A brief gloss on Darleen’s post, below:
Charges of racism are a serious thing. Kaufman uses them to silence critics and shame people into supporting egregious public policy that does nothing more than perpetuate the very racism he claims to abhor — with people like him overseeing the efforts like British noblemen overseeing their Wogs. He’s a selfish opportunist, and worse, he has exchanged the very real and serious charge of racism for the strictly rhetorical effect the word has in public discourse. That is, SEK has decided that actual racists are so few and far between (and so are the lesser of two evils, to his way of thinking) that the charge of “racism” is now to be directed toward those non-racists who exhibit the markers (which are often coincidentally teased out of “coded language” by academics like Kaufman) of a brand of “racism” that SEK and his cadre of progressive flim flam men have themselves determined: a desire for color-blind policy, a failure to support certain race-based initiatives, a refusal to vote social-Democrat, a disagreement with policies put forth by a black President…
Ironically, it is SEK and his like who are so worried about the dwinding number of actual racists in this country that they’ve felt compelled to invent whole new swathes of such — all in order to keep alive the kind of identity politics that, at their base, fundamentally challenge the classical liberal system upon which this country was founded.
SEK is both a serial liar and a moral fraud. He masquerades as a savior of the disadvantaged, and yet he champions policy that has the practical effect of stoking racial animus and keeping his charges (and let’s face it, that’s what he sees them as — not as individuals, but rather as a collection of similarly shaded objects upon which to elevate his own sense of worth) at a perpetual disadvantage. All so he can control the way wealth and power are spread around.
He’s the worst kind of petty tyrant: the kind that hides behind a shield of unearned righteousness and blinding sanctimony.
He should really start his own church.
****
update: Per Joe, Kaufman responds amplifies his position [see update 4, below, for explanation of the edit - jg]:
As the body of the post makes plain, I was pointing out that conservative bloggers are in the unenviable position of race-baiting by default, because no matter what grounds they criticize Obama on, a vocal portion of their commentariat will respond with unveiled racism.
Quickly, if it is conservative bloggers (who may or may not be racist, and who may or may not write in racist “code” in hopes of reaching an audience that may or may not be comprised of racists, at least some of whom are openly so) who find themselves in the “unenviable position of race-baiting by default,” this must mean one of two things: there are no other kinds of bloggers (which, using only SEK as a performative example, we know to be false) or else non-conservative bloggers don’t have such worries, because non-conservative bloggers don’t appeal to those readers who “respond with unveiled racism.”
– Which, it follows, means that either non-conservative blog readers aren’t really racist, or else they’ve learned to respond in a way that is more properly veiled.
Thus, we can safely conclude that, per SEK, non-conservative bloggers are to be envied either 1) because they don’t appeal to racists (and so, they themselves are members of a morally superior political compact and can’t themselves be racist) or 2) because the racists they do appeal to have learned how to “veil” their racism in a way that is socially permissible.
Like, say, by couching it in progressive political policy talk.
I’ll let my readers decide which of those cases SEK is more likely making with his response.
****
update 2: from the archives, my response to Steve Sailer on population genetics and the common usage of “race” in American politics. Check out the comments, where none other than Matthew Yglesias — a one time regular commenter here — chimes in with his “conservative” agreement.
Granted, mine is not so rigorous an argument as “conservatives attract racists because racists are conservatives,” but then, that’s why my shit has never really sold all that well.
****
update 3: A follow-up debate to the Sailer post with the late Aaron Hawkins of “Uppity Negro” fame.
Man. The blogosphere was so much different back then…
If Kaufman and his cloister of unreconstructed bigots wanted to have an actual debate, those past posts of mine — which draw out my “conservative” position on race — would be a fine place for them to start forging their counters.
Of course, tackling those ideas takes more time and effort than vomiting out post after post about how conservatives are racist just because they are, so I won’t be holding my breath.
Meantime, STOP OTHERING US, SCOTT!
****
update 4: Per Joe again, Kaufman responds to my response by noting that his initial response was responding to some other response, not to my response to his response (which response was never intended as a response to me). Accordingly, I’m an “idiot.” For noting that SEK responded. When what he did was something else entirely.
– Which, while his judgment on my intellectual capacity certainly is debatable (and while a side note and a response may very well be two different things), doesn’t change the fact that SEK’s note contains precisely the logic I detailed, and makes just as little sense even in its new context with its new compositional category, and regardless of at whom it was directed.
Besides, I’ve seen Scott’s youtube clips. And frankly? He really should avoid calling other people idiots. As well as “dumpy, slovenly-dressed chick repellants,” if and when that urge ever strikes him.
Pot, kettle, etc., you understand…
****
update 5: A reminder, for next time SEK talks about how we “conservatives” create an echo chamber or fear dissent.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 9:32 am #
You shut down the competition by calling them racist. It is intentional. And it is a tactic that has worked. Stacy McCain is getting a good dose of it–he is now openly described as a “white supremacist” by the left.
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 9:33 am #
Let me provide the response from SEK and his band of labeling men: OWWWW!!!! RACIST!!!
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 9:35 am #
Well, they used to be. Now they’re mostly foolish, as SEK deftly demonstrates.
Comment by Obstreperous Infidel on 11/30 @ 9:39 am #
Well said, Jeff. The dude’s an evil snake oil salesman and nothing else. At least a real snake oil salesman’s clients were just gullible, his are deluded and dumb as dirt on which he counts on. Are there any honest statists? Any?
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 9:40 am #
Kaufman responds: “As the body of the post makes plain, I was pointing out that conservative bloggers are in the unenviable position of race-baiting by default, because no matter what grounds they criticize Obama on, a vocal portion of their commentariat will respond with unveiled racism.”
It is not conservative bloggers who are to blame, it is those damn pesky racist conservative mobs who read and comment on them that are the problem (as Scott Kaufman chuckles at his next cocktail party oratory, “Fortunately most of the conservative proletariate can’t read.”).
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 9:43 am #
Ah, so that leaves Squat in the unenviable position of idiot baiting by default. You’ve seen his commentariat, right?
Comment by Reason on 11/30 @ 9:45 am #
On the upside most of the reality-based community can’t think, Joe.
Comment by ThomasD on 11/30 @ 9:46 am #
It is interesting to see how the level of discourse has eroded over the years as SEK is now descending into full-on bunker mode.
It’s a pattern that we’ve seen before, and one I expect to get much worse.
Should the Democrats lose control of the House and Obama be face a real need for compromise (along with some real investigations) expect it to get much, much worse.
Comment by Spiny Norman on 11/30 @ 9:52 am #
Ironically, most illiteracy in this country is found in ethnic urban ghettos, where SEK and his like-minded self-styled elitists are, like Jeff wrote: “keeping his charges … at a perpetual disadvantage”.
That’s what I’d call an “own goal”.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 9:54 am #
Ah, so that leaves Squat in the unenviable position of idiot baiting by default. You’ve seen his commentariat, right?
Exactly.
1) A post which inspires “racist” comments (by SEK’s fucktarded definition) is “race-baiting”.
2) SEK has characterized the responses to HIS OWN POSTS as “racist”.
3) Therefore SEK is a race-baiter.
That’s white people’s oppressive logic, though, so I’m sure it doesn’t apply. Authentic black folk like SEK have Other Ways of Knowing.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 10:00 am #
As the body of the post makes plain, I was pointing out that conservative bloggers are in the unenviable position of race-baiting by default, because no matter what grounds they criticize Obama on, a vocal portion of their commentariat will respond with unveiled racism.”
Ok, so SEK’s position isn’t that the conservative bloggers are necessarily racist. I mean, they could be, but being such good writers or some-such they are able to veil it. But the commenters? The readers?
They unwittingly reveal their true selves. Can’t help themselves.
That’s pretty much SEK’s position?
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 10:03 am #
I mean, regardless, it’s idiotic. He’s not discussing any particular racism per sec. He’s just expressing his asinine opinion regarding conservatives (being RACIST!) which he can’t support empirically.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:05 am #
He doesn’t need to support his opinion, because it’s FACT!!!
Why? Shut up, that’s why.
Comment by Blake on 11/30 @ 10:09 am #
I’m confused, are we talking about Scott Kaufman or Charles Johnson?
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:10 am #
You know who’s the worst of the default race baiters, according to Squat’s definition? Barack Obama.
Comment by Spiny Norman on 11/30 @ 10:10 am #
Hard to tell any more.
Comment by Spiny Norman on 11/30 @ 10:13 am #
Other Ways of Knowing
Is that what you get after going through compulsory re-education camp?
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:13 am #
Is there a sale at Amazon involved? If not, it’s Squat.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 10:18 am #
Huckabee proves that he is a cowardly douchebag. And probably a racist too. One of those liberal Christian bleeding heart racists, often the worse kind.
Comment by Obstreperous Infidel on 11/30 @ 10:18 am #
So ONLY conservatives (meaning Republicans) are racists? Either way, SEK is an idiot. I live near Cleveland. This is a democratic stronghold and there are more honest to goodness racist democrats (think Union members) than you can shake a stick at. I feel bamboozled by SEK. I thought, at one time, he was a standup, non moronic Statist. I’d like to offer a mea culpa.
