One of the greatest pieces of television, of any show, era or genre,
EVER, is the Star Trek; Deep Space 9 episode "Far Beyond The Stars". I
just rewatched it for probably the 20th time. It transcends Trek. It
transcends Science Fiction. It transcends Television. It is a
brilliantly acted, written and produced piece of fiction, because of
it's stark unflinching reality.
And it is incredibly uncomfortable to watch.
Of course that's as it should be. It very bluntly shows the real
effects of racism in America. Moreso than any other tv show has ever
succeeded in doing. Moreso even than a lot of movies that tackled it. It
doesn't soften the blows, or handle the subject with kid gloves. Maybe
because it's an episode of a syndicated genre show, it had more freedom
than network or cable dramas. Maybe because it wasn't a topic they
tackled regularly, they had the freedom to be as real and ugly and
brutally honest as racism really is, where an NBC or an HBO show might
feel a need to whitewash it a little to avoid making their white
audiences uncomfortable.
But that's just it. A truly good story
about the realities of racism and oppression and white privilege SHOULD
make it's audience uncomfortable. It SHOULD make them squirm. It's not a
flowery light-hearted subject. It's a brutal, ugly reality.
Spoilers ahead.
For those who've never watch Deep Space 9, the story is that Captain
Sisko, the black captain of the eponymous space station Deep Space 9, is
in the middle of a long and bloody war. He's just learned that a ship
captained by a long-time friend of his was destroyed with no survivors
in a border skirmish and is feeling hopeless, and actually considering
resigning his commission and giving up the fight.
Something
knocks him unconscious, and when he wakes up, he's Benny Russell, an
underpaid science fiction writer in New York in the early 50's. His
editor is a spineless conformist who is afraid of upsetting the status
quo who prefers his readers blissfully believe Benny is a white writer,
(and that the one woman writer on staff is a man), and constantly tells
Benny "that's just the way it is".
Benny has some hallucinations
about Sisko and Deep Space 9, and at the urging of a street preacher,
begins writing about Sisko's adventures. His editor of course refuses to
publish them because "a negro captain just isn't believable". When the
other writers finally convince the editor to publish Benny's story
because they all agree it's just too damned good to shelve, the
publisher orders the entire print of that issue pulped and tells the
editor to fire Benny, leading Benny to have a huge mental break-down as
he cries out that you can pulp a story but you can't kill an idea, and
that future of a black captain in space is real.
If that alone were all this story had to offer it would still be good television. But it goes so far beyond that.
Benny is treated like a criminal by beat cops solely because he's
wearing a nice suit, which they deem suspicious because they assume,
when he says he works in the office building where his magazine offices
are, that he means he's the janitor. Willie Mays is in the story, and
when asked why he as a rich successful baseball player hasn't moved
downtown, he says the white players tolerate PLAYING with him, but
living next to them? No thanks, he'd rather stay uptown where the other
black folk idolize him than move downtown and just be a negro with money
the white neighbours stare suspiciously at. Benny's young street thief
friend scoffs at the very idea of Benny's black space captain, because
the only reason he can imagine a black person going to space is if the
astronauts "need a nigger to shine they shoes".
And it's all
brutal and unflinching. They don't act like it's just white people being
annoying like so many shows do when touching this issue. You can FEEL
their anger, their pain. When the white cops harass Benny you can feel
his dehumanization. And when eventually those same cops beat the
ever-loving fuck out of Benny because he dared to question why they felt
the need to shoot his young friend for trying to break into a car, you
feel every single punch and kick, because they don't hold anything back.
They don't pan away and let you just imagine the brutality. They make
you watch it, and they make you FEEL it for exactly what it is. They
make you feel every single blow even as they white cops visually flip
between the cops and the characters the actors are normally playing. And
it doesn't for one moment lessen the impact of the violence.
And therein lies the most uncomfortable truth about watching this episode.
It's set in the 1950's. But it could just as easily be set in 2015.
Because every single slight that white people impose upon "the coloured
folks" in this story? White people are STILL doing those exact same
things. Cops STILL profile well-dressed black people as suspicious.
Stories with strong black characters STILL get passed on in favour of
yet another white protagonist. Most of the characters you see on tv are
white. Minority characters are almost always the "token (insert minority
here)" character. Go look at most popular tv shows, and I guarantee
with extremely few exceptions, the cast is mostly white, with one female
and one minority character.
And most infuriating of all, in
2015, young black people are still being routinely murdered by police
for the flimsiest of excuses, or beaten to a pulp for daring to talk
back. For being "uppity".
