Tips to Win the Black Vote#1 Lose the Democratic Party as Plantation Metaphor

Among the political rhetoric which has become obscenely overused by white conservatives (and all too often parroted by black conservatives), the "democratic plantation or slave" metaphor ranks right at the top of rhetoric which should be urgently retired. I'm like as not to find myself guilty of using this egregious analogy if I peruse my prior posts enough.  But it should be banished from the rhetorical dictionary.

Let's get it straight here and now:  Voluntarily casting a vote in support of Democratic Party candidates or policies is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING like living under a racist terror state where your labor is stolen from you by violence and your family can literally be sold to punish you.  Choosing to vote for and support the liberal agenda of the democratic party DOES NOT REMOTELY resemble being owned by another person, brutalized at whim, forbidden to marry, bred like an animal, tortured, raped,  being sold away from your family or forbidden to learn to read & write on pain of death or torture.  Slavery was horrific.  Comparing the free exercise of the franchise in support of democrats to it is beyond offensive and stupid.

This metaphor is moronic and ignorant in the extreme and it is beyond unfortunate that it has become a standard rhetorical trope of the right.  If you are a white conservative and you use it, you immediately brand yourself as someone who is more interested in pummeling black folk with your political ideas than engaging them.  If you are a black conservative  and employ this metaphor, you show yourself to be not only ignorant of your history, but dismissive of it, for the sake of being provocative.

UPDATE: Because I have this debate repeatedly with white conservatives and too many black conservatives, I'm going to use some comparatives illustrations to help make my point.  This isn't rocket science.  Have you ever seen Pepsi market its product to Coke drinkers with a campaign that suggests they are stupid to buy Coke? No, for the obvious reason that you don't insult the customer you are trying to win.

Things you should not and would not say or do to sell the conservative political message to voters you were trying to persuade to support you with their votes:

• Tell a woman who is a rape survivor that voting for democrats is like making herself a rape victim
• Tell a Jew that voting for democrats is like voting to experience the Holocaust

If you can understand and agree that the two things above are really stupid, insensitive and more likely to repel the voter you are attempting to win a vote from than attract them, then it should be very easy to understand that likewise, you should not

• Tell the actual descendants of slaves that exercising the voting rights the generation before them actually had to fight and die for in favor of a democrat is like voting to be a slave again.

If you don't get why this is really, really bad messaging, why its really offensive and insulting, then I would say you don't want to get it.  I would say that if its the persuasive argument you insist on using with black voters, you're not actually interested in winning their votes, you are simply demonstrating that you have contempt for them because they don't agree with you politically.  And if you spend a lot of time using this metaphor when talking to white voters, in my opinion, you are trading in racial stereotypes and endorsing and fostering contempt towards black voters to curry favor with white voters.

Dr. Laura Quitting Radio to Regain Her First Amendment Right to Say "Nigger"?

All I can do is shake my head.  Black and white folks alike who you think could use their common sense to navigate the issue of race just don't.  Sure, race is a complicated mess, but in this country we've been enmeshed in this issue for so long, that there are some elementary elements of this divisive issue that we ought to know our way around by now.
If you hadn't tuned in last time, Dr. Laura used the word "nigger' several times in her response to a black woman calling for advice about how to deal with her white husband and his friends racially insensitive comments. She apologized the next day for having used the word at all and repeatedly saying it.

  Following her apology, she appeared on the Larry King Show and announced she planned to leave radio:

She wants to regain her First Amendment rights to say what she wants to say? Really? In the wake of this dumb controversy that she created by jumping out of her own bag of unfounded racial indignation on an unsuspecting caller, its her position that she has been denied her rights to free speech? My post title is facetious, but its got a bit of accuracy to it. What are you saying Dr. Laura? That you want to regain your first amendment right to say "nigger"?  Its so very disappointing to see someone of obvious intelligence operate within such a huge blind spot of prejudice and stereotype.  I've listened to her show for years. She's not racist in my opinion, but she has bought into very prejudiced, stereotypical habits of thinking about race, a soft bigotry if you will.  For someone who can be so insightful and challenge others to rethink their assumptions, when confronting the issue of race, Dr. Laura is too caught up in this soft bigotry to step back and see where she's missing the boat:

