This is not a defense. It’s an explanation of how some southerns feel and how some justify poor past behavior. Especially older ones. It’s not they they don’t recognize racism, it’s that they attempt to jusify it. Your video shows her discussing a suicide in the family because the man couldn’t deal with a life change. Now an uncommon reason for people to commit suicide. Paula decribes the change or the end of slavery as a terrific change but the issues and problems it presented her grandfather at the time were too much for him. Secondly, she says she believes every one is prejudice to a point. I don’t believe anyone would disagree with that. She further says she believes the South has less prejudice. Her opinion. Not an uncommon one for older southerns. I have not looked into this at all. Can’t say if it’s right or wrong. I cannot think of any recent issues that occur in the south that aren’t also a problem elsewhere but I’m sure they exist just as other areas may have location specific issues they have to deal with. Finally, she says an off color joke in introducing a black person that she is close to and depends on. Inappropriate behavior on TV yes. An uncommon joke made among friends, no.
I believe there are a passel of people that don’t recognize certain forms of racism. Likely because they lived through and were raised on much harsher forms. I can see how they would not view the off colored joke, such as Paula’s in the video as racist or confuse it with black people joking among one another in a similar way or calling each other the n-word. All forms are racism, but white people can’t act this way because of the power they once held and the current racial dynamics and prejudce we are still trying to work through.
How is it relevant if a lot of really stupid people think: 1. the south is less racist, and 2. slavery was good for black people?
What exactly is that “explaining”? I agree that it’s not a defense, because it’s like saying “I didn’t kill that guy because I’m less violent than other people and oh by the way killing people isn’t violent.” It’s just nonsensical.
This seems like as good of a place as any to drop this blog I’ve been following for the last few days, a blog that has left me choking back tears of laughter on more than one occasion. I give you: White People Mad at Food Network. Gold. It’s gold, Jerry!
Seriously, though. There was a woman on there who seriously said that back in the 50s, the N word didn’t carry any negative connotation or hate, it was just a descriptor. Yeah, for your lily white, ignorant ass perhaps, ma’am.
It your example, they are denying the murder. The South isn’t denying that it happened. The are acknowledging that it did happen and trying to justify it per current social norms and moral. Trying to live with the memory. At one point in Paula Deen’s life, segregation and racial were socially accepted norms. Black people were inferior. They couldn’t handle the right to vote. They were more violent and needed to be watched. After living like that, with that and actively participating in it, then viewpoints change to become very different and the way you were raised is not only wrong, but abusive and criminal. They are justifying the behavior by saying stuff like they weren’t that bad to black people. They distancing themselves from it when they say things like they are not as racist as other parts of the country because they have had more civil rights law placed on them (necessarily) and are watched more heavily (again, necessarily).
I agree. But how is that relevant? Remember, this is a thread about Paula Deen and your claims that it’s “ridiculous” to be judging her for what she has said and done. How is the south’s history and current justifications in any way relevant to what Paula Deen has or is doing and my judgment of her? I shouldn’t judge her so harshly because some southerners are deluded?
I think I have mentioned here before that I was born in Georgia.
I was, quite obviously, lying.
I was born elsewhere.
Anywhere else.
Come on ya’ll. I’m in my fifties. This woman is barely ten years older than I and still evinces the attitudes of the less enlightened members of her parent’s generation towards ‘Others’. That includes black people, homosexuals, foreigners, and especially Yankees. Oh, please don’t get these folks started on how Yankees are the worst thing even spawned upon the earth including Hitler and Cthulhu. This woman has no excuse for her attitudes. She embraces them because there is a solid core of horrible prejudiced people who love to glory in the past fabled history of the Old South. And they buy her overpriced and poorly made products.
Now, I will need to meditate a while before continuing my broadcast day. Please carry on.
Rant is over… nothing to see here.
Because she is being miscontrued in the media grossly. Her worlds are taken completely out of context and she is getting reamed for something that very well could have been happening and she didn’t realize it. Because most people are too lazy to bother with finding out the actual story. Though it’s silly they have to dig as much as they do because the media, the people that should be putting out accurate information don’t bother to check the source before they copy and paste a story for the masses. Because I don’t know how things will be in 30 years, how my views will change or what will be socially accepted, but its really scary to think that something that I may do now will come back to bite me in 30 years, not because what did was so bad, but because times have changed and the standard 30 years from now will be used to judge it. And because maybe, just maybe, opinion and judgement should be held off until the people that are in the court room, listening to all the testimony of all the witnesses and have the full story make a decision.
Everyone here is jumping the bandwagon on a few sentences, taken out of context of 146 page testimony. Why is every one so quick to call her a “trashy piece of shit”?
Just because she may not realize that her words and actions are degrading to an entire race of human beings, doesn’t make them any less disgusting. She is a grown woman who should know better, and 30 years ago is not a long time. “The South” is not a justification or an excuse.
This just irritates the hell out of me. I’m a white woman of roughly the same vintage as Deen, and I was born and was living in the south 40 years ago. I would have NEVER said that word. I remember that time quite well and it was not acceptable then, and it’s not acceptable now.
Oh, and I was a bank teller who was held at gunpoint by a bank robber who happened to be black.
This is not because I’m such a super good person in any way. It’s because I have a fucking CLUE and I’m not a racist piece of trash. The standard for being a decent human being is not that high, and if you were using the n-word even back in the 70’s or 80’s, you do not meet that standard. If today in the 20-teens you think it was okay back then, you also do not meet that standard.
I will, however, call Paula Deen a fucking stupid classless racist c-word.
I just don’t think I’ve ever thought: “Gosh, in thirty years, someone might think I am behaving badly now, so I won’t let you judge anyone for anything they did 30 years ago.”
Thank you for linking this. Makes me sad that we’re laughing at racism alive and well in The Year of our Overlord 2013, but downright cheery that many of us are laughing AT the ignorance rather than donning the white sheets and laughing WITH 'em.
It’s a direct response to Paula Deen’s comments in the video Monstro posted. I believe that to judge her or anybody, you should be aware of the situation, (for the hundredth time) the media is not portraying anything close to what actually happened. If you prefer to make a habit out of judging people without correct or total information, it’s your life, but don’t whine when it’s done to you.
No I don’t see any evidence of it. After reading her testimony, she said some off color things 30 years ago, in the privacy over her own home when recalling a violent event done to her by a black person. If you want to go around persecuting people for that, times are gonna get pretty bad.
She also expressed who impressed she was at a southern themed restaurant that had middle-aged black professional wait staff. Were they depicting slaves, maybe. I equate that to black people playing slaves in movies today though. These men were playing a role, are apparently well compensated for it and considered professionals. At least they were by Mrs. Deen. If she chose to follow such a theme for a party or wedding she was throwing it’s her business. She didn’t however. Not that she is being sued over this. This is just a brief conversation she had that is being used to attempt to paint her as a racist.
Her plaintiff has testified she never heard discriminatory comments from Mrs. Deen and sent her a letter thanking and praising Mrs. Deen for everything she has done for her.
Was there sexual harrassment, discrimination and an hostile working environment at Bubba’s restaurant. The court will decide.
And what exactly constitutes “persecution” in your world? If I say that it’s unacceptable to me to hold certain beliefs and say certain things, did I just persecute someone? If I call someone a racist, did I just persecute them? Do I have to make sure there are never economic repercussions to anything anyone says, lest I be persecuting them, or do there have to be lions involved?