Update II (11/30): Check out the rest of LBC!
Update: A commenter sent the link to Byington’s column. She committed the crime of the century: admitting she was a Republican. Again, let me stress that black students had a right to disagree with her views, but it’s too bad those with deficient intelligence chose to attack her personally.
This line is probably what drove them insane:
I think it’s sad when some whites feel they must stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. That must be what life was like for blacks in the 1950s.
—————————————————————————————————
Who is Christine Byington?
Last week she was a student at Winthrop University in my hometown in South Carolina. Byington, a former copy editor at the student newspaper, wrote a “controversial” column about the unfairness of skin color preferences. There was a barrage of criticism from black students in an uproar because another black person publicly bucked tradition and spoke out against race-based entitlements.
Today Byington is a former student. The pressure was too much for her to handle.
Byington’s column was titled, “Student observes double standards at Winthrop,” which contained similar assertions I make on this blog almost every day: skin color preferences of any kind are unconstitutional, abhorrent, and immoral:
In the column, Byington, who is bi-racial, criticized blacks who complain about Winthrop and went on to oppose minority scholarships and organizations devoted to blacks, arguing that equal treatment should be given to other races. She also compared today’s racial climate for whites to the oppression blacks faced before the Civil Rights movement.“Black people at Winthrop will probably be angry,” Byington wrote in the first sentence of the column.
And she was right….The comments that Kee said proved most controversial are ones Byington made about the current state of blacks in America and the fear whites feel about expressing opinions on racial issues.
“We no longer hose people in the streets,” Byington’s column states. “I’d say if you have the freedom to sit in a classroom and state those opinions, you’ve got it pretty well.”
The last line of the column drew particular criticism, describing what Byington said was a reluctance among whites to discuss racial issues.
“I think it’s sad when some whites feel they must stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. That must be what life was like for blacks in the 1950s,” she wrote. (Source)
Before I go on, let me clear up something. I don’t agree that whites face the same racial oppression now that blacks once faced. I haven’t read the column, so I’m not certain whether Byington wrote that or if it’s the reporter’s interpretation. I don’t make a habit of insulting commenters, but some of you will ignore this entire post and focus on that one statement in the story.
For you registered members of the bonehead brigade, I’m warning you right now against accusing me of claiming whites are “oppressed” in any way comparable to blacks back in the day. Moving on…
Predictably, black students at Winthrop went into a ridiculous and illogical tizzy and did what black folks usually do: gather together in bi*** and moan sessions (BMS) and castigate other blacks (and whites) who have no interest in sharing or expressing their “woe is us” mantra.
That’s when the story was picked up by the Associated Press.
Technically, the college officials called for the forum, according to the story, but that doesn’t change my point. The officials likely did so because the students asked. Either way, the sentiment is still the same.
I’m not surprised by their reaction. As a member of the black race, I am well acquainted with “black think,” a mentally that I once embraced. For the record, just as Byington had a right to express her opinions in the column, students who didn’t like it had a right to say so. But I am deeply disappointed that Byington withdrew from the school.
Part of the reason many people read LBC is that I say what I believe and stick by it, no matter how much pressure there is against me. I haven’t succumbed to peer pressure since I was an insecure kid in high school. I’m a grown woman who knows what she believes and is able and willing to say so, out loud, to anyone who asks. I defend my positions on this blog and in person, and I do so under my own name, fully accountable, and not behind an infantile screen name.
I dare say some of you wouldn’t be able to handle the nasty e-mails and cyber-harassment I get on a weekly basis. I know exactly the sort of e-mail Byington received: unrighteously indignant black people calling her names and questioning her “blackness.”
That Byington is biracial only added fuel to the smoldering embers. It doesn’t matter, though. She could be a direct descendant of a West African slave with not a drop of “white blood” in her. It was her words and ideas that caused the uproar, and calling her out for having a white parent is simply ignorant ad hominem from people who haven’t learned to think critically, formulate arguments, and intelligently challenge the premise.
It’s shameful and embarrassing that some blacks are so emotional and irrational when it comes to discussing race honestly. They pay lip service to “honest dialogue” as long as blacks are portrayed as innocent victims and whites are characterized as demonic oppressors. They don’t want to talk about outrageous crime rates, for example, but skin color-based scholarships and government contracts, they’ll rant about all day.
The advantage I have over whites in this area is that I have an inside view of the game. When I was a naïve college student and perceived threats to my way of life as a member of the victim class (which was based on the fact that I’m descended from slaves), I struck out at whites and attended BMS, fighting for my “right” to retain my lowered-standard place in society. Of course, I didn’t think of it that way at the time, but since my enlightenment, I see it clearly.
It’s a sickness, and I thank God in heaven I was cured.
Christine Byington is young. I pray that she learns to withstand the pressure and not back down from telling and standing by the truth.
Update II: Thanks Kathryn and Betsy. This issue needs more attention. I’d like to contact Christine Byington and lend her my support. She needs to hear from someone who knows what she’s going through, and she ought to start blogging. 
Update III: This is what accountability means, anonymous bloggers and commenters, so take note: I’d like to interview Byington to find out exactly what happened, i.e., whether she received nasty e-mails about her parentage, etc. While briefly researching this story, I thought I read that she received comments about being biracial. If she didn’t get those comments or e-mails, I will retract certain statements in this post. I’d also like to get a transcript or recording of the forum, too.
I know all about the kind of anger Byington’s column sparked, but I don’t want to project my experience on to her. I will try to contact her; in the meantime, if you have an inside scoop please contact me.
More sources: Student quits Winthrop after column and Opinion article in Winthrop University newspaper stirs campus emotions.
Update IV: I’ve e-mailed the reporter in the first Herald story and asked him to forward my e-mail to Byington and the school’s director for “multi-cultural student life” to request a recording or transcript of the forum and an interview with him. I’ll keep you posted.
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I hope she at least enrolls in another school, if she doesn’t rethink her leaving that one. I would hate to see anyone throw away their education, especially over something they have ever right to believe whether anyone else does or not.
For once, La Shawn we agree on something. I too don’t like preferences based on color. But Black folks did not create this situation. We were the victims of it. Yes there are things we can do to change the situation ourselves, but unless the other side is willing to admit there has to be change, then the situation will persist. The young whites and blacks, who both are victims of jacked-up policies of yester-year must realize that it is up to them to understand what the problem is , what caused it, and take whatever steps are necessary to fix it. Both sides will feel the pain of growth if those steps are taken. Black folks will have to not just step up to the plate, but step up to the plate and succeed, and whites will have to learn that the not all opportunity belongs solely to them. I think that it was sad that the young sister left school, that is very unfortunate because those different opinions are what we need at times to help us to see clearly. I didn’t say you have to agree with them, but ofttimes they do help. And by the way, you still have a touch of BMS…
And by the way, you still have a touch of BMS…
Touché!
Thank you for sharing this story La Shawn. Wherever Ms. Byington ends up. I am quite certain she will do well in life. It would be nice to hear where her next stop is.
LaShawn please try to contact this young lady and encourage her. Use your celeb and professional status for good!
American universities like Winthrop today are (as one commentator put it) “islands of repression in a sea of freedom”. It seems that every manner of hatred, bigotry and perversion is not only permitted on campus, in many cases it is mandatory. I don’t blame Miss Byington for leaving school, given the toxic racial atmosphere created by “civil rights” groups and encouraged by college administrators. How could the result be otherwise, given the circumstances?
La Shawn, this post of yours really strikes home. My wife is black, I am white, and our child (due in a few weeks) will be biracial like Christine Byington. This is the world he or she will grow up in.
Here is a link to the Winthrop University newspaper:
http://www.thejohnsonian.com/
To the “Opinion” section:
http://tinyurl.com/9r696
The Opinion: “Student observes double standards at Winthrop”
http://tinyurl.com/9lnoc
It has always seemed to me the ultimate expression of a particularly callous sort of racism: the idea that all members of a group must always think alike.