• On the use of the word nigger between blacks, she's wrong: black comics using vulgar humor for paying adults on HBO are not representative of how blacks deal with each other daily.  There are subsets of black people (some black comics, a lot of our young people) who refer to other blacks with the word "nigger" routinely.  But thats not the majority of black people talking to each other.  In point of fact, the average black person would be offended by other blacks calling them nigger, let alone other white people.  You labor under a mistaken impression if you believe that the majority of blacks routinely address each other using this vulgarity.  Its not true. It irritates me to no end that many black people responding to this minor controversy don't make this point.
• As I heard someone on the radio this morning say, the whole "nigger" piece of this is what's making people pay attention, because the good Dr. is getting a pass for the other piece of soft bigotry in what she had to say, namely her statement that most black people voted for Obama because he was half black and we didn't think or care about what he might actually do.  You gotta love that: presumably, all white people conduct a searching examination of the issues when they cast their vote, but black folks just vote their color and don't think at all.  #1That is an arrogant and bigoted statement. #2 Black people voted for Obama because he was capable, qualified and bonus, he looked like us (IMO).  Folks that didn't vote for Obama (white or black) obviously didn't think the first two were true and were not swayed by the last, but for Dr. Laura or any other white person to say that his racial identity was the only reason blacks voted for Obama is a bigoted statement, point blank. #3. In America, last time I checked, you could vote for anybody you wanted to, for whatever reason you wanted to: because of the race of the candidate, because you wanted to influence primary elections and create riots in the streets. (Operation Chaos anyone?) or because you think they are cute.  You get to exercise the franchise any way you damn well please.
• This trivial debacle has now descended into the "I'm a victim" arena and its quite off putting coming from Dr. Laura. Nobody has taken your free speech rights Dr. Laura and you don't get to control how people express their disagreement with you.  You said what you said, you meant what you meant.  People are free to voice their disagreement to your sponsors, advertisers, etc. You don't decry such behavior when people on the right that agree with you deploy the same freedoms against leftist commentators they don't like.  And all of it flows because you don't have a principled, defensible stand on this issue. You engaged in a bunch of stereotyping of black people, erroneously asserting we call each other nigger all the time, that we voted without thinking for Obama because he was black and you luxuriate in saying "nigger" repeatedly out of some weird misplaced pique that white people can't say it. All of that to a black female long time fan of the show who called to get some relationship advice, which she never got because you could not resist the opportunity to get your racial indignation rocks off. 

Here's a bit of discussion on the topic also from CNN.  How the heck is it that Tim Wise has got the most commonsense on this?

   I wondered when the caller herself might surface as well and caught this piece of interview with Nita Hanson, who was on the receiving end of this and seems like a nice enough person.

 Hearing her perspective was interesting. She's in an interracial relationship and those relationships are often the brunt of a lot of disapproval. They are embodiments of the racial divide in some ways and to hear Ms. Hanson talk about crying jags and being hurt and confused strikes me as a tad silly.  This is not old news.  She was a fan of the show (as am I) so I don't quite get the surprise that Dr. Laura went all mercurial on her.  Fellow blogger Constructive Feedback thought "Two members of an interracial couple should expect to deal with the fact that we do not live in a "color blind society".  I think I'm inclined to agree.  She sounds overly surprised at the idea that they would encounter insensitivity in the course of their union.
I do think she has a very legit beef in terms of her husband's reaction to some of the crap.  She describes a scenario where racially themed questions and comments keep coming up over and over, some of them probably insensitive at best and probably full of the same soft bigotry Dr. Laura put on display during the call. The interviews mainly left me thinking where the heck is her husband? Right now, not having heard from the guy, he comes off seeming like a bit of a jerk, participating in or permitting a lot of racially insensitive commentary around his wife from his friends and family.  She called in about his butt, I'm waiting to hear a little from him.  Whoo boy, I'll bet this whole deal is way more than he thought he was getting into when he married a black woman. LOL!

• You won't have Dr. Laura to kick around anymore (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Dr. Laura Has Black Friends, Only Apologized "Because She Got Caught" [Race Matters] (jezebel.com)
• Palin: Dr. Laura no racist (politico.com)
• Sarah Palin Twitters in Support of Dr. Laura Don't Quit Re-Load (nowpublic.com)

 Exit Link: The founder of the site Abolish the N Word is one of the panelists in the CNN clip above.  I actually find the site to be a thoughtful response about in community use of the word.

Dr. Laura: For White People Who Have Considered Saying "Nigger" When Common Sense Was Enough

Apologies to Ntzotke Shange. I've been a Dr. Laura fan for years. I started listening to her show on WJR when I lived in Detroit.  I recall the first time I listened to the show and being appalled at her comments and thinking she was a horrible and mean person.  There were other advice shows on the air with hosts who were nice to their callers.  But Dr. Laura was not about coddling people as she handed out her moral opinions.  Though I at first found her objectionable, I kept listening and over time, came to appreciate the fact that she's actually a very insightful person.  In church language, she has a perceiver motive gift.  She can gain insight into a situation with only a bit of information or observation. And while she can be harsh and stern with her callers, I have again and again heard her on her show demonstrate tremendous compassion and empathy, at times towards people I didn't think there was any thing to empathize with them about. I have also heard her help a lot of people with her advice.  Don't let the Listerine delivery cause you to miss the value in her advice.

But Dr. Laura, like many of us, black and white, has a bit of blind spot when it comes to race. That blind spot was on display in this call to her show from a black woman married to a white man who called for advice about how to handle what she deemed racially insensitive comments from her husband's family and friends.  Check the audio.

Not surprisingly, Dr. Laura got a boatload of criticism for her response and subsequently apologized.
Her apology seemed sincere enough, at least in the reading of it.  But its clear from the apology and from the conversation with her caller Jade, that Dr. Laura was off base in a variety of ways that I'd like to lift up for some examination.  Responding to Jade, Dr. Laura asserts that black guys use the slur "nigger" all the time.