For not knowing "their place".
In 20-FUCKING-15.
And white people are STILL denying things are really as bad as they are.
And that's why "Far Beyond The Stars" is so uncomfortable to watch;
because it's the motherfucking truth. It's fiction only insofar as that
the characters in it are fictional people, but otherwise it's 150% cold
hard brutal unflinching reality. It's brutal, raw, hones, and it pulls
absolutely no punches. If you can watch it and not feel shame for the
human race, or end up in tears, there's something very very wrong with
you. It's the closest thing a tv show can be to perfect.
And that
discomfort is why it's among, if not THE best of all television. And it
should be required viewing. It should be shown in schools. It should be
discussed endlessly. It should be a teaching tool. It should be
treasured.
Sometimes humans NEED to take the blinders off and be
made uncomfortable, because the reality of racism IS uncomfortable. And
if those with all the power and privilege are comfortable what "the way
things are", they'll never be motivated to help the rest of us get this
crapsack racist world to the way things SHOULD be.
If you've
never seen this episode, PM me for a link to watch it online. It is the
most important piece of tv you will EVER watch in your life.
Showing posts with label racism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label racism. Show all posts
9/12/2015
ENOUGH ALREADY White People! Stop Defending Racist Killer Cops!
Seriously, it NEVER fucking fails. Point out a factually valid proven statistic that proves racial bias and violent patterns by police, and there will ALWAYS be a white person there to insist you’re wrong, lying, or garbage for daring to ever even think of questioning the police.
And that’s what happened on Facebook, on Lizzy the Lezzy’s wall. I pointed out the decline in cops killed by suspects versus the staggering rise in cases of unarmed black people murdered by racist police. Factually accurate and easily provable.
And like clockwork, almost immediately I had one woman calling me trash for smearing cops with such lies, linking to a news story about all of one police officer shot by a suspect a few months ago as her Smoking Gun to prove I was lying, and another asking me to cite sources, practically DARING me to, because she was so absolutely sure my claims were bullshit I pulled out of my ass.
So cite my sources I did, because here are the fucking facts;
FACT; Thus far in 2015, all of 24 police officers were shot and killed by suspects.
FACT; But nearly FOUR-FUCKING-HUNDRED unarmed black folks have been shot and killed under suspicious circumstances by white police officers thus far in 2015. And that’s not ever counting other minorities.
FACT; of all those suspicious police deaths so far in 2015, only TWO officers are actually facing charges; one in Cincinnati, and one in South Carolina. One of those isn’t even a full real officer. He’s a university cop. Campus police. The rest are walking around scot-free, and at worst were suspended with pay, fired but never charged, or given desk duty until an internal police “investigation” magically cleared them of any wrongdoing.
FACT; I have black female friends who are mothers confirm to me that they have to raise their children to be hyper careful and leery around police, the same way some parents are forced to teach their daughters how to avoid rapists. Black children all over the USA aren’t getting to have normal happy childhoods because they live in a permanent state of very justified fear of white cops.
And most cops may not be murderers, but most cops DO turn a blind eye and keep their head in the sand. And the small tiny handful of cops brave enough to speak out against the corruption and racism in their co-workers end up fired and get death threats for their trouble.
So when I point out that there’s something seriously fucking wrong in America’s police departments, that is FACTUALLY PROVABLE, if you come at me with dishonest lying BlueLivesMatter propaganda that the proven facts utterly destroy? Expect a verbal beatdown. And then a block.
3/24/2015
An Example of Ingrained Social Racism I Just Realized
I've noticed a subtle example of ingrained socialized racism while
watching this past Sunday's episode of Jon Taffer's "Bar Rescue".
While I was cooking dinner, listening to the show in the background, I heard the narrator begin to introduce the chef Jon was bringing in to help the failing bar of the week. The moment the narrator described the chef's style of cooking as "soulful" I knew without even having to look at the screen the chef was black. Why?
Because on Bar Rescue whenever Jon brings in a chef who happens to be black, the narrator describes their cooking as soulful, as in "soul food". When the chef is white, the buzzword of choice is "elevated". Latino chefs always have food with a "zesty kick". And never ever does the narrator mix it up.
This to me shows a very mild and subtle example of ingrained racism. Assuming the Narrator is simply reading copy in front of him in the recording booth, whomever writes that copy writes it with some preconceived racist notions so subtle I doubt they even notice they're doing it. Certain descriptors that have over time somehow become tied to different races.