Comment by Whitey Dont Play Dat on 11/30 @ 10:18 am #
“Stacy McCain is getting a good dose of it–he is now openly described as a “white supremacist” by the left.”
It is inaccurate to call him a white supremacist. The guy writes about the “natural revulsion” towards interracial marriage and how targeting whites in teen pregnancy campaigns is part of racial suicide. Some of this under pseudonyms that evoke confederate supporters of slavery.
That is not supremacy. It is decline. He seems to be leading by example in whitey’s decline. And it is amusing to watch.
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 10:25 am #
So Scott’s position is that conservative commentators, because of the positions that they hold on ideology, policy and government, are the only ones who speak to “veiled” racists, bringing them to the front, because those very positions held constitute race baiting to a small group of veiled racists baited into revealing themselves by conservative bloggers and their positions?????
[...]
Paging Rube Goldberg … Rube Goldberg … Please report to SEK’s rhetoric class to fix the outrage machine…
So is SEK baiting the race baiting conservatives or does the use of “racist” constitute an unintentional baiting of conservative bloggers natural race baiting?
Or is the whole thing as fundamentally ridiculous as it sounds?
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 10:28 am #
sockpuppets ‘R us.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 10:37 am #
Post updated to respond to response.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:37 am #
There is a certain “natural revulsion” towards anyone who is not of “our tribe.” This dates back to our hunter-gatherer past, which in evolutionary time is not very long ago. Since the left embraces evolution, it’s surprising that most of them don’t recognize this. I don’t see this as being wrong, it’s just a fact of life. I also think that basic horniness will overcome that instinct as tribal pressures to conform to it are lessened. Finally, since “mutts” are the most healthy of critters, I think ultimately that the mixing of “races” is overall a good thing for the future of human survival (when I care if humanity survives, which isn’t often).
It’s also fairly clear that if your “tribe” does not reproduce at least at a replacement rate, your tribe will disappear. Pretty obvious, and not racist in the slightest.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 10:39 am #
You should try responding to me, WDPD, and not Stacy McCain, who not only isn’t here, but isn’t the one making the argument.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:40 am #
I don’t think he even knows.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:41 am #
Uh, uh,…RUSH LIMBAUGH!!11!!
Take that, wingnuts.
Comment by ted360 on 11/30 @ 10:44 am #
Wow, a defense of hating inter-racial marriage! Don’t tell jesus that all people are people.
We’re all just tribes, you know, and whatever instincts we have, we just cannot help. Civilization was a bad idea and the Founders had it all wrong.
That’s pretty cranky, David.
Would you care to defend RSM for anything found here:
http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.com/2009/10/meet-robert-stacy-mccain-neo.html
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:45 am #
Yeah, I guess I should’ve left that comment by WDPD alone. I had a weak moment.
The racism on the left is veiled and pervasive. It permeates a good deal of their policies and rhetoric. The racism on the right (what little there is from the fringe element) is blatant and limited. But since appearances clearly matter more than substance, the right is evil.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:46 am #
Ted is a moron. Everyone look at ted and laugh.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:49 am #
Ted is a product of our public schools, where apparently teaching “multiculturalism” is more important than reading comprehension.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 10:49 am #
FOCUS TED. Scroll up to the top of the page and re-check where you are. Scan through the commenters.
Then get back to us.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 10:50 am #
Good to hear ted is down with the whole melting pot thing.
Because frankly, I find the whole multicultural / “diversity” quilt idea to be anti-American.
Comment by Whitey Don't Play Dat on 11/30 @ 10:52 am #
“You should try responding to me, WDPD, and not Stacy McCain, who not only isn’t here, but isn’t the one making the argument.”
That was in response to Joe, not RSM.
“It’s also fairly clear that if your “tribe” does not reproduce at least at a replacement rate, your tribe will disappear. Pretty obvious, and not racist in the slightest.”
The racism would be along the lines of your “tribe” being white people, as opposed to, say, people. But it could also just be lazy ignorance to use some pseudo-science evolution to declare a revulsion “natural” and therefore somehow acceptable to liberals. It’s not racism, it’s lazy ignorance. It’s not supremacy, it’s whitey’s decline.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 10:55 am #
Whitey Don’t Play That is suddenly in for the whole melting pot idea, as well!
Wow! Looks like we’ve inadvertently outed two conservatives here today!
And by “conservatives,” I of course me racists. Congrats! SEK loathes you.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:55 am #
Does it work that way for black people as opposed to, say, people? Surely you’ve got a condemnation up your sleeve.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 10:55 am #
Yup, my description of what I think is a natural, ingrained response in humans (which I also stated I think is best overcome) is my justification for saying that one should HATE “interracial” couples. It’s all there if you just read it with the proper nuance.
Sheesh.
Anyway, ted360 is Trollhammered again, so I won’t waste anyone’s time reading me batting him around any more.
Comment by EJ D on 11/30 @ 10:58 am #
As the body of the post makes plain, I was pointing out that liberal bloggers are in the unenviable position of race-baiting by default, because no matter what grounds they criticize social programs on, a vocal portion of their commentariat will respond with unveiled racism.
So amateurish.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 10:58 am #
Ah, I’ll bet WDPT is down with abolishing the White Congressional Caucus.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 11:00 am #
But if there are only people, how can there be conservatives?
Comment by Silver Whistle on 11/30 @ 11:01 am #
The racism would be along the lines of your “tribe” being white people, as opposed to, say, people.
I think you’ll find that a “tribe” is a small subset of “people”, and that “tribes” exhibit “tribal” behaviour frequently, without the label “racist” being applied.
Comment by Brock on 11/30 @ 11:02 am #
Now THIS is the sort of content that might be worth a monthly subscription. I’ve missed ya JG.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:03 am #
I should have hammered WDPD as well, but instead I read his latest screed of stupidity. Reading comprehension is not just a river in Egypt.
Anyway, he’s hammered as well. If a regular can tell my why what I said is wrong, I will listen and take heed. While it isn’t fully fleshed out, to me it follows a logical pattern of human behavior and gives a reason for it’s existence. That doesn’t justify it, it just points out why the initial response occurs.
Tangentially, as Ric Locke wrote before, the natural human inclination is towards a collectivist society, which again arises from our hunter-gatherer past. We didn’t really improve that much until we moved away from that kind of thinking into capitalism. However, those inclinations towards collectivism are still a part of our makeup, and should be recognized while being minimalized.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 11:04 am #
Incidentally, genetic work is being done in the area of “race”; it’s just that race doesn’t mean the same thing to most geneticists as it does to people who use the word casually and politically.
I made the same argument to Steve Sailer years ago: I argued for a change in terminology to account for a change in what is meant (an argument I’ve used also in the same-sex marriage debates).
Ironically, it is a “conservative” like me who is able to reconcile the science (there are such things as “racial difference,” though I wouldn’t call them “racial” as such) and yet those differences are — and should be — incidental where the law is concerned.
Whereas it is progressives who want to Balkanize the country into racial/ethnic/gendered identity groups, and grant special protected classes rights and privileges withheld from other groups — making the law complicit in racism, while pretending there is no scientific difference between so-called “races” that aren’t socially constructed (by whites, naturally).
If only you people would stop being so defensive and examine the logic of your own positions, you wouldn’t tie yourself up in knots trying to justify your own bigotries. Try it. It’s liberating…!
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 11:07 am #
So you like them, like, all tribal and such.
I hear Stacy McCain has a newsletter you can subscribe to.
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 11:10 am #
Up is down. Black is white. Cheech is Chong.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 11:12 am #
I like my ethnics unassimilated and their restaurants “authentic”
I’d suggest staying well clear of SEK’s campus, then. White as a Lutheran lutefisk church supper in Luverne, Minnesota, it is.
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 11:12 am #
Being 100% Portuguese I have the distinct pleasure of cultural history on both sides of the slave equation.
While that might give me authenticity I’m having trouble defining the authentic.
Suggestions?
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 11:13 am #
#49 SBP: Garrison Keillor just issued a cease and desist order on your ass. ;-)
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:15 am #
Whiter than white? Check.
Raised Lutheran? Check.
Live in Minnesota? Check.
I guess a person cannot get whiter than I am without becoming translucent.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 11:16 am #
I always use the anti-racism-accusation-magic-bullet:
“What Alan Keyes said.”
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 11:18 am #
Holy Jeebus and Good Allah. Denounced. Denounced and condemned.
RACISTS !!!!!!!!!!!
Merely by defending yourself against the charge of racism, you prove yourself to be a racist. Haven’t you learned that by now?
I am going to go oppress some minorities, and women, all in my own home.
Comment by Immigration's Red Rooster on 11/30 @ 11:23 am #
“So you like them, like, all tribal and such.”
Tribal? I just like my food strong and flavored and not all melting-potted together into bland High Fructose Corn Syrup-based slop designed in a New Jersey chemical lab. However, I will add that the finest example of transcending the tribal / assimilation / non-assimilation debate is Sriracha hot sauce. Made in the USA. Does it get any more american than this guy?
