Kinja reply list

Read More
Graymyas LeighCord Jefferson
12/30/13 4:57pm
I really wish they'd outlaw the confederate flag. Pisses me off to no end seeing some ignorant hicks flying one next to a US flag, as if they're totally unaware of the irony in it. Also its hilarious that the mouth breathers who fly one tend to be the most 'patriotic'.
Reply
- Read More
  John BoehnerGraymyas Leigh
  12/30/13 5:05pm
  Dude, my state was part of the fucking Union and I still see that shit on the rear windows of trucks every other day.
  
  (Good points. Just ban that shit. It only represents the worst.)
  Reply
- Read More
  Rod Strickland PropaneGraymyas Leigh
  12/30/13 5:13pm
  In their defense, most of those people probably don't even know what irony means.
  Reply
Read More
Rod Strickland PropaneCord Jefferson
12/30/13 5:04pm
Being a minority is a bit like being left-handed. If you're right handed, you probably never have noticed how our world is set up for right-handed people. If you're left handed, I'm sure you noticed how most college desks are set up for right-handed people, how even our writing system is based on writing from the right(unless you enjoy getting ink on your hand), spirals on notebooks, even cooking tools like can openers. That's not to say what hand you write with is the same as being a minority, just pointing out that, some of us whites probably don't notice that things like the workplace and education were set up for middle to upper-class white people.
Reply
- Read More
  BrilliantButMedicatedRod Strickland Propane
  12/30/13 5:12pm
  That is a very interesting metaphor. I will have to do some thinking on that...
  Reply
- Read More
  asmallcatRod Strickland Propane
  12/30/13 5:13pm
  I like that the left-handed comparison can also work as very loose parallel to views on homosexuality in this country as well. My grandma was left-handed, and in school they tried to force her to be right-handed, and a nun would smack her with a ruler whenever they saw her writing with her left hand. Sounds like something else people still think is a choice that can be beaten or otherwise forced out of you.
  
  Edit - My grandma is left handed. Re-reading my post made me realize it sounded like she was dead.
  Reply
Read More
muffin_cupcakeCord Jefferson
12/30/13 6:25pm
I saw 12 Years a Slave (but I feel like I should confess that it wasn't my idea; non-white friends invited me). We all found it incredibly difficult to watch, and I don't fault people who don't feel like they can take it. The violence was incredibly graphic and relentless — they even showed a rape. I didn't regret the experience, but I didn't feel like it taught me a lesson. I was already against slavery, and already understood it to be horrible, before I saw the movie. And I didn't feel implicated by it, because I've never been a part of anything like that. There was even a white hero at the end (Samuel Bass, Brad Pitt's character) who allowed white people to reassure themselves that they would have done the right thing too.

I also felt like the film had a strange message about slavery itself, because it told the story through a man who was "like us" — a middle class, educated person who was kidnapped. So the whole time you're thinking, "he's not supposed to be there" when the point is that nobody was supposed to be there.

Anyway, it was a well-done movie, and I appreciated the faithfulness to the book when I looked it up later — but I wouldn't push my friends to see it if they had concerns about the content. Some people can handle it, and will appreciate it, but others will be deeply disturbed in a way that isn't helpful or productive — especially people who have experienced sexual assault in their lives.
Reply
- Read More
  The Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabyStepsmuffin_cupcake
  12/30/13 6:45pm
  "I also felt like the film had a strange message about slavery itself, because it told the story through a man who was "like us" — a middle class, educated person who was kidnapped. So the whole time you're thinking, "he's not supposed to be there" when the point is that nobody was supposed to be there."
  
  That's an interesting point and I never thought about it before. That said, the book like all slave narratives was a call to arms and had a very specific norther, educated readership. I imagine that it would have been quite effective from that standpoint (and actually it was).
  Reply
- Read More
  outthereThe Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabySteps
  12/30/13 6:58pm
  I kept thinking that it wasn't only Solomon who shouldn't be there. When Solomon left in the carriage, and Patsy—-I mean how could anyone not at that point (at the very latest) think no one should have been there? Wasn't asking you that, was just commenting it kept railing at me the whole movie.
  Reply
Read More
The Masked ProgressiveCord Jefferson
12/30/13 7:09pm
We're the most racist country on earth, and I'm ashamed to be white. Thank you for writing this. I can't fathom how Republicans ever get elected in this country, except that there are so many people here who are just too stupid not to be racist. They're called "conservatives" and "capitalists" and "Christians."
Reply
- Read More
  Cam/ronThe Masked Progressive
  12/30/13 8:14pm
  You might want to travel overseas more often.
  Reply
- Read More
  ohh-75The Masked Progressive
  12/30/13 8:26pm
  Not this guy again. We are so far from the "most racist country on earth" it's not even funny. The US does better than virtually all majority white nations on the planet. That does not mean it is perfect. Basic anecdotal proof: we are the first majority white nation in the world to elect a non white leader. We also have a very diverse population. More diverse than the vast majority of countries in the planet.
  Reply
Read More
The Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabyStepsCord Jefferson
12/30/13 5:32pm
"A person's skin color as it relates to crime only becomes pertinent when that person's skin is dark, the implication being that a white criminal is an aberration, while a black criminal is indicative of a larger threat. "

Not just indicative of a larger threat but apparently constitutive of his or her very being. It appears to be ontological rather than social or just situational. At least that is how the racist logic appears to me.
Reply
- Read More
  GugurarhThe Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabySteps
  12/31/13 6:04am
  You´re right, but I wouldn´t go all the way to say it´s ontological. I object to the use of the term in anyways related to the bug brained shit that racists manifest. It´d be like saying that the Nazi hatred of Jews is ontological. It´s just the product of an aberrant psycology which has terrifying and maddening consequences.
  
