Oct 29 2006
Are You Kidding Me?
What in the hell is wrong with the left today? What makes them think this is acceptable? ANOTHER incident of putting someone in blackface.
Crying UncleBLITZER: I have been covering the Cheneys for many years, including on a day-to-day basis when he was the defense secretary during the first Gulf War and I was CNN’s Pentagon correspondent . . . I was surprised when she came out swinging on Friday, surprised . . . at her sniping at my patriotism.
Wolf Blitzer
CNN Late Edition
October 29, 2006Translation: Oh Lawdy! Massa's wife so mad she even beatin' on us house slaves now. What dis ol' world comin' to?
This is sick.
UPDATE: Would-be commeters really should read the comment policy on the "About" page.
UPDATE: No, honestly, you really should read the comment policy. I will continue to delete comments that violate the rules. So you are really wasting your time if you keep trying to post comments that break the rules. Period.
UPDATE: Many thanks to all the people linking to this post. Please do take a look around if you're visiting for the first time.
64 Responses to “Are You Kidding Me?”
Quick, Spot the Racists…
Let us not forget that these incidents of lefty racism usually go on hiatus while they concentrate on attacking conservative Christians and Jews. Well actually the former is a twofer.
……
The most negative campaign commercial of all time…
I turned on the TV last night to watch a little football and had to suffer through another series of negative campaign ads. One stuck out as the most negative ad I’ve seen yet……
You think this one blogger represents “the left”??
Jane Hamsher did the same thing to Joe Lieberman. That wasn’t the first time. Where does it stop? Is this one blogger the entire left? No. Is he symptomatic? At this point there have been enough incidents to say yes, there is a problem and it is on the left.
Rich: they all look alike.
Gaius: Would have been better if it was Andy Cooper, the proverbial silver spoon-fed twit git.
So it’s OK for the Left to do this stuff, but it’s not OK for George Allen to say “macaca” and have a Confederate flag 30 years ago in his dorm room?
Fausta? Shuss yer mouth!
Fausta, Allen was actually hurling a racist slur. Billmon is making a point by reference to the legacy of slavery.
To say it’s racist, you’d have to argue that the constant use of such a horrific thing as this kind of racist imagery somehow normalizes what should be something like a sacred text. (this would be similar to critiques of comparing this or that to the holocaust - by using it in everyday discourse, the critique goes, we sap some it of its unique horror).
No jpe, this is unacceptable imagery in any context. There is no excuse for this - none whatsoever.
“You think this one blogger represents “the leftâ€??”
Why not? If it were one rightly blogger it would represent “the right,” Christians everywhere and allllllll ships at sea.
More Minstrel Humor From The Snarling Left…
Always angry Billmon takes a tip from always angry firedoglake and uses racist humor to try and score points on Dick Cheney. (HT: BlueCrabBoulevard.)
That’s the Pelosi left.
Any vote for any Democrat is a vote against victory and a vote for……
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jpe? Don't tell me… junior year; majoring in something with no economic dividend… believes Chomsky actually has done any worthy linguistics work in the last twenty-odd years, to be afforded a pass from class and paid for talking out his *** when it comes to things politic…. Am I close?
(Edit and warning, TC. I'm being very strict on this comment thread)
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[…] They are neither, and they don’t get a ******* pass. Blue Crab Boulevard | Permalink |MAIN […]Probably almost as surprised as Lynn was when you failed to talk about her book, and tried to ambush her politically. Of course, it’s always a challenge to patriotism, rather than an explanation of why a so-called American network would air enemy propaganda.
query to Large Blue Claw-enhanced majordomo: so, dancing down the steps to Hell is “not a good idea” today?
No, it is not a good idea today, TC.
I am a big ole liberal, and as much as it may pain me to say this, I am going to have to agree with my conservative friends here. that comic on billmon’s blog is offensive and not helpful to the debate discussion. there are a lot fo ways you can make the same point, and I am not sure why it is necessary to appeal to the ugly legacy of this nation’s racist past to make them. Having said this, I will say it is not ok for people on the left to do this (notice I differentiate between people on the left and “the left”) AND it is not ok for george allen to call people racist names (plz, don;t give me this “he made it up” crap) or for people to run racist ads in TN. neither should be acceptable.
Another blackface Photoshop from the far left…
The first time around it was Nutroots activist and Lamont supporter, far lefty blogger Jane Hamsher.
