amazing country. 

What if the grand plan was to uplift the masses, and create a wealthy black middle class, regardless of the price. 

If the white neighbourhoods were neglected, in the process, and those who didn't take their wealth to Australia remained behind to sing songs around the fire yearning for bygone days when the robots worked and a black man knew his place in the grand scheme of things, was a fair price to pay. 

What if this grand plan was based on the premise that these wealthy rich people were not the job creators they claimed to be, and that the real job creators were still being created. 

The kids from these BEE families or their kids would be the highly qualified, yuppy future of this lovely land. They would in one or two generations, not be the incompetent token blacks in power but the entrepreneurs who get to rebuild a new country.  

What if you have to burn the bush, all the way to the ground to make room for fresh growth. 

If this was the actual master plan. Would you speak of it to anyone? Would you talk about it? 

You dare not cos the world would shun you, and the capital would disappear and you would be up  the creek without the proverbial paddle.  You would be forced to keep that true plan under wraps and watch this long game play out over the decades. 

I do realise that there are a million things that could go wrong with this master plan, and some of these disasters have already happened, but it doesn't mean that it is a bad plan. It might not be the best plan or the only plan, but it makes an oddball kind of sense in this mad wonderful country we find ourselves in. 

Please feel free to share your thoughts with me in the comments below. 

Mohammed Parak