That liberals embrace that idea is ironic in the extreme, because it is so fundamentally racist; moreover, it is the cause of the great lie of diversity. I attended University of Michigan law school, and heard much about the diversity of my classmates.
And they were diverse … superficially. Every skin color and ethnicity under the sun.
But diversity? Not even close. They *all* thought exactly the same, adopted the exact same liberal nod to victimhood — and you better believe all the Blacks thought *exactly* the same and preached *exactly* the same message of oppression and victimhood. Not once – not once in three years – did I hear one of my classmates of color suggest – gasp! – that society be based on merit rather than affirmative action.
I did, however, hear plenty of “oreo” references when Clarence Thomas came up — which is, again, so blatantly racist it defies the imagination. Can you imagine the outcry if I insulted a white person by suggesting they were “black inside” (is there such a cookie?
)
It is the benign racism of low expectations and group-think, and frankly it does more harm to modern Blacks than the KKK could ever have done.
My question has always been the same: why do Blacks tolerate it? Why aren’t they insulted?
Yes, Miss Byington is young. She’ll need a few more years of experience to gain the iron fortitude required to withstand the bile of this world. Maybe if it were only cyber-harassment she suffered, she may have stayed, but since she was actually on campus with these hysterical people, she may have feared for her physical safety and left the school for that reason. Sometimes it’s good to retreat & regroup before heading out to battle again.
#6 Mwalimu Daudi — Congrats on the upcoming birth of your child! Make The Rock his or her foundation, and the world won’t be able to shake your child.
Prof. Blather….Hear me out…What you are talking about when you see those things Black folks do are a direct reflection of what institutionalized racism has done. I’m not going into the blame game, some black people have risen above allowing it to completely direct their lives, and some haven’t. It’s kinda the same as when black folks see white people practice racism and wonder where’s the outcry from white folks about this being wrong? That’s the problem with racism..you see it ill effects everyone! Black racism is the same as White racism. No, it’s not right, but I think that it is tolerated because a majority of black people feel that white folks tolerate it when blacks feel that they have been wronged. That’s why it self defeatist to practice it in any way shape or form. In the end, all you do is cause problems for yourself..
Neither your post nor the AP story you link gives any detail of the supposed abuse this woman received. Was she threatened with harm? Was she assaulted? Were her critics personally abusive or insulting? There is no description of these events, or even evidence that there were any such events. Obviously she was upset about the response her writing earned for her, but it’s a little much to conclude that she’s some kind of victim because she perceives herself as yet another self-appointed conservative martyr.
Further down the AP story, it mentions that the school paper was going to publish “all eight” letters to the editor that it had received. That hardly sounds like a lynch mob in the making. It also mentions that there had been enough attention to the issue that the administration scheduled, and 400 students attended, a discussion forum on it – but it nowhere says that any of the furor had taken the form of threats or abuse.
If students simply disliked what she wrote – if, perhaps, they regarded her comparison of white “oppression” by all those “special rights” that blacks have today to segregation, lynch mobs, and firehoses as, say, “idiotic”, “insulting”, “ignorant”, or “foolish” – she can hardly take exception to that. She is entitled to speak her mind without being threatened, but she is not entitled to be respected while making an insulting ass of herself. It’s not “black think” to take offense at such lunkheaded belittling of black experiences, though it may be “conservative think” to claim she is some sort of victim for being offensive.
If you have information the AP does not, regarding actual threats or personal abuse this writer has suffered, it would help your case to share it. If she merely wrote a stupid, ill-informed piece, thinking she was being “cutting edge” by making counterintuitive statements about such an inflammatory issue, and then found that people were, you know, inflamed by it, she deserves to be told so and take her lumps.
Help me understand. She wrote an opinion piece that she knew would be at least somewhat controversial. She received ugly emails from idiots. Therefore she had to drop out of school. Something is terribly missing in this story. That sequence of events just doesn’t add up.
[from Trackback at http://www.gringoman.comBig Bro’ in America……
Whether or not George Orwell would write about ‘”Big Bro’ in America” today, pungent La Shawn Barber, in her bright blog, delivers color and controversy yet again. She focuses on how a Southern girl of mixed parentage is reviled by black students on campus after she dares to criticize today’s racial double standards and double talk.
Can, or should (nominally white) gringoman stir the pot further, being possibly even more politically incorrect than the elegant D.C. lady who is formerly of the black South?
Oh, well, here goes…..
It’s kinda the same as when black folks see white people practice racism and wonder where’s the outcry from white folks about this being wrong?
Are you kidding me? White people decry racism all the time!
What I think we are beginning to see and hear and read is the flip side of 1960. Then, it was the white power structure, the white establishment that had dug in its heels and refused to change its thinking and actions. I just read the Ron Rice column on Fox and realized that it could have so easily been written by some of the young gun democrats of 1960. Substitute “white” for “African-American” and you will see what I mean. And just like those young people of 1960, the Christine Byingtons of today will face misery, opprobrium, hatred, all the nastiness that their elders and those who would identify with those elders can bring. Mr. Wallace will face the same kind of injurious and injudicious attacks that were suffered by businessmen in 1960 who were willing to do business upfront with blacks. All of these folks will have to deal with the fact that their actions and words have upset the apple cart for the self-proclaimed leadership of the Black community. My hope is that, in time, we can get around this, too, as we did the issues of 1960. In another 50 years, and it could easily take that long, we may finally reach that point where people can largely be taken, not at “face” value, since that would still imply the power of skin color, but rather at personal value. Will that be the millenium? No, deep-seated antipathies will still exist among people of different skin tones, but the majority of folks will simply see skin color as irrelevant, as it truly is. With some luck and a lot of work on all sides, by then we may be able to wonder what in the hoo-haa was that nonsense about looking black and thinking white all about!
As a member of the other half T Jack refers to I am shocked by his naive statements. I can assure you almost every white male past the age of high school is quit aware not every opportunity belongs to us. In fact a good portion of opportunity specifically exclude us, not in any sweet covert way but specifically to the point white male not eligibile. Besides the clicks in school and clubs the first time I noticed institutional discriminatin was my senior year when we were given a handbook of scholorships and financial aid, as a white male I was not eligibile for about half of the programs. Additionally their was 0 programs specifically for whites or men. Black, Asian, Latino, Female all had special scholorships. My lack of opportunities was again apparent with college admissions. I persoanlly wasn’t affected by it but a number of employers will pass over a white male in order to maintain certain “minority” ratios. On a side note if everyone but white men are minorities and we only make up 25%? of the population at most doesn’t that make me a minority? The next time I came into contact with out right discrimination was applying for SBA loans, the additional weighting “miniorities” get is insulting, people I worked with or competitors easily got loans for businesses not nearly as sound as mine, I know this becuase they are out of business and I am still getting by. T Jack I am well aware most opportunities are not solely mine, so I worked since I was 15 to pay my own way, worked two jobs while going to college and work 60-80 hours per week. Do you really believe white people feel that way? Where do you get raciest sterotypes like that from?
It is highly unlikely that if such things were occurring, Kevin, that the AP would report on it, as such reports would be “racist” (scare quotes chosen deliberately). “Protected” groups never, ever, ever do anything bad, and even if they do, it’s good.
Your questions are good and should be answered, but in this case, absence of evidence is definately not evidence of absence, and I’d reserve the skepticism for the idea that it had no effect; *that* would be amazing today.
Well, LaShawn, I must compliment you on a thoughtful (and thought provoking) post. You have achieved a level of literary color-anonymity. I would never have guessed your heritage without your announcing it. (Though your name might have given it away
)
As for pepster: Given that the young woman is young, she may not have had a clear picture beforehand of just how hot the fire could get. I know from previous experience just how surprising the heat can get when you act as a prophet in your own country and the previously loving populace comes at you with feathers and a pot of boiling oil.
Very surprising. And extremely unsettling. The story may be no more than what we already know.
Similarly, LaShawn, my one cavil with you is the criticism of her bailing out so early. It is quite possible that she simply got surprised and then overwhelmed.