Schlessinger:"Black guys use it all the time. Turn on HBO and listen to a black comic, and all you hear is nigger, nigger, nigger. I don't get it. If anybody without enough melanin says it, it's a horrible thing. But when black people say it, it's affectionate. It's very confusing."

Jade: Is it OK to say that word? Is it ever OK to say that word?

Schlessinger: It depends how it's said. Black guys talking to each other seem to think it's OK.

Jade: But you're not black, they're not black, my husband is white.

Schlessinger: Oh, I see, so a word is restricted to race. Got it. Can't do much about that.

First, the main thrust of her argument to the caller which is often referenced by people in arguments about the slur "nigger", namely that  black people use it in conversation with each other, comics use it copiously and so on.  I'm sorry, but this is a stupid argument based on the false premise that black people routinely and casually use the word "nigger" to refer to each other. Its not true.   Despite the unfortunate prevalence of this racial vulgarity in popular culture created by and targeted at urban youth, many blacks find it to be an offensive and unwelcome vulgarity whatever the color of the person speaking. Dr. Laura actually attempted a bit of an argument for context which would have been somewhat sensible, but misapplied it. She jumped from raunchy black comics talking to adults in HBO programming to the blanket idea that black people use that terminology on each other routinely. Thats a leap.

People, this isn't complicated, its plain common sense.  I don't walk around thinking that it would be appropriate to use the word "bitch" in reference to women, despite the fact that I hear women saying it in the popular culture all the time and the same common sense logic applies here.  Moreover, Dr. Laura's point about observing black comics in pop culture programming using the term is an exercise in stereotyping.  While it is entirely true that black comics routinely use the word "nigger", that's a small subset of the black population. That group is not broadly representative of black Americans in general.  Yet Dr. Laura looks at  the raunchy language of black comics and extrapolates that to the entire black population.  Its inaccurate stereotyping. Some people observe that many urban youth commonly use the word "nigger" in reference to each other in casual conversation ,and that's accurate. However, its also true that most adult black people are chagrined and embarrassed by the way which this vulgarity has become very common in the everyday language of urban youth.  We wince at hearing it, just like we metaphorically throw up a little in our mouths every time we see young black men in sagging pants with their underwear hanging out. Popular culture amplifies this vulgar behavior, thus the mistaken idea that its common among all blacks. Its not.

Her caller, Jade, had a bit of a blindspot too.  Her comments suggested that she subscribed to the idea that using the term "nigger" was acceptable if you were black, but not if you were white. White people react to that because it seems arbitrary.  If its okay when a black person says it, why isn't it okay for a white person? The reality is that in 2010, there is a bit of arbitrariness to this unwritten social rule. But there is nothing magical about why it doesn't go over well when a white person uses this vulgarity for any reason. #1 We're not all walking around calling each other "nigger". I know pop culture tv shows and videos and comics make it seem that way, but you're extrapolating from the behavior of a subset of black people to the whole group.  The majority of the group does not behave that way. So if most of us don't routinely use the word nigger to each other (and we don't) white people have no basis to be mad when we object to you using it either. #2 history is relevant.  There was a time in America when you could be called a nigger by a white person and be killed if you dared to object.  That went on for a few hundred years.  Times have changed, but its no surprise that a word so bound up in a history of oppression, violence and degradation should have a continuing stigma and taboo attached to it. And even if you think "hey, times have changed, don't  be so sensitive", see #1 again. This is the point that Jade should have made to Dr. Laura in response to the bit about comics.

 The social stigma around the word "nigger" also mirrors a practical, commonsense reality which is that I can't really think of very many situations that call for the average white person to use the  racial slur "nigger" in a sentence around the average black person, for any reason. Just doesn't happen very often. And guess what, the same is largely true when black people are talking to other black people.  Simple self test you can try if you're a white person reading this: can you think of a situation where it would be appropriate to use the word "nigger" in a sentence in the company of any black person you know?  The reality is that the majority of black people don't go around calling each other nigger all day.  There is a subset of the population (urban youth) that refers to each other this way quite frequently, but they are not representative, merely more visible via pop culture.  So, if you share Dr. Laura's frustration that a white person simply is not permitted to use the word "nigger" without suffering severe social opprobrium,  get over it. You're laboring under a mistaken impression.

And oh yeah, for the record; I'm still a big Dr. Laura show fan. 

The Racist Web

There is a whole network of sites that cater to a group of people in our society who are quite racist in the sense that they forthrightly argue for the ordering of society based on racial determinism.  I don't go looking for these sites, I simply stumble upon them.  I think they are worth sharing to illuminate the point that a very dangerous kind of racial groupthink is quite alive and well in America.  Here's one that fits that bill:

Majority Rights.com

GOP Again Demonstrates Disregard for Blacks As A Political Constituency

The blog Mirror on America observes the GOP attack on Kagan using Justice Marshal as their foil and calls it racist.   For the record, I don't support the Kagan nomination.  I'm sorry, but I'm just sort of partial to the idea that a person who is going to sit on the highest court and adjudicate the Constitution, the basis of my individual rights as an American citizen, ought to have significant  experience sitting in judgment and have experience in the practice of the law.  So I'm not with her nomination.  But I wryly and with great annoyance, like my blogging fellows at Mirror on America and blowhard Olberman, observed the GOP's attack, which sought to diminish Marshal and by doing so, damage Kagan.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