“While that might give me authenticity I’m having trouble defining the authentic.”
How easy is it to find a decent Bacalhau à Brás?
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 11:24 am #
I like my ethnics unassimilated and their restaurants “authentic” and not watered down to please whitey.
So you like them, like, all tribal and such.
I’m so down with my inner-tribal-self, I refuse to eat in any ethnic restaurant that would actually serve someone a pasty-white as SEK.
Comment by BumperStickerist on 11/30 @ 11:25 am #
I find SEK’s comment about Darleen learning “jiu jitsu” from Jeff to be Anti-Semitic.
Dozens of martial arts and mixed martial arts terms to use and SEK comes up with JEW jitsu?
Jeff being Jewish and all …
… why it’s clearer than clear. Scott Kaufman – Anti-Semite.
Why, I doubt *any* of SEK’s commenters took him to task over SEK’s anti-semitic comment … ergo all of SEK’s commenters are anti-semites as well, being as they are attracted to SEK’s blatant anti-semitism.
His viewers are more than likely to be Anti-Semites as well. But that just follows logically.
..
..
..
and don’t give me any explanation that involves jiu-jitsu being a form that turns an attacker’s force upon his or herself. It’s anti-semitic. Unless you’re Asian. Asians are not anti-semite. They’re asian.
..
~ cough ~
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:26 am #
46: Even before I read your argument years ago against the notion of race as it is normally used, I was ready to throw it out as the useless term it was. What you wrote finally pushed me over the edge, and I usually don’t like to use the word without having quotes around it, because it has too much freight.
There are obviously certain expressions of the human genome that tend to clump in various regions in genetic space. Often those regions can be associated with melanin content. Beyond that, there isn’t much to say, which won’t keep the left from saying it.
All humans should have an unobstructed chance at the brass ring. However, that doesn’t mean that if they don’t all make it we should “do something” about it. Some are luckier than others, some need to work harder than others, that is simply a fact of life. If you want to “fix” that, you are embracing your inner collectivist. If we do that too much, we’ll all be hunter-gatherers again.
Here’s a fun fact that I learned when I was doing robotics as a grad student, before I switched to data mining. We shared a lab with the computer vision guys, and guess what? There is no such thing as different-colored humans. The only differences are the intensity. Sorry to burst any bubbles, lefty race-mongers.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 11:27 am #
I just like my food strong and flavored
Right. Served by colorful natives who know their places and wearing their colorful native costumes!
Comment by Rusty on 11/30 @ 11:27 am #
#49
I went to my oldest daughters masters in education graduation at UC Irvine. Pretty damned white stuck out there in the middle of Orange County. I suspect it is a diploma mill. Maybe if I apply for a grant I can get a graduate degree in the forbidden science of transmorgafication. I could be right up there with the climate scientists, so called. I thijnk the Irvine family should a kept it a ranch.
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 11:27 am #
Holy crap. I’ll bet that means my truck bumper is irretrievably racist, made as it was by Luverne Truck Equipment. I’m sure the fact that they’re now located in South Dakota is no defense…
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 11:27 am #
Tribal? I just like my food strong and flavored and not all melting-potted together into bland High Fructose Corn Syrup-based slop designed in a New Jersey chemical lab.
I bet you’ve often used the term “fly-over country” as well.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 11:28 am #
“ethnics”? Sounds like racist code to me.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 11:29 am #
I find SEK’s comment about Darleen learning “jiu jitsu” from Jeff to be Anti-Semitic.
Also racist against Japanese. You know, those inscrutable “Orientals” with their sneaky fighting tricks that no red-blooded white man would be caught using?
SEK might as well have photoshopped Darleen as one of those bucktoothed Tojo caricatures from World War II.
But some of his best friends are Asians!
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 11:30 am #
I’d bet this was several years ago, at least. Multicolor imaging is fairly common, now.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 11:30 am #
By the way. I don’t do rhetorical jiu-jitsu. My rhetoric ain’t designed to be “the gentle art.” Snap, no tap.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 11:31 am #
“ethnics”? Sounds like racist code to me.
Me too. Ah, those spicy ethnics! Good cooks and musicians, if not quite what we’d want in the academy.
Comment by Chaining Down Culture on 11/30 @ 11:33 am #
“I bet you’ve often used the term “fly-over country” as well.”
It depends on what you’re flying over. Some Kansas City BBQ or the Applebees? If you can get it anywhere you might as well fly over it while going somewhere. And once you’re at that somewhere, don’t go to Applebees or the Red Lobster.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:36 am #
They were using color cameras, sir. They ran faces of the whitest of white and some of the darkest of dark. This is what they told me, and I have no reason to doubt it.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 11:38 am #
Chelsea is engaged?
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 11:39 am #
here is a story about sensors and skin color and also Portia de Rossi is involved.
Comment by Ted Turner's Colorizer on 11/30 @ 11:39 am #
“There is no such thing as different-colored humans. The only differences are the intensity. Sorry to burst any bubbles, lefty race-mongers.”
All those black and white films — actually color!
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:40 am #
I guess I should have said the intensity of the melanin content. Excuse me for living.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 11:41 am #
I find it amusing that it’s ok to criticize what one considers “white bread” eating habits. I’ve got a bet for you, Mr I-make-fun-of-Chain-restaurants as “beneath me.” Check out a Red Lobster located in any of the burbs of Detroit. Report back on the ethnic make-up of the patrons.
Then, add that to your little superiority act.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 11:42 am #
yup. engaged.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 11:42 am #
I give up. I can tell why Jeff hates this, though I knew before. Believe whatever you want.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 11:44 am #
Check out a Red Lobster located in any of the burbs of Detroit. Report back on the ethnic make-up of the patrons.
Or for that matter, McDonald’s.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 11:45 am #
All the cool kids avoid the “white” chain restaurants. They’re like plantations.
They like to dine in the kind of authentic restaurants where they just know that, were they racists, and were they willing to drop an extra $50, there’s a room somewhere in back where instead of a mint, some pretty Oriental lady would give them a happy ending.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 11:46 am #
yup. engaged
Then there’s still hope for Susan Boyle.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 11:51 am #
Also Andrew Northrup, before he lapsed into glibberish.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 11:52 am #
Truth be told, I hate chain restaurants. But not because I hate my whiteness.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 12:00 pm #
Jeff, you are driving the argument here. Stacy McCain is just a recent example of a conservative being labled a “white supremacist” in order to shut him down. You have faced similar bullshit charges over the years from the right and left (certainly not limited to mere bogus charges of racism).
As far as true genetic differences between various human populations, okay. The problem with that is “race” is often way too macro to be of much help in that analysis. It is in smaller populations where the statistical and genetic differences become more pronounced (and objectively undeniable). But when you have people trying to block legitimate scientific inquiry of a skeleton more than 9,000 years old because it was found in the same rough geographic location of some modern group of individuals–there are a lot of issues being raised well beyond science.
But we can always schedule a PW meetup to discuss these issues in person, say at some high end places in Colorado like Applebees, Red Robin, or if you want ethnic, Bennigans.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 12:05 pm #
You probably also know how to make a hell of a paella (Portuguese do it better than the Spanish do too).
Comment by Kneel Before Ronald on 11/30 @ 12:07 pm #
“I’ve got a bet for you, Mr I-make-fun-of-Chain-restaurants as “beneath me.” Check out a Red Lobster located in any of the burbs of Detroit. Report back on the ethnic make-up of the patrons.”
Oh it seems like you are not getting it. It is not the ethnic make up of the patrons or even the staff that makes a place. It is the makeup of the food. I’d argue that you fly over that Red Lobster no matter who was in there.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 12:08 pm #
Being 100% Portuguese I have the distinct pleasure of cultural history on both sides of the slave equation.
And you’ve got that great weather in Port Ugu. I’m jealous.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 12:10 pm #
“the [ethnic] makeup of the food” has still got me scratching my head.
…
…
CANNIBAL!
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 12:13 pm #
How many locations does a “chain” need before it sucks? I just want to make sure I don’t violate any rules of coolness or fail at worshiping ethnicity or whatever it is all the cool kids who don’t live in flyover country are doing these days.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 12:15 pm #
CANNIBAL!
I’m havin’ a ball!
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 12:16 pm #
This one seems thor-ish, seeing as how thor is over at SEK’s doing his performance art.
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 12:17 pm #
Like, there’s a well-known, sort of ethnic-y barbecue joint here in town that has at least six locations. Too many? Another has three. Just right?
Please let me know, so I can understand what food I’m allowed to enjoy with little or just the right amount of guilt.
Comment by newrouter on 11/30 @ 12:18 pm #
“It is the makeup of the food. ”
probably a walmart hater too
Comment by DarthRove on 11/30 @ 12:20 pm #
When I a kid, there was a breakfast place in Richmond, Indiana called “Sambo’s”. They had a little statue like the Big Boy restaurants do, but it was a very dark, chubby kid in a turban, silky pajama-type clothes, and pointy slippers. Holding a stack o’ pancakes (buckwheat cakes, I can only imagine). Inside, there were paintings on the wall of L’il Black Sambo running around the jungle, holding his rich buttery pancakes, (topped with Aunt Jemima syrup, no doubt), getting chased by a tiger.