Otherwise, GREAT SHOW!!!
Nate, I’m not naive, but er’body’s entitled to his/her opinion. You missed my entire point. go back re-read what I said and get back at me…..Mighty Samurai, talking about it is a start……
I am a white male,
I was denied a civil service job because minorities received bonus points BASED purely on their race – Which is clearly unconstutitional.
Several years ago, my employer did some focus groups – based on race/gender lines. My employer was shocked to hear from the white males because of all the opportunities we are DENIED based upon our race/gender.
DIVERSITY means favoritism towards selected races.
If people want EQUAL RIGHTS they should not demand SPECIAL TREATMENT.
In a couple of years, my daughter will head to college. I do not look forward to seeing all the MINORITY ONLY scholarships and financial aid that will PROMOTED by the public universities. These same schools maintain two sets of admission standards, a tougher set for whites and a much easier set for non-whites.
BUT I am not allowed to complain, because I am white.
Nate Ogden
There are white people who actually feel that way. I surprised you can’t acknowledge that. Certainly you can agree that many on this post are quick to acknowledge that blacks generally persist in a state of victim-hood. That neighborhood, however, is not exclusive residence of one race. You have segments of all races and nationalities who feel that any decision against them is based on their race. Whites who feel they are more qualified than a black person will decry affirmative action. Blacks who feel overlooked will scream racism. But in most cases, the best qualified person for the job got the position.
There are some white people who cannot even imagine that a black person, woman, or Hispanic could not have received a job, admission to that school, or contract without race factoring into the decision. As I see it, many people can’t accept the fact that there are other people, including minorities, that are better qualified than them.
So the real question is why can’t they accept that fact?
What Byington is feeling is the wrath of black middle class guilt. Most affirmative action preferences in college go to middle class kids who went to the same schools as everybody else. They weren’t dodging bullets in the ‘hood or children of sharecroppers. These aren’t the kind of people who don’t need preferences and the middle class blacks know it. They know they’re benefiting from a system designed for their lesser fortunate brethren, and they feel guilty about it, but that’s never going to stop them from demanding more preferences. Basically, this is a scam and the minute anybody points this out, they must be crushed, especially if they’re black.
La shawn, I just read the link you left and I’m trying to figure out what the problem was/is? Ok WE all know there is a race problem in America…all she’s done is voiced her opinion about it. I see where she is coming from, don’t totally agree w/her, but in order to get rid of the problem you have got to get to the root of it. I agree w/Kevin T. Keith take your lumps. La Shawn maybe you should get w/her and toughen her up. Sounds like she may be a good writer one day. Lord knows she already knows how to stir it up!!;)
Hello,
Though I do agree with what Byington is trying to say…. I am offended by the way she has chosen express it.
I know that this was an “opinion” column, but I felt that her article was too bias and stereotypical of blacks.
Why must she bring up “how to speak English” on this issue? And along with that, why must she try to “relate” to blacks, by mentioning she biracial therefore in the midst of things, and clear from charges? Her being biracial doesn’t mean that she has some special permission to speak on the issues that may plague black and white relations (and I’m not saying that she can’t, but don’t use being biracial as a reason why one can). It makes her sound desperate.
Along with that she says that she doesn’t mean “all” blacks… but later in her article starts addressing the reader as “you” when pointing out the extreme things that some groups in the black community at her (former) school have done.
And of course she went on with the “I know some blacks have already thrown down the newspaper” after mentioning she is a Republican… are we just hostile beings?
I’ve decided to maybe write an article on this issue in my own school’s newspaper. Not addressing the “valid” or “invalid” points she has made… but addressing how the race debate should be debated… it should not be debated with a bunch of stereotypical and bias remarks… “learn how to speak English” or “White people just don’t understand blacks”…
cya
“Both sides will feel the pain of growth if those steps are taken. Black folks will have to not just step up to the plate, but step up to the plate and succeed, and whites will have to learn that the not all opportunity belongs solely to them.”
That is what you said. The problem with race relations today is we can’t have open discussions to even determine were we stand. A majority of black people feel White’s are starting at one point and need to travel to another point for us to have equality. The reality of the matter is White’s , in general, have already traveled the majority of the way we need to go. Racism is not 50/50, in my opinion the black community is not doing it’s share. Whites will not finish the 10% of their path until blacks at least start making an effort. In fact I would caution if the black community doesn’t stop the victim game and start treating whites equally racism is going to get considerably worse. For how many generations do you expect white men and whites in general to be discriminated against in the name of equality while black community “leaders” accuse us of being racist and not doing anything to solve the problem? Why do we have quotas for black coaches and GMs when there is not a single white running back? What percentage of the NBA is white? If you keep crying victim and pushing for quotas be careful you might just get it. NAACP ready to go on a white hiring binge? Ready for a white front court on your local NBA team? When does it start being about EQUALITY and not about giving some people a free ride? I would love to hear as a white person what is expected of me in regards to race relations, I treat everyone the same, don’t discriminate based on race yet I keep being told I’m not doing enough…what else is there?
Just read the column and as I expected this is the money quote.
I think it’s sad when some whites feel they must stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. That must be what life was like for blacks in the 1950s.
She is not comparing today’s racial climate for whites to the oppression blacks faced before the Civil Rights movement. She is saying Blacks in the 1950’s had to stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. No one could possibly argue that they did not. She is saying some whites feel they must stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. Some do, don’t kid me that there are no whites who in a discussion with a Black person will not decide to keep some opinions to themselves rather than “go thereâ€. La Shawn was exactly right when she wondered if it was the reporter’s interpretation. And I bet most of the negativity hitting Ms. Byington was based on that reporter’s misrepresentation of her column.
Nate I’m laughing right now…Your not getting what I’m saying…ok ok I’ll entertain this for a milli-sec……how many nba players and nfl runningbacks are black? a majority to say the least. Now how many owners of said teams are black? a minority. now that we cleared that up you are doing exactly what you shouldn’t. I’m merely pointing out what both parties need to do to begin to take care of the problem,…merely a starting point. Nate you sound like a person who believes affirmative action was made for minorities…please tell me you don ‘t believe that!!..Before you answer that, ans. this: why are laws made; for the law breakers…..now keep that in mind if you are going to to
respond to what I said about AA.
I re-read T. Jack’s statement:
And I don’t believe that I misunderstood the latter half of it. I’m a white male who certainly doesn’t believe that “all opportunity belongs to” me (or “us,” whatever that means). We just want to be treated fairly. Ironically, many of us have given up on that possibility.
Just as one example, a couple of years ago I interviewed for a desirable position with another firm. I was told flat-out that they were not hiring for that position. One month later, I read in the newspaper that they had just hired an Hispanic female for that position. I went back and looked over the firm’s website and realized how naive I had been: Not one white male had been hired by that firm in the previous year.
The new black man is emblemized by the “50 Cent” phenomenon, in particular, the sport drink ads featuring Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, in all of his gun-shot-riddled glory, reading the Wall Street Journal while a couple of bikini-clad models watch hungrily.
The ad copy reads something like:
“No Love – No Groupies – Just 50″
While riding a train full of mostly black people, my wife and I started to comment on the predatory nature of the ad, but quickly shut up because of who was seated around us.
That is precisely what Blyington is talking about when she says:
“I think it’s sad when some whites feel they must stifle their opinions because of the color of their skin. That must be what life was like for blacks in the 1950s”.
Nate
You just made a host of inaccurate statements. There are a number of white running backs in the NFL (remember the guy in Tampa). There is a good percentage of whites in the NBA (Walton, Williams, and Nash (reigning MVP)to name a few). I understand that you have a point to make but you do yourself a disservice by making exaggerations.
You say that racism is not 50/50. You also say that the white community is not going to go their last 10% until black folks do more. Please explain what do you consider whites to have done. Also what is it that you think blacks need to do? Please keep in mind that history teaches us that it was both courageous black and white people seeking equality who shaped the civil rights movement.
