blog #2- south africa and america alike????

I always knew that every country has their similarities just like every religion has similarities. Even though i knew this it still surprised me to learn about the reconstruction after the Civil War and the Apartheid. The Civil War occurred in the United States and Apartheid occurred in South Africa and I found it strange that even though they are miles apart that the events during reconstruction were amazingly similar with very few differences.

One thing in particular that is shockingly similar is the fact that racism still exists after the reconstruction. The U.S. had the white supremacists and the KKK which were groups of people who didn't want the African Americans around and believed that they all meant trouble. South Africa had groups that forced them out of the white neighborhoods because they supposedly caused just as much trouble.

Another similarity is the fact that their rights were stripped from them. In both aspects, they lost both the right to be able to own land and the right to be able to vote. They even had their separate toilets, restaurants, and even stores. They weren't even allowed the right to education. It's scary that this was a world renown problem.

There are very few differences. In fact I can count them on one hand. First of all South Africa's reconstruction took 40 years which is a lot longer than America's reconstruction. South Africa had reconciliation counsels where as America did not. Plus South Africa's number one priority during reconstruction was education.

To me this lesson brought up a lot more questions than it did answers. If history repeats itself, then what's going to happen next? If South Africa's reconstruction plan was better, how did we end up on top? If we went through similar situations how is it that it gave us two different situations now? This lesson really made me think "What if ?"