We have another instance of this type of asinine and juvenile behavior happening today. Blue Crab Boulevard has the details of the latest instance of a…
Gaius:
“this is unacceptable imagery in any context. There is no excuse for this - none whatsoever. ”
I agree but then I also agree that waving the traitorous, pro-slavery Confederate flag is inexcusable. What say we try to stop all of these coded race-baiting images? Okay?
Hi,
Here’s my follow up to this :
Vote Democrat. Even if some of them are morons
Apologies for leaving the link here but I can’t run trackbacks anymore due to spambot attcks.
Good catch, Blue Crab. I’m sure you are dealing with children who do not understand what they did or why it wa swrong. We on the right must remain patient and instructive.
Why is this “racist”? What race was Billmon poking fun at? Black people?
The words and text obviously aren’t equating black people with the subservient shuck-and-jive stereotype of minstrel shows.
Billmon was casting aspersions on Wolf Blitzer and CNN. Accuse Billmon of Blitzerism, if you must, but not racism.
Blackface is racist imagery, Kman. If you really don’t get that, you have a problem.
[…] Linked to : Blue Crab Boulevard,Webloggin […]
Lynne and Dick Cheney indeed really know a lot about patriotism… As evidenced by “five-deferment-I-had-other-priorities” Dick! These people have never seen a war they did not like, as long as they can stay far away from it and line their pockets with war-profiteering, stolen taxpayer dollars.
The Confederacy wasn’t racist. Jim Webb said so, so it has to be true, right?
And those “racist” ads in TN? The screams would be just as loud if the “playmate” had been black (reminding viewers of Ford’s race) or Asian or Latino (sexualing women of color).
So frickin predictable.
The MSM, Liberals, And “Racism”…
Last week, the double standard with which the media treats allegations of racism made by Democrats and Republicans was made abundantly clear. You can read my take on that at Human Events today. Here’s a taste: In November 2005, Sen…….
Ed:
The Confederate Flag is not necessarily racist. It would depend on how it is being used. Let me give you an example:
My wife was born and raised in the USSR. She is now an American citizen, has been for 10 years. In our home we have a big Soviet flag hanging right next to our American flag. We are quite aware of what was done in the Communist days and make no apologies for any of the horrors from those times. We cheered when the Berlin Wall came down, and cried tears of joy when the Russian people gained their freedom. However, none of this changes the fact that that flag to my wife represents Home to her. It represents her childhood, her growing up, her worldview; if you will, and always will. Does that mean we want Gorby and his ilk back? Of course not, but it does represent for her a past that is a part of her.
Hmmmm Evil Progressive. President Clinton’s draft dodging and Carter’s pardon of thousands who left the country for Canada doesn’t seem to bother you all that much, so why harp on legal deferments?
It is racist to insist that Harold Ford Jr. can date only black women. Kofi Annan, Clarence Thomas and a few million other black men might havve a problem with that.
Blackface is racist
Faux outrage when minor lefty blogger comments that CNN is a house slave to the Bush administration. No problems with Allen using macaca - a common term in hard-core racist Virginia circles and in Allen’s mother’s homeland, and no problems with Allen’s unbelievable lying and saying that he has never used the n-word. One former GOP lobbyist wrote he heard Allen use it in soliciting money to run for Senator.
Support civil rights and be less hypocritical and then we might believe your outrage.
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No wonder he is such a ****. Hey lizards.
(edit and warning, please read the comment policy)
Topp 100 in the TTLB ecosystem is minor? Your name is quite apt.
bebelbrox:
Of course it has memories that she has respect for but would she insist on flying it in the Ukraine or Latvia that were occupied? Would she insist on waving it in the faces of the Gulag survivors or the families of those who didn’t survive?
The fight over the flag has been exactly over these issues. It’s been used as a symbol of defiance and resistance to the Civil Rights movement and to our Constitutional form of government. If you think it’s a good idea to destroy the USA, go ahead and wave it. As a patriotic American, I consider it the sign of traitors.
Race For Congress Tightens Up In Last Days…
It looks like it will be a nail biter for both sides once again. While some pundits have already written post-mortems for the GOP and many Conservatives have all but given up on retaining control of the House, it looks to be a close race as they appr…
Ed:
I think I am say the same thing as you. There are those who use it as a symbol of hatred, there are those who use it to express a certain “southern pride” or a pride in a rural life (rednecks if you will), and there are those who haven’t a darn clue as to why they display it. They are not all one and the same.
