View original postA) In language, context is everything. So it is absolutely different when a black person says the "N" word than when a white person does. You know how you can say whatever about your friends and family, but anyone else better watch their mouths? It's similar.
Agreed, though all the same it IS quite absurd how black rappers and others keep using the word.
View original postB) Paula Dean was not fired for being racist. She was fired for making herself controversial. It's the Food network. They'll take arguments on the ethics of stuffing kids faces with stick after stick of butter all day, but race questions? Forget it. It's not their fight and it distracts from what they do. So they pulled her. It'll cost them money, too. But you can bet that figured in their equations before they made the call.
I think there's a general growing distaste for the increasing haste with which companies are distancing themselves from anyone and anything who/which could even remotely taint them with anything. JC Penney's "Hitler" kettle. Michael Phelps having posed with a bong at some point. This. The list is endless, apart from the particular merits of any particular case.
View original postWe know Racism is bad. It took a century or two, but we finally figured that out. But now every attempt to deal with the problem seems to only make it worse, and this is largely due to a huge misunderstanding, that being seeing Racism in binary terms: you either are racist, or you are not.
Very true.
View original postBy that standard, each and every one of us is a Racist, regardless of color, education, or background, and the term has lost all meaning, other than a bogey man.
View original postI think that is a large part of the reason that actions like Paula's actually get defended. So Paula called someone the "N" word. Crap, I've done that, too. So if she's a Racist, then I'm a Racist. I don't want to be a Racist, that's Bad. I actually like some Black People that I know. So I can't be racist. So she isn't, either. We see ourselves in the actions of others and defend their actions in order to exonerate ourselves, which is a perfectly understandable reaction.
There's that, but there's also more simply the direct consequence of the binary view that you mention - Paula's defenders may not have a problem with condemning her statements themselves, but have a problem with the way some of the media presents her as a horrible person and a Racist just for having made them. Even if those defenders themselves never said anything of the kind.
So what exactly is Racist, anyway?
- 01/07/2013 10:32:06 PM
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Refusing to print or say "nigger" in reference to the incident is absurd.
- 02/07/2013 01:48:11 AM
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Re: Refusing to print or say "nigger" in reference to the incident is absurd.
- 03/07/2013 01:12:54 PM
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Knowing what the word actually means would be helpful for everyone.
- 02/07/2013 04:29:34 PM
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Good points.
- 02/07/2013 09:26:28 PM
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Who cares? Crimes are crimes, words are words, and opinions are opinions. Leave it at that.
- 04/07/2013 03:42:45 AM
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