Member rolls eyes:
He didn’t insult anyone. He used the American English ambiguous “you” as in “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.” Same as the post to which he responded.
Dr Deth, surely you can see this in terms of the “your mom” metaphor? You see, I can think of plenty of attributes about my mom that I may sometimes complain about. But if anyone else wants to complain about my mom having those attributes, then damn, they better be ready for a fight, because as much as I might dislike things about my mom, that does not make it reasonable for anyone else to complain about those same things. And the same applies to any group or culture I may belong to.
Whether you realize it or not, context matters. And if you refuse to see that, it doesn’t mean McGruder is racist, it just means that you’re naive.
**DrDeth. ** I’m not calling you stupid, I’m calling you wrong and possibly disingenuous. You picked the wrong allegory, too: this is no fairy tale King stripped naked and conned that he’s wearing clothes. Nuh-uh. This is Biblical. Having suffered terribly in bondage, having been finally freed from Pharoah, and with Moses gone, a whole bunch of freed slaves take this glorious opportunity by acting the damn fool. Partying. Getting drunk. Fucking around. Worshipping gold and false idoltry instead of being about the business of nation-building. When Moses came back from the mountaintop he was righteously pissed. But even when he called them “a bunch of trifling, ignorant niggers” this was not racist. You know why?
When you are part of the group, you have much more leeway in criticizing the group, and how you criticize the group, then criticism from without. Self-examination and even damning vicious and hateful criticism of your own people is not racist behavior. It might be self-hating, just not racist. Conducting yourselves as a chosen people might be delusional, bit it is not racist as long as you embrace all people as being equal humans. It’s entirely possible to be an postive embracer of Aryan culture, prideful of the development of Western Civilization, without all that hate directed at other groups or demanding other groups be deferential. Ethnic pride is not racism.
I think you already know this, since you explained to Marley23 that, “One can use racist material without actually being a racist. It’s difficult now, sure. The motive could be greed, instead- combined with a cavalier attitude about racism.”
Maybe we should just agree that this particular satire was a little preachy and obvious.
Liberal. He said people like me who take pride in our ethnicity and culture are idiots, “plain stupid” and “99% of the time… racist.” Then **RikWriter ** said people who think their ethnicity makes them special are fools. You know I try not to be thin skinned but this namecalling is asking me not to feel insulted by association when he’s damned 99% of people like me as morons for our beliefs… in his opinion. He’s at least a toe over the line here, and should know better to try that with me – which is why I said “don’t go there, son” and why C K Dexter Haven growled. I didn’t fly off the handle and it doesn’t appear to be a formal warning but he HAD to know that might have gotten ugly.
explore like dora. Exactly. Also see: “Only I can call my kid an idiot” syndrome. When it’s family, it’s just different.
Though I disagree with your idea that his work is racist towards anyone I will leave that aspect up to other posters. You say that he is being racist towards both blacks and whites. If someone lives in a culture with predominantly two races (lets not get into a discussion of the proper definition, I am using the common skin tone based meaning) and is racist against both of them, doesn’t that just make them a misanthropist? I don’t think you can really be a racist if you just hate everyone… unless you are talking about the human race.
I’m not “trying” anything, I am stating my belief. If my beliefs offend you, that’s not my problem, as you are not their target. The FACT is, you had ZERO to do with what race or ethnicity into which you were born. Can you argue against that? And since you had nothing to do with it, have no control over it and couldn’t change it if you wanted, WHY THE HECK should you feel pride in it?
DrDeth, I’m curious: do you think that any joking about race is, by definition, racist? If not, can you come up with an example of such?
Rik, I can argue anything, as long as I’ve pooped, eaten recently and feeling ornery.
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The FACT is, your beliefs could be phrased nicer. Using words like “idiots” and then acting surprised when people object strikes me as either really naive or painfully transparent disingenuousness.
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It good to take pride in your achievements. You can also be proud, and be rightfully so, of something you had no direct involvement in. Happens all the time. It’s called “having healthy emotions” and “empathy.” It’s not stupid. By your logic, if you’re at all proud to be a human being, you had have no right to that feeling because you had nothing to do with the decisions to be conceived or to be born. Of course, there are some of us that take the view we picked our parents well.
I didn’t say I wouldn’t meet him. But I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t like me, since he seems to rather despise people like me. I don’t know what his background is, but it seems he’s well to the left of me, and has a lot more connection to the “street” and the city than I.
Actually, many conservatives do want better education. However, we don’t think much of the current system for doing it. We think there’s a better way. It’s not so much teachers we dislike, as teaher’s unions, which often seem to us to have their own interests, and not students at heart. Which might be fine, except that (a) they’re public servants, and (b) they keep claiming they have students’ interests at heart.
And that doesn’t even get into how many problems are built into the system as a whole.
But I apologize for hijacking.
Yes, an allegory about Bush and Rumsfeld, but they were depicted as two white doofuses who were all done up in full hip-hop regalia. B & R were represented by members of the class of caucasian suburban kids who graft themselves onto the hip-hop culture. It makes sense: white suburban kids who listen to rap and pretend at having “street cred” are poseurs, just as old rich white guys who never served in combat but are eager to start wars are poseurs, too. In both cases, the behaviors are the products of the culture. Not–it is important to point out–the race of the individuals.