So you can have your chain restaurants and RACISM!!!1!!!!1! too.
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 12:20 pm #
I agree, JD. Although “Alan Colmes’s Nutsack” would be a better name for it to choose than what it’s been using recently, if that’s true.
Comment by psycho... on 11/30 @ 12:25 pm #
Welcome back to the world, JG. Unfortunately, this is it. Still.
It’s not your whiteness if you’re not at Red Lobster. Disdaining others’ whiteness — code: insufficient — is the One True Whiteness. It seems you don’t have it, or not much of it. Perhaps the Lobster calls.
But it’s full of black people, so watch out.
“Authentic” “ethnic” food priced beyond the reach of the people who serve it to you.
Etc., again, again.
Comment by Makewi on 11/30 @ 12:27 pm #
Jim
The easiest way to be sure of your food choices is to call your local community college and get the opinion of the head chieftain of the gender/ethnic studies department.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:30 pm #
it’s good to see you mr. psycho. I haven’t seen you since that post about DJ Adam. I’m glad you’re back.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:37 pm #
Oh it seems like you are not getting it. It is not the ethnic make up of the patrons or even the staff that makes a place. It is the makeup of the food. I’d argue that you fly over that Red Lobster no matter who was in there.
I’m arguing that folks of various ethnicities are driven to certain food choices. It’s OK to make fun of the eating habits of white folks (THE CORN SYRUP), but NOT those of blacks.
For every Applebys that is filled with whites, there’s a Red Lobster that filled with blacks.
Of course, it’s all theoretical at this point, ’cause I haven’t been inside either of those restaurants in over 15 years.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:39 pm #
chain restaurants always have so much parking
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:40 pm #
There is a Somali restaurant in Detroit [insert joke here] that I ate at once. I think it really pumped up my otherness bonefides. The other customers were mostly those smarmy, hipster douchbag types. But I did enjoy the food. Spicy.
You had to eat with your hands.
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 12:40 pm #
Gack. That puts us right into poser-land, doesn’t it?
But that does it. I’m going to stop by the “La Taqueria Mona” taco truck on my way home for lunch and let them know they’re lame and perhaps inauthentic…
Makewi, I don’t know how well that will work. Our local community college is a bit of a chain, too. So now I just don’t know what to do.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:42 pm #
I always judge the authenticity of the “ethnic” food by how many of that ethnicity are actually eating there.
If you want good chinese food, you eat where all the engineers from the GM tech plant eat. Chinese newspapers at the cashier are always a good sign too.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 12:43 pm #
Didn’t I see you at working at Chotchkie’s, Carin?
You weren’t wearing enough flair.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:43 pm #
I’ve also got a GREAT Lebanese joint. Both these places are near work.
Detroit may have many reasons for suckage, but if you want non-pretentious ethnic food? We’ve got that in spades.
Oops. Denounced.
Comment by Lost My Cookies on 11/30 @ 12:44 pm #
No love for the Sizzler? Where do all of you go for your second dates? How do you close the deal without Sizzler?
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:44 pm #
like nobody’s ever like ok 8:00. Red Lobster. Where do you park?
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:44 pm #
I’m gonna have to google that, Slart.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 12:44 pm #
I’m confused. What other body parts would you use to eat with?
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 12:44 pm #
You hang with racists, happy. SEK says so. Because he’s a good person who is trying to help you out. By showing you where to go to avoid hanging with racists, and so absorbing their taint.
That it happens to be on his side of the political fence, where he as an “academic” vested in raising the lot of the downtrodden (provided he gets to decide who are the downtrodden, and how best to lift them), is purely coincidental.
I mean, that you can stop being the bad kind of racist by simply acknowledging your inherent racism and joining in with those who’ve done so? Who can resist THAT kind of absolution?
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 12:45 pm #
You have missed one of the greatest movies of all time if you have to Google that, Carin.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:47 pm #
I did work for a bit at a TGIF’s.
Didn’t really like it much.
Only chain place I ever worked at. And, in my defense, I was 22. Before grad school.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:47 pm #
Sorry. Hands and fingers. No utensils.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 12:48 pm #
You didn’t go to grad school, Carin.
People who read and comment here are trailer trash.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 12:49 pm #
As my disappointingly revealing conversation with a lefty a few weeks back showed, THEY KNOW we’re using code language, even if we don’t:
They really need to publish a lexicon of these codes and dog whistles so that everyone, including conservatives, can see how vile we are.
It would be like the East Anglia CRU leak, only for wingers.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:49 pm #
I’ve missed a lot of movies Slart.
What’s it rated? It’s hard to watch a movie w/o the kids watching. Especially now since they often stay up later than me.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:50 pm #
I don’t know how to help, Jeff. My whole week goes by and I can’t tell you how little racial drama there is. I remember George Lopez thought it was racist when his stupid show got canned and I thought to myself dude you should be kissing their ass for dragging you over the syndication line. But I just thought it. I didn’t say it out loud.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:51 pm #
You didn’t go to grad school, Carin.
People who read and comment here are trailer trash.
My mistake.
Also, folks who went to grad school don’t end sentences with a preposition like I did up there.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 12:51 pm #
If ever you do say it happyfeet, try it like that girl from White Men Can’t Jump
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 12:52 pm #
Did anyone point out that the vile comments attributed to RSM (“natural revulsion,” etc.) were fabricated out of whole cloth?
I tried to find the original document for such things and found only “quotes” in articles by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Which is really quite tender, when you think about it. SPLC is so concerned with outing white supremacists that they put what they know we’re thinking into words FOR US, thus saving us the trouble of having to use all those veiled references and junk.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:52 pm #
I’ve never seen that one. I have a way of avoiding quality films.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 12:53 pm #
It’s rated R, for language and some brief bestiality.
Ok, I totally made up the bestiality part.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 12:54 pm #
It is not the ethnic make up of the patrons or even the staff that makes a place.
Fess up. You just like having subservient brown people waiting on you.
Comment by baldilocks on 11/30 @ 12:55 pm #
There are plenty of persons who are black and who are competent in law, medicine, security, social planning, etc. But to hire any of them would deprive Obama of wielding his (and/or his puppeteer’s) heretofore pretty successful tactic: hurling accusations of racism. Thus are incompetents from Eric Holder to Desiree Rogers installed into place to wreck havoc. And Leftists will fall for the racism tactic every time. One might call the tactic the Obama Doctrine.
This whole brouhaha about the “security breach” is yet another of his methods of sowing racial discord. But since it’s pretty elaborate, I don’t think that it originated with Obama.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 12:55 pm #
I couldn’t function without sriracha. It’s on sale next door at Ralph’s all the time. Never the chili garlic sauce though.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:56 pm #
Plus I don’t see why you’ve got High Fructose Corn Syrup as being that white.
Well, you gotta read the entire thread. Here, #55:
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 12:56 pm #
dicentra, I’m struck by that exchange you posted. Malkin is a vile hater! It’s in code! Christ, don’t you asshole wingnut fucks EVER accept facts for facts, or see hate where it exists? THIS IS WHY WE DESPISE YOU SUBHUMAN CANCERS ON THE BODY POLITIC!
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 12:56 pm #
It has Wesley Snipes which is one of Tim Geithner’s favorite actors.
(I might have made that up too)
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 12:56 pm #
Plus Carin is from Detroit. It’s not NEARLY as ethnic as the Multicultural Wonderland that is Orange County.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 12:59 pm #
He who should not be named said he’d been in Detroit more than I.
[chuckle] that still cracks me up.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 12:59 pm #
Concept of “dog whistle” is faulty reasoning.
It’s like the ability to smell a witch. You either have it or you don’t.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 12:59 pm #
While that might give me authenticity I’m having trouble defining the authentic.
1. You must spell ‘Brasil’ with ‘S.’
2. You must palatalize all frontal occlusives after high and middle rear vowels.
3. You must refer to inhabitants of Rio de Janeiro as ‘cariocas.’
4. You must pronounce terminal ‘O’ as ‘U.’
5. You must be an afficionado of the Fado.
6. You must nasalize all vowels that carry a tilde (~).
That should do it.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 1:00 pm #
I’d like to see a Wesley Snipes movie just cause of Hollywood ones what have gotten up close and personal with the IRS are probably way cooler after than they were before. Wiser. Sadder. Awake.
Comment by Blake on 11/30 @ 1:02 pm #
Carin,
No sex scenes in “Office Space” just some vulgar language and one memorable scene involving a middle finger display by Jennifer Aniston.
Modern cult classic.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 1:02 pm #
Oh, but codifying the rules would spoil the game, di.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 1:03 pm #
It is probably still there, Denny’s bought up most of the old Sambo Restaurants.
I saw a play that explored this issue, it was actually pretty well done. Didn’t see the film.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 1:03 pm #
Besides, it’s not about “rules”. It’s about how you feel.
