monstro, you really feel that you have lived your life with “everyone reminding you in subtle and not-so-subtle ways that you don’t belong”?
Everyone?
I think this is a once-bitten, twice-shy sort of thing. People who have been slighted (or think they’ve been slighted) b/c of racial issues will obviously be more sensitive to any racial issue the next time. I’ve never been a victim of racism, so I wouldn’t make a big deal out of the shirt. However, if monstro believes that her whole life is defined in moments of belonging/not belonging, then the shirt is just going to represent another moment of not belonging, or being spurned or made fun of by the so-called dominant group.
But in this case, a particular race was penned. It doesn’t matter that the same items have been attributed to men in general. Not when there’s a big picture of a black man next to them. Not when one can, as Green Bean did quite easily, relate them to well-known stereotypes.
People keep comparing this shirt to “anti-male” shirts, but it’s not the same thing. Few people hate men. There has been little history of male-hatred in our society. But more than a few people are racist against blacks. There has been a lot of anti-black hatred in our society. Putting on a shirt like this makes it a lot harder for a black person to assume that the wearer isn’t a bad guy. There is no tongue-in-cheek cue. The same message could be found on a stormfront website.
I’m not understanding why people are so confounded by this issue. Maybe they’re just pretending to be for argument’s sake. Either way, it’s making my tears of rage transform into tears of fatigue.
Please tell me how selectively pulling statements out of context makes any point other than you have an axe to grind and are determined to do so in the face of facts. The entire quote:
The difference is the difference between talking about an individual and a group of people who share a genetic trait. Why is that so hard? Are you that determined to crawl up on a cross?
When you’re a Black person you can’t escape from the concept of race because it comes up so often in your lifetime. I can understand why you, and I’m asumming you’re not a person of color, would think that monstro is bound up in the idea of race. In order to get an idea about what she means you would have to be Black person or have some very close personal friends that are Black then you would get a better idea of how race issues play out when you’re not White.
Of course you can, it doesn’t touch you personally, understand that is the reason why you can and you do. Just realize that your notion of the world or should I say the USA is different more often than not than that of a person of color. Oh, and please, don’t start asking me how so, okay? Do your own homework, study the history of this country, and in particular the history of Black people in this country, if you even want to get an idea where monstro is coming from.
As for the t-shirt:
I’m amazed that idiots get paid money to come up with idea like this and they don’t get shot down before they:
[list=1]
[li]Become an idea that people sign off on[/li][li]Become something that’s actually funded[/li][li]Become a solicitors stand with people actually promoting it[/li][/list=1]
No, not everyone. Goodness, I’ve never had people reading my words so literally!
Not everyone, but not a day goes by when I’m not reminded that I’m black. This in itself isn’t a bad thing. I like being black. But it sets me apart. It makes me “different”. It makes me sensitive about certain things.
My friends tease me about being black and it doesn’t bother me. Why? Because they’re my friends and I understand they’re just kidding. They’re laughing with me instead of at me. But would I want to hear the same jokes coming out of the mouth of a stranger? No. That’s what this t-shirt represents to me. A stranger laughing at me, not with me.
Monstro, I think GB, is just going way too far with the analysis. The fact is the list was probably not drafted with blacks in mind, and that was only added later. So to say that “Beer won’t yell at your kids” is somehow different from “Beer won’t yell at the kids” and this somehow indicatates a play on a stereotypes is to apply a level of textual analysis more befitting a Supreme Court opinion than a free t-shirt.
The whole community/people identity issue is an interesting one, and probably deserves its own discussion out of the pit. I apologize if I sounded like I was on a soap box to you, that was not my intent. This is obviously a sensitive issue for you, and while I still feel you were, and are, over reacting, I could have been nicer in the way I said it.
How many people does it have to be? Let me ask you some questions NightRabbit.
Have you ever been denied entry or service in an establishment simply you have a particular skin color?
Have you ever gone to a building to meet a friend and had tenants in the building question your motives for coming there or better yet slamming the door slammed in your face, while people that are the same color as them that they don’t know walk right in or even have the door held for them?
Ever have people act like they’re afraid of you for no apparent reason but not afraid of someone else twice your size though the same color as them?
I may not know monstro personally, but as a Black man I definitely understand where she’s coming from because I’ve lived it, I’ve seen it and I know far too many people that have as well and a few of them are White.
Excuse me if someone has already addressed this comment.
Similar shirts about women don’t seem as outrageous to some because the prejudices against women are more ingrained in our culture. Many African-American women will tell you that they have been discriminated against more because of their gender than their race.
I find any stereotyping outrageous. Call me on it if you see it in any of my posts. This t-shirt is very offensive to me! It is not only tasteless, it is humorless. Monstros, I am curious – would you have found a t-shirt poking fun at stereotypical women offensive or funny?
I am all for a good joke, but not at the expense of someone else. This wasn’t even a good joke.
I think I will have a t-shirt made up that says
“Ten reasons why I will never carry a BankOne credit card”
I disagree, I think the analysis is spot on and articulated well. I would expect you to feel the way you feel about based upon your comments here in this thread. This issue isn’t personal for you and because of that, there will be a lot that you wouldn’t consider and wouldn’t be aware of. Analogy: If I’m in the business of fixing cars, I’m going to be looking at a car in an entirely different context than you a person that has never owned a car.
Because we’re still talking about different things.
Do you really think I’d be upset about this if black people weren’t a minority in this country?
Do you really think I’d be upset about this if black people weren’t still being discriminated against? or if black people were welcomed in all communities? or if the KKK didn’t still exist?