They call it racist, which I don't think works well.  Tagging the GOP as racist lacks precision, but if you read the charge to mean an apparent hostility to blacks as a political constituency, then its an entirely justified and foreseeable response to this performance. This is more of the same funky messaging to blacks that I've come to regard as a depressingly routine part of our political practice as a party. Using Kagan's association to a revered figure (within and without the black community) like Justice Marshal as proof of her unfitness to be on SCOTUS is clearly going to repel blacks and other minorities for whom Marshall's work to overturn segregation is legitimately heroic. What is the message the GOP sends to blacks, a group it claims it wants greater engagement with, by attacking Kagan in this way, ? The GOP figures its good political practice to attack a revered historical figure such as Marshall, the first black on the court and the man who led the effort to overturn segregated schools? And to do so in the context of an attack on a SCOTUS nominee by the first black president? That plays to the republican base all day, but it repels blacks and other minorities. Its not the political play of a party that actually cares about black votes. Its merely a continuation of the cavalier messaging the GOP does to blacks. Out of one side of our mouths we claim to want blacks and latinos in the party and out the other, we attack the heroes of the black community. Its politically stupid, unless of course, the GOP really don't mean it when they say they want blacks in the party. 

Its my contention that the GOP does not consider blacks to be a political constituency necessary or essential to their aspirations for governance. Performances like this one prove my point. The Marshall attack line was a coordinated messaging attack on Kagan's nomination. They thought about it, refined it, to deliver it with the greatest impact. This is not the messaging behavior of a party that wants a greater relationship with blacks as a political constituency. Its not simple minded to read this performance and all the other cavalier and negative messaging by the GOP towards blacks as evidence of a disregard, even hostility, to them as a political constituency.

Is This Racist?

That's the way fellow blogger Cobb frames his question about the Tea Party member pictured below.  I'd like to frame the question differently:

Based solely on the information in this photograph, would it be reasonable, justified or warranted to question the character of this man or draw the conclusion that bias, prejudice or stereotypes play a role in what he says and how he behaves? 

Leave your answer Yes or No and why you think so in the comments.

Black Republicans Call Steele to Account

Hat Tip Booker Rising

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga professor and head of the National Republican African American Caucus, Dr. Howard Hill, responds to RNC chairman Michael Steele's statement calling for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to resign over his comments about President Obama: “If RNC Chair, Michael Steele is truly concerned with racism, then perhaps he needs to first begin within our own party. There are certainly enough issues with race for him to have his hands full in dealing with this right here within the Republican Party. There also are a few within the GOP leadership, he also may wish to ask to step down.”

She continues her statement: "As a 30-year veteran African American Republican and as the head of the National Republican African American Caucus, I find it offensive to see and hear this kind of meaningless rhetoric. It is simply another way of posturing and playing to partisan unrest..... Many of us (African American Republicans) have tried to sit back and look the other way, but when this kind of silly and meaningless rhetoric is espoused with such callousness and lack of sincerity, you can’t be silent. I don’t like having to speak out against my own party or its leadership. But if we do not, this continues, and it makes it appear that all African American Republicans are a part of this foolishness. Because of this, many of us have bowed out of the GOP political mix.  It also makes it hard to recruit other African Americans into the Republican Party, at a time when the Party needs to attract us.”
 
....So Chairman Steele, we invite you to be fervent in the same commitment you have to challenge Democrats, to also call for a change within the GOP; where what you do actually can have an impact in changing the racial climate in America.”

I don't think I could have said it much better myself.  This is really serious indictment of Steele's lack of leadership when it comes to doing something effective to grow the GOP's relationship with blacks as a political constituency. While he's busy jumping on the latest political bandwagon in calling for Reid to step down, he is totally silent on Rush's asinine Haiti comments, or any of his other race baiting rhetoric for that matter.  The guy is forever opening his mouth to gaffe in one way or another, but he can't seem to wrap his lips around a word or two of pushback when it comes to the party's funky rhetoric and messaging towards blacks, an issue he knows to be real.  Now, the Reid flap has become the proverbial straw and even black republicans deep within the party are finding this nonsense hard to stomach.

Newsflash Black People: It's Not Obama's Job

Hat tip Shortform blog:

On race relations:

• 58% of Americans thought Obama would change race relations before his inauguration
• 41% of Americans say he's actually improved race relations in his first full year in office source

• Where was the freefall? Strangely enough, it was largest among other blacks. While white voters dipped to about 40 percent from 55 percent, blacks were at 75 percent a year ago, free-falling to 51 percent – a 24-point decline.

Little newsflash to my disappointed brothers and sisters; it's not Obama's job to solve all your problems in life.  Its not his job to solve "racism" to the extent such a thing is solvable. Anybody that thought his election would magically heal the divisions between black, red, white, brown and yellow was criminally deluded. Perhaps this disappointment that some feel is a good thing that will spur some people out there to solve their own problems, now that they realize Obama won't. 

Despicable

Hat tip Booker Rising

This is a profoundly disgusting comment of which Pat Robertson should be ashamed. 