Is it necessarily inaccurate that soul food is most often cooked by black cooks, or that Latino cooking is traditionally more spicy? No. Those are the sorts of stereotypes that exist because they are often actually accurate. Where it truly slips into racism though, however unintended it may be, is that the only ethnicity that ever has their cooking described as "elevated" are the white chefs. THAT'S where the subconscious stench of culturally ingrained racism begins to seep in.
Because this kind of racism is so ingrained, so sewn in to the social consciousness, that it just seems perfectly normal to describe the white chefs as cooking the "elevated" dishes, and almost no one ever even notices. We all just kind of shrug it off. It rarely registers with most people, regardless of their race, that what they're hearing is kinda broken and problematic, because we've all been subtly conditioned to see this kind of thing as simply normal. And it's damned hard to unsee it. I've been watching Bar Rescue for all 6 seasons, and only JUST realized this.
And that's why racism ends up being so difficult to fight, to beat, to eradicate.
Anyone can see the problem when a neo-nazi shouts "ni**er" on a street corner. Those are the big blunt examples. We all know that's wrong. But we can't succeed in fighting the big loud examples if we can't get ourselves to see the subtle tiny ones. Because it's the subtle tiny ones we all just blindly accept that give the bigger ones the room to keep festering until they thrive.
While I was cooking dinner, listening to the show in the background, I heard the narrator begin to introduce the chef Jon was bringing in to help the failing bar of the week. The moment the narrator described the chef's style of cooking as "soulful" I knew without even having to look at the screen the chef was black. Why?
Because on Bar Rescue whenever Jon brings in a chef who happens to be black, the narrator describes their cooking as soulful, as in "soul food". When the chef is white, the buzzword of choice is "elevated". Latino chefs always have food with a "zesty kick". And never ever does the narrator mix it up.
This to me shows a very mild and subtle example of ingrained racism. Assuming the Narrator is simply reading copy in front of him in the recording booth, whomever writes that copy writes it with some preconceived racist notions so subtle I doubt they even notice they're doing it. Certain descriptors that have over time somehow become tied to different races.
Is it necessarily inaccurate that soul food is most often cooked by black cooks, or that Latino cooking is traditionally more spicy? No. Those are the sorts of stereotypes that exist because they are often actually accurate. Where it truly slips into racism though, however unintended it may be, is that the only ethnicity that ever has their cooking described as "elevated" are the white chefs. THAT'S where the subconscious stench of culturally ingrained racism begins to seep in.
Because this kind of racism is so ingrained, so sewn in to the social consciousness, that it just seems perfectly normal to describe the white chefs as cooking the "elevated" dishes, and almost no one ever even notices. We all just kind of shrug it off. It rarely registers with most people, regardless of their race, that what they're hearing is kinda broken and problematic, because we've all been subtly conditioned to see this kind of thing as simply normal. And it's damned hard to unsee it. I've been watching Bar Rescue for all 6 seasons, and only JUST realized this.
And that's why racism ends up being so difficult to fight, to beat, to eradicate.
Anyone can see the problem when a neo-nazi shouts "ni**er" on a street corner. Those are the big blunt examples. We all know that's wrong. But we can't succeed in fighting the big loud examples if we can't get ourselves to see the subtle tiny ones. Because it's the subtle tiny ones we all just blindly accept that give the bigger ones the room to keep festering until they thrive.
1/09/2011
The Flip Side of Isms
Crossposted on Pam's House Blend
As a woman who is mixed race, overweight, intersex, and a lesbian, I've had to put up with all the major ism's and bigotries we all know and love. (Snrk). Racism, sexism, fatphobia, ageism from teenagers who think anyone over 30 is useless, homophobia, transphobia, etcetera. I know all too well that bigotry causes harm and is destructive.
But earlier today I got sucked into an argument with some now former friends on Twitter over Ableism and it reminded me that every "ism" is a double edged sword and that humanity in general is mostly selfish self-absorbed lazy cowards unable to take responsibility for themselves.
Ableism for those unfamiliar with it is fear and/or abuse of physicaly and/or mentally disabled people. As a disabled person also, I'm not in the least oblivious to the fact that ableism DOES exist and treating disabled people dismissively as if they're automatically useless, crazy, lazy or faking for sympathy happens a lot and can be very hurtful and destructive. But like so many "isms", I find more often than nor it's a cheap defense used as an excuse to be coddled or protected from reality.
I'm sure most of you have heard about yesterday;s shooting in Arzona, which among other things left a goddamned NINE YEAR OLD CHILD DEAD. Now to me, when something that bad happens, the last thing I'm thinking about is me or how words make me feel. My thoughts were squarely on the dead child and feeling heartbroken and angry that this even happened.