Do you really think I’d be upset about this if the “bad ole days” weren’t just forty years ago?
Do you think there’s a history of male- or female-hatred that’s comparable to the history of anti-black hatred in this country?
You think there’s the same offensiveness in anti-male shirts as there is for an anti-black male shirt. Perhaps you geniunely feel just as offended about the former as I do about the latter. But there are real reasons why most people wouldn’t agree with you. I’m afraid they aren’t really debatable.
It’s just how things be sometimes. That’s all I can say.
Hey, Rhum, I agree with you that the reading is woefully strained, but the idea of putting “black” in front of a jokesy shirt about universal female/male issues, is pretty disgusting in and of itself.
But still just a t-shirt. Ok, a racist T-shirt; But to give that out so that sophmores will sign up for more Bank? Might as well roll 'em and stick it in their wallet.
You know, I interact with people of color on a daily basis, indeed my best friend is a person of color, (and no, this is not an “I’m not a racist, I have a black friend” argument, but you opened this door so I am just responding to it) and many of our mutual friends are as well. As I interact with them I am not aware of the color of their skin, it is simply not an issue to me. It is unfortunate that there are people who are racists, and I acknowledge that race does come up in people’s lives more often than it should. But, at the same time, let’s not go out looking for additional times to bring it up.
I’m quite well acquainted with our country’s sad past. I think that if we are to have a brighter future we must work to live in a country where skin color begins to loose the significance that we have in the past, and continue in some respects, to accord it. Part of that is being able to look at ourselves and not take everything so seriously.
I was prepared to like you, but now on preview I see that you are trying to defend GB’s ludicrous interpretation, and all I can say to you now is that you are out of your mind. There is no way in hell that the difference between “the” and “your” should be accorded any significance whatsoever, or give rise to some additional stereotype. This is a t-shirt for crying out loud, the source for which was probably some other t-shirt that the bozos working for the bank picked up on spring break last summer in Daytona. It is not likely that each word was chosen with the utmost care so as to subtlety impart the idea that black women are unmarried mothers. Making this argument makes you look like a fool. Stick with the cartoon, where you might actually have something approaching a point.
Damn straight. In a Montgomery Wards. I wanted a drink of water and the only water fountain I could find had a “Colored Only” sign. Made me mad! I was thirsty.
And at the movie theater many years later, I wanted to sit in the balcony plus tickets for the balcony were only 35 cents, but no. I had to pay the full 50 cents for the orchestra seating. Hey! 15 cents was a lot a money and I wanted to watch the picture show from the balcony.
Not sophisticated or multi-layered, but if there isn’t a presumptive underlying “issue” to be addressed and that can be “zinged” by adding the word black or the word Asian or the word gay or the word Jewish or the word Muslim or any other qualifier into the joke, then it wouldn’t be done.
Let’s face it, this shirt wouldn’t have been made using the same “reasons” if the men in question were Asian or Jewish. The reasons on this shirt played specifically to stereotypes and notions – all negative stereotypes and notions – that are held by certain people about black men.
This wasn’t self-parody (ala Chris Rock and a host of other Black comics) or the work of a bunch of black women sitting around, laughingly or lightheartedly joshing about men ala Waiting to Exhale or something. This was an insult shirt put together by a white-owned company, handed out by a white-owned company to a student body which is mainly white.
It may be “just a joke” and while that may not seem to be a harmful thing in and of itself, the continued perpetuation of jokes made at the expense of racial, ethnic, sexual and religious minorities doesn’t do a damn thing toward ending the divisiveness between divergent populations, either.
And for those of us who live our lives as those racial, ethnic, sexual or religious minorities, there is very much a realization (or ought to be) that there is no room for leeway for anything that adds to the atmosphere of disrespect and division which still pervades far too much of our society.
Well all you had to say is that you had a single drop of Black blood in you from a distant ancestor and you could have drank all day. As a matter of fact you would have no longer been allowed to drink from the fountain that had the “White Only” sign.
I really hate this stupid, self-justifying argument. If it’s not ok to say something that will deliberately hurt someone, it’s always unacceptable. It doesn’t matter if you’re hurting a rich white guy or a little blind girl from China, they both have feelings. Having power doesn’t make you any less likely to be hurt by something, and being poor doesn’t make you more likely to have a thin skin. All the argument does is “prove” it’s ok to be an asshole some times. Either it’s ok to behave that way or it isn’t, who the the victim is should have no bearing on what is decent behavior on your part.
How about we bring it up every time it comes up? That way, we get it out there to everyone that we’re fired up, can’t take no more.
This reminds me of what you posted earlier. That I’m “wasting time” being upset about this. Like I have to spend every grain of my being worrying about “important” things, like youth crime or crack babies or something. I’m starting to think that only white people are allowed to fume over small slights. Every time a black person does it, they are told–very patronizingly–to focus on more important matters.
I don’t like negative images of women, but I wouldn’t find a “joke” shirt against women offensive. At least, not to the same extent. Why? I guess it’s because I don’t think a shirt against women would keep guys from hooking up with girls. They would be able to see the joke because they know women that don’t act in those stereotypical ways. Their mothers. Their sisters. Their girlfriends.
How many black guys does an average white person in Louisville know personally? How many Kentuckians have been raised to view blacks guys with suspect? How many Kentuckians subconsciously fear black men, particularly in a sexual way? The answers to these questions explain why I feel differently about this than I do about “anti-women” shirts.
