Trevor Noah The Comfort Zone

Trevor Noah cannot be replaced, for the same reason why The Daily Show chose him as the host of this television show. He was a comfort zone for American television audiences. He was a foreigner, a South African. He was neither pizza, corn bread, bratwurst sausage, baked beans on toast, dim sum, roti, cabbage soup, challah bread, baguette, haggis, spaghetti, peanut butter and jelly, perogies or pork pie.

He was neither black nor white to the American audience. Very comforting indeed. That race thing can be so tedious, makes me wanna reach for my gin and tonic, and scotch on the rocks for my husband. He was colorless like water. He was also comforting in South Africa, the land of his birth. The racial system known as apartheid classified him as a ‘Coloured’. There were four classifications: white, black, Indian and Coloured. The lowest, most despised, most treated like animals was the ‘black’ majority, with the blackest skin and owners of the land stolen by the British. Black meant savage.

‘Coloureds’ like Trevor were neither black or white. They were a mixture of races. He always talks about his white father and African mother. Coloureds could be children of African domestic servants and white bosses. It could be children of the San people, history books called Bushmen. Indians need no introduction. They had the blackest skins. The  British brought them to Africa from India to plant sugar cane because Zulus said they cannot be farm slaves on land stolen from them.

Trevor Noah regards himself as an African, a black person but he was a comforting face to millions of Americans because of his looks. He was neither nor. He was mid-way. He was a compromise. His jokes had no venom nor accusation because he was from another land, another place, another country, not America. That’s why The Daily Show will never found another Trevor Noah. Americans must get used to different hosts for that show.

Nonqaba waka Msimang

Executive Blogger