Comment by newrouter on 11/30 @ 1:05 pm #
while looking through the trash at my trailer i found a dog whistle.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 1:07 pm #
Also, folks who went to grad school don’t end sentences with a preposition like I did up there.
I went to grad school and I do it all the time.
TO PROTEST THE LATINIZATION OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.
(Srlsy. They made that rule because classical Latin doesn’t have prepositions, it has an inflection, so you can’t separate off the preposition in English, either. Same with the injunction against splitting infinitives, which can’t be split in Latin.)
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 1:07 pm #
Just like a white male to clamor for such patriarchal structure. The horizontal logic of the hideously benighted Enlightenment.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 1:09 pm #
I know, Dicentra, that you CAN. But, would William F. Buckley ever have done such a thing?
gail gave me absolution years ago for my transgressions, but I always feel it reveals something about me.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 1:14 pm #
I feel confident that somehow racism plays into this story.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 1:15 pm #
See, I’m trying to figure out what constitutes racism in the Leftist cosmos.
Because back in the day (before 1964 or so), whites pretty much figured that Africans were objectively inferior—lesser intelligence, morally suspect, etc.—and so the idea of mixing with “not quite humans” had a big EWWW factor to it.
Hence the Jim Crow laws that prohibited the intermingling of personal fluids (for lack of a better term): Stay away from our drinking fountains, lunch counters, hotel beds, bus seats, swimming pools, and ESPECIALLY OUR WIMMIN.
It was OK to share sidewalks and such, but not stuff that might carry cooties.
Currently, the idea of objective inferiority is not accepted (except by white supremacy pukes). So the “racism” is now more of a “you ain’t one of us” thing. Like rival gangs or tribes.
And everyone can play at that game. The Africans couldn’t institutionalize any EWWW factors against whites, but they sure can decide We ain’t Them. On account of our fish-belly whiteness.
But most conservatives I know? Their tribe has to do with actions and beliefs and lifestyle, not ancestry, whereas Leftists are still obsessed with tribes based on ancestry.
Hmmm.
Nope, can’t square that circle.
Comment by BlandMix on 11/30 @ 1:17 pm #
“Well, you gotta read the entire thread. Here, #55:”
Oh I see, the part where I called it “meltinging-potted” is the part where you found it was “white.” So now I point to the part where I said I wouldn’t argue you on this.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 1:17 pm #
dicentra, I’m struck by that exchange you posted
I hope you got to the part where the Preamble to the Constitution is not about ideas, it’s about PEOPLE (you racist wingnut!) on account of the word “people” being in the first line.
My potted plants have better reading comprehension than that.
Comment by alppuccino on 11/30 @ 1:18 pm #
But the funny thing is some white men can jump. I mean, isn’t that funny? Dick Fosberry? Hello?
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 1:20 pm #
Just like a white male to clamor for such patriarchal structure.
But what would a fish-belly white FEMALE do?
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 1:23 pm #
Racism is the act of besting a leftist in debate.
Comment by Carin on 11/30 @ 1:24 pm #
But most conservatives I know? Their tribe has to do with actions and beliefs and lifestyle, not ancestry, whereas Leftists are still obsessed with tribes based on ancestry.
That is the crux of it, now isn’t it. But, how else to stir up grievance based on history?
Comment by DarthRove on 11/30 @ 1:25 pm #
Racism is the act of
bestingdisagreeing with a leftistin debate.FTFY
Comment by Lost My Cookies on 11/30 @ 1:26 pm #
alp, that wasn’t a jump. That was a white man using his privilege to get ahead.
Comment by RTO Trainer on 11/30 @ 1:29 pm #
Sambo’s is Denny’s.
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 1:44 pm #
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 12:59 pm #
While that might give me authenticity I’m having trouble defining the authentic.
1. You must spell ‘Brasil’ with ‘S.’
2. You must palatalize all frontal occlusives after high and middle rear vowels.
3. You must refer to inhabitants of Rio de Janeiro as ‘cariocas.’
4. You must pronounce terminal ‘O’ as ‘U.’
5. You must be an afficionado of the Fado.
6. You must nasalize all vowels that carry a tilde (~).
That should do it.
[Sigh]
It is clear that a white Morman woman from Utah knows more about my own tribe than I do.
Therefore I am in-authentically brown/othered and subject to all subsets, dog whistles. code words, secret handshakes and wink winks/nudge nudges, firmly implanted in the diorama of veiled racists, having been brought forth by SEK, Darleen and Jeff G.
I should probably go weave a basket or something. Or sign up for Grad School!
Comment by baldilocks on 11/30 @ 1:44 pm #
My bad. I thought that this post was in relation to Darleen’s post about Desiree Rogers.
Comment by BJTexs on 11/30 @ 1:46 pm #
That’s OK, Juliette. We know you are authentic, no matter what the topic.
Comment by DarthRove on 11/30 @ 1:46 pm #
So is Denny’s using better code and no dog whistles, or are they still racist? The last time I was in a Denny’s was 15 years ago, and accompanied by Al K. Hall so I don’t remember much.
Comment by baldilocks on 11/30 @ 1:46 pm #
But most conservatives I know? Their tribe has to do with actions and beliefs and lifestyle, not ancestry, whereas Leftists are still obsessed with tribes based on ancestry.
Reading Sowell’s Conflict of Visions will tell you all you need to know about us and them.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 1:47 pm #
it wasn’t unrelated, what you said
Comment by baldilocks on 11/30 @ 1:47 pm #
“That’s OK, Juliette. We know you are authentic, no matter what the topic.”
Authentic…lol
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 1:50 pm #
You mean chili garlic paste? Man, that stuff will melt your earwax.
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 2:01 pm #
We put that chili garlic paste on LOTS of things in our house. And Srirachi is Asian Ketchup.
Comment by JHo on 11/30 @ 2:01 pm #
In which SQEK invents the racially sensitive concern troll. Or maybe all concern trolls are racially sensitive.
Regardless, cite said unveiled racism. Go on.
Either way, thanks for the admission, SQEK. Because the extension of your wholesale, projected racist-baiting is what you’re basing a career on. Great work if you can get it, eh?
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 2:03 pm #
Denny’s is racist to chickens. And pigs.
Comment by Lazarus Long on 11/30 @ 2:06 pm #
Repeat:
Remember, Nazism was the Grand-daddy of identity politics.
(paraphrasing Jonah Goldberg)
Comment by JHo on 11/30 @ 2:06 pm #
See what Joe did there, SQEK? How about you divine his intent? Go on.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 11/30 @ 2:10 pm #
“a vocal portion”? This reads like Engrish.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 2:18 pm #
Racism is the act of
bestingengaging a leftist in debate.FTFY.
Though you could specify Existing While Conservative as sufficent grounds in most cases.
It is clear that a white Mormon woman from Utah knows more about my own tribe than I do.
I took a semester of Portuguese 101 for Spanish-speakers, plus I had a course in Romance Philology (how Latin-derived languages evolved), my BIL served a mission to Brasil, and a cousin went to Portugal.
So I ran into all kinds of stuff without ever having set foot in Portugal.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 2:28 pm #
I haven’t done the paste… I will look… the chili garlic sauce is that red stuff you usually get at chinese… there’s a good brand next door and it sits next to the sriracha, which is always on sale.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 2:29 pm #
I see the error of my ways, and I denounce and condemn all of you.
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 2:31 pm #
Because the extension of your wholesale, projected racist-baiting is what you’re basing a career on.
A lot easier than real scholarship, to be sure. Just mouth the proper catch-phrases, genuflect to the correct dispositions, and you too can look forward to thirty or forty years of faculty teas, free trips to conferences, sabbaticals, and the occasional bit of grad student totty on the side.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 2:38 pm #
I don’t care what you say, SBP. SEK ain’t getting any grad student ass. Ever.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 2:45 pm #
Gibbons really despise lemurs. They consider them a primative race of primates.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 3:18 pm #
As anyone who has spent time in Asia knows, most Asians are race obsessed. When in Asia it was joked that races were ranked accordingly (with some variations) the following order:
1. Predominate ethnic group of country you were in.
2. Americans (white).
3. Western Europeans/Australians/South Africans/Israelis (white).
4. Americans (black).
5. Japanese.
6. Tawainese.
7. Chinese.
8. Neighboring Asians usually based on wealth.
9. Eastern Europeans/Russians.
10. East Indians.
11. Black Africans.
12. Pakistanis
13. Arabs (they fucking hate Arabs in Asia).
Comment by Jim in KC on 11/30 @ 3:25 pm #
I don’t see how that solves my restaurant problem, Joe.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 3:32 pm #
Jim in KC, if you are in KC you should not have any restaurant problems. Provided you like BBQ and steaks.
Comment by Pablo on 11/30 @ 3:36 pm #
I thought it went without saying that those are one and the same. ;)
Comment by SBP on 11/30 @ 3:38 pm #
#170: I dunno… being on someone’s thesis committee does have powerful aphrodisiac qualities, or so empirical evidence appears to show (not as a participant on either side, let me be quick to note).