Naturally a lot of people think the shooter was completely batshit and said so on Twitter. As someone with a history of mental issues this, according to my ableism fighting "friends", should automatically hurt my fee fees and mortally offend me.
It doesn't. The bastard who opened fire in a crowd to kill a judge and a senator clearly is not right in the head. All evidence says he was a Teabagger, a group of bigoted hateful people to begin with, most of whom are very much not right in the head. From people who still insist Obama is Muslim or foreign born despite overwhelming evidence otherwise to people who spend millions to prevent GLBT equality at all costs while letting homeless people, including children starve, I have ZERO problem with anyone calling these hatemongering delusional fuckwits "crazy people".
But to bitch at people for calling the shooter crazy and go into conniption over how you "won't stand for ableist fuckery" when a child is dead is not only bullshit but a serious lack of priorities. So I told them to get their priorities straight and focus on the real victims. They proceeded to just shit on me and act like I was betraying them to the "enemy".
They both ended up blocked when I got sick of trying to get through to them. And it reminded me that isms can all too easily be abused.
Seriously? How many people do you know who, should something not go their way, almost immediately blame an ism for it? A black man or a woman doesn't get the job they applied for and immediately accuse the employer of being racist/sexist? I know some employers are and would find excuses for it to avoid hiring "undesirables" but they're statistically few and far between. I know a gay man, friend of my parents, who is a complete and total douchebag, who actually accused the staff at A GAY BAR of being homophobic for tossing him out after other patrons complained he was drunkenly hitting on married men who told him no.
Well fuck that noise. It's bullshit cowardice. It's selfish self-absorbed responsibility deflecting stupidity. It's someone immediately claiming bigotry as a crutch because they don't want to deal with their own flaws.
I'm in a wheelchair. I don't whine and bitch and treat the world like it's out to get me. It's not Joe Blow's fault I'm in it, why should I expect him to coddle me?
I used to cut myself when severely depressed. I don't blame anyone else for that. No one put the razor in my fucking hand. No one forced me at gunpoint to put it to my skin. I did that. Me. My stupidity and I take responsibility for it.
So why can't anyone else just own their own shit? Why do people whine and bitch and think only of themselves and expect the world to hand everything to them because of something innate like skin color or sex or sexuality or something unfortunate but unchangable like a permanent disability? Why does everything that doesn't go your way HAVE to be someone else's fault?
Sometimes people DO screw you. Sometimes bad shit IS someone else's fault. When it is by all means hold them accountable. But when it isn't? Just deal with it already and move on. Learn from it, grow as a person, be better than you are now. Don't hide behind an ism to avoid admitting you need to work on something.
Seriously humanity, grow the fuck up already. Focus on the shit that causes REAL damage. Fight bigotry that's hurting people tangibly. Don't just sit and whine about your own feelings as if they outweigh the rest of the world.
After all, a child is dead. Is a bruised ego really more urgent than that?
As a woman who is mixed race, overweight, intersex, and a lesbian, I've had to put up with all the major ism's and bigotries we all know and love. (Snrk). Racism, sexism, fatphobia, ageism from teenagers who think anyone over 30 is useless, homophobia, transphobia, etcetera. I know all too well that bigotry causes harm and is destructive.
But earlier today I got sucked into an argument with some now former friends on Twitter over Ableism and it reminded me that every "ism" is a double edged sword and that humanity in general is mostly selfish self-absorbed lazy cowards unable to take responsibility for themselves.
Ableism for those unfamiliar with it is fear and/or abuse of physicaly and/or mentally disabled people. As a disabled person also, I'm not in the least oblivious to the fact that ableism DOES exist and treating disabled people dismissively as if they're automatically useless, crazy, lazy or faking for sympathy happens a lot and can be very hurtful and destructive. But like so many "isms", I find more often than nor it's a cheap defense used as an excuse to be coddled or protected from reality.
I'm sure most of you have heard about yesterday;s shooting in Arzona, which among other things left a goddamned NINE YEAR OLD CHILD DEAD. Now to me, when something that bad happens, the last thing I'm thinking about is me or how words make me feel. My thoughts were squarely on the dead child and feeling heartbroken and angry that this even happened.
Naturally a lot of people think the shooter was completely batshit and said so on Twitter. As someone with a history of mental issues this, according to my ableism fighting "friends", should automatically hurt my fee fees and mortally offend me.
