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South African Minister of the Police Bheki Cele. (Xabiso Mkhabela/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
PHOENIXMASSACRE

Mass shootings in South Africa are often over group turf: how to stop the cycle of reprisals

The killings made international headlines and were shocking even in South Africa, a society with one of the highest murder rates in the world

  • Guy Lamb
6 min read
Community members gather around a road block they set up in Phoenix, north of Durban, on July 15, 2021 to prevent looters from reaching the community. File photo by GUILLEM SARTORIO / AFP
PHOENIXMASSACRE

A time for collective grief: Reflections on the Phoenix Massacre

Protecting our loved ones from harm and destruction is brave and noble but the insistence on framing the brutality in Phoenix in terms of the protection narrative is disingenuous

  • Sarojini Nadar
4 min read
The shadow of a lynching set against a crowd of people; the image was created and distributed by the NAACP, c. 1930s. The writer argues that recent, vigilante-led killings in South Africa echo the practice. (Everett Historical)
PHOENIXMASSACRE

Hashtags bear a strange fruit: The visual terror of the #PhoenixMassacre

As vigilante groups stepped in to ‘protect’ their property and families, the visual spectacle of death took on a sinister pleasure in some quarters, with Black lives bearing the…

  • Zamansele Nsele
7 min read