Biggirl came in shitting up the thread and attacking me personally. I tried to sluff it off several times, posting, “Regardless of how talented he might have been most people on the street could probably only name two of his songs. The tributes and lavish praise seem to be disproportionate to his actual contributions, IMO. But I’ll admit that maybe that says more about me that him.” By trying to seek a middle ground I was hoping she would drop it.
Instead she amps it up:" How old are you? And how white". Again I joked it off saying maybe I should turn in my Marvin Gaye records. She continues…
Those remarks and others about the “darker side of town”, etc were directed at my inability to judge Bob Marley based on the color of my skin. That’s a racist way to judge me.
I don’t give a shit about her attitude or ideas about me but its disingenuous of you to accuse me of calling her a racist when it’s clear I was talking about her posts.
It’s also bullshit that as long as you were pulling out posts of that thread, that you left out her posts that *were *racist in nature. I went a long way to diffuse her hijack, including me in your mod note was ridiculous.
I moderated her comments and explained why she needed to stop saying those things. And you didn’t call her racist, but you did call her posts racist. I don’t want to see either in Cafe Society.
It is a fact that many people are culturally isolated with limited exposure to things outside their culture group, said culture group largely defined along racial lines. I will note for myself that I am damn white, that my first awareness of raggae was mention on The Cosby Show without any idea of what the music was like, and in my 40+ years I have very little exposure to raggae or Bob Marley. What bits I have heard don’t impress me, not that that matters to anyone else. I’m comfortable with shorthanding that to “how white are you?” Not all references to racial groups and cultures is racist in the derogatory sense that word typically carries. Limited exposure does not equal unreasoning hate of the group.
Right. Everyone has a frame of reference and so on, and describing it in that fashion isn’t racist- but it’s also not hard to see why PlainJain objected and took it that way because it’s very dismissive and Biggirl was making some very broad generalizations about both white and black music fans. The argument was tangential and it was time to let it go. That said, it’s true PlainJain did not call Biggirl herself a racist. I was telling Biggirl to drop the subject and I wanted to make it clear that PlainJain also needed to let it go. And saying a post is racist doesn’t violate the rules, but ideally a thread about music doesn’t turn into a discussion of whether or not a comment about someone’s listening habits is racist.
Go back and read the thread. The post he quoted was about the least offensive of the bunch. There are a couple that directly point to how “white” I am if I don’t love Bob Marley as much as she thinks I should. Again to be clear, I’m not bitching about her comments to me I’m saying that if Marley is going to say this to me “calling other posters racist is strongly discouraged”, then he should have pulled out her posts I was referencing to provide a more balanced overview. I acknowledge he has since retracted accusing me of calling her racist.
I did go and look at the thread. I thought it was obvious that he was talking to both of you, and just didn’t bother selecting all the posts in question. I don’t think you’ve really got a gripe.
I agree with you about the undertone of Biggirl’s posts, though, for what it’s worth.
My gripe was that he said I called her a racist, which I did not. I think the fact that he modified his position in this thread is evidence I did have a gripe.
I should have reported her posts rather than being baited into replying. Lesson learned.