It doesn't. The bastard who opened fire in a crowd to kill a judge and a senator clearly is not right in the head. All evidence says he was a Teabagger, a group of bigoted hateful people to begin with, most of whom are very much not right in the head. From people who still insist Obama is Muslim or foreign born despite overwhelming evidence otherwise to people who spend millions to prevent GLBT equality at all costs while letting homeless people, including children starve, I have ZERO problem with anyone calling these hatemongering delusional fuckwits "crazy people".
But to bitch at people for calling the shooter crazy and go into conniption over how you "won't stand for ableist fuckery" when a child is dead is not only bullshit but a serious lack of priorities. So I told them to get their priorities straight and focus on the real victims. They proceeded to just shit on me and act like I was betraying them to the "enemy".
They both ended up blocked when I got sick of trying to get through to them. And it reminded me that isms can all too easily be abused.
Seriously? How many people do you know who, should something not go their way, almost immediately blame an ism for it? A black man or a woman doesn't get the job they applied for and immediately accuse the employer of being racist/sexist? I know some employers are and would find excuses for it to avoid hiring "undesirables" but they're statistically few and far between. I know a gay man, friend of my parents, who is a complete and total douchebag, who actually accused the staff at A GAY BAR of being homophobic for tossing him out after other patrons complained he was drunkenly hitting on married men who told him no.
Well fuck that noise. It's bullshit cowardice. It's selfish self-absorbed responsibility deflecting stupidity. It's someone immediately claiming bigotry as a crutch because they don't want to deal with their own flaws.
I'm in a wheelchair. I don't whine and bitch and treat the world like it's out to get me. It's not Joe Blow's fault I'm in it, why should I expect him to coddle me?
I used to cut myself when severely depressed. I don't blame anyone else for that. No one put the razor in my fucking hand. No one forced me at gunpoint to put it to my skin. I did that. Me. My stupidity and I take responsibility for it.
So why can't anyone else just own their own shit? Why do people whine and bitch and think only of themselves and expect the world to hand everything to them because of something innate like skin color or sex or sexuality or something unfortunate but unchangable like a permanent disability? Why does everything that doesn't go your way HAVE to be someone else's fault?
Sometimes people DO screw you. Sometimes bad shit IS someone else's fault. When it is by all means hold them accountable. But when it isn't? Just deal with it already and move on. Learn from it, grow as a person, be better than you are now. Don't hide behind an ism to avoid admitting you need to work on something.
Seriously humanity, grow the fuck up already. Focus on the shit that causes REAL damage. Fight bigotry that's hurting people tangibly. Don't just sit and whine about your own feelings as if they outweigh the rest of the world.
After all, a child is dead. Is a bruised ego really more urgent than that?
11/02/2010
Message to the Tea Party - What took you so long to get angry?
Hat-Tip to Alvin at Holy Bullies & Headless Monsters. He has also cross-posted this on Pam's House Blend, where he and I both frequently crosspost. He's given me permission to share this here, as it is an utterly brilliant and brutally honest take-down of Tea Party "values".
As Alvin himself has pointed out, no one seems to know who actually authored the following message. On the off-chance that the auther stumbles across this and can prove authorship, please e-mail me at theaerie@shaw.ca and I will update this blog entry to give you your due credit.
- The brilliant anonymous message to the Tea Party in the USA;
You didn't get mad when the Supreme Court stopped a legal recount and appointed a President.
You didn't get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate Energy policy and push us to invade Iraq .
You didn't get mad when a covert CIA operative got outed.
You didn't get mad when the Patriot Act got passed.
You didn't get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us. You didn't get mad when we spent over 800 billion (and counting) on said illegal war.
You didn't get mad when Bush borrowed more money from foreign sources than the previous 42 Presidents combined.
You didn't get mad when over 10 billion dollars in cash just disappeared in Iraq .
You didn't get mad when you found out we were torturing people.
You didn't get mad when Bush embraced trade and outsourcing policies that shipped 6 million American jobs out of the country.
You didn't get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans.
You didn't get mad when we didn't catch Bin Laden.
You didn't get mad when Bush rang up 10 trillion dollars in combined budget and current account deficits.
You didn't get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed.
You didn't get mad when we let a major US city, New Orleans drown.
You didn't get mad when we gave people who had more money than they could spend, the filthy rich, over a trillion dollars in taxbreaks. You didn't get mad with the worst 8 years of job creations in several decades.
You didn't get mad when over 200,000 US Citizens lost their lives because they had no health insurance.
You didn't get mad when lack of oversight and regulations from the Bush Administration caused US Citizens to lose 12 trillion dollars in investments, retirement, and home values.
