Oh, and side note: it *is *possible to be unintentionally racially insensitive (cf. “Oreo Barbie”). This is just definitely not one of those times.
I missed that one, but you have just doomed me to a full day of trawling Wikipedia “controversy” sections.
The NAACP blew this one. Claiming outrage over a non-issue like this trivializes real racism. They should apologize to Hallmark.
Maybe they make a card for that? 
You have no idea how hard I’m restraining myself from digging up a situationally appropriate TV Tropes link to respond with.
Heh heh.
First of all I must say that Hallmark pales in racism compared to Stephen Hawking. That racist bastard uses “black whores” like it is going out of style. He has Black Whore Tourette’s for fucks sake!
That said, as a black horse owner I am appalled that Hallmark would put out a card that puts me on notice to “watch my back”. Who the fuck do they think they are, Don Vito Corleone?
I posit that these are the same exact opinions. One is blunter than the other, but I think the folks making the second statement are disingenuous. They (think they) know “why” there are so many more black criminals/underachievers blah blah blah. They’re just leaving it unsaid.
After they recall them, just imagine all of the blank slots in greeting card sections across the country.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste. 
I don’t hear whores or hoes; I hear holes. I find the characters annoying and moronic, but I dislike all cards that talk/sing/make noise. Surely the LA Chapter could have found something ELSE to get up in arms (legitimately) about? 5 minutes online will show anyone that racism is alive and well. Maybe they’ve taken Jesse Jackson’s role modeling a bit too seriously…
I think it’s time Hallmark properly apologizes to Jesse Jackson for this one.
“Kiss it. That’s right… a’pologize”.
I’m just gonna go ahead and quote this, because this is what slays me most. These colored people are really, with all the outrage they can muster, trying to tell us that they believe Hallmark deliberately created a card saying to watch your back from ominous black whores? :smack:
*J’accuse!
*
Bravo!
I don’t hear the ‘n’ in black, do you?
Well, we are talking about the NAACP.
I don’t know specifically about the statement you’re addressing, but here’s an analogy. I happen to think that the most vocal Christian Evangelicals are whiny twits with a persecution complex. I look down on them for attempting to make a big deal when people “persecute” them by failing to allow them to persecute others, or to break the law (or both!). And it’s very, very hard not to let that taint my reaction when someone self-identifies as “Christian.” I work really hard to combat knee-jerk “us vs them” mental habits and prejudices, so I get over that reaction. But most people don’t even realize there’s work to be done on that score, never mind doing it.
So if people see a prominent group portraying itself as representing a class, and that prominent group acts like a bunch of braying jackasses*, people are going to be more likely to assume that the class is a bunch of jackasses, and any complaints they make are to be dismissed.
*please not that I did not say water buffalo!
Oh lord. I was willing to accept that some subtle racism could have slipped in, some ‘wacky characters’ that were thinly-veiled ethnic stereotypes, or even that a huge company could just be racist out of sheer stupidity… then I saw the card. How is this not on The Onion?
I just was able to watch the whole video now that I am off from work. I had to make several attempts to finish it. I cringed and winced the entire way through it. I couldn’t even laugh at it as if it were a ridiculous Onion video or Daily Show skit. No, I could only grimace at the screen in horror. They really fucked this one up bad.
Unauthorized Cinnamon, I have no problem separating the the extreme Christians from the rest. I’ve done that my whole life with no problem. It is crystal clear that the Benny Hinn Christians are nothing at all like my Grandma’s church Christians. I can use my own lil’ brain to make the distinction. If you can overcome knee jerking, and I can overcome kneejerking, then let everyone overcome it on their own terms, and let no one feel pressure to alter their behavior lest someone who ‘doesn’t know there is work to be done’ doesn’t do their own work.
I think everyone struggles with this issue in some way or another (and in varying degrees). To me, the important thing is being aware of your own prejudices and working to overcome them. People who refuse to do so are ignorant assholes IMO.
We had a incident many years ago in our school district re a book for the elementary school kids. It dealt with the Revolutionary War and slavery. I think it was War Comes to Willy Freeman, but I’m not sure. Anyway, the book contains the word nigger.
One of the student’s parents worked for Fox News and so this whole nonsense got some airplay on the local affiliate. The nonsense involved a group of very angry and upset black parents speaking out against using this book to teach history. It was not the sole source for the history lesson (obviously), and the teacher used the novel as a teaching tool for changing social mores and honesty about our founding as a nation. Pretty radical.
The situations are not the same, really, because the Hallmark card does NOT contain any slur in any way (except to cosmic bodies and they don’t have an advocacy group that I know of), but the whole WTF? is similar to me.
I see what you’re saying, and I agree to an extent. Especially regarding the idea that any individual ought to act like “a credit to their race” 24/7 or somehow be blamed for racism.
I guess my point was that the fruitloops who stand out front claiming to represent a class make it a legitimate question, when meeting a member of that class, to ask oneself, if only for a second, “is this one of those fruitloops making up pretend problems, or is it the nicer, saner type of ___________?” Where the legitimacy of that initial uncertainty ends and prejudice begins isn’t a bright line, and people who import some doubt about other claims of racism from this incident aren’t necessarily stupid or evil.
I agree with you completely. I feel for the masses who have to sift through all this shit to separate out the nuts (heh!). It isn’t right, but it’s a cold hard reality. I would submit that the same holds true for any type of super-extremist group. PETA, for example, brands any animal rights advocate with the kook label. Same with Al Qaeda and Muslims. Yes, most moral, sane folks will put forth the effort to make the distinction, but it doesn’t always happen, and society as a whole suffers for it.