Shoe on the Other Foot

The photo plays with your assumptions once you know the context. Where do you think this is set, and what do you think you are looking at? (Detail after the jump…)

The photo shows a squatter camp for poor white South Africans in Krugersdorp.

In the post by Reuters photographer Finbarr O’Reilly, you’ll see — with the impact of black affirmative action and the slumping economy — that poor whites aren’t faring that well. Although there are over 2,000 black squatter camps in South Africa, the number of whites in the 80 camps around the capital experiencing what is sometimes called “reverse apartheid” represent a growing, if largely undiscussed problem in the country.

Reuters post. O’Reilly slideshow.