Trackback by baldilocks on 11/30 @ 3:45 pm #
Tactical Analysis…
(Preamble: Typepad’s html editor is making me crazy!) Eric Holder Valerie Jarrett And now Desiree Rogers. From Michelle Malkin: [Rogers is] the intimate Chicago fund-raising crony of Michelle Obama and Valerie Jarrett who was once married to fellow Ob…
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 3:56 pm #
You can rank blogs too: Start with Protein Wisdom and work your way down. Outlaws! Racists!
Comment by newrouter on 11/30 @ 4:18 pm #
if you need tickets please see Desiree Rogers
Comment by Spiny Norman on 11/30 @ 4:32 pm #
It seemed pretty obvious, actually. I’d be surprised if it weren’t our favorite smarmy infantile pest.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 4:37 pm #
thor’s understanding of theory was decidedly MA-ish. He could drop names, had memorized a few quotes…but he didn’t really understand much of what he would parrot — or, at the very least, he hadn’t thought through the implications of the garbage he’d bought in to. After all, the “democratization of interpretation” sounds lovely and honorable on the surface.
Strikeouts are fascist. Throw some ground balls. Ground balls are democratic.
Comment by cranky-d on 11/30 @ 4:37 pm #
Oh, that was thor all right. It changed its name every post just to be sure we saw it with its tallywacker waving about (the latter was just for LYBD).
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 4:45 pm #
Ground balls may be democratic, but it is awful when one gets away from you.
Althouse has the bad sex literary awards. Funny and awful at the same time, but you could make them far worse by converting them into leftist rants about endemic conservative hypocrisy and racism.
Comment by Bob Reed on 11/30 @ 4:48 pm #
“Strikeouts are fascist. Throw some ground balls. Ground balls are democratic.”
A delicious analogy Jeff! Is a quarterback throwing into traffic being democratic too? Or should he throw a pick every once in a while just to ensure equality of outcome…
Me? I prefer the running game. Very methodical and workmanlike…
Run ’til their eyeballs are jiggling, then go play action to a massive tight end and let the DB’s have fun tackling the big guy…
Comment by Lazarus Long on 11/30 @ 4:59 pm #
“Run ’til their eyeballs are jiggling, then go play action to a massive tight end and let the DB’s have fun tackling the big guy…”
And then I said to myself ‘Andy Reid’.
Then I laughed and laughed and laughed.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 5:06 pm #
Bob –
I can’t take credit. From Bull Durham. Paraphrased.
Comment by Bob Reed on 11/30 @ 5:15 pm #
That had slipped my mind Jeff. The dialogue in that movie is great…
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 5:43 pm #
SEK updates:
If SEK was a batter he would get beaned on a regular basis.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:04 pm #
Well, Joe, you did tell me SEK had responded.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:14 pm #
The only way he could make the team in the first place would be through some kind of legislation ensuring that everyone plays and gets a trophy.
Which, in a way, is what he promotes in his public policy pronouncements on race.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:16 pm #
update 4 added.
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 6:18 pm #
Now that SEK has “responded” we can expect more nuggets of inanity from his angry mob of haters that hate on his behalf. So far, Teddie360 has brought its D game. Richie and Call Me Doctor! Steel should be along shortly.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:22 pm #
They won’t ever debate me here. Ever.
Ever.
Which is just as well for them. They can go on feeling superior — and they don’t have to watch in horror as I skin them, gut them, and turn them into belts.
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 6:27 pm #
Theodore360 p3wnd all of us racists, Jeff ;-)
Comment by JHo on 11/30 @ 6:27 pm #
Maybe by now this is off topic but isn’t it my damn right to be hardcore racist if I so choose?
Because if not, what is SQEK on about, anyway? Because if it’s not statism it’s religion. Pick one.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:30 pm #
Meh. SEK is learning what many of the big lefty sites learned before they were big lefty sites.
Best to pick easier battles. And the easiest way to do that is to pretend the toughest battlers have already been discredited.
That’s SEK’s new tack: who IS this “Jeff Goldstein” idiot, anyway? He writes a screed on something or other, but seriously, I just tuned him out. After all, I’m doing serious academic work here.
Now, who wants to join my “Why are all conservatives racists?” academic listserv…?
Comment by JHo on 11/30 @ 6:49 pm #
Then I’m shocked to learn that SQEK just isn’t that racially goodhearted after all.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:53 pm #
Yeah. It’s the same reason Thersites only peeks his head out to comment on our debate on how interpretation works when it’s to cheer on someone like Patterico, who championed a similar argument.
I’m very often the common enemy of the left and right here in the blogosphere. Because I’m an equal opportunity prick, one who recognizes that you can be just as wrong from the right as from the left.
Comment by Jeff G. on 11/30 @ 6:55 pm #
Oh. And another reason to go subscription? People like SEK will DIE when they can’t read what’s being written about them.
Comment by happyfeet on 11/30 @ 7:02 pm #
here’s a song that makes me happy
Comment by newrouter on 11/30 @ 7:09 pm #
now available in the pw shop sek pelts for your
vulva
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 7:15 pm #
Waaaaaay off-topic, but Olbergasm just stated that Cheney created the Taliban in 1991.
Comment by Darleen on 11/30 @ 7:20 pm #
knock me over with a feather, but Patterico is mocking SqEKer’s “conservatives should stop writing because they can’t do anything BUT race-bait. QED.”
Comment by Darleen on 11/30 @ 7:22 pm #
Waaaaaay off-topic, but Olbergasm just stated that Cheney created the Taliban in 1991
wha..?
Slobberman has been standing way too close to Sully.
Comment by geoffb on 11/30 @ 7:26 pm #
It’s the tariff on sugar combined with the power of ADM that did that.
Now, my graduate degree owning wife (University of Michigan) drags me to Red Lobster every chance she gets because around here it is the only place to get fresh live lobster served. I don’t care what place i eat at as long as I like the food and can afford it. Any other criteria go whoosh, down the drain.
Comment by Joe on 11/30 @ 7:44 pm #
I suppose he could sign up like Patterico did to the Factor Site, but that would require a credit card (O’Reilly had no idea was Patterico/Frey was before he signed up to his site).
Comment by No one you know on 11/30 @ 8:18 pm #
After what we witnessed in 2008 regarding the election, I have a very hard time thinking of liberals as anything but racists.
Here’s a thought experiment. Imaging Barry O’brien from the Gold Coast decided he was going to run for President. He’s got the same resume and policy positions (yeah, I know, remember this is imaginary) as the eventual president. How far does Mr O’Brien get? I’m thinking he does not pull as many votes as Dodd in Iowa. Hell, he doesn’t raise enough money for anyone to know who he is. Want to keep working backwards? I’m thinking there’s no seat set aside for him at Harvard Law? Further still? He doesn’t get a leg up from Occidental to Columbia…..
Looks like the color of a man’s skin counts for a whole lot to Dems.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 11/30 @ 8:27 pm #
Well, he did have the obvious advantage of the fabulous inherited wealth common to the Irish diaspora. Obama, we are told, has been a victim – of what I have not yet been apprised.
Comment by Spiny Norman on 11/30 @ 8:42 pm #
BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
“Blithering” doesn’t EVEN begin to describe the idiot Olberdouche is.
Comment by mcgruder on 11/30 @ 8:55 pm #
Olbermann, having been queried to appear on his show several times, is an amiably uninformed sort who found himself wielding real power and influence over a section of the electorate. Also, decent scratch. He was helped along mightily by the facts that Bush was an awful POTUS, that we have gotten ourselves into a couple of seemingly intractable wars in stupid places where we have neither the will or the resources (seemingly) to win, the 40k plus dead and wounded, and the Wall Street led economic collapse.
Andrew Sullivan is just a sick asshole who harps on the parental lineage of a retarded kid. What a piece of shit. All because he went round the bend when the GOP said sod off to gay marriage; he went crazier when the Dems took his money, stroked his three-day growth and said, “Sorry, was it good for you?” on the same issue. [Granted, he realized Bush sucked, which made for easy copy, but he is still an asshole.]
There is a difference between the two.
Comment by JD on 11/30 @ 9:03 pm #
Mcgruder – The differences are only in the root of the idiocy, and the dissemenation of same.
Comment by geoffb on 11/30 @ 10:53 pm #
OT: sorta.
Learned a new, to me, term today. Post-Normal Science(warning 2nd link is pdf).
A description here.
PoMo Science, CRU was cutting edge after all.
Comment by kristan on 11/30 @ 11:13 pm #
damn, it’s good to see jeff kicking ass and taking names again.
Comment by B Moe on 11/30 @ 11:18 pm #
Anybody that repeats that unironically should get a fucking bullet in the back of the head.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 11/30 @ 11:24 pm #
Alas, my heart doth breaketh again. Damn you happyfeet – I was blissful in ignorance of this fact.
Comment by dicentra on 11/30 @ 11:35 pm #
the democratization of science
That would consist of posting all data and code and analyses on the web and letting the Army of Davids pick it to pieces.
Like open-source Linux or summat.
Which, that’s how all science should proceed from now on. Let retired statisticians like Steve McIntyre tear it all apart and put it back together.