Harry Reid's Comments: There Is No Double Standard

Blacks weigh in on Harry Reid's racial comments / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com

So Washington is abuzz with the latest piece of red meat for politicians and associated operators to gnaw at, the simultaneously awkwardly phrased, stereotypical yet oddly insightful comments by Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada. In their new book, "Game Change," journalists Mark Halperin and John Heilemann expose remarks Mr. Reid made in an interview about Barack Obama during the presidential campaign. Mr. Reid is quoted as saying that he believed the nation was ready to elect a "light-skinned" black man "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one."

Race hustler Ward Connerly is one of the voices of outrage from conservatives. "it's hard to avoid the conclusion that the spirit of forgiveness is universal—except when it comes to conservatives."

Conservatives charge there is a double standard, case in point, the experience of former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, who made remarks praising Strom Thurmond in 2002. Mr. Lott said of the segregationist: "When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we [Mississippians] voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years either." Lott was forced to step down in the aftermath.

I'm sorry to break it to you guys, but there is no double standard here at all. In fact, quite to the contrary, I would argue that the condemnation conservatives get for verbal malfunctions like this, at least from the black community, is entirely logical and consistent.  Furthermore, its not complicated and when conservatives behave as though they don't understand it, it annoys me.

Let me break it down for you.  Why is it that Harry Reid can make a comment like that and largely get a pass from black folks while conservatives get branded with the "Raaciisst" label for similar verbal vomit? Simple:  

Harry Reid belongs to a party that behaves like it gives a damn about black voters!

I wish conservatives would stop behaving as though this is incomprehensible rocket science. I've said numerous times before:  the GOP does not consider blacks to be a political constituency necessary or essential to its aspirations for governance and the party, from rank and file to its leadership, behaves accordingly.  I've repeated that many times here at the Season, but maybe I'm falling into that pesky "Negro dialect" thing Reid was talking about and its making me hard to understand.  Why don't I let our illustrious chairman Michael Steele explain it to you:

Q: Why do you think so few nonwhite Americans support the Republican Party right now?
A: "Cause we have offered them nothing! And the impression we’ve created is that we don’t give a damn about them or we just outright don’t like them. And that’s not a healthy thing for a political party. I think the way we’ve talked about immigration, the way we’ve talked about some of the issues that are important to African-Americans, like affirmative action… I mean, you know, having an absolute holier-than-thou attitude about something that’s important to a particular community doesn’t engender confidence in your leadership by that community—or consideration of you for office or other things—because you’ve already given off the vibe that you don’t care." -GQ Magazine March 2009

So the next time a conservative makes a racial verbal bellyflop and gets tarred, feathered and run out of town on a rail while your neighborhood liberal democrat gets a playful slap on the wrist and a pass and you don't understand, just return here and let our chairman explain it to you.

So-Called "Race Realism": A Reaction

If you go to Wickipedia, it explains "race realism" as the claim that races are real rather than social constructs, and that racial distinctions are enduringly important because racial groups differ by nature (genetically) with regard to such important behavioral tendencies as intelligence and impulsiveness. This claim holds that racial distinctions are real and measurable, and further claims those measurable differences are based in science instead of idealism. Examples of scientifically demonstrable racial distinctions are said to include different decision and reaction times, intelligence, crime rates, and medical characteristics, such as differing tendencies toward diseases such as osteoporosis or sickle cell anemia.^[1] Critics often claim that racial realism is a euphemism for scientific racism. I would agree.

Dennis Mangan is the author of the blog Mangan's Adventures in Reaction and describes his views on race in various ways, one of those self descriptors being that of a "race realist". His way of explaining this viewpoint in an April 2009 post responding to James Collier of the blog Acting White: "it merely means the recognition of persistent racial differences in biology and behavior."  He further self describes himself  as " nothing other than a patriotic American, white and race-conscious to be sure, who wants to stop the rising tide of immigration and the declining proportion of whites in the country."
One of the commenters to this April 2009 post, Latte Island, in their comment, said the following

"I think the harsh tone of many race-realists, and I plead guilty here, is pushing back against the threat of losing our right to do our culture with people we choose freely"

From my viewpoint, I experience a choking level of incredulity in reading a statement like the above. Does such a statement stem simply from prohibitions against discrimination in some private settings and things of that order? Its never seemed to me that whites have difficulty doing their own thing amongst themselves. Isn't this what the defacto segregation of large swaths of America's neighborhoods and certainly her houses of worship is all about?

More broadly, this seems to me merely intellectual rationalization for why people don't want to live around people of other races, unless you are in a position of numerical, financial, political, military or other superiority. That would be okay, then you could deal with it, otherwise, separation is desired.

Mangan's commentors wonder aloud as to why someone who is not white would regard this "race realism" as sinister or threatening? That someone like me would not immediately conclude that this way of thinking applied to the world I live in, is antithetical to the interests of those I care about? That a world crafted to fit these ideas is not a world that would welcome my children?

Often this conversation Mangan's readers are having with each other strikes me as merely studied and practiced exercises in convincing themselves that their race based antipathy does not spring from the same source as the "white nationalists, Nazis, skinhead" types which they disavow.