No.....You finally got mad
When a black man was elected President and decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick.
Yes, illegal wars, lies, corruption, torture, job losses by the millions, stealing your tax dollars to make the rich richer, and the worst economic disaster since 1929 are all okay with you, but helping fellow Americans who are sick...Oh, Hell No!!
As Alvin himself has pointed out, no one seems to know who actually authored the following message. On the off-chance that the auther stumbles across this and can prove authorship, please e-mail me at theaerie@shaw.ca and I will update this blog entry to give you your due credit.
- The brilliant anonymous message to the Tea Party in the USA;
You didn't get mad when the Supreme Court stopped a legal recount and appointed a President.
You didn't get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate Energy policy and push us to invade Iraq .
You didn't get mad when a covert CIA operative got outed.
You didn't get mad when the Patriot Act got passed.
You didn't get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us. You didn't get mad when we spent over 800 billion (and counting) on said illegal war.
You didn't get mad when Bush borrowed more money from foreign sources than the previous 42 Presidents combined.
You didn't get mad when over 10 billion dollars in cash just disappeared in Iraq .
You didn't get mad when you found out we were torturing people.
You didn't get mad when Bush embraced trade and outsourcing policies that shipped 6 million American jobs out of the country.
You didn't get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans.
You didn't get mad when we didn't catch Bin Laden.
You didn't get mad when Bush rang up 10 trillion dollars in combined budget and current account deficits.
You didn't get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed.
You didn't get mad when we let a major US city, New Orleans drown.
You didn't get mad when we gave people who had more money than they could spend, the filthy rich, over a trillion dollars in taxbreaks. You didn't get mad with the worst 8 years of job creations in several decades.
You didn't get mad when over 200,000 US Citizens lost their lives because they had no health insurance.
You didn't get mad when lack of oversight and regulations from the Bush Administration caused US Citizens to lose 12 trillion dollars in investments, retirement, and home values.
No.....You finally got mad
When a black man was elected President and decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick.
Yes, illegal wars, lies, corruption, torture, job losses by the millions, stealing your tax dollars to make the rich richer, and the worst economic disaster since 1929 are all okay with you, but helping fellow Americans who are sick...Oh, Hell No!!
8/13/2010
Tranny, Nigger, Faggot and Other Things Bigots Say
Crossposted on Pam's House Blend
So apparently, to the surprise of absolutely no one who's been paying attention for the last 20 years, Doctor Laura Schlessinger is a flaming racist. She has of course, issued a half-assed non-apology since then for saying "Nigger nigger nigger" on her radio show, claiming she meant no racism but was only trying to illustrate the double standard of the word.
The sad part is that, while her way of going about was indeed blatantly racist and boneheaded, she has a valid point. There IS a very sad double-standard on Hate Words, one that only succeeds in perpetuating them.
So I'm going to take a look at some of the most "popular" hate words, and why the obvious problems of common usage are actually outweighed by the less obvious but more devastating problems caused by sanctioned use.
Nigger is, of course, the vile word most often used as a hate word by the white supremist crowd. It's derived from the word Negro and any white person stupid enough to say it, even in jest, around black folks ought not be surprised when he's shitting shoe polish the next day. Faggot, which was originally a word that meant the lighting end of a straw torch once it was lit, and eventually became, (and in the UK still is) British slang for a cigarette, is the most common and vulger slur against homosexual men. Tranny, which Aunty Kate Bornstein assures me began as a positive term used in Australia's trans community 40 years ago, has become the de facto porno term most people think of when dealing with a trans woman, and I can personally confirm most trans woman are offended when non-trans folk say it.
There are of course other hate words for every race. But these are the three I hear most often, so thanks to Doctor Laura's tirade, I'm going to examine the real destructive potential of each.
Nigger is obviously the worst of the three. The malice behind the word nigger is the same malice behind Segregation, The Jim Crow Laws, Seperate But Equal, and Martin Luther King's assassination. Google any of those things and you'll see a plethora of horror stories about the brutal cowardly abuse black people in America have suffered at the hands of cowardly ignorant white folks. But if you Google the word "Nigger" itself, you'll as likely get as many websites for song lyrics as White Supremist websites.
Why? Because damn near every black rapper on earth uses it in their rap. The obstensble reasoning behind this is, supposedly, "Reclaiming the word".
The concept behing reclaiming a hate word is that the group the word is meant to hurt, uses the word freely to disarm it, to nueter it's ability to hurt. And I suppose it's a well-meaning ideal.
