The Big Read: Don't be a colour, be a light

Dear high school and university students

I thought I should write to you about the recent troubles in our country. You might have heard about the hateful speech of popular singers. Or of the black family denied access to a Cape Town restaurant. Or a black boy assaulted with a broomstick up his rear end. Or a black working woman kicked in the body by university students. Or anti-Indian sentiment in the lyrics of songs from Durban. Or that some state agencies provide bursaries only to "black African students".

It is hard to believe that we are into the 21st year of democracy and freedom, and yet adults behave as if nothing has changed. In fact, the South African Human Rights Commission claims that, of the 10000 cases brought to its attention, roughly 45% concern racism.

This is a serious indictment of the state of our young democracy and I want to offer you several ways of negotiating your way through the lingering racism that continues to humiliate, injure and divide all of us.

• First, and this might unsettle you, you were not born a race. You were born a human being, and that gives all of us hope.

Racial tags came later, and people started to impose an identity on you; that is, they told you what you were - coloured or African or whatever.

Actually, you're all human beings, so behave that way and refuse any attempt to press-gang you into one identity. If you get one of those official forms asking you to tick your race, write "human".

• Second, make sure you make many friends who do not look like you or pray like you or come from where you do. This is your salvation in a fast-changing country and a global economy in which many of you will work.

The sooner your friends are middle-class and poor, Jewish and Muslim, black and white, and even (gulp) Stormers fans, the sooner you will become more able to deal with the division in our society.

This will be difficult for many of you since there is a false sense of safety in hanging out with people who are narrowly like you in every respect. Break out from such straitjacketing as soon as you can. It will help you in life, work, studies and play.

• Third, learn early on to take a stand against injustice from within your in-group. If you're with Christian students, like you, and they make anti-Muslim or anti-Jewish statements laced with prejudice, condemn that behaviour loudly and immediately. If somebody makes jokes about students with disabilities, slam that behaviour in public without fear.

If you lack the courage to stand up for what is right, no matter what the consequences, you will remain a wimp throughout your life. This country needs independent, courageous voices among the youth who can change the future of our democracy.

• Fourth, challenge your parents. Many of you have parents who would blow a gasket if you, a white student, showed up with a black lover, or you, a Hindu student, introduced your parents to an intimate Muslim companion. Your parents, like me, are products of the old South Africa - we change more slowly than you.

You have to be better than us, make better choices than us, and live more freely than us. Do not let your parents tell you whom to love. We have baggage and you must not carry that baggage into your own adult life. Listen to your parents, but then make your own decisions.

• Fifth, look for opportunities to place yourself in unfamiliar or uncomfortable situations. Take a careful look at the picture above this article. It shows my students playing rugby together earlier this week as they beat another university. In the intensity of the game they learn something important - that they are blue, together, and that winning as a team is more important than your skin or your culture. In this moment of competition and celebration, great distances are overcome.

I am not optimistic about the future of South Africa if we depend on our current leadership. In fact, we are doomed unless you, as youth, gain a strong education that combines competence, courage and compassion, and the desire to break down divisions and build solid friendships across colour, class and creed. We look to you to lead us out of this mess.