Helen Zille Criticised For Dolly Parton Tribute

Mods please trust me this is relevant.

Helen Zille is the Democratic Alliance's candidate for Mayor of Johannesburg, and is the dominant personality of the party regardless of who the official leader is at the time. The DA is South Africa's largest liberal party, and by all accounts Zille is leading in the polls and the DA will be the largest party in Johannesburg.

When you ask DA supporting South Africans why the DA doesn't win more votes, many will cite racial divisions as the party is often seen as a White party. But it is also very often the case that people will concede that Helen Zille really does have a habit of putting her foot in her mouth and offending people unnecessarily.

It is sometimes hard to explain this because when we give the big, scandalous tweets, they have to do with race. People file that under "racial divisions" and don't really listen to the point that this party has this abrasive side to it which is a bit of a turn off. But if you browse on this sub, you will find examples of sincere DA supporting South Africans saying that they like the DA and hope Zille wins but they need to keep her phone away from her at all costs.

Now here is a nice, small, non-racial example of how Zille needlessly disrespects and offends people. She tweeted:

"Dolly Parton — love her. She nursed her ill husband till the end. She looked like a complete floozy but she was a strong and deep humam being. RIP."

When people took issue with her describing a woman who just died as a "floozy", this is how she responded on Twitter:

"Idiot. It is a tribute if you are too thick to get it."

Someone in the Zille campaign screwed up and let gogo (grandma) get onto her phone. Now imagine if instead of being a tweet about a recently departed and beloved musician and philanthropist, it was about something sensitive: Apartheid, Colonialism, Race.

I know this article is not about policy and it is about a tweet and random electoral politics. But I am hoping it gives you some insight into the electoral dynamics around Zille and the DA, which is relevant to the progress of South Africa's largest liberal party.