I think it would be helpful if the person who created this thread actually explained how Billmon’s razor-sharp criticism of mainstream media servility by utilizing a classic American cultural symbol that exemplifies that “plantation” mentality perfectly is somehow racist?
Does the use of any racist imagery to drive home an analoguos point automatically make the user a racist and/or discount all his or her credibility? Were the Dutch newspaper editors who ran those cartoons awhile back automatically anti-Muslim? Or were they simply utilizing powerful imagery to generate a point for discussion?
How does the sheer use of an image of America’s racist history make the user a racist? Particularly when that image is used in an effort to criticize a person or institution for acting in a manner that is analoguos to that racism?
Your criticism seems to be the eptiome of what rankles critics of overweening political correctness across the ideological spectrum.
Your sum counter-analysis of what obviously really struck a chord within you is “this is sick.” Why is it sick? Is just the image itself sickening? If so, that seems a bit overly sensitive if not outright intellectually childish.
Thanks in advance.
It’s not the wretched PhotoShop that’s racist, so much, it’s Billmon’s deliberately racist use of black minstrel slang. That’s what’s so offensive here. I see the Usual Suspects are showing up to provide the Usual Rationalizations and Argument By Misdirection. They did the same thing after the Wellstone Funeral catastrophe.
Believe me, you have no idea how much in common your highly partisan Lefty Kossack has with David Duke and the people over at the National Socialist White People’s Party. Two sides, same coin. They just don’t see it. Most of them haven’t read Hoffer’s The True Believer. They need to.
Defending the indefensible as razor sharp. Very good.
Perhaps Prometheus 6 could get it through.
http://www.prometheus6.org/node/14419
There is of course one other simple test: what would the reaction be from the left if a right leaning blog had done this? Describing it as razor sharp would not be the way that discussion would go.
It is racist imagery, but is every use racist? What if it were displayed at a civil rights museum - that wouldn’t seem to be racist, because the context is important. So what we have to do is look at the context: is Billmon using the imagery to say that blacks are subservient creatures or somesuch? Or is he using it as a play on the meaning of the imagery?
These are the questions that have to be investigated in analyzing the post.
[…] We have another instance of this type of asinine and juvenile behavior happening today. Blue Crab Boulevard has the details of the latest instance of a far left blogger thinking it’s funny and entirely appropriate to create and post an image of someone in blackface. […]
It would be proper in a museum in context. That’s the only legitimate reason for it. Again, if a right wing blogger had done what would your reaction be?
Mine would be the same. It is unacceptable. Period.
Lemming, “macaca - a common term” - I had no idea this term was a “common term” and apparently neither did anyone else since every news report (and there have been a abundance of them) treated it as if it was the first time the word was ever uttered in the United States; as it may very well have been.
Without any proof to the contrary, the whole ‘macaca’ incident simply comes down to a guy trying to call out to someone who’s name he didn’t know using a word that just happened to be a slur in another part of the world. There is no indication he meant it as a personal insult or even was aware of it’s meaning, even taking into account his maternal heritage. His explanation that it was a simple mishearing of a nickname being brandied about by the volunteers makes much more sense then that it was meant as a racial attack for no apparent reason.
The same can not be said for the use of blackface or the constant referral to African American Conservatives as “Uncle Tom’s” or “Aunt Jemimas”. When these terms or images are used it is quite clear that the speaker/artist is being deliberate.
Jlo:
The reason it is racist is the same reason the original use was racist; the sole purpose is to demean. The same as the the ‘n’ word, the word was originally used to make a class of people feel ‘less than people’.
Unfortunately, in this country as well as other English speaking countries throughout the world, the word became part of the general vocabulary as it’s original meaning faded with time.
To quote Gaius: ‘If you really don’t get that, you have a problem.’
A link to your comment policies would be a good idea.
“It is racist imagery, but is every use racist? What if it were displayed at a civil rights museum - that wouldn’t seem to be racist, because the context is important. ”
The museum is displaying racist imagry and explaining it. Billmon (and FDL) _used_ racist imagry to convey a message, and the message had nothing to do with why/how this imagry was _bad_.
Is it racist? Most obviously so. What is the context and who is it making a statement to and about? If we want to use Melhman’s definition, if the “respectfully disagrees” with the implication that it is racist, then it isn’t racist.