I think its instructive, enlightening and should at least give them pause that this conversation, these ideas routinely attract this unsavory racist element. Why does that not give them some indication that perhaps there is something aberrant, perhaps even abhorrent, about these ideas and the conclusions they lead to?

I note from past conversations, that a response like mine often engenders a fierce response from adherents to these "race realist" views that I simply do not understand, that indeed I am to inculcated in multiculturalism and other traps of lazy thinking to cogitate with any objectivity on these things of which they speak.

I think not. I would in fact submit that the value of an idea or philosophy can be judged in part by its utility. I ask, of what utility is any ideology that must posit the alleged inferiority of one human being as against another to derive its energy or merit? Indeed, the very racists and supremacists which Mangan's philosphy attracts is partial evidence for the inherent error of this point of view. There are few ways in which one might apply this philosophy, this set of intellectualized prejudices, that would not be harmful to those whom race realism views deem as undesirable. That should be damning of these views alone, the fact that there is scarcely any way in which these ideas, implemented as social or political policy, would not result in terrible and grievous harm to those not favored by it. I cannot imagine a society fueled and organized by this way of thinking in which a decent human being would want to live. Dennis and his intellectual compatriots can. We look upon each other across a great divide.

How Not To Sell A Minority Point of View

A member of my FB circle posted this PSA. I'm all for more accurate, non distorted readings of history. If you don't understand the past, blah blah blah. But this group or coalition of groups is trying to sell two different outcomes that really ought not to be conflated with each other, as they do with this PSA and website:

Outcome#1: Eradicate Columbus' name from the federal calendar.

I kid you not, its stated just that way on their website. So you start your campaign by seeking to tear down something long established, without having laid a sufficient foundation in education or outreach to change peoples viewpoint about this historical figure. Further, this stance is not necessary, they could have just stayed with the soft kill approach of getting out the alternate historical viewpoint on Columbus. But they are so busy trying to make people feel like crap over Columbus Day, so busy being self righteous they don't get the more important issue of correcting the historical record right. That alternate history should be front and center when you hit this link. If you are going to lambaste Americans as perpetuating racism with Columbus Day, your take on the history should be the FIRST thing I see when I hit this site to back up the fact that you're calling me out as an oppressor for taking any part in Columbus Day.

The tactical decision to essentially vilify people who celebrate or otherwise recognize Columbus Day is the strategic blunder here. Those folks are not doing that to insult native peoples or "perpetuate a philosophy of racism and domination". Its just flipping Columbus Day to the average American, but this bunch turns them into monsters by essentially saying "Columbus was a monster. If you celebrate Columbus Day, you condone heinous crimes against native people. You're a monster too".

Outcome#2: Honor the people who were really here first by petitioning for a nationally recognized Indigenous holiday.

This sounds like a good thing. I'm not sure there are a lot of people who would disagree with it. Oddly enough, even people who believe in white supremacy have a measure of respect for native peoples history of resistance and some of the storied ways and traditions of native peoples. Most Americans of all colors brag a little about having native blood in their ancestry. Further, most Americans are on board to one degree or another with the concept that we took the land from the native peoples of America and we were not particularly nice about it. There is a level of residual guilt on this score, kept somewhat fresh by the historical presence of reservations. I don't think you have to work that hard to get this. But the goof here is that these folks conflate their two desired outcomes when they should have remained wholly separate. Making eradication of Columbus Day from the federal calendar synonymous with honoring native peoples puts the two things together in a completely unnecessary way.

An exit note: I had to dig through several links to get to anything that seemed to provide the alternative historical information that this PSA seeks to highlight. When I did get to something, it was a table of contents for a "Rethinking Columbus" set of teaching materials. In looking at it, it further confirms the bull in a china shop approach. These materials seem more likely to be useful for an audience of people who largely agree with the native viewpoint, not for convincing other people to think and educate their children differently.

As a campaign for changing people's minds, I think the Reconsider Columbus Day campaign is a whole lot of fail.

White Guilt, Political Correctness - What Is This Really About?

A recurring theme out there in the political atmosphere about Barack Obama becoming president is the idea that we live in a PC, guilt addled culture that was willing to elect an unqualified affirmative action candidate for its attendant history making feel good effect.

This meme never fails to tick me off. Every time I hear it or see it expressed in writing in one form or another, I think to myself "Dear God, please stop with the whining". Its enough (almost) to make one yearn for the days of open and unabashed hostility between white and black as a more open and honest time. 2040 has not arrived yet, there are still way more of you than us. If affirmative action is such an anathema, just outlaw it or better yet, simply stop doing it. I resent the resentment about such things, though if I'm being fair I have to admit black people had a hand in creating it. We share some of the blame, as race hustlers like Sharpton and Jackson have created small, self serving industries out of exploiting white guilt and defensiveness about race. We've been willing accomplices often enough.

If I get analytical about it, then I have to ask, if we are a guilt ridden PC culture, what is it that white America is guilty about? What is the guilt that Sharpton and Jackson exploit for money again and again? They keep drawing from this well and each time I see it happen, I'm wondering what underground source are they tapping?

