Help a Fool

Thank you for your interest in supporting a fool.

Why support a Fool?

Two reasons come to mind.

The first is the matter of value. I believe in exchanging value for value. If you find value in my work, then you may consider repaying it in kind, in measure of your judgment of the value to you.

The second is simpler. I do this in my spare time. In order to keep food on the table I work full time. I also study essentially full time. This means I have very little spare time to direct towards thought on these matters. As such I do not produce a lot of posts.

If it became possible for me to do I would like to write much more often and in much more depth. The quality and volume of my writings would obviously benefit from this.

Time is money though and I simply don't have enough to do everything I would like to do.

More about The Fool

For those that are interested, I decided to share some of the realities of my life, as perceived by me.

I do so not to win your sympathy, but to give you perspective, and to have you reflect on whether my views gave any value to you, in the hope that you will exchange value for value.

I was born in South Africa to a middle class family in 1983. I was 7 years old when Nelson Mandela was released from prison, and 11 years old when we had our first democratic elections.

My parents were non-racist and voted in favour of democratic elections in the referendum in 1989. I don't recall my parents ever speaking in derogatory terms of suppressed black people. You may keep in mind however that such things were quite far from my mind at such an age.

Those were kinder years, and the conservatism of my inherited culture shielded me from growing up too fast. There was no internet, no mobile phones, no easy availability of drugs, no exposure to sexual advertising in every media form and being in a middle class family trying to make ends meet, no easy available money for getting into trouble with.

None of us have a choice as to the circumstances we are born into, nor the country or culture for that matter.

As I grew older, beyond what we were taught in school about our new reality in our young new democracy, the reality of living it also seeded in me a curiosity about the history of our country and our people.

I learned of the blatant hateful discrimination which included, but was not limited to : people not being allowed in certain areas, not being allowed the use of some public facilities, not being allowed to apply for certain jobs, not being able to travel without permission, etc.

A sad history of repression and oppression of a people based on race.

While not politically minded at a younger age, by 1998, at the age of 15, with the Rainbow nation speech of Nelson Mandela, I shared the feeling of hope for our new country, felt by my countrymen.

It is said that history rhymes, sadly this seems to be true.

Our bright new hope has spluttered like a candle in the night. Our dreams of a united nation killed by years of suppressed outrage and hate, fermented by those in newfound power for what was done to them. It would seem our mutual icon, Mandela, spoke in vain of forgiveness and reconciliation.

I understand why this is happening to our nation, but that does not mean I can condone it. The wisdom of elders is supposed to guide a nation from repeated folly. Or rather this is what I believed at a younger more idealistic age, and it did seem to be true in the figure of Mandela.

As I grow older however it seems that this projection of wisdom that is embodied by my elders is nothing but an illusion. A vestige of power worn self righteously and 'earned' by the passing of years.

As the years have passed I have seen the hatred between my countrymen grow again, sparked and encouraged by governmental policies seemingly designed specifically to create class and racial conflict, born of a lack of understanding and a desire for revenge.

This has led to policies such as BEE( Black Economic Empowerment) whereby there is preference(prejudice) for black candidates in applying for jobs, and transformation goals whereby a certain percentage of all businesses must be black, and ownership must be black for a significant percentage.

Our country is unique in that the empowerment legislation is to the detriment of a minority of the population, 5% or so, and for the benefit of about 90%.

This is in effect for all whites, a kind of reverse apartheid, with just the colours switched around. This will likely be in effect for the foreseeable future. It is truly sad for those whites who were born after 1994, the year of our first democratic elections, that will be entering the workforce next year.

It is very much harder to get a job if you are white and young than black, it is almost impossible if you are white and middle aged.

My middle class parents were chewed up and spit out by the machine of the state, and are now fast approaching poverty themselves, something that has happened for broad swathes of whites since 1994.

I have noted that the ideology of socialism is to be found in most countries today, and in that regard my country is not unique, though we do have our own unique history that amplifies the suffering, anger and lack of morality this system creates, by, for the most part, splitting it along racial lines.

The end results of this ideology is fast approaching, as it has done many times before in history. This time it will be a worldwide event, as opposed to the isolated historic incidents.

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My current daily reality is this. I am thankful to have a job, a roof over my head and food on my table. In addition I am very thankful to have the opportunity to have Internet as it allows me a world of information.

I earn R4000 a month at present, which is about $500. From this I fund my costs of living, studies at university, Internet, and try and augment my preparations for the coming transition. As you may imagine it is a incredibly difficult task to do so on this income.

Luckily I have no debts, I believe in paying for what I use and have done so my whole life.

I am working on improving my position, hence the studies. However I doubt I will even be done with my studies before the transition.

There isn't really anything left over for me to save as wealth. Sadly I am unable to add more gold to my own savings, unable to follow my own advice and benefit from the coming transition, beyond my current small gold position, which was very hard won. This is very frustrating as you can imagine.

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My previous blog can be found here : http://blogs.fin24.com/Motley.Fool

What I would use the donations for

This could augment my income and perhaps even replace it, in which case I would be able to blog full time.

I would like to be able to afford a plane ticket out of this country if circumstances force me to do so.

Studying is a costly endeavor, and extremely hard to finance on my current income, I would use some towards this purpose.

I would of course love to own some more gold, so that in the holding of it through knowledge I will be able to use that at the right time to create opportunities to improve my life and implement some of my business ideas.