The whole Confederate flag thing really is silly. It is like the revising of the Civil War not being about slavlery and into being about state’s rights versues Federal Power. From a degree of seperation, it is… however, if you look at the administrations leading up to President Lincolns, the Free Land issues and the disagreements leading up to it (such as Bloody Kansas) you will see that it was caused by the differences between the north and the south… it was about slavery… it was about the preservation of the Sourthern way of life (most assuredly including slavery!).
However, as to attributing to all based upon the actions or beliefs of one… that is quite common when Limbaugh or Coulter writes a book… they look for the looniest person and say all “liberals” believe that. I am a liberal, and I am a disabled vet and I resent the way we vets are treated as “heros” until we happen to disagree. That is not honoring a vet… that is using a vet. It is shameful.
Ford said the ad wasn’t racist, btw.
Linked the comment policy.
This is just another cheap right wing smear job, utterly petty and irrelevant. Since Wolf is about as black as an albino cat, who cares?
It’s usually under the surface…
…but occasionally it comes out for all to see. There’s a pattern this year - the racist treatment of Steele, racism (and yesterday’s possible anti-semitism) in liberal blogs. The constant screeching of “racism” at conservatives in cases where the…
DISGUSTING!!
Yup, just as I thought. More rationalizations than a Deconstructionist at a Wellstone Funeral.
Jesus wept.
[…] related Links: Are You Kidding Me , Race Tightens, Rove’s Legacy, Kerry Pimps Zot Media Inc. is an original comic strip from Vimto, a regular contributor to Nuke’s news & views, and is the exclusive property of Zot Media Inc. All Rights Reserved. […]
Blitzer considers himself a patriot? I must be Old School: I thought patriots didn’t provide aid and comfort to the enemy.
Never, not for a moment, did I ever beleive Black Face to be a racist. It was’nt designed, nor meant to be a negative image of African-Americns. It was and remains an ancient Theatrical device (Greek and Japanese KaBuki) to designate a symbolic voice, eg: of the gods. It is a ‘Masque’, not to be confused with, let us say, a halloween mask, which is, in it’s origins a religious/political ceromony which defines specific enemies of Christian States during particular periods in Europe eg: the hooked-nosed Witch, the malformed dwarf (now:’Little People’ on TV) etc. even Death itself is the enemy.
Black Face was and still is, in my mind, a magnificent form of Theatre that brought and still brings Joy to vast millions of people of all racial and religious diversities. Some of the earliest desplays of Black Face were in Early American ‘Vaudeville’ Shows (Vaudeville is an ancient French word & concept that is translated and defined as: The Voice of the City), and that tradition lasted in the U.S. about a hundred years. Vaudeville, with it’s Black Face gave rise to great performers - say rather - Artists!
I see only error in the Faux-Political Correctness that demonizes Theatrical Black Face by revolutionaries and radical scholars who declared, in the 1960’s that Black Face was demeaning to Negro’s. They manipulated the young people of the era to accept a LIE, a total false-hood. They made the young into dhimmis, They Mau-Mau’d the kids of America, and coined Black-ness into a commodity.
The House-Servant Slaves were not excoriated, certainly not by the Master’s and certainly not by the Field Slaves themselves, for the House Slaves, whether it was Uncle Tom or Aunt Jamimma were the trusted interface between two worlds that were seperated by much more than different cultures.
Black Face, Uncle Tom and Aunt Jamimma were and are demeaned by the college educated(?) young Black men and woman of the sixties, their contrary & lame racist war cry: “Black IS Beautiful” and for the most part their attempt at a proprietory copywrite on victim-hood.
enuf-fur-now!
AHAHHAHAHA!
Hysterical in every sense of the word.
Gaius Says:
October 30th, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Defending the indefensible as razor sharp. Very good.
Perhaps Prometheus 6 could get it through.
http://www.prometheus6.org/node/14419
There is of course one other simple test: what would the reaction be from the left if a right leaning blog had done this? Describing it as razor sharp would not be the way that discussion would go.
…………………………………………………………………
But you see, this is exactly my point - and you miss it just as badly as you miss Billmon’s. This isn’t a right or left issue (I mean for crissakes, Billmon is criticizing CNN), but an issue about everyone’s right to utilize powerful and even distasteful imagery to portray a point of view.
It’s fine to disagree with that p.o.v. (in fact I encourage dissent and criticism), but don’t try and paint Billmon as a racist when it’s painfully obvious under any objective examination that the point he’s attempting to make is that Blitzer and far too many of his cronies in the popular media were a bunch of syncophantic clowns regarding the current presidential administration up until the public polls told them that that kind of fawning coverage was no longer necessary. Of course, the hard questions Wolf chose to level at Lynne Cheney are now, after a all that has happened in the last half decade, repulsively too little and too late.