What is it that makes the city of New Haven deny white firefighters promotion because a few black test takers didn't make the cut? The test subject matter was known beforehand. I presume that the same books the white fire fighters studied were available to the black firefighters. In the absence of some relevant information that I'm missing, at first blush, it just does not make sense that the city of New Haven would behave so completely unreasonably merely because black firefighters complained, legal catch 22 or no.

You can't put it all on us. What is it at work in the psyche of white America in 2009 that makes the New Haven case possible? Obama is easy to understand (white guilt did not elect him, simple as that), but the New Haven case, that makes much less sense. Can you explain it? I can't.

Online Home of Gutless Racists

Way back in March of 2007,  fellow blogger Villager of Electronic Village posted on the hate site Detroit Is Crap. Interestingly enough, the site owner showed up in the comments to deny that his site was racist in any way.  I thought it was an interesting exercise in stupidity, that this racist pig would show up on a black blog and try to argue to black people that his view (that we are sub human animals) is correct and supported by evidence.  I was rereading that particular post today and popped over to see if the Detroit is Crap racist crowd was still at it.  Indeed they were. I'm sure that each and every one of them would all claim that they are not racists, but indeed they are, which means not only are they racist, but they are gutless racists to boot.  Give me good old fashioned racists, the kind with enough balls to say so.  

This band of wingnuts would happily kill every black man, woman and child in America and enslave any of us left alive.  I'm incredibly sorry that I didn't mosey over to this site the day Obama won, it would have been a hearty laugh. They link to a variety of other hate sites, but since I can only stomach so much bile in one sitting, I have not checked the others.  I have nothing but contempt for these people who are probably among the lamest folks you could ever meet.  Only lamers would spend their time the way these gutless wonders do. 

NAACP Leadership Foolishness On Display

The NAACP national leadership is majoring in the minors and providing further validation for the viewpoint that they have lost their sense of purpose, proportion and mission. The New York Post was culturally incompetent in printing the cartoon and one could certainly find it offensive, off color, some level of inappropriate, tasteless, etc. If you are just determined to go there, call it racist if you must. But thats pretty much all the energy and time it's worth in the scheme of things. Some words of condemnation.

But in the words of Bejamin Jealous, "... we will move this from a local, regional issue to a very national issue". I am hard pressed to see how this merits such attention. Obama has been the president for but a minute. He is and will continue to be the target of hostile and negative invective, much of it far worse. In what universe is this New York Post carton even remotely important or worthy of a nationwide organized effort to get the cartoonist and editor fired by the NAACP? Are we really to believe that this is worthy of the NAACP's resources?

Its not. The NAACP national leadership is foolish to pursue the issue in this manner. The New York Post cartoon, offensive though it may be, is simply not that important. Indeed, it is not important at all when laid alongside the myriad number of serious issues wreaking havoc in black America and indeed among black peoples the world over.

This sort of reactionary, non-strategic, victim centered waste of time offends me.

Color of Change Spins Up the Reactors on Oscar Grant Killing

Color of Change has entered the fray in the Oscar Grant killings in California, with the following email to its members:

On New Year's Eve, Oscar Grant was shot execution-style by a transit police officer in Oakland, California. He was shot in the back while face-down on a subway platform--unarmed and posing no threat.

Twelve days later--despite several videos showing exactly what happened--the officer who killed Grant hasn't been arrested, charged, or even questioned. He quit the force and has refused to speak. The District Attorney has done nothing.

It's time to demand that California Attorney General Jerry Brown take over the case and arrest Grant's killer, and to ask that the US Department of Justice launch an independent investigation into the conduct of local authorities. Please join me:

http://www.colorofchange.org/oscar/?id=2176-544691

In the case of Grant's murder, the DA has already let 12 days pass while doing essentially nothing--the officer who killed Grant is able to travel and leave the state, and he's free to talk with other officers and attempt to construct a story to justify his killing of Oscar Grant.

California's Attorney General needs to step in now and arrest Oscar Grant's murderer. And the US Department of Justice should investigate the failure of the authorities in Alameda County to act. It's the first step towards justice. After that, we will push for systemic changes to create public accountability for BART and other police departments. Creating those structural changes will be a much longer fight, but Oscar Grant's tragic death is a wake-up call that should give us a real chance to help prevent this from happening again.

Please join me in demanding justice, and then ask your family and friends to do the same:

http://www.colorofchange.org/oscar/?id=2176-544691

Our take: The refusal to act 12 days later by the authorities is sorta like them indifferently spitting in the face of the black community. This guy blows away an unarmed, defenseless and helpless man on camera and has not been subjected to so much as a question by the authorities? That is unmitigated &%#@*%*. I followed COC's link and submitted a customized letter about this egregious failure by the authorities. You should too.

Killing Oscar Grant: Senseless

A second, somewhat clearer look at the shooting and some sense of the officer reaction:

When it comes to the topic of how race impacts decision making and perception of an event, police abuses and excessive use of force are often tragic, infuriating and insightful vignettes. The event itself is terrible, but the horror and fury generated are often made monumentally worse by idiotic suggestions that require you to suspend your common sense. The two such suggestions already emerging from the murder of Oscar Grant are 1. that the video evidence currently available, does not tell the whole story and 2. that the officer may have mistook his gun for his taser.

