The Cape Flats may dominate the news, but violence has spread far wider. Gangsterism is no longer “somewhere else.” It is at our doorstep.
LET ME tell you something uncomfortable. Over the course of my life, I have met a few real-life gangsters.
Not the movie kind, the actual living-and-breathing ones. And here is the truth we don’t like to admit: some of them had good qualities. They could be generous. Funny.
Loyal to their mothers in a way that would make you pause.
I am not saying this to romanticise them. I am saying it because if we are going to speak honestly to our youth, especially here in South Africa, where the pull of fast money and street reputation are very real, we need to start with the truth.