Apparently you would have everyone never utilize any reference, whether direct or indirect, to blackface or slavery or any other form of institutional racism to drive home a critical point. That’s fine and all as your own tastes and values go, but Billmon was utilizing the imagery to emphasize his well-founded disgust with what is often referred to (thoughtlessly) as the liberal media.
There’s a lot more to Billmon’s post than you are willing to allow simply because of your knee-jerk political correctness is screaming so loudly as to drown out any of your normal analytical skills.
On that last point, you really ought to develop a more sophisticated sense of humor too. After all, isn’t ironic to refer to a chief CNN commentator/reporter as essentially a “self-loathing uncle tom” so to speak? If it were some Fox equivalent, I would accuse Billmon of taking a cheap shot, but you gotta hand it to him for instead directing the cannon at one of leading lights of the so-called Communist News Network.
Tell you what, jlo, how about you try that sophisticated sense of humor at an NAACP meeting. Better yet, how about a Nation of Islam gathering.
You’ll be a real hit.
If that is sophisticated, I’ll just keep the sense of humor I have. It suits me better.
That and my sense of what is right and what is wrong.
Gaius,
The LLL’s have no sense of right and wrong. That is why they simply can not understand why people do not laugh at things like their blackface cartoons.
This is just reason #88956353769 as to why the Democrats and their LLL supporters should never be allowed into a position of power ever again.
I predict former Crossfire personality, Lynn Cheney will stay Former. One blogger doesn’t represent the left, but somehow
Pat Robertson and that Falwell guy speaks for all Christians.
Like Fred Phelps speaks for Al and Tipper Gore:
http://www.lcrga.com/archive/200010251159.shtml
It’s all part of an incredibly complex yet wonderfully simple system of self-entitlement that that particular group feels.
If done by a conservative, it’s racist; if done by a leftist, it’s art.
The complex part of it is the pretzel logic required to justify the whole thing:
Apparently you would have everyone never utilize any reference, whether direct or indirect, to blackface or slavery or any other form of institutional racism to drive home a critical point. That’s fine and all as your own tastes and values go, but Billmon was utilizing the imagery to emphasize his well-founded disgust with what is often referred to (thoughtlessly) as the liberal media.
There’s a lot more to Billmon’s post than you are willing to allow simply because of your knee-jerk political correctness is screaming so loudly as to drown out any of your normal analytical skills.
Republican inappropriately propositions underage page; he’s outed and roundly condemned as a predator by the HRC among others. Democrat has sex with underage page, and he’s a trailblazer, celebrated by HRC and others.
The key, I guess is how you define “normal analytical skills”.
Gaius Says:
October 30th, 2006 at 8:14 pm
Tell you what, jlo, how about you try that sophisticated sense of humor at an NAACP meeting. Better yet, how about a Nation of Islam gathering.
You’ll be a real hit.
If that is sophisticated, I’ll just keep the sense of humor I have. It suits me better.
That and my sense of what is right and what is wrong.
………………………………………………………………………………….
Like I said, knee-jerk. You must be a real blast at parties.
Again, why would any black person have a problem with some one using black face to criticize a white television reporter and the industry he works for?
Wouldn’t the black face have to be directed at, um, BLACK PEOPLE, to be so “wrong” as you insist? Here’s an idea, forward this ridiculous thread to your nearest NAACP chapter and get their comment before you presume to speak for them. I don’t even know how I became a Farrakhan lover with my post, so I won’t address that comment.
Please don’t bother to invite me to join you at the next screening of Borat. I can imagine you standing up in the theatre two minutes into the movie stridently lecturing all the rest of us on how sick and wrong we are to laugh at irony.
Hypocracy to the left of me, hypocracy to the right of me….Ad Nauseum…political correctness has grown into a hideous monster that stifles legitimate debate, no matter your political leanings. Enough.
Jim,
You are wrong here. This is not political correctness.
I believe we are all “politically incorrect” in someone’s eyes. (except of course liberal statements to liberal ears). I have long since quit giving a rat’s *** about whether or not anything I say is deemed PC. I just speak my mind and let the chips fall where they may. Is the Blackface Blitzer PC? Depends on what “is” is! No need to try to make any logical sense from the Party of Obfuscation. I’m Jim and my dog Spot approved this message.