Both suggestions have little merit. Its clear that the victim had no weapon, was being cuffed, face down, with two officers astride him. The officer, Johannes Mehserle , pulls his weapon, aims it and fires. There is no ambiguity there. If the officer does not know the difference between his gun and his taser, he is too dangerously incompetent to be a police officer.

This officer made a decision to unholster his weapon, aim it and fire. I will watch and listen with interest to the justifications offered to explain away the murder of a young black man as somehow reasonable. Those justifications are a window into the way black skin can impact how you are treated and the incident only reinforces my intention to teach my sons to be upstanding men who will not come into adverse contact with the police in the first instance, but to also assume that any interaction with the police in a law enforcement situation, no matter how minor, has the potential for them to end up dead and they must act accordingly.

There has been some rioting in Oakland. Imbeciles. Your actions only deepen the tragedy and waste of the murder of Oscar Grant.

No One Said A Word

Here is what is very troubling, very disturbing to me. The shouted racial slur heard on the tape when you listen to it is pretty clear. I don't know if Sarah Palin heard it. If she did and ignored it, that's pretty deplorable behavior on her part not to call that out. I'll assume she did not hear it. But given that I can hear it on the tape very well, that means that a multitude of people at that rally were able to hear it very well. I've seen and listened to many a rally where some heckler in the crowd shouts out to interrupt the candidates and they are shouted down with chants of USA, USA! But here, dead silence. No response from this crowd whatsoever, or at least no response that one can discern. Maybe the shouter was escorted out. But somehow I doubt it, given that there is not a single reaction or peep to this obvious racist name calling. That lack of reaction is deplorable and shameful in a situation that has zero ambiguity.

Update: 8:20 pm - Gadfly in Residence Phelps says I'm all wet, that this didn't happen. That either I don't hear what I think I hear or this is doctored stuff. Either way, I'm not invested in talking about a lie. Who's got the straight dope?

Brother On the Other Side

Hat tip Dirty Harry's Place



This was a fun and well delivered piece of rhetoric for the McCain/Palin ticket. Harry said he would vote for Palin-This Guy 08. I think I would reverse the order. He makes a good argument or two for the conservative viewpoint. I'm a conservative myself, so I enjoy hearing the case made. However, its major drawback is that it lacks authenticity in articulating the case for conservatism within the black community from our perspective. When you articulate the case for conservatism in the same tone of scorn and derision used by conservatives pursuing political advantage rather than positive outcomes in our community, you lose credibility with me.

His arguments about planned parenthood for example, while correct in their irony, are the same arguments served up by conservatives who will not contribute anything to the discussion about re-entry or justice system reforms while they pursue voter suppression strategies to beat back the exercise of black voting power. I'm all for arguing the conservative case because I am one, but I have very little patience for people who espouse conservative principles and their superiority for the black community (which is true) but turn a blind eye to conservative efforts to gain power using the black community as its foil.

McCain's Uppity Negro Attack

We have over 90 days left to the general election and I'm already worn out with the racially coded criticism of Obama as "arrogant'. Every word and deed from the man is being used to tag him with this and associated labels like elitist, hubris, presumptuous and so on. Nearly any turn of phrase twisted into ironclad indications of his flawed character, to be contrasted to American hero McCain, who is supposedly unflawed. I should not be weary, especially since I called this tactic out months ago.

Well, if Obama's every word is going to be indicative of his "arrogance" and bad character and McCain's POW bio is the bonafide of his character, lets keep it real. Don't just talk about the POW years when you want to extol his character. While he was imprisoned, his then wife Carol Shepp was in an auto wreck (1969), thrown through her car's windshield and left seriously injured. Despite her injures, she refused to allow her POW husband to be notified about her condition, fearing that such news would not be good for him while he was being held prisoner.

When McCain returned to the United States in 1973 after more than five years as a prisoner of war, he found his wife was a different person. The accident "left her 4 inches shorter and on crutches, and she had gained a good deal of weight."

If you're gonna talk about character, don't just talk about the POW years, talk about what he did when he came back, when he cheated on and eventually left the wife who was badly injured in a car accident while he was imprisoned. Injured so badly, she was in the hospital for a long while, her body was disfigured and she was dependent on the kindness of friends like Ross Perot to pay her medical bills. The wife who, when she was in the hospital, severely injured and was asked if she wanted McCain to know, told the doctors No, don't tell him. He came home and took off running after now wife Cindy, a young, cute new trophy, with a lot of loot to boot. He married Cindy in May 1980 -- just a month after dumping Carol and securing a divorce.

Now, to be fair, lord knows, marriage is hard. I'm mindful of how Nelson Mandela and Winnie's relationship was unable to recover from the twin blows of his imprisonment and her persecution and clearly, the Mandelas were subject to much worse. But it does not sound like McCain came home unable to emotionally engage or emotionally damaged, since he didn't have a problem hooking up with other women or with Cyndi. So he was functional. He just didn't want his broken wife anymore. He put her aside to trade up for a new and improved model. He went to the mat for his country, but the wife who stood by him for five years, her he threw under the bus.

But Obama has a character problem. Go figure.