You say that if blacks don’t stop playing the victim game that racism will get worse. But aren’t whites playing the same game? And want black person do you personally know that is playing the victim game? Because I don’t know that many who are claiming to be a victim. Most of the people I know are trying to better themselves and provide a good life for their children. Let’s stop with the generalizations. There are isolated instances of victim-hood with all races, and we must try to overcome that mentality.
You claim that you don’t discriminate against anyone. I suspect you don’t. But do you have prejudices? Do you believe the stereotypes?
Here’s a little more on Christine Byington –
http://tribunetimes.com/stories/2002/09/10/200209103928.htm
She’s very talented young person with a bright future. I hope she doesn’t let the Winthrop experience bring her down.
She certainly did hit a hot button, didn’t she?
What I found far more interesting was the “protest” graphic E&P used to accompany the AP article, specifically the four fists: black, brown, yellow, …what? Is that fuchsia? A dusky rose? Who on the planet has anything resembling an epidermal exterior that even remotely matches that fourth color?
3 things: 1st: HBC if I talked about all the stupid racism I’ve encountered…not enough space. That is why I deal in the solutions: They are usually straight at you. 2nd: Zorro I feel ya I’m not a 50 fan…I would like to hear what you think about that predatory nature of the ad, and tht to me is only half the problem. The other half is why does 50 glorify that? They pay him for it. 3rd: Antonio…I’m not sure if Nate gets it. He’s taking it personal (I think), I’m not attacking him, per se’ it’s the institution that’s fowl, (and I mean to spell it that way), and that causes all people suffer under it. That includes red, brown,and yellow as well as black and white. If you are one of these and I’m sure you are, then it touches you in 1 way or another. What caught my interest about the article was a bi-racial girl struggling the race issue and it effects her like a two-edged sword! I’m impressed that she at least has tried to deal with it.
La Shawn, Below is a link to another “Opinion” in the Johnsonian (Winthrop University paper) titled “Columnist sees truth in Byington opinion piece” by Paul j. Roman, Dated November 17, 2005.
http://www.thejohnsonian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/11/17/437c98b689031
The predatory nature of the 50 Cent Glaceau ad is this: this ad runs in Chicago on CTA trains through the worst ghettos of the west side. The kids riding that train to school see that ad, idolize 50 and the idea of being a gangsta’. His reading WSJ implies strongly that he’s rich (which of course he is), and “playin in the white-man’s world by his own rules”.
50 Cent expands the chasm between white culture and black culture in exactly the same way that Michael Jordan and Bill Cosby bridge that chasm. Only worse.
In a lot of ways, MJ is a pipe dream- he’s rich, articlulate and handsome.
50 cent is much more “attainable”- he’s rich- but he looks, acts, talks and dresses just like the ghetto kids who idolize him.
He is to inner city black boys what Paris Hilton is to suburban white girls.
Something isn’t right here.
I’d like to know more about what’s going on. Quitting after writing this article, just because of controversy, is childish.
There is more to the story.
This is mighty thin, LaShawn.
The second Herald Online article quotes Ms. Byington as saying that leaving school “had more to do with how my whole semester was going than what’s happened in the last few days.”
It later paraphrases her, even more unequivocally:
But to say students’ reactions forced her hand just isn’t true, she said. “It shouldn’t be about it, and it’s not.”
And her column that you linked has affixed comments, which are overwhelmingly positive and supportive.
Obviously, something of a furor was generated, but the school and its paper appear to have handled the matter forthrightly: an immediate constructive forum by which to clear the air, and the wholehearted support of the paper’s editors and staff, many of whom disagreed with what she wrote.
Still, nowhere is there evidence that the ruckus arose from her being “another black person [who] publicly bucked tradition and spoke out against race-based entitlements,” or that she was attacked personally, or that liberal universities stifle dissent.
I believe some stereotypes and I think stereotypes and generalizations when used in a large context are both beneficial and wise. It’s when they are applied to individuals or specific circumstances of expectations they are potentially racist or wrong.
Who’s TB’s RB?
The number one thing black people can do to improve relations is change their voice, I think the majority of black people are not racist nor do they play the victim role, but they allow the wrong people to claim to speak for them. Jessie Jackson, Al Sharpton, etc etc are racist crooks. They make their living of racial strife, if there was no racism Jesse, Al and the others would have to actually get jobs and stop extorting white people for a living. With t he exception of Cosby I can’t think of a black leader I could even have an honest open debate about racism with. When the black community allows Jesse and Al to be their voice racism will prevail.
Let go of the past, 400 years ago my family were surfs, you don’t see us demanding reparations from England and France.
The last thing is give blame equally…Kyane was a perfect example of blaming the first white guy you see while over looking the black mayor who left 100s of buses to drown with his citizens. I have never heard anyone place any blame on Africa, Salvery didn’t start with white men running through the jungle with nets, anyone ever asked African nations for an apology for selling slaves?
Antonio,
The weasel word in your post is “feel”. There is a huge difference between “feeling” that one is more qualified and overlooked because of race, and the fact that a more qualified person indeed is overlooked precisely because of their race. Given that difference, and especially the latter, it’s more probable that “in most cases, the best qualified person for the job got the position” does not follow.
I caveat that with “probable” since you do not make it clear what frame of reference is alluded to in your “in most cases” -are you speaking of those cases and only those cases in which race conditions the hiring? Or are you speaking of every case of hiring whether or not race conditioned?
Please clarify your argument. If it is one that is…
Amid ‘Black Think’ Pressure, Christine Byington Quits
This is my comment about Christine Byington. I don’t want to over rationalize, but sometimes if a great majority of people are telling you something, chances are great an opportunity to learn something is at hand. Sometimes lessons are hard to discern, sometimes illusive, sometimes hurtful. I believe Christine is overlooking the spirit of the heart that Rosa Parks demonstrated. Her legacy to the american people is beyond reproach. I don’t believe she was a racist but she fought racism. Christine Byington does not have to join the battle against racism that most blacks cannot pretend does not exist. I choose to believe the people whom she felt harrassed her were only exhibiting a small measure of the fight against racism. I personally believe some statements are indefensible. An example of that would be the recent comments by the former presidential cabinet member Bill Bennet. Perhaps I am naive but I cannot think of a context where “aborting all black babies” is appropriate. In her youth I believe she made the same mistake. I have made similar mistakes. Here is an example. I am a 54 year old black man, raised by wonderful parents. I was born in a small western Pennsylvania town. Regardless of the different socio-economics of the members of our community everybody went to the same junior high school and senior high school. They offered a great education. When I was a child between the ages of eight and fifteen my Mother was a housekeeper for the family of one of my classmates. His Father owned a Plumbing Contracting company, they lived in a mansion. I was on the football team with him, played baseball with him. This was in the sixties during a time of ‘jim crow’ in the south. I am blessed I did not grow up to be racist. In 1986 I moved to Dallas, TX. I got a job working at a company that made concrete blocks. Twelve hours a day, six in the morning until six in the evening. A good job, a hard job. I was so happy to get this job I laughed and joked with everyone. I remember an older black man that had worked there for thirty-three years. He didn’t smoke, he didn’t cuss, he was putting a couple of kids through college. He drove a forklift. I respected him a great deal. One day it was raining real hard and he gave me a ride to the bus stop. He talked to me and said some things to me that I have never really been able to completely get my mind around. He calmly asked me a question, “Do you think the Supervisor is your friend, I see you laughing and talking with him all the time?” I replied, “yes, he gave me a job.” He then told me that he had been working there for thirty-three years, the supervisor whom was white had been working there for thirty years. He said that until recently at the job there was a bathroom for the whites and a bathroom for the blacks. A water fountain for the whites, a water fountain for the blacks. He said that other than giving him instructions about the job, the supervisor never spoke to him for twenty years. He didn’t say it in anger and I don’t believe there was malice. He liked me. I was a grown man. When I was twenty-one years old I was a Seargeant in an Airborne Ranger Company (June 71 to June 74). At the very least I believe he was attempting to inform me, enlighten me to some truths I was unaware of. If there are some triths that you or Christine are unaware of try not to that sixty million black people have the wrong idea. Thank you for hearing me out.