  I don´t buy that stuff that says that racism is merely a belief. It´s not merely a system, nor a politic, nor a set of norms, it goes beyond all that. It´s an unthinkable combination of fear, envy, and pride that comes together in ways that words will never be able to resolve. It´s a real demon.
  Reply
- Read More
  The Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabyStepsGugurarh
  12/31/13 3:09pm
  I was trying to indicate that for racists whatever bad behavior they ascribe to black folk is not because of the situation that black folk find themselves in but is really because they are (black folk) inherently bad. Their badness emanates from them and is not a manifestation of social inequities.
  Reply
Read More
theladyvanishesCord Jefferson
12/30/13 5:11pm
I know plenty will find reason to complain in the comments, but this was a contemplative, well-done piece. That is all.
Reply
- Read More
  EatTheCheeseNicholsontheladyvanishes
  12/30/13 7:47pm
  Agreed, Cord is fast becoming one of my favorite writers on the site
  Reply
- Read More
  Korey BookerTee Washingtontheladyvanishes
  12/31/13 3:36pm
  Thanks Cord. I didn't think you could top your last article about white criminality and how its downplayed when compared to minorities but this was great. It's articles like this that make me proud to be an American of African descent.
  
  Reply
Read More
southernmanCord Jefferson
12/30/13 6:24pm
First, I think it's readily apparent that we still live in a horribly racist nation, even if the laws no longer prop it up - directly, at least.

I do have a question, though. I'm a Southerner by birth, although I haven't lived there in about a decade. But, I'm interested in the history of my birthplace. And there is romance in the notion of the lost cause to me, but I can't separate what my ancestors fought for from... Well, what they were fighting for. I don't like the Stars and Bars, I saw far too much of it over Christmas but- how do we remember this period, the Civil War period, properly? I don't want to take the South's slave based economy and society out of the picture at all but it's still my history. How do you honor the deaths of your family when they were the bad guys?
Reply
- Read More
  cafegogosouthernman
  12/30/13 7:02pm
  It's a good question. How do modern Germans do it when their relatives and ancestors participated in the Holocaust? Maybe the best you can do is take it on a person-by-person basis. Surely not all of your relatives were "bad guys," and if you look further, perhaps you'll even find a few quiet heroes.
  Reply
- Read More
  FaustianSlipcafegogo
  12/30/13 10:23pm
  On the topic of Germans and the Holocaust, there's a phenomenal documentary called Hitler's Children that follows a number of the now-grown children of some of the Nazi regime's most notorious war criminals. It discusses exactly what you talk about here- how they deal with having this in their family history, how they found out about their family member's role in what happened, et cetera. One interesting parallel that was drawn was by a Jewish man who is the child of Holocaust survivors and said that the family of one German man (I think it was Rudolf Hess's son) he befriended handled their wartime experiences much as his parents had handled theirs: with silence and reluctance to discuss anything that had happened.
  Reply
Read More
erasedCord Jefferson
12/30/13 5:44pm
While this is a great piece on the state of black/white relations on the USA, please stop erasing my existence and the history of my tribe by conflating all things about "race" and all "racial" crimes w the horrors inflicted on those of African descent.

I realize that makes it harder to write snappy headlines if you are reductionist..., but I don't give a pass to anyone to erase the struggles of other POCs bc it's too easy to focus on only their group.

-A member of the race that was here first whose ancestors slaughtered to make room for the rest of you
Reply
- Read More
  911Ducktailerased
  12/30/13 6:30pm
  
  -A member of the race that was here first whose ancestors slaughtered to make room for the rest of you
  
  I dont mean to be snarky at all here, and Im also taking a huge guess as to your ancestry. but unless your ancestors go back to the Pleistocene era, PaleoIndians were 'beat' to this "country" by about 1500 years.
  Reply
- Read More
  theladyvanisheserased
  12/30/13 10:18pm
  Don't be fatuous. Just because he's writing specifically about one aspect of race doesn't mean he's trying to downplay the plight and struggles of other people of color in this country. I don't see any conflation in here.
  Reply
Read More
The Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabyStepsCord Jefferson
12/30/13 5:23pm
"You may not have been rich enough to own a nigger, but you were still better than a nigger, and that made all the difference."

Though that psychological wage is still paying to this day it's force is becoming ever more blunted as we move into this "post racial", neo-libral age and whites who count on it FEEL THAT DECLINE DEEP IN THEIR BONES!
Reply
Read More
sui_generisCord Jefferson
12/30/13 7:13pm
The second most interesting thing to me about 12 Years a Slave is how few of my white friends have seen it.

I think this is the equivalent of "if we don't pay any attention to it, it never happened!"

Or just, you know, sticking their fingers in their ears and going "lalalalalalalala"
Reply
- Read More
  COINTELPROsesui_generis
  12/30/13 8:20pm
  I saw it at a matinee (alone) and did find it very difficult to watch in parts: I covered my eyes during a few scenes; during one in particular I did a full-on 'see no evil hear no evil' thumbs in the ears, fingers over the eyes thing. It would've been embarrassing if I wasn't one of only ten people in the theater, nine of which were over 70 years old. When I mentioned to some of my white friends that I had seen it, a lot of them saw it as some sort of accomplishment. Now, I like to think of my friends as very progressive so I chocked it up to squeamishness. I mean, I'm not typically squeamish and even I found it exceptionally challenging in parts. Not sure how to tease that out to get to this premise, because I do think there's likely a lot of truth here—but there is no way anyone admits.
  Reply
- Read More
  Snagglepusssui_generis
  12/30/13 8:39pm
  I'm Jewish and I refused to see Schindler's List (I was Jerry Seinfeld). I know exactly what happened during that time, it's just that I don't want to watch it happen in a movie. It's just to visceral
  Reply