I’m finding it weird that people are having such a difficult time distinguishing what “racism” is. It’s not racist to criticize someone as a fool (or worse) because he does something, commits a certain act, lives a certain way, etc. That’s about behaviors, not the core of who a person is. It is racist if you characterize someone as incapable of doing something or being something because of that person’s race. If you say, “Blacks should be more active in helping to improve society for themselves, for their families, for their fellow blacks, for everyone,” that’s not racist. If you say, “Blacks are incapable of improving society, because they’re blacks,” that is racist. There is a difference.
Think about it: if McGruder is racist against blacks, The Boondocks is an absurdity, because the protagonist, the voice of reason in the madness, is Huey–a kid who is defiantly African-American. Whatever you see of Huey’s doubts about life his world in The Boondocks, he’s never ashamed of himself. Huey doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with himself because he’s black. He just sees behaviors in those around him he deems counterproductive, and wishes that others could see the world the way he does. (Don’t we all…)
It recalls to my mind that routine Chris Rock did several years ago: “I love black people, but I hate niggas.” Where he goes down a list of things “niggas” say and do and take credit for, most of which are, as he put it, “what you’re supposed to do.” “I ain’t never been in jail…Nigga, you’re supposed to stay out of jail!” A funny bit (if you’ve seen it, you know what I’m talking about here), but also interesting, in that it’s premise is an explicit act of distinguishing between who a person is and what their actions are. Underneath the jokes, it’s a very sophisticated analysis of who we are and how we should react to each other. Criticism applies to actions, not to being.
And now my action will be to get off this message board and start doing some work. Later.
smiling bandit. “People like you?” Who, conservative East Tennesseeans?
Hell, I’m more street and city than you and I like you just fine, smiling bandit. We may only be to the left of you on a few issues; you’ve struck me as amazingly moderate and not all stringent in most regards.
You two can always talk comics.
Not A Tame Lion. People confuse actual racism with different indicators of possible racism all the time. When someone says something prejudiced – it’s racist! When someone else says something bigoted – they’re racist! Japan is a xenophobic society? Must be racist! Experience prejudice – it’s racist!
People need a new vocabulary to describe what they experience.
What, hasn’t this thread been moved to GD yet?
Well, it just depends on how much hatred and contempt is in the humor. You don’t need to denigrate a race in order to get a laugh.
Sounds more like you were looking for a reason to be offended.
You can, but you have no rational reason to be. Of course, people do irrational things all the time, particularly when it comes to group-identity. Being “proud of your race” is what led to things like the Nazis, the pogroms in Czarist Russia, ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and much, much more. Not only is it irrational, it’s downright dangerous.
Hell, it makes more sense to be proud of what your sports team accomplished than what race you are. At least you gave them your money, presumably went to their games and yelled support.
I don’t really think you answered my question there, DrDeth. Maybe it would help if you addressed the second half, and gave an example of humor about race that you don’t consider racist?
Heh. I’m very much conservative. However, unlike most conservatives (or liberals, for that matter) I know exactly what principles I stand for, which ones I’m not sure about, why I stand for them or don’t, and the limits of my knowledge. Sometimes I may seem very moderate. Sometimes I go further than almost any conservative could comprehend.
Of course, America has few, if any, true conservatives. Europe had some, but they died out somehow.
True.
But what counts as “denigrating a race?” In the Boondocks episode, MLK is denouncing behaviors. The show picks on targets like gangsta rappers, pimps and BET, which definitely doesn’t denigrate black people. It may denigrate the people who like those things, but that’s kinda the point of satire. BET and rappers are targets because McGruder thinks they’re hurting black people. I don’t think his or Richard Pryor’s attitude toward racism could be called cavalier.
I think this, like other arguments on this thread, comes down to terminology again. Most of the time when people say they are proud of their race, I think they’re saying their proud of their culture and heritage – since in many places race and culture historically go hand in hand. A Polish-American kid raised learning Polish traditions and culture, the history of the Polish troubles in America, and their success in spite of it, may reasonably say that he’s “proud to be Polish” – meaning, most likely, that he’s “proud of the Polish people.” And if he strongly feels himself to be a part of the continuum of Polish-American history, he might well say “I’m proud to be Polish” and mean exactly that. That doesn’t make him a moron, even if it was pure chance that he was born into a Polish family. There’s nothing wrong with being proud of your culture. Nor does it inevitably lead to genocide. :dubious:
“Polish” isn’t a race, or even an ethnicity. Being proud of your country isn’t quite as senseless as being proud of your race. If you don’t like a country, you can emigrate and become part of another. If you don’t like a culture, you can abandon it, and if you do like it you can contribute to it. That’s totally different from being proud of your “whiteness” or “blackness.” A black man from Tennessee is likely from a totally different culture and has a totally different sort of identity than a black man from Ghana. A white man from Idaho has a totally different culture and identity than a white man from the Ukraine. I know what I am talking about. Perhaps Askia isn’t expressing what he means accurately, however.
I think it’s MUCH more likely you don’t fully realize what an ethnic group or a culture consists of, like, say, “Polish” or “Pan-Africanism.”
For instance, read back over my posts and locate where I said anything about being proud of my race. I have consistently said culture or ethnicity.
I agree with** Marley23** and Rodgers01.
I think I do.
Yet you did NOT make that distinction in this thread in the post I addressed.