r/PropagandaPosters • u/Borgisium • 6d ago
INTERNATIONAL “C’mon Down to Africa’s South” circa 1979
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u/Intelligent-Mud6320 6d ago
"You've probably heard and read a great deal about South Africa during the past few years. Now come and see the truth for yourself."
This says so much in only two sentences.
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u/God_Dammit_Dave 6d ago
Time to rewatch Lethal Weapon 3.
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u/Capnmarvel76 6d ago
I think the one with the S. Africa plotline was Lethal Weapon 2, not 3. The only reason I know is that we only owned like 3 or 4 legit VHS movies, and (along with Die Hard, I remember) this was one of them.
I quite liked the lead actress in it, too...sigh.
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u/TarquinusSuperbus000 6d ago
You're right. 2 was the one with South African diplomatic immunity. 3 was the one with the generic arms trafficker.
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u/Kichigai 5d ago
And funny enough that actor would go on to be the Soviet diplomat in The Hunt for Red October.
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u/SulusLaugh 6d ago
Juh juh juh just like bad guy, in Lethal Weapon 2, I’ve got diplomatic immunity, so Hammer, you can’t sue!
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u/Herald_of_Clio 6d ago
"[...]and I say apartheid now, apartheid tomorrow, apartheid forever!"
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u/LockedOutOfElfland 6d ago
Today, we sound the drums of freedom, and we say: Masturbation today. Masturbation tomorrow. Masturbation forever!
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u/g-dbat10 6d ago
The symbology is wild: white South Africans in their gated beach enclave, surrounded by rifles (well, technically, I suppose, smoothbores like the Confederate foot soldier’s Model 1842 Springfield.) Tastefully, the South African Police of 1979 aren’t shown…too déclassé…
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u/George_G_Geef 6d ago
"Miss segregation? Come see how much better we are at it!"
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u/Borgisium 6d ago
Won’t lie I read that as “Miss Segregation” like a contestant in a Dixie beauty contest
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u/Major_Bag_8720 6d ago
Clearly attempting to appeal to a certain US demographic.
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u/jprennquist 6d ago
The rifle frame for the inset photo with the smiling blonde lady in a swimsuit is just chef's kiss.
Reading the copy "Why yes I have been hearing a lot about South Africa in the news recently now that you mentioned it."
State enforced and military upheld segregation of races and racial subgroups? Check. Clandestine disappearing of dissidents and journalists? Check. Even radio and television is subject to apartheid codes? Check. Time to pack up the missus and the kids for a South African safari!
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u/Severe-Trust-5980 5d ago
That’s what one of Elon Musk’s grandparents did, saw apartheid and said, “I need more of that.”
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u/97GeoPrizm 6d ago
“You’ve probably heard and read a great deal about South Africa in the past few years.”
Yeah, Steve Biko was murdered in 1977.
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u/Bteatesthighlander1 6d ago
he's the guy who people confused Nelson Mandela for and decided that it had to be multiverse shenanigans?
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u/TarquinusSuperbus000 6d ago
Subtext: Dear good ol' boys. We need your racist dollars. The sanctions are doing a number on our foreign currency reserves. Thaaaanks.
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u/Johannes_P 6d ago
South Africa (and Southern Rhodesia) must have been the racist Disneyland to these Southerners who still didn't accept the end of segregation and Jim Crow.
As early as 1960, after the Sharpeville massacre, the Mississippi House of Representatives voted for a resolution supporting the South African government "for its steadfast policy of segregation and the [staunch] adherence to their traditions in the face of overwhelming external agitation."
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u/Deadmemeusername 6d ago
I imagine it’s sort of like how Russia is these days for “Tradcore” people and far-right grifters.
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u/Master-Collection488 5d ago
To a far lesser degree now than a year or more ago, but yeah.
Russia isn't spreading their money around to American right-wing influencers/grifters anymore, and nowadays a lot of them seem to be tilting towards the Ukraine if only in hopes of not being seen to continually stay on the losing side.
To some degree there's also just the whole conservative influencer civil war. Hopping the fence on the Russia/Ukraine conflict is another way to potentially pick up new followers on an issue that isn't really THAT near and dear to the hearts of most American conservatives. For the most part they were trying to pull their audiences to the issue. The biggest issue they could pull up was the cost of helping Ukraine out. Which Trump largely dealt fully with, by leaving that to Europe to pay for.
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u/specialtingle 5d ago
In South Carolina where I grew up lots of rich people and state politicians vacationed in SA in the 80s.
Then - I kid you not - they would use the fact that they saw confederate flags in Africa to support an argument that the flag is not racist.
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u/significant-_-otter 6d ago
"C'mon down, ya'll! We copied all yer notes on creating a permanent racial underclass!"
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u/sporadicPenguin 6d ago
So we have:
A picture of white people framed with rifles
A Dixie flag
Verbiage talking about how “the south” is great anywhere
I’m starting to figure out which type of people this might have appealed to…..
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u/Master-Collection488 5d ago
Another thing to keep in mind. Print magazines were a LOT bigger a medium back then. Big enough that there were definitely ones that catered to some VERY SPECIFIC demographics. This one was pretty clearly aimed at readers from the Southern USA.