Or would be if it came even CLOSE to working.
But we all know it doesn't. If it did, no black people would ever be offended when a non-black person says it. They'd shrug it off as if they'd said "Ice cream" or "Sunshine". But they don't. The word, in the hands of any non-black person, still offends and hurts black people. And what makes it worse is the fact that a huge chunk of the hip-hop audience are middle to upper-class WHITE KIDS, too young to remember the civil rights struggles, who hear Nigga this and nigga that in their favorite music and think the word is cool.
How do I know this? By listening to the white teenagers I see every day at the bus loop greeting each other by saying "Wassap mah nigga?" with absolutely NO trace of irony or awareness.
The same goes for Faggot and Tranny. I know a lot of queer men who loudly call themselves proud faggots, but who get justifiably upset when they hear it from Fred Phelps and his inbred horde. And I've had more than one argument with Kate Bornstein over the use of the word Tranny in her work.
The common logic is that if you are PART of the group a particular work targets, it is perfectly okay for YOU to use it hile anyone else is forbidden.
This is where Doctor Laura and I differ on the double standard.
Where Doctor Laura's argument was that EVERYONE should be free to say nigger and not get any grief, I believe NO ONE should be perpetuating any of these words. I myself am intersexed/trans AND part Japanese, so I have, technically, the right to say Tranny, hermy, and Jap all I like. But I don't for one moment believe I SHOULD.
Black people, gay people and Trans people self-applying these words make the words seem okay to those NOT in the affected group. And reclaiming these words is a bullshit excuse for self-applying them because reclaiming never works. When the word is used OUTSIDE the target group it will ALWAYS have a high likelihood of causing harm and offense. And Doctor Laura proves the double standard. As long as rappers say Nigga every 5 words, idiots like Doctor Laura will be there to say "Well THEY say it so why can't I?" and be completely oblivious to the obvious answer.
17 years ago in high school, I lived in a small town called Vernon here in BC. There was LITERALLY only ONE black family in town, in a population of about 50'000. The elder child of the family was my friend, and because he thought I was one of the cool people being from big cities and not wrapped in small-town mentality, insisted it was okay for me to greet him and refer to him as "My nigga". I had his permission to be racist for lack of a better term. He actually got angry with me for refusing to do so. He took OFFENSE that I wouldn't call him Nigga. It actually ended up ruining our friendship, but I refused to perpetuate the word even with his approval, because I knew other kids would hear it and think "Well if she can say it then I can too" and things would've gotten ugly.
In the last few years I've asked black folks I've become friends with online about that incident. I asked if he was right to be angry at my refusal or if I was right to voice my discomfort and decline his "permission". Some said "It's just a word, if it bothered him he wouldn't have asked you to", but most have pretty much universally agreed that I was in the right to refuse, both because the word is bad itself, and because they think it was unfair of him to put me on the spot and not respecting my discomfort.
So while Doctor Laura did in fact have a point about the double-standard, she got it completely backwards.
NO ONE should flagrantly or flippantly use hatewords, LEAST OF ALL those they're directed at. It's destructive to make them seem okay when it's impossible to use them without causing harm. I didn't even like having to use them in this blog to illustrate my point, and this blog is the only time you're likely to see me ever use them, because they are destructive words.
Some words simply CANNOT be disarmed or reclaimed. And self-perpetuation only aggrivates the problem. I would implore everyone to erase these words from the English language if it were possible.
Hate words will always BE hate words. No matter who is using them.
So apparently, to the surprise of absolutely no one who's been paying attention for the last 20 years, Doctor Laura Schlessinger is a flaming racist. She has of course, issued a half-assed non-apology since then for saying "Nigger nigger nigger" on her radio show, claiming she meant no racism but was only trying to illustrate the double standard of the word.
The sad part is that, while her way of going about was indeed blatantly racist and boneheaded, she has a valid point. There IS a very sad double-standard on Hate Words, one that only succeeds in perpetuating them.
So I'm going to take a look at some of the most "popular" hate words, and why the obvious problems of common usage are actually outweighed by the less obvious but more devastating problems caused by sanctioned use.
Nigger is, of course, the vile word most often used as a hate word by the white supremist crowd. It's derived from the word Negro and any white person stupid enough to say it, even in jest, around black folks ought not be surprised when he's shitting shoe polish the next day. Faggot, which was originally a word that meant the lighting end of a straw torch once it was lit, and eventually became, (and in the UK still is) British slang for a cigarette, is the most common and vulger slur against homosexual men. Tranny, which Aunty Kate Bornstein assures me began as a positive term used in Australia's trans community 40 years ago, has become the de facto porno term most people think of when dealing with a trans woman, and I can personally confirm most trans woman are offended when non-trans folk say it.