Sincerely,
John Smith
I’m a college prof. Let me say it plainly: orthodoxy (a/k/a black think, political correctness, victimology, whatever) DESTROYS intellectual freedom.
I hope Byington licks her wounds (I’ve got some scars myself, from grad school) and gets back in the game. We need all the independent thinkers we can get.
Hmmmm.
1.
What a ridiculous, inept and ultimately *stupid* argument.
Ownership of an NFL team is based on money, money, money, money, money and desire. If you don’t have the money to buy a team, then it doesn’t matter what your skin color is. If you don’t have the financial acumen to make owning a team more than a severe financial risk, then it doesn’t matter what your skin color is. If you don’t have the business background to avoid losing your shirt in negotiating player contracts, then it doesn’t matter what your skin color is.
And if you don’t have the desire to pump millions into a team that might not make the playoffs for years, then it doesn’t matter what your skin color is.
Why aren’t there more black NFL owners? Why not ask why aren’t there more *asian* NFL owners. I’m asian and I watch football, but I damn well don’t ever have the desire to own a team. Even if I ever did have enough money to buy one.
Are there blacks with enough wealth to own an NFL team? I’d suspect so, yes. Are there asians with enough wealth to own an NFL team? Probably.
So why aren’t there more asian or black NFL team owners? Frankly the answer is a massively obvious; because they don’t want to.
Seriously now. What an idiotic question.
2. Frankly the success of asians, many of whom came to America deficient in wealth, education and english language skills, proves the whole racial preferences nonsense as nothing but a lie.
Has a black inner city youth had a tougher life than someone who survived the Killing Fields of Cambodia?
Has a black inner city youth survived a harsher environment than someone who lived through the Vietnam War and then had to survive the Vietnamese Boat People ordeal?
Has a black inner city youth lived through a more desperate situation than survivors of North Korean Death Camps?
Frankly when someone starts in on the whole “evil white people, oppressed black people” crap I just gently point out that at least they didn’t have to eat their parents at gunpoint.
Schmucks.
What happened to this young woman should not have happened but racism and intolerance aren’t exclusives to whites anymore (if they ever were).
I have worked and lived for decades with lower income whites, blacks, Asians and Hispanics. I have heard every racial slur in the book used by all groups towards each other. Blacks complaining about those “Arabs” taking over all the convenience stores in their neighborhoods, Indians (Asian) complaining about Mexicans moving into their neighborhoods, Vietnamese complaning about the Mexicans, Mexicans complaining about “lazy” blacks (in a Girl Scout troop of both, no less) and blacks coming right back with “wetback”, and on and on and on. I’m sorry but anyone who claims that they don’t harbor a prejudice toward some group is just lying. And anyone who claims minorities are prejudice free doesn’t know any.
We all have prejudices and stereotypes in our heads. It’s how we decide to let them guide our actions that makes the difference.
LaShawn,
Thanks for providing a forum for healthy debates about relevant issues.
Nate
One of the Tampa Bay running backs is Mike Alstott. Also, I am surprised that you contend that generalizations and stereotypes are good in some instances. Do or most black people claim to be victims? Are all or most black people on welfare? Are all or most white people racist? We know the answer to those questions. That’s why we should not use generalizations and stereotypes. Generalizations and stereotypes give license to those who refuse to make independent evaluations of the character, integrity, and intellect.
James
The reason I say feel is because that is what I have found during my own investigations. I investigate these types of claims every day and generally they come down to people (white and black) feeling like they were more qualified than the next person. But in reality, they have no basis for their feeling. They have never seen the person’s resume. They have never interviewed the person and accessed that person’s capabilities. So without any factual support for a claim of being overlooked because of race, a person’s claim can only come down to a feeling.
La Shawn,
I check out your blog occasionally. To be frank, I disagree with you most of the time. What can I say? I’m a lefty. There is one thing that I do agree with you, though: the idea that black conservatives and Republicans are somehow traitors to their race is absolute nonsense. It’s maddening and an issue that I have addressed on my own left-leaning blog. So, you should know that there is at least one black liberal in the world that disagrees with you often, but does respect you. If I ever comment here again, it will only be in the interest of civilized debate.
T. Jack, sincerely, you can’t argue that we need to be honest and talk to each other, both sides have to do their share, etc., when you’re already setting up the secondary argument. I.e., when it comes to anyone actually questioning what those shares are…bam…out comes the victim excuse. How is that constructive or even intellectually honest?
Slavery and Jim Crow are awful stains on our history. But this country is filled with people whose ancestors, or even parents, endured terrible things. Famines, war, pogroms, murderous dictators, concentration camps, religious persecution, ethnic bloodshed, etc. I know there are people who want to slight those experiences, or claim that they don’t compare to what African Americans suffer and still suffer. But if the victim mentality isn’t getting blacks anywhere–I mean, truly, honestly getting them unfettered personal success–then maybe it’s time to re-examine it. Cf. LaShawn’s own story.
It’s pabulum to say that whites need to understand that a healthy society depends on everyone being given a real chance. No rational person thinks otherwise. And if you’re talking about irrational people, that’s another story. But irrationality, and ignorance, and bigotry, and fearful thinking, are not confined to any ethnic group. I think you already know that, but if not, you can read all about it in the Byington article.
I’m sorry that Christine Byington had to pay such a price for daring to express her opinion. But I hope she ends up as an editor-in-chief or a CEO or whatever, while the people who howled her down end up wearing themselves out with imagined outrages.
I just read Ms. Byington’s article and the related comments. I agree that she has a constitutional right to her statements. But I don’t think she has committed some act of bravery, i.e. writing her article pales in comparison to risk of life people endured during the civil rights movement. She is on a college campus and can friendly express her ideas. While it is true that some did not agree with her article, there were others who did. What’s more, she knew that her article would incite a heated reaction, which she stated at the very beginning of her article.
So please don’t blame the dissenters for Ms. Byington’s exodus from campus. Remember conservatives, each person is responsible for his or her actions. Therefore, Ms. Byington is the only person responsible for her leaving school. (I hope she returns).
Since when did “equal opportunity” become “equal outcomes”? Sad.
I’m a little confused as to why this person would drop out after this, unless she received some sort of threats…
While I think there was once a need for affirmative action policies, in today’s United States it just seems like more of an insult to blacks. It’s like saying, “You couldn’t do this without the government’s help.” You don’t fight discrimination with discrimination. Sorry. It just doesn’t work.
Nice blog.
It’s such a difficult topic for discussion because of the very “oversensitivity” you mention La Shawn. I am 15 nationalities; I look ‘white’. I have cousins who are half black, half mexican, half native american, and who look non-white, and so ’socially’ they live as that race (and of course half their family is entirely of that race). Even us, family who love each other, all of us of mixed race, have a helluva time discussing these things without problems. I feel as an American and many nationalities that I can and *should* be interested in addressing all issues that affect any significant block of Americans; for example, if natives or blacks are living in stark poverty en masse, I feel that hurts our whole country. I don’t want any child to grow up in that, any person to not have the ability to strive for what they want in life; who cares what color they are? But even with family, it’s tough. They ‘feel’ more black or native etc. as the world has always looked on them that way, and they feel I can’t really know their pain so to speak–and I agree, I cannot know what it is like for them. But to me, until everybody stands for the rights of everybody, we get nowhere. So, if even family who love each other have a hard time discussing things in a pleasant environment, I can imagine that people who don’t know or like each other, in a hyped-college environ especially (isn’t everything a drama queen reprise in college?
) would be touchy.
I’m sorry she left school. That’s the biggest bummer.
It’s the most absurd phenomenon – some black people being against education – in German that’s called the “Andorra” effect – after a play by Max Frisch in which a boy who isn’t Jewish is discriminated against for being Jewish and eventually takes on all the stereotypical traits people had accused him of.
It’s come from the racist opinion that blacks are dumb to many blacks condemning not-being-dumb.
