Inside the kommando camp that turns boys' doubts to hate (South Africa)

Mail and Guardian ^ | Friday 24 February 2012 | ELLES VAN GELDER

[MinorityRepublican]

Thick clouds of diesel smoke fill the air outside a run-down guest farm outside the town of Carolina in Mpumalanga. As the stench dissipates, a group of boys, aged between 13 and 19, spill from the bed of a rusty truck. The trip from the city to the country was long and hypnotic in the old jalopy.

It is after midnight when the boys heft bags full of military clothing. "There are old blood stains on my uniform," one of them says, as he trades his sneakers for army boots.

Shouted orders ring out. The harsh intimidation begins immediately. Groaning, the boys raise 4m tent poles among the cowpats dotting the grassland. The large army tent will be their home for the next nine days.

Thirteen-year-old Jano, the youngest at the camp, spreads his sleeping bag on the bumpy floor. He is at the camp because he wants to prove to his father that he isn't a sissy but a real man, he says with a shy smile.

At 18, Riaan is already a little more self-assured. His lily-white skin is recovering from acne. "I want to learn how to camouflage myself in the veld." He, too, seems excited to be camping out and playing soldier, as if he's living an adventure out of a boyhood novel.

[gaijin]

Exchange a few words, and that same article might as well describe the political indoctrination in Hawaii of Obama, or very typical sermons given to him for DECADES in Chicago.

[Little Bill]

I have read allot about the Afrikaans in SA, interesting bunch. Reminds me of my early LDS ancestors rather stubborn.

[Da Coyote]

Sounds like the quality of “education”is about the same as out public schools.

So, what’s the problem...libs?

[MarkL]

Wow, that’s sort of like the everyday school teachings at islamist schools and madrasas all over the world.

It’s horrible when they find someone in South Africa teaching these things... No big deal and not worth reporting when islamists teach these things against Christians and Jews, day in and day out, in thousands of these schools, all over the world!

Mark