There are of course other hate words for every race. But these are the three I hear most often, so thanks to Doctor Laura's tirade, I'm going to examine the real destructive potential of each.
Nigger is obviously the worst of the three. The malice behind the word nigger is the same malice behind Segregation, The Jim Crow Laws, Seperate But Equal, and Martin Luther King's assassination. Google any of those things and you'll see a plethora of horror stories about the brutal cowardly abuse black people in America have suffered at the hands of cowardly ignorant white folks. But if you Google the word "Nigger" itself, you'll as likely get as many websites for song lyrics as White Supremist websites.
Why? Because damn near every black rapper on earth uses it in their rap. The obstensble reasoning behind this is, supposedly, "Reclaiming the word".
The concept behing reclaiming a hate word is that the group the word is meant to hurt, uses the word freely to disarm it, to nueter it's ability to hurt. And I suppose it's a well-meaning ideal.
Or would be if it came even CLOSE to working.
But we all know it doesn't. If it did, no black people would ever be offended when a non-black person says it. They'd shrug it off as if they'd said "Ice cream" or "Sunshine". But they don't. The word, in the hands of any non-black person, still offends and hurts black people. And what makes it worse is the fact that a huge chunk of the hip-hop audience are middle to upper-class WHITE KIDS, too young to remember the civil rights struggles, who hear Nigga this and nigga that in their favorite music and think the word is cool.
How do I know this? By listening to the white teenagers I see every day at the bus loop greeting each other by saying "Wassap mah nigga?" with absolutely NO trace of irony or awareness.
The same goes for Faggot and Tranny. I know a lot of queer men who loudly call themselves proud faggots, but who get justifiably upset when they hear it from Fred Phelps and his inbred horde. And I've had more than one argument with Kate Bornstein over the use of the word Tranny in her work.
The common logic is that if you are PART of the group a particular work targets, it is perfectly okay for YOU to use it hile anyone else is forbidden.
This is where Doctor Laura and I differ on the double standard.
Where Doctor Laura's argument was that EVERYONE should be free to say nigger and not get any grief, I believe NO ONE should be perpetuating any of these words. I myself am intersexed/trans AND part Japanese, so I have, technically, the right to say Tranny, hermy, and Jap all I like. But I don't for one moment believe I SHOULD.
Black people, gay people and Trans people self-applying these words make the words seem okay to those NOT in the affected group. And reclaiming these words is a bullshit excuse for self-applying them because reclaiming never works. When the word is used OUTSIDE the target group it will ALWAYS have a high likelihood of causing harm and offense. And Doctor Laura proves the double standard. As long as rappers say Nigga every 5 words, idiots like Doctor Laura will be there to say "Well THEY say it so why can't I?" and be completely oblivious to the obvious answer.
17 years ago in high school, I lived in a small town called Vernon here in BC. There was LITERALLY only ONE black family in town, in a population of about 50'000. The elder child of the family was my friend, and because he thought I was one of the cool people being from big cities and not wrapped in small-town mentality, insisted it was okay for me to greet him and refer to him as "My nigga". I had his permission to be racist for lack of a better term. He actually got angry with me for refusing to do so. He took OFFENSE that I wouldn't call him Nigga. It actually ended up ruining our friendship, but I refused to perpetuate the word even with his approval, because I knew other kids would hear it and think "Well if she can say it then I can too" and things would've gotten ugly.
In the last few years I've asked black folks I've become friends with online about that incident. I asked if he was right to be angry at my refusal or if I was right to voice my discomfort and decline his "permission". Some said "It's just a word, if it bothered him he wouldn't have asked you to", but most have pretty much universally agreed that I was in the right to refuse, both because the word is bad itself, and because they think it was unfair of him to put me on the spot and not respecting my discomfort.
So while Doctor Laura did in fact have a point about the double-standard, she got it completely backwards.
NO ONE should flagrantly or flippantly use hatewords, LEAST OF ALL those they're directed at. It's destructive to make them seem okay when it's impossible to use them without causing harm. I didn't even like having to use them in this blog to illustrate my point, and this blog is the only time you're likely to see me ever use them, because they are destructive words.
Some words simply CANNOT be disarmed or reclaimed. And self-perpetuation only aggrivates the problem. I would implore everyone to erase these words from the English language if it were possible.
Hate words will always BE hate words. No matter who is using them.
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