Category: this is south africa

The power of the ill-informed social media lynch mob wins again:

YOU, Huisgenoot and Drum announces Slide the City events will no longer take place this year in light of one of South Africa’s driest seasons in recent years.

Because people got their knickers in a knot over the fact that it was going to use water. Even though it wasn’t really going to actually use very much water at all.

Let’s listen to some experts, shall we?
Yes, I recognise that’a a bit of an unusual step in this sort of situation, because OUTRAGE! is better, but still:

A veteran environmentalist says:

“I would rather ask whether they are employing local people and contributing to the economy,” said Simon Bundy of SDP Ecological and Environmental Services, an organisation operating in the environmental sector since 1999. “The tourism industry, for example, would have benefited in the cities where Slide the City would have been hosted. The volumes of water that would have been used would be miniscule,” Bundy adds. “I don’t think it would make much of a difference if you used it for something else.”

Sod what you think, Bundy. I completely disregard your 16 years of specialist experience and I’m going to ignore everything that you have to say because I’ve got a bit of a bee in my bonnet over this and your views don’t match mine.
Because, yeah, how are the farmers going to manage without that water? How? Huh? HUH?!?

Well, let’s ask one, shall we?

Jannie de Villiers, head of Grain SA agrees. “What will happen if you give 35 000 litres of water to a farmer? It won’t make a difference. Perhaps it will for a household but it will make no difference to the agricultural sector.”

Yeah. See? Oh… wait… But anyway, what does he know? There’s more to agriculture than grain. Cows and stuff. And some of the water would have, like, evaporated or something.

Of course it would. But now, those several thousand individuals who were going to use that “miniscule” amount of water under the eagle eyes of the self-elected Water Police, will instead be cooling off at home in their pools and gardens, each wasting water left, right and centre because splashing in swimming pools and jumping through sprinklers does that, and there’s no-one there to stop them. *cough* own goal *cough*

And they won’t be helping out our tourism sector either: they won’t be buying drinks and snacks in or around the event, they won’t be parking their cars and helping the local car guards, they won’t pop into pubs and restaurants afterwards to cap off a great day in the sun. All the people who were going to be working the events across the country will now have to find alternative seasonal employment.
All of this is fine though, as our economy is absolutely booming right now. Isn’t it?

Perhaps setting up a store selling pitchforks and flaming torches might be a good business plan?
Just a thought.

But, the mob has spoken and we’re not allowed to have Slide The City, because the mob is unable or unwilling to comprehend simple facts that go against its narrative.

God help us all when they find out about the City of Cape Town’s six “Spray Parks”, which run every day throughout summer. But those will be ok, because:

Water is recirculated and treated through a process similar to that of a swimming pool filtration system. Water is a scarce resource and spray parks have been designed to minimise water usage.

Now, where have I heard that before?