*
Comment by Adriane on 12/1 @ 12:01 am #
There are only 2 possibilities in this world – either it will or either it won’t. Thus, all things have a 50% chance.
QED.
Comment by alppuccino on 12/1 @ 12:42 am #
He was helped along mightily by the facts that Bush was an awful POTUS,
I don’t buy this. Even if it was posited by someone with the gravitas to be queried to appear on Olbermann several times.
Because, you know, Olbermann only queries those with an opinion contrary to his own. And he would never invite someone who takes every opportunity to frame is comments with “Bush sucked, but I’m with you guys.”
Guess what Mcgruder, global warming isn’t happening. But it’s got major traction. Guess what else, Obama isn’t brilliant. He’d have to cram overnight to get to stupid. Yet the genius of Obama gets much press. How’s that smart diplomacy working as compared to Bush’s cowboy diplomacy. Don’t look now but it’s a fucking debacle. But will you and yours from the press report that? Not while little Shante is on societal life-support due to lack of health insurance.
The world hates Bush like this: “Look at him. Deposing dictators and installing democracy. And helping tsunami victims and giving money to Africa for AIDS. He thinks America is so great.”
The world loves Obama like this: “Look how he bows to self appointed kings and dictators. He’s not very strict. And he seems to hate America. I love this guy.”
Except for Sarkozy. He knows Obama is a joke. But the guy who read more books in one week than Obama will ever read in his life was the worst president in history. I get it. Get a new headline.
Comment by Carin on 12/1 @ 5:15 am #
Alp, let’s take a trip to a few months back- to a piece in the Huffpo (link at my blog if anyone is really interested). I get a kick out of this. After years of “cowboy diplomacy …”
Thats working miracles in the ME, now isn’t it …
Smartest. President. Ever.
Comment by Carin on 12/1 @ 5:18 am #
Also, though, the ME don’t love Obama. They think he’s a tool. Yesterday in the WSJ:
Now, anti-Americanism is the pap the tyrants use over there to keep their peps focused on anything but their own government, but Obama PROMISED. They hated us because of BUSH!!! You know, the small memories of folks really bugs me. Remember Obama PROMISED he was going to get Obama?
People should have laughed. I know I did. But his voters took that shit seriously.
Comment by alppuccino on 12/1 @ 5:21 am #
Thank you Carin.
But I guess Obama did speak directly to the young people of Iran. But what he said was “You had better find a place to hide. Because I’m with the dictators.”
Yeah, this guy is smart alright.
Comment by alppuccino on 12/1 @ 5:23 am #
You’re faster than I Carin. And I wish Obama would hurry up and get Obama. Ha! Freudian?
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 6:22 am #
Talking about homo-erotic wannabees like SEK, Charles Johnson explains why we are all haters and he is right. It has something to do with pony tails.
Comment by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on 12/1 @ 6:30 am #
Actually, the engagement has gone wonderfully. As soon as Obama picks out his wedding burkha, we shall consummate the relationship.
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 7:02 am #
Most of you are going to die.
Comment by JD on 12/1 @ 7:35 am #
I was just thinking that I really hope there are a number of links to a bunch of other sites that I could go read on my own should I choose to do so. Fortunately, there are people who care about other people and crap links to their places. WHO GIVES A FLYING FUCK WHAT CHARLES JOHNSON IS DOING? Raise your hand if you care.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 12/1 @ 7:38 am #
For certain values of “fresh”, no doubt. And my lobsters are generally dead by the time I rip the claws off of them.
:)
Dead Lobster would probably be much more my favorite place to get lobster if they didn’t cook them at least five minutes past “way overdone”. I do better lobster in my kitchen, even if my methodology is a bit gruesome for the average amateur chef.
Here’s what I do:
Turn the lobster upside-down, and (being careful, because they’re wiggly up to this point) using a large chef’s knife, press the point in the seam between the small legs, and split the lobster along the midsection, all the way up to the mouth parts. Then hold the now-fairly-limp animal under running water, and wash all entrails, eggs, etc out of the head/midsection. Drop immediately into boiling water and cook for 10 minutes, max.
You get the tail meat without all of that entrail taste to it, which no matter how much some folks say it’s the best part, is actually just the shit.
For just the tail, I’d remove that from the live animal for the same reasons, and clean it a bit first.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 12/1 @ 7:46 am #
I do not care, but Ace’s bit is kind of funny.
I parted ways with the Republican Party a while back, but I did so without much of the fanfare Charles seems to need, because as you said: who really gives a shit?
It’s not like sports. This speaks to who people are, and what they hold to be true. Going to bat for the other guys, as opposed to striking out on your own, is just a complete change of who you are. Perhaps Charles has done that, but who’s to say he won’t reverse himself again in a trice, just because someone or some group of folks pissed him off, again?
And, as you ask, who really gives a shit?
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 7:50 am #
Carin & al: The very things you two mentioning above are the sorts of problems that have to be driving those of SEK’s ilk mad. Combine that with a somewhat reinvigorated conservative electorate and the very early concerns based upon the two governor’s races and frustration is rearing its ugly head.
It’s too much to expect SEK to take out his frustrations on Obama and the Dem Congress so he casts his eyes to those inconvenient wingnutz who continue to rant and scream their tired old limited government/individual liberty bromides. Rather than engage in a substantive way, SEK chooses to take the “lazy academic” approach, fed by his own inflated sense of “right,” and broad brush an entire half of the country as either veiled racists or race baiting.
In addition to being easy it provides some visceral sense of satisfaction as well as a mile marker for self indulgent intellectual “superiority.” The irony, of course is that the approach is anything but intellectual or critical. Instead, it’s merely the leftist version of playground taunting. “I’m not a racist but you are or you bait those who are making your entire political philosophy cheap and tawdry.”
It’s ridiculous, gutter leveled and would be sad if it didn’t speak so strongly to their almost utter disdain for free speech and reasoned discourse.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 12/1 @ 7:57 am #
Oh, I dunno about that. He’s talking about vocal portions, and unveiled racism. Whatever the fuck those things mean.
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 8:19 am #
Ace’s bit about CJ was funny JD and somewhat along the lines of what Jeff is doing with SEK. But hey, Patterico is doing an SEK theme too. You can check that out.
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 8:23 am #
True, Slart, but don’t you think at least part of his thinking is colored by his own latent bigotry with regards to “flyover country rubes?” I’m not suggesting that he thinks the sorts of commentators here and at Patterico’s or Hot Air are uneducated rubes … but … he’s certainly willing to to apply “rubeish” status on those who comment in a “veiled racist” way.
I know, even as I try to make sense of it the insular loopiness of the argument makes me shake my head.
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 8:27 am #
Patterico is also on the CJ bandwagon too. Maybe you have a point JD. Of course, you are posting over there (and I did not see you protesting the CJ link Pat Frey put up).
Comment by ted360 on 12/1 @ 8:33 am #
So I see you are stupid too.
As far as I can tell, the only racist here is the guy who thinks Obama got into Harvard as a “set aside.”
You’re just an asshole who gets his ass kicked on regular basis. But, you know, don’t bother to read or nothing, ’cause that degree in sociology has taken SO far.
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 8:36 am #
Hey Joe?
While I agree that the Ace piece is tangentially related (and damn funny, as well) the other link had nothing to do with this discussion and, at least, deserved an “Off topic but interesting” preface.
Just sayin’…
Comment by Danger on 12/1 @ 8:41 am #
The world hates Bush like this: “Look at him. Deposing dictators and installing democracy. And helping tsunami victims and giving money to Africa for AIDS. He thinks America is so great.”
The world loves Obama like this: “Look how he bows to self appointed kings and dictators. He’s not very strict. And he seems to hate America. I love this guy.”
ALP
Can’t wait for the BDA report on that strike 8^)
Comment by JD on 12/1 @ 8:42 am #
Joe – My bad, I extend a humblke apology, as one of those links appears to have been tangentially on topic. Mea Culpa.
Theodore360 – The next ass you kick will be your first. You are a weird little thing.
Comment by Pablo on 12/1 @ 8:44 am #
Here’s a masterpiece in the annals of code reading and intent divining. The story also has a great moral: Do not fuck with Krauthammer.
ted, STFU.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 12/1 @ 8:45 am #
Don’t try; the argument doesn’t make sense. In the marketplace of ideas, Scott is attempting a wormburger ploy. Doubtless Scott thinks it’s clever, just as he thought the Click/claque play on words was clever.
Comment by Danger on 12/1 @ 8:47 am #
“….In addition to being easy it provides some visceral sense of satisfaction as well as a mile marker for self indulgent intellectual “superiority.” The irony, of course is that the approach is anything but intellectual or critical. Instead, it’s merely the leftist version of playground taunting. “I’m not a racist but you are or you bait those who are making your entire political philosophy cheap and tawdry.”
BJT,
Thanks for the brain massage O8^)
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 8:49 am #
BJTexs, off topic should have been stated, but given CJ’s hysteria on endemic racism of the right, Pam Geller’s breasts, Glen Beck, creationism, and the right wing; a piece suggesting we all will die (or most of us) by global warming seemed, well, in the holiday spirit.
