Two Mozambican men are dead in South Africa, ostensibly murdered in a spasm of xenophobic violence. The response, predictable as a sunrise, is the roar of British NGOs demanding justice. But whose justice?
And for who? The modern NGO has become the new missionary, the colonial do-gooder in a pith helmet, dispensing moral superiority to the savage corners of the globe. They demand investigations, tribunals, reparations.
They invoke the ghost of the International Criminal Court. But they forget the old Roman adage: when you make a desert, call it peace. These NGOs, these self-appointed guardians of universal virtue, are the new emperors of a dying empire.
They lack the legions, but they have the press releases. They lack the swords, but they have the sanctions. The deaths of these two men are tragic.
But the cynical manipulation of their corpses for political capital is the true obscenity. South Africa, like much of the West, is caught in a trap of historical guilt and demographic panic. Every murder becomes a referendum on the nation's soul.
Every foreigner's death is a chance to lecture. But let us be honest: the NGO class does not care about Mozambicans. They care about power.
They care about the sweet high of moral indignation. They want to be the new priests, the confessors of a secular age. So they demand justice.
But justice, in their lexicon, means submission. They want South Africa to kneel, to apologize, to pay. They want the old racial hierarchies reversed, but only so they can sit at the top.
The victims deserve mourning. But they do not deserve to become hashtags in the culture war. Let us bury the dead.
And let us bury the NGOs' desperate need for relevance. Their empire of sentiment is crumbling. And good riddance.
