As South Africans, we should be celebrating comedian Trevor Noah… after all, he is one of our most successful arts exports.
Yet, many people say they can’t stand the man. He is criticised for “running away” from his homeland to make enormous money in the US, for not being white enough, not being black enough… and being a racist (by both sides).
We would venture a guess that Noah generates such passion simply because of his honest and accurate humour and satire wounds because the truth hurts. As the offspring of a white father and African mother, growing up in the suburbs and the townships, he has a unique perspective on race, the topic which makes just about everyone angry, for different reasons.
The rest of the world, though, can see what a comedic genius – never mind a perceptive social satirist – he is. Noah has just won the Erasmus Prize in The Netherlands.
ALSO READ: Trevor Noah joins Charlie Chaplin in the history books and bags a cool R3 mil
Named after Dutch humanist scholar Desiderius Erasmus (1466-1536), it recognises anyone in the arts who upholds his mantra of humaneness, moderation and tolerance while rejecting social or ideological dogma.
That is exactly what Trevor Noah does: He laughs at all of us. We should learn to laugh at ourselves, too.