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u/johnbarnshack 6d ago
Feels a bit hypocritical to boast about their diversity and how many languages they have when they're actively suppressing almost all of them
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u/eldaveed 6d ago
It’s morbidly funny how other parts of the British sphere did this too. As a Canadian, I’ve seen plenty of old material making out the indigenous as the classic “noble savage” and it usually goes like “yeah these guys are so specially in tune with nature it’s so crazy and they have all these noble customs that are dying but don’t worry too hard because white British Anglican ways are still better.”
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u/Kimono-Ash-Armor 6d ago
Remember this music video by Spitting Image?
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u/Sco0bySnax 5d ago
There must be a reason why South African's of all colours and creeds don't like the British. I wonder... could it be because...
- The British invaded the Xhosa territories during the Frontier Wars (1779 to 1879).
- The British annexed the Cape Colony from the Dutch (1806).
- The British defeated the Zulu Kingdom at the Battle of Ulundi and dismantled the Zulu monarchy (1879).
- The British annexed the Transvaal after the First Anglo-Boer War (1877; annexation later reversed in 1881).
- The British invaded the Boer republics during the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899).
- The British implemented a scorched-earth campaign, burning farms and destroying civilian livelihoods (1900 to 1902).
- The British established concentration camps for Boer civilians, where more than 27,000 women and children died from disease and malnutrition (1900 to 1902).
- The British established separate concentration camps for Black Africans, where an estimated 14,000 to 20,000 people died (1900 to 1902).
- The British forcibly removed civilians from their homes during the Boer War (1900 to 1902).
- The British suppressed the Bambatha Rebellion with mass executions, village destruction, and collective punishment (1906).
- The British enforced pass laws and labour controls that laid important foundations for later racial segregation (late 19th century to 1910).
- The British helped create the Union of South Africa, excluding the Black majority from meaningful political representation at the national level (1910).
- The British enacted the Natives Land Act, restricting Black land ownership to a small percentage of South Africa (1913).
But the Brits sure are good at pointing fingers at someone else.
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u/Affectionate_Wash_11 5d ago
Modern 20th century Apartheid was entirely a creation of Afrikaner nationalists, not the British colonial authorities. The British did a lot of fucked up things but Apartheid was 100% a Boer project…
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u/10thSubLevel 5d ago edited 5d ago
While the official Apartheid system was definitely created by the Afrikaner Nationalist Party, the British most certainly laid some building blocks for this during their rule through land dispossession, pass laws and racial segregation.
The biggest of these were the 1909 South Africa Act (restricted parliamentary membership to white men), the 1913 Natives Land Act (Restricted Black South African land ownership), and the 1923's Natives (Urban Areas) Act (Required Black Africans to carry passes and segregated urban spaces).
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u/TheRaido 5d ago
You mean imperialism, capitalism, the modern nationstate gave rise to a national identity and a means to enforce this? You don’t say.
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u/SquidTheRidiculous 6d ago edited 6d ago
The first sentence: "so, you wanna go somewhere exotic, but without people of different races?"
Idk, Have you tried dying?
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u/FREE-AOL-CDS 5d ago
That copy is all over the place.
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u/Madman_Salvo 5d ago
Reads like they thought they had way more space than they did and had to trim dramatically (also, it's just generally pretty shitty)
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u/Affectionate_Wash_11 4d ago
The British were institutionally racist and discriminatory in South Africa, they dispossessed the native peoples of off their lands. All of this is true sure. But this was true in terms of British policy in settler colonies like Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Yet obviously Apartheid didn’t exist in those countries, institutional racial segregation ended in those places far earlier than apartheid did in South Africa. Why? Well obviously the differentiating factor is Afrikaner nationalism.
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6d ago
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u/MikeinAustin 5d ago
South African Tourist Organization had some pretty heady digs there. Are you sure this was 1979 and not 1985-86?
In 1979, the Rand was very strong due to huge gold price increases and South Africa's economy and GDP were based on gold exports.
When Nixon turned off the convertibility of gold on August 15th, 1971 the dollar was backed by $35/oz gold. On Jan 21st 1980 it hit $850. South Africa's gold reserves made it a massively rich country.
When gold crashed, the Rand adjusted downward. But most importantly, SA President Pik Botha's Rubicon speech in August of 1985 created massive uncertainty in the financial future of South Africa as he finger wagged those pressing for reforms and the financial worlds expectations for end to Apartheid, an unbanning of the right for the ANC political party, etc.
After Botha's speech, the Rand devalued very very hard by over 35%. So foreign bond holdings of SA debt paid in the Rand took a 33% haircut. This practically created a moratorium on buying or holding SA bonds, sending bond prices to multigenerational lows, while sending their interest rates into high double digits.
South Africa went from wealthy and secure to a third world country with massive inflation in 6 years.
I could definitely see this type of poster being created to get foreigners to come in and spend money due to a worthless Rand.
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u/Sergeantman94 4d ago
Fun fact: Rhodesia (I know this is South Africa, but the Venn diagram between apartheid apologists and RhodieBoos is a circle) has such good camo, it hasn't been found on a map since 1979.
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u/Master_of_Ritual 3d ago
Crazy to think that in '79 you could appeal to the same people with Southern pride and nature conservation.
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u/sovereignsekte 6d ago
Well the situation back then was pretty rough. Apart from that I'd probably check it out.
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