Enough to make one’s head spin !
Click my name to read my blog
It’s more than “sad”, as Ms. Byington puts it, that some whites stifle their opinion – they are pathetic. Got a guilt complex? Get a life! Better yet, get Christ. I for one won’t stifle my opinions or compromise my beliefs for anybody. My wife is black so we (occasionally) experience racial bigotry from both sides. But, I don’t give a rat’s rectum. We live our lives through Christ, the only answer of hope for all mankind. But we don’t live it passively. That’s why I admire the work of LB so much.
I wonder if she read Ward Connerly’s Book “Creating Equal”. He outlined some of the hate he received as well …
This isn’t an answer but here are a couple of salient facts.
I see racial harmony lessening rather than increasing. Most of the white people I know are mad as hell that there are so many black criminals. The number of black criminals, and particularly violent black criminals, relative to the black percentage of the population is absolutely outrageous. What is even worse is the near-blanket refusal of the black community to accept that members of their group are causing a MAJOR LEAGUE PROBLEM for the rest of society. I heard someone within the week, in all seriousness, suggest that blacks be charged a tax to fund the costs of incarcerating the huge number of their population segment that is in prison. If the black community doesn’t realize that this extreme criminality from their portion of society is causing a great deal of anger in the rest of society, they’re living in a dream world. Even before Katrina, the public face of violent crime in America was black; now that image is absolutely engraved in the entire world’s collective consciousness.
One last comment: I know people who are in business who have told me that they would under no circumstances ever consider hiring a black employee. When I asked why, the answer was that if they hired someone of another ethnicity and they weren’t up to the job, said new hire could just be sent on down the road. If they hired a black who turned out to a bad employee, they would probably be stuck with him/her because of the potential wrongful-dismissal-based-on-race lawsuit. Those blacks who feel that AA is helping should realize that in only helps with the government and huge corporations. It hurts blacks with a lot of small business because those owners just can’t afford to take a chance.
Yeah, La Shawn–I believe you take a lot of heat for what you believe. You have a lot of guts. I’ve also been cured–it took almost a decade.
Did you ever do a post about how you changed your political worldview?
mac, since the overwhelming majority of Blacks aren’t criminals, blaming the majority for the minority makes no sense. if there is anger as you say, it’s due to their own ignorance.
if you are walking down the street, on one side, 2 Blacks, on the other side, 2 whites you know, the chances you will be killed are higher on the “white side” than the “Black side.”
Mac writes:
>>>”If the black community doesn’t realize that this extreme criminality from their portion of society is causing a great deal of anger in the rest of society, they’re living in a dream world. Even before Katrina, the public face of violent crime in America was black; now that image is absolutely engraved in the entire world’s collective consciousness.”
Of course the public face of violent crime is black. The media gatekeepers are are predominantly white, and they know that the two highest ratings/circulations movers are white sex and black violence. That’s why the OJ Simpson case was the “trial of the Century.”
I actually hope this young woman who wrote the article continues her education, not only at a college, but in LIFE, meeting as many diverse people as she can. Ignorance isn’t neccessarily evil, so she can be forgiven for parroting some of the monocultural mythology spewed forth on Fox News and right winged talk radio, but I feel that
INDEPENDENT research done on her part would let her know the reality of American history and society in regards to African Americans.
For one thing, she may learn to appreciate the fact that the same white conservative movement she embraces once declared her parent’s marriage, and her very miscegenation spawned existance ILLEGAL.
Independent research may teach her the TRUE nature of employment and loan discrimination against blacks (and she IS black based upon hypodescent–the ONE DROP RULE).
But of course, if one construes “thinking independently” with adopting white conservative agendas, well…
–Cobra
Well, white people *are* repressed in their comments; at least, I certainly have been a zillion times.
I think on a daily basis we deal with both extremes of wrong from both ends, and it is hard to speak openly about either lest we be seen as racists. I have seen both extremes — total unfairness to someone black, and total unfairness on the part of someone black — and both came with their share of “problems saying anything openly” on both sides.
I have an opinion that tends to be very unpopular with everybody. Which is, that a lot of seeming racism is actually culture-ism where the people of a given culture are recognized by their race.
This gets a lot of ire from people because it implies that it is not skin color that is sometimes offensive, but behavior; but that’s the reality of it.
About a year ago I was in Tulsa when my truck broke down and I ended up sitting in a Ford dealership all day. As I sat in the (large) waiting room, which had a counter with coffee, tea, donuts, and misc. things like that, lots of magazines, a TV etc., I watched the people come in and out. People of all sorts; the population. Some came alone, some in whole van-load groups. Now and then someone would come in and clean a little or put down more free donuts, by most auto place standards, it’s nice.
By 1pm or so the room had a lot of people in it (I really didn’t notice the races) sitting quietly reading. The door opens to about 120 decibels of “black culture,” and something that looked and sounded like the worst of TV sitcom jive entered, in the form of about 5 people who were so LOUD it was literally shocking (the room was quiet). They ate ALL the donuts, drank ALL the coffee, made an utter disaster of the entire area, threw magazines all over the place, loudly bitched about everything (not “enough” FREE donuts etc.), and spent 20 minutes making life hell for everybody else in the room. The baby wandered around bawling, the man in the group half-danced around acting hysterical in the way that only a black sitcom with some guy with a giant comb sticking out of his afro can manage, and the women talked so loudly they drowned out the airguns on the other side of the wall. When they left, en masse, the door closed, sudden silence descended, and this really old man sighed from behind his magazine, “Thank God!” and the entire room just busted up laughing–it really was pretty funny.
But I was sitting there thinking to myself, now there is another example of culturalism, so to speak. Nobody would have had a second thought about one or all of those people if they had, you might say, “adapted to the climate” they entered. The reality is that at least in some areas or for some people, that IS reflective of their culture– or at least how they behave around others I guess. I am certain that most people in the room had a poor opinion of them based on their behavior; it was so “TV archetypally” black, in the worst way. We were all glad to see them go.
Yet, if anybody had said something like this openly, we would be accused of not liking them because they were black. But really, they were way over-loud, expect-it-free, total slob obnoxious people. It wouldn’t have mattered if they looked like Aryan archetypes, the result would have been the same.
I don’t know if in their culture of inner city Tulsa, which I am wildly assuming (sorry if THAT is racist) they are from, that kind of behavior is normal. In my little world it is not normal. In my world, blacks talk and act about the same as anybody else, I mean, they’re just people. They don’t act like a bad TV show turned up too loud.
I feel that the non-blacks in that room probably had a little more “opinion” added to their perception of blacks (at least, if they do not normally deal with a lot of people who are black to ‘balance that out’) from that experience. And that opinion, will be seen as racism.
But it isn’t racism. It’s cultural-ism where the people of that culture are recognized by their race. Now, I guess it becomes racism when you assume “all” black people are like that. But in my view, the tendency to racism comes with the same survival instincts that kept the ancients from getting eaten by a tiger; it may be true that not all tigers will eat you, or that even those which might, will not do so all the time; but the ability to see or hear that your friend got eaten by a tiger, and hence to have a major bias against tigers as People-Eaters, that’s a basic human trait. I think this basic trait is part of what sponsors racism, the labeling of stereotypes essentially.
But the so-called white culture can’t tell the so-called black culture that this is the kind of thing that causes resistance, drawing back, even dislike, because if we do, we’re racists, we’ve insulted black culture. And even blacks can’t do so because if they talk and act like normal humans they’re called Oreos and Uncle Toms etc.
When I meet my friends, I might say, “Yo! How goes it dude?” (a California girl origin here). If I answer a business telephone, I don’t talk like that. Yet, if you expected someone who was black to skip all the ebonics for the business environ, you would be ‘insulting their culture’. Well heck, business culture is a culture of its own, and it isn’t entirely mine, either. Someone could easily tell a white girl, “Answer the telephone like this,” or, “Don’t say X, say it like Y.” No problem. You tell a black girl that, and you are offending her culture, her language, you are a racist.
