And conservatives say there's no racism in America ...
November 09, 2009 11:45 am ET by Jamison Foser
Neal Boortz: Rep. Maxine Waters is an "idiot" who "should be cleaning restrooms"
Ann Coulter: Without affirmative action, Rep. Waters couldn't get a job "that didn't involve wearing a paper hat"
And, of course, Don Imus famously referred to Gwen Ifill as a "cleaning lady"
Why is it that when some conservatives think of successful African American women, these are the first things that pop into their minds?
Media Matters: The Palin chronicles
The Friday Rush: A series of conflicts
Contrary to media hype, Sarah Palin is very unpopular
Their own, of course.
And now we know the answer: No, America was not ready for a black president.
I think many American racists are not even aware that they are. They keep saying things like, "I just want to return to the America I used to know..." and they have trouble articulating exactly what they're uneasy about.
But they're racists just the same.
What America do they want to go backto...segregated 50's and 60's .Jim Crow lynching era of the post Reconstruction days ....or back to the slavery endorsing period when the Constitution was adopted!?? Either way it is all a backsward step or steps..Why does anyone want to go backwards...fix what's really broken and go forward!!!Liberals/Progressives as always will have to do that because conservatives never do!Left to conservatives I don't think anyone would be voting now except white males!!!
If conservatives had their way, voting wouldn't be restricted to white males -- they'd have to be white male land owners.
White people are not caricatured by referring to them as holding jobs as cleaning ladies or restroom cleaners. That's generally how racist Americans caricature minorities.
I could refer to a white person being lazy, having a fondness for fried chicken and watermelon, or being prone to violence -- and no one would bat an eye.
If I say those same things about a black person, those are racist statements.
Get the difference?
How times change.
I work with people who went to high school here in Whites Only and Negroes Only schools.
Racism isn't something that ended when Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. It's alive and well, and its ugliest forms are very recent.
It's a shame you can't appreciate that.
And still no convictions of the KKK members (who showed up at the protest march with loaded guns in their trunk) responsible for the deaths.
It's hard for some younger people to appreciate it, but 1979 was not that long ago.
I wasn't that old in 1979, but it wasn't that long ago for certain.
In Durham, look at the tensions that exist between NCCU and Duke for instance. Duke, mostly white, and rich, NCCU, working class and black.
Wait...they were innocent, but, but, they just HAD to commit those crimes because, you know, she was a poor black girl who made the charges...
It is alive and well mainly used as a cudgel on your side.
Or would you prefer a society where I (41-year-old male) should be able to marry a 12-year-old girl?
Oh, dear! That 12-year-old girl doesn't have the same standards that adults have. You better go out and organize a Tea Party in support of marriage for 12-year-olds.
You see, as an advanced and complex society, blanket standards rarely apply.
Oh, that's just sick. Even by my standards.
You can't possibly be serious, dawuss. There's one standard here: "Don't be an a-hole". If white people had been enslaved and been denied the right to property and all legal rights for generations and then subjected to systematic segregation and denied voting rights, and then if white people had been redlined and denied housing, and then if their primary representation in media for decades had been as either servants or criminals or mysterious magical strangers... then yes, we could say that calling an accomplished white journalist a "cleaning lady" would have the same associations. But I'm pretty sure that didn't happen.
So if you want to find out why these comments are racially charged, why don't you find a female African American superior where you work and call her a cleaning lady. Perhaps she could explain to you why that particular image carries racial overtones better than I can.
Do your own poll.
Go to both an all white neighborhood and a minority neighborhood and in both say that you think Gwen Ifil looks like a cleaning lady and that Maxine Waters should be cleaning public restrooms.
You'll get your answers.
Like Michael Steele.
And.
Uh.
Hmm.
They say something about tax money. I ask them if they make more than $300k/year, answer has always been NO, which means, they, like me, and 98% of the other folks in the country, have received a tax CUT under Obama.
Then they say something about health care. What has changed I ask? Well, nothing, really, but Obama WANTS everyone to get health insurance. Is that so bad? Really? These are the same looney birds who complain about having to pay for uninsured people who use the ER as their doctor. Umm, hello?
Thing is, they can't point to one thing that they've "lost" since Obama was elected, which leaves the fact that they're not very happy that a democrat is in office, and a black democrat at that (the latter is a smaller portion of people). Now, if they were really honest about things, they'd just say, I don't want a democrat in the White House, which I would say for about 80% of the tea partiers is probably the truth, for the other say, 20%, they REALLY have a problem with a black man running the country, as in, how dare that N***** tell ME what to do!!!
They haven't lost anything under Obama, thing is, Obama has carried onward with a lot of W's policies, which SHOULD make these fools happy, but nothing does, and nothing will, except for a blundering fool like Palin to be sitting in the Oval Office. If we're dumb enough to elect someone like her as President, God help us all.