Lies About South African “White Genocide“
The United States is in a fascist political crisis.
There are so many not only alarming, but outright “unhinged” updates from the US administration this past week, it’s hard to know where to start and respond. But that is because the marching orders of a fascist government takeover in 2025 are to use “shock and awe,” an unrelenting barrage of announcements and executive orders to both distract and overwhelm the public.
From a media literacy standpoint this situation about false and alleged genocide of White South Africans by United States President Donald Trump is notable. While media literacy alone cannot “save us” or “fix this,” it is vitally important. Facts matter, and the ability of citizens to “identify, resist and oppose false propaganda” is essential in an open society and functioning democracy.
The President of the United States, Donald Trump, continues to outright lie, announce completely false and fabricated assertions are fact, and mislead the United States public, our government and the world with repeated, invented falsehoods. We are in the midst of a fascist crisis in the United States.
“Yesterday, with Musk in the Oval Office, Trump showed to the cameras a picture of people moving body bags, and said “[t]hese are all white farmers that are being buried.” In fact, it was a picture from Goma in the Democratic Republic of Congo, showing humanitarian workers burying bodies in a war zone.”
From Heather Cox Richardson‘s update from May 22, 2025:
https://open.substack.com/pub/heathercoxrichardson/p/may-22-2025?r=4unjx&utm_medium=ios
For more on this see Reuters’ 22 May 2025 article, “A check of Trump's false claims about white genocide in South Africa”
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-makes-false-claims-white-genocide-south-africa-during-ramaphosa-meeting-2025-05-21/
“5. Trump held up a printed sheet of paper with a picture of people lifting body bags and said, "These are all white farmers that are being buried".
The image actually showed humanitarian workers burying bodies in the city of Goma in Democratic Republic of Congo. It was a screengrab taken from Reuters video footage in early February following deadly battles against Rwanda-backed M23 rebels who had captured the city.
The image was added to a blog post about tribalism in South Africa and Congo which did not provide a caption but gave a link to the YouTube video it was taken from, which credited Reuters. Trump showed the blog to reporters amid a stack of printed articles which he claimed showed evidence of killings of white people in South Africa.”
Together my friends, we must “resist and heal.” This is a long-term effort, we are going to continue to be in the struggle for years to come.
Together, we need to work to “heal our culture.”
Part of this work involves education, and the struggle to help people of all ages develop critical thinking, including media literacy skills.