I think not until more blacks and non-blacks can have open dialogues about stuff, will any reality start to seep through the P.C.B.S. of it all. In that regard, you do a great service here La Shawn.
(You have a good blog regardless of your race. But you offer a good forum for race-related issues.)
Well, I see mac’s point, though from a different angle. The ‘inner cities’ are whole subcultures that have little in common in some important respects with the rest of what we consider America. I don’t see any more middle class black kids in trouble with the law for violent crime than white kids. You can’t say the same for the poor, though.
No, definitely not all blacks are criminals, that would be stupid, but any group with such an unequal representation of violent criminals in the population is going to get noticed for it. It isn’t racist or ignorant to notice it, it’s a fact, and I suppose if someone lived in a region with more of this it would be even more obvious. White people cannot solve it, although it’s possible that some focused government and business tandems could help work on it (not just for blacks, but for ‘the poor’ of whatever race).
Blacks don’t look “more” criminal because white racist media people put them in the paper; as a racial group in our culture, more of them ARE committing crimes that get them in the paper. Should we ask the media (which I admit, I distrust anyway, but…) to NOT put blacks in the paper because it looks bad or causes racism? That would be another kind of suppression and reverse bias.
Given the majority of the role models for blacks are either “gangsta” images or religious leaders who do nothing but lay on that party line of you’re a victim so be pissed about it, it’s hardly surprising. I would expect this to be the statistical result in ANY culture with that situation.
Growing up, Bill Cosby was one of my heroes, and his skin color had nothing to do with it; my dad liked him, thought he was intelligent and funny, and so that’s what I knew of him. The things he says about black culture could apply to any culture — take responsibility, etc. The irony is that many cultures, hearing this advice, would say, “That is a wise man.” Yet a lot of the black culture and ‘leaders’ seem only offended at Cosby’s input, which I find bewildering.
I think anybody qualified to be a ‘leader’ of a group ought to be looking at issues like horrible educational levels (I don’t mean how many finish HS–that matters too–I mean how many can read well when they have!), horrible crime levels, horrible adult poverty levels, and saying, this is a problem, what can we do about this. It doesn’t help to bias scholarships to blacks if most of the inner city never goes to college anyway! These are problems that I feel affect all Americans and as such, become issues that everybody has a right to observe openly.
It is hilarious that on this very blog, about this very topic, there is still the kickback about someone pointing out something which is, alas, true.
I give mac points for his honesty – he points out things that we all know. Racial discrimination against hiring Blacks exists in his social circle, and he at least understands it, if not condones it; and all Blacks bear the stain of responsibility for black criminality.
McTank writes:
>>>”Blacks don’t look “more†criminal because white racist media people put them in the paper; as a racial group in our culture, more of them ARE committing crimes that get them in the paper. Should we ask the media (which I admit, I distrust anyway, but…) to NOT put blacks in the paper because it looks bad or causes racism? That would be another kind of suppression and reverse bias.”
If you don’t think the attitudes of the gatekeepers of media influence the presentation of news, then I don’t know what to tell you. If there was a REAL representation of crime depicted in the media, you’d understand that there are far more WHITE criminals than there are black criminals. Sheer population demographics dictate this, as well as FBI statistics. The fact is that the vast majority of violent crime is INTRAracial, meaning you as a white person has far more to fear from other whites statistically, than from black folks like me. And if you see white teenagers coming towards you wearing trench coats and listening to goth music, watch out, sister!
McTank writes:
>>>”But the so-called white culture can’t tell the so-called black culture that this is the kind of thing that causes resistance, drawing back, even dislike, because if we do, we’re racists, we’ve insulted black culture. And even blacks can’t do so because if they talk and act like normal humans they’re called Oreos and Uncle Toms etc.”
You see, it’s these kinds of statements that raise the tempeture a bit in the room. You probably don’t mean to do it, but you’re insinuating that only language characteristics and mannerisms you feel psycologically compatible with are “acting like a normal human.”
I guarantee you if you were at a repair shop on 18th Avenue in Brooklyn, or Macon, GA during a NASCAR race, the ambiance of the waiting room would not resemble C-SPAN’s “Book Notes.” Would you cast aspersions on “white culture” at that point?
Second, I doubt you’ve delved deeply enough into American History and Sociology if you think that White America has “hesitant” to express their disdain for non-whites. I guess taking 190 years to get Civil Rights on paper isn’t a big enough hint for some folks.
I get it, though.
–Cobra
Ed….I won’t entertain your desciptions of my remarks #45 like that again..you see you are exactly what I’m talking about….that’s my right to say what I feel, I wasn’t being disrespective just stating facts. If you read before you commented, you would see I was responding to a ques. posed to me. Don’t apologize, I wouldn’t believe you any way. Point out the facts to YOUR kind and…… face the wrath…your pretty much what I expect. Was I wrong about the ownership? If I am stop me when I start lying…..ya can’t all you will do is put up sound bites…and hope some dolt goes “Oh Yea, he sure told him”…..you my friend are what I consider a real waste of space…can’t take some one else having a view of their own, different from yours……By the way…I READ YOUR ENTIRE THREAD……..YOUR ASIAN….wasn’t talkin bout’ your skin….just what’s underneath……
AK..You feel you don’t people need to honest when discussing a percieved problem? Discussion is good. Hopefully when you have discussions with folks it’s honest. Ok for all that did’nt guess by now (laughing as I’m typing), I’m Black. My experiences are different from other black persons that I know, still, that doesn’t keep me from trying to see where they are coming from. I frequently have open dicussions with all types of people about almost everything…you see my 1st rule is let’s agree to disagree. I’m cool with that, I know your life’s experiences are different that mine so when you tell me how you feel, I try to put myself in your shoes, and try and get a clear understanding as to why you feel as you do about a particular subject. If you felt I was trying to play victim some where point that out to me. Don’t be like ED….read the entire thread before you respond….. you may be reading a response to a ques. that was posed to me. You may need to go back and read what led up to that point. AK….listen I don’t play the blame game. Too much of that to go around. Now I will from time to time when the situation calls for it, go there, especially when an IDIOT tries to insult me for no reason…I too still suffer from BMS…….But please, feel free to question me on anything I say just know that I will argue my point in a strong but respectful manner. All I ask is that you respect me the way I respect you. Otherwise the gloves will come off, and it won’t be pretty….Food for thought…One day an innocent bystander walked by and saw a fool and a wise man arguing, when asked which one was the wise man and which the fool, he couldn’t tell one from the other. One more thing…Nate Ogden what’s up with that post #41….Dude you’ve got issues!!
Cobra….Thank You!!
Zorro…post #38 Yea, I see your point, But I don’t know about the Michael Jordan and the handsome thing..I’ll let you have that one!! That’s a pretty cool correlation…P.Hilton and 50…. never thought about it that way. It’s bad that advertisers just go for the bucks….no one cares about children anymore. I don’t know if he expands the chasm between black culture and white culture….I would think that most white folks don’t believe that’s how a majority of black people live….that’s tantamount to blacks believing that most white folks have sheets in their closets!! I think it’s just the people who are trying to make the bucks that keep that kind of crap in our faces….thanks for sharing with me about the ad…..
Cobra wrote:
> If you don’t think the attitudes of the gatekeepers
> of media influence the presentation of news,
> then I don’t know what to tell you.
Naw, I said myself I didn’t trust the source. My point was that concerning the public getting an idea that there is a crazily high violent crime rate among blacks, that this is true, no matter what media does with it. Though I will grant you, they probably make it worse (as they do anything).
As for who is more likely to commit a crime, the problem is that ’statistics’ are generalities; here in NE Oklahoma, no black is likely to harm me. Not because they are all saints, but because there are damn few of them (and I’m probably related to half). Now if I drive in ANY direction I find more, but in my little town, there aren’t many. My town land was donated by the natives and so, there are tons of natives (of about a dozen diff tribes) and a variety of immigrants from guatamala, micronesia, china, but not many blacks, oddly. I say oddly because it’s a nice town and I see no particular reason why blacks wouldn’t want to live here. In my little girl’s school, she had only one classmate who was black (or as she put it at age 6, there was ____ who was the tall boy, and ___ who was the girl with the brown face).