Meanwhile, my heating bill just came in and it is a bitch!
Comment by SDN on 12/1 @ 8:58 am #
ted,
1. Are there programs that allow members of certain groups to be admitted under lesser performance standards? Yes or No?
2. Because O! has refused to provide any information, why shouldn’t we assume he’s one of them? Especially given his performance.
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 9:03 am #
Pablo, thank you for the CK bitch slap down of AS. That was great.
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 9:30 am #
This comment on a blog that shall not be named encompasses everything at odds with what Jeff G. has been trying to teach us as well as providing a skewed and twisted concept of Freedom of Speech: (Relating to the Charles Johnson kerfuffle)
The commentator was not being an ass or superior when he posted this. In fact. he went out of his way to be respectful. He is, however, so carefully guilt ridden about America’s racial history that even the suggestion of a racial archetype regardless of the intention of the writer might perpetuate thoughts of racism in others. Thus it must be denounced and banned.
Welcome to our world and I apologize in advance for Jeff’s agony when he reads the above.
Comment by JD on 12/1 @ 9:30 am #
Of course, you are posting over there (and I did not see you protesting the CJ link Pat Frey put up).
Joe – I do not have any idea what this means, but if someone wants to post a link to something on their own blog, I have no beef with that. I apologized already, humbly, for my little rant above. As people have gone over with you no less than 9481 times, this constant linking to other threads at other sites is a bit tiresome. But, my apology was sincerely extended.
Comment by Joe on 12/1 @ 9:48 am #
JD, thank you for your apology and I did not say anything snarky about you after you made it. I agree that OT posts should be minimally labled as such, even if peripherally related to the post.
Comment by Pablo on 12/1 @ 10:01 am #
That might make some tiny little bit of isolated sense if not for the fact that comparing people, all kinds of people, to apes/monkeys is a longstanding tradition. If any mention of lower primates were racist, then this would be racist. Sorry, kids. It ain’t. And your timing sucks out loud.
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:18 am #
McClellan called President Lincoln “the original gorilla”.
Was Lincoln black?
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:20 am #
“I’m not going to use the federal government’s authority deliberately to circumvent the natural inclination of people to live in ethnically homogeneous neighborhoods. . . . I have nothing against a community that’s made up of people who are Polish or Czechoslovakian or French-Canadian or blacks who are trying to maintain the ethnic purity of their neighborhoods.”
–Jimmy Carter, 1976
President, 1977-81
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:21 am #
“I did not lie awake at night worrying about the problems of Negroes.”
–Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, 1961
Kennedy later authorized wiretapping the phones and bugging the hotel rooms of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:21 am #
“Everybody likes to go to Geneva. I used to do it for the Law of the Sea conferences and you’d find these potentates from down in Africa, you know, rather than eating each other, they’d just come up and get a good square meal in Geneva.”
–Sen. Ernest F. Hollings (D., S.C.) 1993
Chairman, Commerce Committee, 1987-95 and 2001-03
+++++Candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, 1984
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:22 am #
“I have never seen very many white people who felt they were being imposed upon or being subjected to any second-class citizenship if they were directed to a waiting room or to any other public facility to wait or to eat with other white people. Only the Negroes, of all the races which are in this land, publicly proclaim they are being mistreated, imposed upon, and declared second-class citizens because they must go to public facilities with members of their own race.”
–Sen. Richard B. Russell Jr. (D., Ga.), 1961
++++The Russell Senate Office Building is named for him.
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:23 am #
“These Negroes, they’re getting pretty uppity these days and that’s a problem for us since they’ve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppityness. Now we’ve got to do something about this, we’ve got to give them a little something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference. For if we don’t move at all, then their allies will line up against us and there’ll be no way of stopping them, we’ll lose the filibuster and there’ll be no way of putting a brake on all sorts of wild legislation. It’ll be Reconstruction all over again.”
–Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson (D., Texas), 1957
IIRC, he was President, too.
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:24 am #
“Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds.”
–US Senator Robert Byrd
+++++A man who is referred to by many Democrats as the “conscience of the Senate”
Comment by Lazarus Long on 12/1 @ 10:26 am #
“These laws [segregation] are still constitutional and I promise you that until they are removed from the ordinance books of Birmingham and the statute books of Alabama, they will be enforced in Birmingham to the utmost of my ability and by all lawful means.”
– Democrat Bull Connor (1957), Commissioner of Public Safety for Birmingham, Alabama
Comment by B Moe on 12/1 @ 10:41 am #
Did that pinhead just say that to JD?
Comment by JD on 12/1 @ 10:43 am #
Yeah. Cute, isn’t it?!
Comment by Jeff G. on 12/1 @ 11:04 am #
BJ –
Was that posted in the comments of a site that I’m allowed to comment on?
Comment by geoffb on 12/1 @ 11:05 am #
I just love when Wordpress won’t post a simple comment for some reason and then insists when I retry that I’ve already posted it, though it hasn’t shown up yet, so I have to add an intro, like this which spoils the simplicity of the original which was…
Perfect Progressive Projection.
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 11:06 am #
Um … Jeff … um (Patterico’s)
Comment by Lost My Cookies on 12/1 @ 11:27 am #
Way down the comment thread, but here’s a link that should set heads spinning. Right? I mean, who am I supposed to root for? Me being a racist by default and all.
Comment by Jeff G. on 12/1 @ 11:28 am #
Oh. Well, I’m not allowed to post over at Patterico’s, so I can’t try to explain why such thinking is pernicious, and how it aids the progressive worldview, which is reinforced consistently through a decentering of language. That is, I am not permitted to reach that particular sector of the “right wing” audience and show them how they are in fact aiding the left in its long term plans to destroy individual freedom and replace it with liberal fascism.
But hey, let’s keep our eyes on what’s important: did you see the latest bit in the LA Times? Why, they were less than precise in their reporting! OUTRAGE!
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 11:38 am #
Jeff: Would you take a minute for this ill educated rube and explain “a decenterinf of language” as it applies to this foolishness?
Comment by Jeff G. on 12/1 @ 11:48 am #
If you aren’t trying to discern intent, you aren’t trying to communicate with the person who put his intentions into language. At which point, there is no substantial ground for meaning: contexts shift, convention changes… communication has no lynchpin, and so “interpretation” becomes creative writing.
Comment by JD on 12/1 @ 11:50 am #
Creative writing is a perfect descriptor of what SEK and its ilk do in these instances.
Comment by Jeff G. on 12/1 @ 11:50 am #
And frankly, BJ, if the folks over there who supported Patterico’s position during our late unpleasantness over Rush and language are now disagreeing with this commenter, they are either hypocrites or dullards. Because this commenter is merely offering another iteration of the kid yelling “boy” to his dog when he knows a black man is around to scrutinize him. It’s again about “reasonable” interpretations in a world that inventories all it’s previous baggage, and so constantly accrues “reasonableness.” After all, what if not that is the OED?
Comment by BJTexs on 12/1 @ 12:17 pm #
Boy, I was hoping not to pick this scab but …
I agree with you, Jeff, that the “reasonableness” argument was lame and borderline cowardly. It’s really the same side of the coin that SEK and CJ are trying to present in terms of allowing others to determine the consequences of a writer’s intended meaning as opposed to allowing the intent to reign supreme.
Creative writing, indeed, devoid of critical thinking and lazy to boot.
Someone has to make personal determination as to what constitutes “reasonable” in speech and image just as someone has to define “racism” or “race baiting” in same. It’s a white hankie presented to opposing views who, ultimately, will continue to impose their own template for “meaning” in their own, ideologically driven metric.
Some of the commentators over at Pat’s agreed with your position but others will fail to see the connection today.
Comment by John Bradley on 12/1 @ 2:14 pm #
From LMC’s link:
The cartoon, which appeared on the front page of Wednesday’s paper, depicts State. Sen. Nina Turner as Aunt Jemima, the much-maligned vaudeville character and food-company logo that has become a pejorative symbol of a black woman who aims to please whites in authority positions.
And here I had always thought that Auntie J. was just trying to sell the good waffle-loving folks of all races a quality maple syrup.
Jeff’s oatmeal could not be reached for comment.
Comment by Jeff G. on 12/1 @ 2:29 pm #
My oatmeal can never be reached any more, now that it’s gone all big time.
It’s like my oatmeal is Adam Sandler and I’m Keisha Knight Pulliam.
Comment by cranky-d on 12/1 @ 4:30 pm #
The oatmeal has gotten too big for its bowl, huh? That is so typical of your rolled-grain products.
Comment by Rusty on 12/1 @ 8:14 pm #
My oatmeal won’t even return General Mills’ calls.
Comment by John Bradley on 12/1 @ 10:44 pm #
Dissing a General?!? Woah, that oatmeal of yours is gonna be looking at a stint in Leavenworth for insubordination.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 12/2 @ 1:59 pm #
That’s why I eat this stuff. All oats, not one of them rolled. Pretentious, but knows its place in the (pardon the expression) food chain.