The Lollapalooza music festival took place in Chicago over the weekend. And like pretty much every other major music festival around the globe recently, Die Antwoord played there. During an interview with Entertainment Weekly they explained why they don’t prefer to do gigs in South Africa. As it turns out, Ninja & Yolandi does not seem to care much for South Africans in general.

According to the notorious two, South Africa is “pretty fucking retarded” and the majority of its citizens are “insecure”. Also, performing to South Africans is “like doing magic tricks for retarded children.”

When asked how their American fan base differed from their South African fan base, here is how they responded:

Yo-Landi: South Africa is pretty fucking retarded.

Ninja: There’s two sides to South Africa. Our experience in South Africa is there’s a minority group that are in tune with us, but for the rest of South Africa, we’re quite notorious. South Africa is amazing on a certain level, because it’s very innocent and naive like us. In South Africa, the epicenter is dysfunctional, it’s chaotic, it’s corrupt, there’s a lot of problems with it. When we get exposed to the good stuff from overseas, it’s like, ‘Oh my God,’ it’s like this rich treat. But then the downside in South Africa is when someone does well in general, if it’s not for rugby or something very commercial, like safe and acceptable, everyone gets pissed off that you’re doing good at something, that you’re standing out. It’s very small-time thinking. There’s a thing called crab in the bucket. It’s a syndrome. When one crab tries to get out of the bucket, the rest of the crabs kill it and pull it down. We get that a lot in South Africa. But we love it there and will never leave.

The reporter then asked them if South Africans thought Die Antwoord does not represent the country in a good light.

Ninja: They’re just insecure. The majority of South Africa is insecure. The minority who relates to us? They don’t give a fuck. It’s a combination. South Africa is made up of people who don’t give a fuck, and a majority that’s insecure. The insecure people don’t really exist. Yo-Landi broke it down really sweet. She’s like, ‘Sometimes doing shows in South Africa, it’s a yin yang thing. On one side you get like a fighter, warrior group of South Africans who are proud, it’s like this fierce pride thing. And on the flipside, it’s like doing magic tricks for retarded children.

Yo-Landi: They don’t know what they see.

Ninja: They don’t know what’s going on. But you cant be angry with them because they’re a little bit retarded. You’re just nice and carry on. Maybe you can help them understand reality better one day. It’s just kind of funny.

As a South African who has spent money on buying their music, concert tickets, t-shirts, or any other related items (essentially making you their business client), how does this make you feel? Would you still spend your money on them in future, knowing how little they actually thought of you?

The rest of the interview can be read here.

[Thanks, Deon!]