But in Culver City CA where I used to live, where walking through the mall made me think, “Gee… I am one of the few whites in the room, I guess now I know how it feels to be a minority!”… the stats would be different.
Anyway I agree with your point, that the perception is overdone. Sometimes I think this gets into what I said elsewhere, a cultural issue; marauding packs of skinheads in NY for example are recognized as ’skinheads’ not ‘whites’, whereas you could have 250 completely unrelated, different blacks alone or in groups who behaved badly and they would all just be seen as ‘blacks’ to most others. I think often the black race pays the price for that, socially (perhaps this is simply a variant on the they-all-look-alike-to-me theme).
> If there was a REAL representation of crime depicted
> in the media, you’d understand that there are far
> more WHITE criminals than there are black criminals.
I believe you. Maybe I don’t pay as much attention in that case, or, maybe the media makes a big story out of it if the people are black and puts it on page B-6 if they’re not. I haven’t really studied this. I did once do a serious study on the media related to Northern Ireland and was so aghast at the bias that reached “outright lie” proportion that it really disillusioned me. Perhaps it is that way with any topic one cares to study.
> you as a white person has far more to fear from other
> whites statistically, than from black folks like me.
Well yes, but that’s like the statistic that most car accidents happen close to home: I interact with vastly more white people than I do black people, since the blacks even in my family are a minority (and definitely are in my locale). There are more white people, with more white interaction, so there’s going to be more crime.
> You see, it’s these kinds of statements that
> raise the tempeture a bit in the room.
Well thanks for responding well…
> You probably don’t mean to do it, but
Actually, I don’t. And I think that most everybody including me has a lot of totally unconscious stuff that amounts to racism, translateable as assumption and stereotype, even below the level of conscious operation. I am for sure in any debate going to say something unusually stupid and rude that I had no intent for, simply because the problem with ignorance is, ya don’t know you’re ignorant when you are, or you wouldn’t be. Anyway, I’m sorry about that (after the fact, though it could happen again if I keep talking). I am open to education, though accidentally obtuse on occasion.
> insinuating that only language characteristics
> and mannerisms you feel psycologically
> compatible with are “acting like a normal
> human.â€
True I suppose. I would say, though, that what I am saying is normal is what is “average based on the environment.” When someone walks into an environ that is clean and neat, calm and quiet, and acts so differently that they openly shock everybody in the room (with race not even being an issue here), then I would say that person is not acting ‘normal’ (since the word normal is a stupid word, but at best would mean ‘average’). Had they been a group of white Texas cheerleaders behaving so rudely, it would have been just as shocking. (But, as I know more white chicks than black families, that probably would have less stereotype effect on me.)
> I guarantee you if you were at a repair shop on 18th
> Avenue in Brooklyn, or Macon, GA during a NASCAR race,
> the ambiance of the waiting room would not resemble
> C-SPAN’s “Book Notes.†Would you cast aspersions on “white culture†at that point?
Ah, but you have just taken the discussion out of the context here: that is a completely different environ. Trust me, even the environ in a speedway rally here in nowhere Oklahoma with a bunch of rednecks is pretty nutso by any standard–loud and chaotic and frenetic, no doubt. You are–in response perhaps to my doing so–reverse implying that a calm, quiet environ is “white” and I don’t think that’s the case; surely there is every range of social environ for people, no matter what their race. Part of being a well adapted person is being able to adapt to your environment.
I think this almost starts to mosey into the topic of integration and assimilation except on a more individual level perhaps. Back when I had 2-length tri-color hair (and a real gutter mouth) I didn’t fit in well with the church ladies anymore, but I was capable of putting on a hat and behaving well in the city library; I didn’t consider it an affront to my culture that I was expected to be relatively neat and quiet in a public place.
> Second, I doubt you’ve delved deeply enough into American
> History and Sociology if you think that White America
> has “hesitant†to express their disdain for non-whites.
> I guess taking 190 years to get Civil Rights on paper isn’t a big enough hint for some folks.
Well, I do have some edu there but not a great deal, but not geared toward the areas most affecting blacks and this discussion.
La Shawn’s post, and the spawning article, and the original comments, stemmed from a specific case of a comment that MODERN whites often feel inhibited from speaking what they wish about many issues where race overlaps the topic, because they fear being called a racist. Going back to the founding of the nation and the civil rights stuff is taking this out of context; I am sorry for history, but I didn’t do it, wasn’t there, and can only speak for my own little world. In that world, I’m a white person who has often been highly restrained about comments for fear of appearing racist, and I know many many others who have–the topic has even come up in conversations in business, in the social world, in family circles, over the years. So, I consider this a valid point and a real experience that I and others have… currently.
You know, this brings to mind something for me; women were treated like shit in several important ways until pretty recently as well. But I don’t think I have ever brought up, with a man in conversation even when the topic was men vs. women or more personalized similar issues, the issue of how long it took women to get the right to not be beat by their husbands let alone vote let alone work the same jobs for even marginally comparable pay. Probably because I was not raised with that atrocious history hanging over my people, my self-image, and my future; by the time I learned about this I was already an adult, and I didn’t have any sense of “fighting to be an equal” because I always considered myself to be one. Maybe in that case my ignorance was bliss.
> I get it, though.
–Cobra
Thanks for being decent about it.
La Shawn,
As usual, anytime you post on anything to do with race, it causes a firestorm of comments. I only wish I hadn’t been out of pocket at a law enforcement / security technology seminar, and had the opportunity to get in at the beginning of the discussion.
A lot of the comments have made good points, and I think that the heavy participation that takes place when you post about subjects like this indicates a need for this country to begin to have a more open and frank dialog about race, culture, racial preferences, and racism (both perceived and actual).
Oh, and BTW Mctank, what part of OK are you blogging from? As a 20 year cop who lives and works in Tulsa, you have gotten my curiosity aroused (guess I’ll have to check out your blog).
I agree with everything that Christine wrote, and add a serious concern. It is a terrible, terrible sign that white people are demanding the reeducation of a black woman merely because she thinks independently from the way that they do. I find those posts extremely offensive: They prove that least some South Carolinians are admittedly angry white people who are refusing to leave behind the ‘white knows best’ mentality of the antebellum south. For them to demand Christine take “course work” until she thinks thoughts approved by white people proves racism is alive and well. Michael Steel and Condoleeza Rice know this well too. Digusting.
The attitudes adopted by white liberals toward blacks who espouse a Conservative position is often racist and degrading. This mindset is nowhere better illustrated than when Howard Dean suggested at a Democrat Convention, that if the Convention had been Republican the only blacks in attendance would be the hotel help. What he is basically saying that black people have no right to be Republicans, because in Republican circles they are the hired help. This is disgusting and demonstrates a “big daddy” attitude. People like La Shawn fortunately help to set the record straight on this and other Democrat BS.
LaShawn and McTank, et al, great stuff.
R/
There is unwritten affirmative action in professional sports:
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0007,hsiao,12566,3.html
Nate, poster #41. I do agree with the majority of your comments with the exception of a few. Mainly the last comment about the slave trade. slavery was wrong no matter how you look at it, regardless as to who sold and bought who, slavery kept back a race of people in a country where its constitution read, “all men are created equal” So please do not include other foreign countries. There is no comparison. Those white people from those country would not have had any problems roaming this country back then, when slavery was prevalent. Many changes have allow blacks a lot freedoms today that they must grab hold of and keep pressing forward. No blaming just pressing forward.
That is truly a loss. People should be aware that she is entitled to her opinion.
I wish her the best of luck.
Keep up the good work, Ms. Barber
Monika Brooks
I guess freedom of the press only belongs to those who dont critize the liberal minorities what next? for the socialists and wheres JESSIE JACKASSON and aAL SHARKPTON?
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