Wise words from the Iron Lady

A friend recently sent me this brilliant quote from the late, great Iron Lady herself:

“I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.”
― Lady Margaret Thatcher

Though I have always found it entertaining, rather than wounding, when I think of the sort of abuse I receive from the increasingly desperate Defenders of the Myths for daring to take on National Party propaganda, I was struck at just how germane this quote is. Egged-on by a pair of ‘academics’, who used their book reviews of my work either to bizarrely fantasize about what I wear under my kilt[1], or to tell blatant lies[2], their sheeplike minions quickly swung into action.

Emboldened by these comically nonsensical reviews, and without feeling the need to actually read any of my books themselves, these excitable fellows furiously rejected all my work out of hand, with many copying one of the aforementioned ‘esteemed’ reviewers, and oh-so-cleverly dismissing it all as ‘kak’. Another favourite is to assure me that I am ‘not a real historian’ (ie. a historian who only writes things they like to read, and doesn’t in any way challenge them to think), this despite my being elected as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society – so work that one out. And needless to say, it simply doesn’t even occur to such people that someone who, during the Apartheid-era, attained and held a senior position in the History faculty of one of the traditionally Afrikaans South African Universities, might be the slightest bit biased.

Others got rather more excited, and took to levelling surreal accusations of ‘holocaust-denial’ at me, or refused to even countenance considering my research by pretending that I have an irrational, and deep-seated, hatred of Afrikaners. More perversely still, I was even accused of ‘smuggling heroin while serving in Afghanistan’[3]… though only when I am not indulging in bestiality with Shetland ponies (would you believe). I was then earnestly assured that I was going to be taken to court for ‘compensation of hundreds of millions of dollars’ (compensation for what, exactly, was never made clear), while several gentlemen threatened to drive me from South Africa, haunt me, ‘break me in half’, and / or ‘Bliksem’ me (that was a common one). One particularly deranged chap – bizarrely, if entertainingly – completely dismissed the entirety of my work simply by claiming that HM Queen Elizabeth II was a Nazi.

All in all, the sight of their treasured NP-version of events crumbling clearly sent many of these poor fellows into something between a meltdown and an absolute flat panic. And so they reacted by going into full-on attack mode, desperately spewing out anything and everything they could think of to discredit my work, and – more often – me. Well, everything, that is, apart from actually challenging the inconvenient historical facts that I raised, or explaining why every single one of my thousands of references is completely invalid.

Of course, as their much-cherished Apartheid-era myths collapse around their ears, and rather than addressing any of the enormous number of references I used to support my writing, it is far easier to instead angrily squawk that I am ‘a liberal’[4], or scream that I am the product of a fling my late-father enjoyed with a black maid, or – a personal favourite of mine – that I am, and despite all evidence to the contrary, actually a Pakistani Muslim. Needless to say, even if any of that were true, it is still unclear why these people felt that my being non-white would somehow invalidate all my writing and research – though I am sure you can make your own mind up on why they might think that: what a pleasant bunch.

And as for all those extremist cowards who prefer to call me various four-letter words and / or threaten to punch / shoot / kill me (all by email, of course – none have ever had the courage to say such things to my face), by so doing, they only serve to prove beyond all doubt that they have absolutely no answer to any of the troublesome points I dare to raise. One has to pity them, really: if the best the ‘academic’ guardians of the myths can come up with is to point out a spelling mistake[5], giggle about my choice of undergarments, and to lie, then what chance do the hoi-polloi faithful really have?

A certain class of True Believer probably hopes that flinging personal attacks at me online will impress his chums in the Facebook group echo-chambers they tend to hide out in, and this maybe bolsters his flagging feeling of self-worth for a moment. Or perhaps such people lead lives that are so empty that they desperately need the twin comfort blankets of faux-victimhood and Boer martial brilliance that the National Party myths so conveniently provide.

But – and as was the case in most things – Maggie was right; the insults and threats simply mean that they haven’t got a single research-based argument left.

NOTES:

[1] If this particular Professor still spends his afternoons day-dreaming about this, I am happy to assure him that the answer is ‘nothing’

[2] I still patiently await a public apology from Mr Boje, and – more importantly – an explanation as to why he felt the need to lie about my work: http://www.chrisash.co.za/2018/09/17/frantically-trying-to-defend-the-myth/ Did he really feel so threatened by my challenging National Party myths that he had to stoop to such levels? Why is the preservation of NP myths so very important to him?

[3] I’ve never been to Afghanistan… or – I hasten to add – partaken in immoral acts with any sort of farmyard animal

[4] Nothing could be further from the truth

[5] If any readers think I am over-egging the pudding, and still doubt the extreme bias of certain South African academics against anyone who dares to challenge the Apartheid-era version of the Boer War, it is worth noting the squealingly enthusiastic endorsements the same True Believing twosome gave to a book which was absolutely riddled with spelling mistakes and glaring schoolboy errors… but which – far more importantly, it would seem – didn’t threaten their much-adored myths: https://www.chrisash.co.za/2019/02/01/how-to-get-a-glowing-review/