# A proposal to address a racial injustice **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 21, 2009, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292 "2009-01-21T13:46:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/41 "2009-01-21T18:06:40Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > It was probably not that obscure to Lowery. **Regardless, some googling leads me to the conclusion that most of the people who were upset about what Lowery said were upset Obama was inaugurated at all.** That’s not my experience. I’m a bit sick of this idea that white people are supposed to just keep shutting up and taking it every time so-called unity is being offered. I voted for Obama and it bothered me. I know others who are not upset that Obama was inaugurated who were bothered by it. It was just completely nasty and out of place. Spiteful and vindictive would be the words I’d use. Being a civil rights hero doesn’t make it all ok. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/42 "2009-01-21T18:07:47Z")
It isn’t about white people being victimized it is about being vindictive when people are trying to come together. He didn’t piss on white people he pissed on the shared moment out of spite. ---
**Author:** ![haymarketmartyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/35a633/32.png) [@haymarketmartyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/haymarketmartyr)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/43 "2009-01-21T18:12:09Z")
Two summers ago, this really nice retired couple moved in next door to me. They are really wonderful people. At least I thought so. Then the wife starts sending me these “white pride” emails which at first seem only stupid but then get pretty offensive and outright racist. So one day I tell her nicely to please not send me this stuff. Then in the Fall, I had two Obama signs on my lawn and she could see them clearly. But this week I get more crap like the initial post in this thread. Some folks are just hopeless. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/44 "2009-01-21T18:12:11Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > Of course it is given the myth of racial inequality in this country. One fact does not negate the other. This is grade school logic. It’s entirely possible for there to be racist inequality and still be white people who embrace what’s right. [QUOTE=Dio] Quit giving me reasons to sing it then. White people are not victims because an old black preacher rhymed “white” with “do right.” Of all manufactured outrages, white people crying oppression is without a doubt the lamest. I am as white as a ghost and I couldn’t care less that a near-90-year-old former victim of Jim Crow said “I hope white will do right” in a poem. Getting outraged about it is an insult to those who’ve actually suffered through something. [/QUOTE] Your problem is your strawman assumption that anytime a white person asserts that a black person has made an outrageous claim, or behaved in a racist manner, he is accusing him of repression. Please show me exactly where in the post you quoted anyone complained of being repressed. Do think Obama would even have been elected without a substantial number of white people “doing right?” I’m white. I voted for him, and I was out there on election day, going door to door to make sure folks got to the polls. The assumption that I do not “do right” based on my color is a vile, racist one, and he had no excuse for suggesting it. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/45 "2009-01-21T18:13:38Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Sure, but I’ve been to so many so-called unity events where some black speaker gets up and says nasty things about white people that makes me feel suddenly very uncomfortable and out of place. I’m just kind of tired of hearing, ‘Yay unity, fuck whitey!’, it’s just a bitter pill to have to swallow over and over again. I’m all for unity, but I’m tired of the the backhandedness. Ironically, Obama chastised this very tendency in his speech on race and addressed the need to move on. I think civil rights veterans of a certain generation are still stuck in a certain kind of mindset, but bear in mind that it’s a mindset that was engendered by bitter reality. If you grew up in a time where you were expected to step in the gutter to let a white person pass on the sidewalk, it’s probably near impossible to let that resentment ever completely fade. > [@](#): > > You don’t think he did? Maybe he didn’t. I seriously doubt that Obama personally vetted anything. ---
**Author:** ![mlees](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/46 "2009-01-21T18:14:00Z")
I am not familiar with the lyrics of very many blues/jazz tunes either, so I didn’t get the reference. I assumed that ryhming was some Chicago thing. (Jesse Jackson does it, too.) ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/47 "2009-01-21T18:15:23Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I seriously doubt that Obama personally vetted anything. That doesn’t bode well. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/48 "2009-01-21T18:16:44Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > Do think Obama would even have been elected without a substantial number of white people “doing right?” I’m white. I voted for him, and I was out there on election day, going door to door to make sure folks got to the polls. The assumption that I do not “do right” based on my color is a vile, racist one, and he had no excuse for suggesting it. No such assumption was made. It was just a forced rhyme. Calling him “racist” and "vile’ is ridiculously over the top. He is neither. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/49 "2009-01-21T18:18:26Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > That doesn’t bode well. It would bode very badly if he DID waste his valuable time vetting every meaningless prayer at every event he attends. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/50 "2009-01-21T18:21:02Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Ironically, Obama chastised this very tendency in his speech on race and addressed the need to move on. I think civil rights veterans of a certain generation are still stuck in a certain kind of mindset, but bear in mind that it’s a mindset that was engendered by bitter reality. If you grew up in a time where you were expected to step in the gutter to let a white person pass on the sidewalk, it’s probably near impossible to let that resentment ever completely fade. Yeah, fair enough, but at an event like that of such moment, it would have been nice if he could have. > [@](#): > > I seriously doubt that Obama personally vetted anything. Fair enough. I voted for Obama and not Lowery. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/51 "2009-01-21T18:23:12Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > It would bode very badly if he DID waste his valuable time vetting every meaningless prayer at every event he attends. In all fairness the speeches given at his inauguration isn’t ‘every event he attends’. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/52 "2009-01-21T18:24:08Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > No such assumption was made. It was just a forced rhyme. Bullshit. The words either had meaning or they didn’t. He spoke them. He is responsible for them. What a remarkable coincidence that in the case of every other color, he managed to espouse a positive message. Only with “white” was he reduced to forcing a rhyme that he didn’t mean. Do you suppose he just ran out of time? > [@](#): > > Calling “racist” and "vile’ is ridiculously over the top. He is neither. Another strawman. I never said he was. I said the \*assumption \*is. You’re a more careful reader than that, when you want to be. Still waiting for that claim of being repressed, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/53 "2009-01-21T18:30:59Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > I’m a bit sick of this idea that white people are supposed to just keep shutting up and taking it every time so-called unity is being offered. I don’t recall proposing white people shut up every time. I said this is nothing. Al Sharpton’s “diamond merchants and interlopers” comments in Crown Heights were worth getting upset over. (I know he was referring to Jews and not white people in general, but it’s the first counterexample I thought of.) This isn’t, in large part because it was not offered seriously. > [@](#): > > It was just completely nasty and out of place. […] Spiteful and vindictive would be the words I’d use. And all of this would be over the top. Here’s the chorus from the actual song. “This little song that I’m singin’ about, People you know it’s true If you’re black and gotta work for a living, This is what they will say to you, They says, ‘if you was white, should be all right, If you was brown, stick around, But as you’s black, hmm brother, get back, get back, get back.’” I understand this is unclear if you don’t know it’s from a song. I didn’t know the song yesterday but I either read or just guessed he was paraphrasing a song lyric. Either way, Lowery repeatedly called for inclusiveness in his benediction. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/54 "2009-01-21T18:32:13Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > or as Jon Stewart so eloquently added > > When blue can finally break through, when puce can be set loose, when we embrace the minutia of fuchsia And orange…? Screw orange! ---
**Author:** ![villa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/bc79bd/32.png) [@villa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/villa)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/55 "2009-01-21T18:34:19Z")
> [@Laudenum](#): > > And since ‘crack’ is mostly prevalent in poorer areas, does it not make sense to punish its distribution harder, since drugs tend to have a disproportionately devastating effect in such areas? > Does it not make more sense to punish the drug that does more harm to society? Might not one of the reasons that crack has a more devastating effect on a community that “club drugs” or powder cocaine be the disparity in punishment involved? The War on Drugs ™ has destroyed communities, and been at least partial responsible for creating the violence that it uses to justify itself. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/56 "2009-01-21T18:35:58Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > In all fairness the speeches given at his inauguration isn’t ‘every event he attends’. Oh come on. The guy has enough to do without copyediting the text of the sermons at his own inauguration and going over them with an eye to every word that might offend anyone in the audience. Next thing, somebody will propose he keep an eye on the White House tennis court schedule so nobody hogs court three. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/57 "2009-01-21T18:37:32Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > One fact does not negate the other. This is grade school logic. It’s entirely possible for there to be racist inequality and still be white people who embrace what’s right. Of course there is and I’m pretty sure that old black man knows it. It’s your grade school reaction to something so minor that surprises me. Assuming he made a blanket attack and insult aimed at all white people is an over reaction. > [@](#): > > Do think Obama would even have been elected without a substantial number of white people “doing right?” I’m white. I voted for him, and I was out there on election day, going door to door to make sure folks got to the polls. The assumption that I do not “do right” based on my color is a vile, racist one, and he had no excuse for suggesting it. He meant the other whites not you. After the election my son overheard some folks from his company using racial slurs to describe their disappointment in Obama’s election. He meant them. Honestly, I can’t see why you would take a few words from an elderly black man so personal. He was praying for equality in a situation that clearly shows we {the human race} has made great strides. He wasn’t making social commentary. ---
**Author:** ![Bootis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e8c25b/32.png) [@Bootis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bootis)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/58 "2009-01-21T18:39:07Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > What a remarkable coincidence that in the case of every other color, he managed to espouse a positive message. Not true. “When yellow can be mellow” implies that Asians not only need to relax, but they are as yet incapable of doing so. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/59 "2009-01-21T18:41:58Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > It would bode very badly if he DID waste his valuable time vetting every meaningless prayer at every event he attends. His inauguration is hardly “every event he attends.” ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2009, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292/60 "2009-01-21T18:45:11Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > And orange…? > Screw orange! 😃 right, forgot that one. We could use all the obscure color names from the Crayola box. When khaki won’t be held backi. When brass won’t have to kiss ass. When Aquamarine will be held in esteem When Chartreuse won’t get no abuse When Cerulean um… um… dam it. Who’s turn is it now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-proposal-to-address-a-racial-injustice/482292.md?page=4)