Last week I couldn't even spell intelekshul....now I are one

By David Bullard (Richmark Sentinel)

Three years ago Blade Nzimande warned on the South African Communist Party website under the title “Red Alert” of the “creeping danger among sections of our intellectuals, through some of their pronouncements and paradigmatic assumptions, of creating a climate of anti-intellectualism”. I was one of the intellectuals he referred to by name. Within days I had threatened to slap a lawsuit on him for defamation. I may be many things…..cigarette scrounger, drunk, bottom pincher, Bonzo Dog fan even…..but don’t ever dare call me an intellectual. As Charles Bukowski said “An intellectual is a man who says a simple thing in a difficult way; an artist is a man who says a difficult thing in a simple way”.

Last Saturday The Weekender newspaper produced its list of South African intellectuals as voted for by 92 of its readers who had bothered to e.mail their choices to the editor. This either indicates a lamentably low readership for The Weekender or, more probably, a healthy disinterest in who is and who is not an “intellectual” on the part of Weekender readers. I suspect the whole idea came about as a bit of a lark because of their dismal weekly columnist Xolela Mangcu who constantly reminds us that he is an intellectual. Mangcu clearly spent the week lobbying fellow coffee drinkers at the Seattle Coffee Shop in Hyde Park where he lurks during the hours when most decent men are earning a living. Even with the lobbying he only managed to get 12 votes which puts him well below Mamphela Ramphele who held pole position with 31 votes. Professor Jonathan Jansen trounced the reptilian Mangcu with 16 votes but he probably didn’t vote for himself. A man like Jonathan Jansen doesn’t need to constantly remind people he is an intellectual….it’s obvious. However, it is the rest of the list that makes interesting and gloomy reading as we discover who South Africans (albeit only 92 of them) regard as intellectual.

In fairness, the newspaper doesn’t claim that this is a scientific or definitive list of public intellectuals which is a wise caveat when you have such names as Justice Malala and Mondli Makhanya on the list. Makhanya, the giggling, bibulous editor of the troubled Sunday Times got two votes to Malala’s one making him twice as intellectual. He is also, surprisingly, twice as intellectual as Michael Katz but only half as intellectual as his cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro who got four votes. Trawling through the list of names it became obvious that readers had simply tried to remember the names of South Africans who might qualify. Poor old J M Coetzee only got one vote which probably cheered my ex colleague Fred Khumalo who also only got one vote. Fred likes to tell people he is the South African Ernest Hemingway when he goes to literary festivals. Unfortunately his sales lag some way behind both Hemingway’s and Coetzee’s but, who knows, now he is an accredited intellectual maybe his books will fly off the shelves.

Clem Sunter, the scenario planner managed a barely respectable three votes while Thabo Mbeki, the scenario saboteur also managed three votes. Moeletsi Mbeki, the ex president’s garrulous brother, got five votes though so I envisage some sibling rivalry over the family dinner table along the lines of “I’m cleverer than you Thabo so I can have the last lamb chop”.

Names like Peter Bruce, Tim Cohen and Stephen Mulholland appear on the list which must be terribly embarrassing for all of them. The last thing you need for a successful career as a journalist is to be thought an intellectual. Most people are instinctively mistrustful of intellectuals because they believe them to be poseurs and people with strange bathroom habits. And, let’s not forget, intellectual isn’t the same as intelligent….a subtlety I suspect that was missed by many of those who voted.

Intellectual, according to my dictionary, relates to or involves the mental process of abstract thinking and reasoning rather than the emotions. If there were a steward’s enquiry that would rule people like Mangcu out of the race. The man is all splenetic emotion and hatred and hardly a week goes by without him resorting to the tired old race card. When he vigorously lobbied for my dismissal from the Sunday Times (a huge favour had I known it) and said that I should be taken to the highest court in the land on charges of hate speech I suggested we meet for a live debate on radio or TV. I suggested the same to Makhanya but the Eunuch of Biermann Avenue ( as he’s now affectionately known) hadn’t got the balls to discuss racism or press freedom live on air with me. So let me throw the gauntlet down again in front of hundreds of online witnesses. If Mangcu and Makhanya want to be thought of as intellectuals why not meet me in live debate at Constitution Hill? I don’t even claim to be an intellectual but I guarantee I’ll whip both your sorry asses. Accept the challenge and I’ll ask John Kane-Berman (score of 7) to fix it. Loser buys the drinks.