Twitter is an interesting place to watch people express themselves. It all feels ephemeral. While some are obviously playing roles, far more comments are made by average people revealing themselves. Recently I was following one of the many tags aimed at the election. I think it was the convergence of #Romnesia and #ThingsObamaVotersSay. What struck me about the latter tag was the number of times the tweeters invoked food stamps. In their view, being on food stamps is a vile thing done by vile people. It's a terrible program symbolizing a lack of moral character. In short, those who oppose the President also oppose feeding hungry children. I'm not really sure how you open a conversation with someone whose core belief involves citizens starving in the street.
If these figures can be believed (and I think they can) your average food stamp family is (white) employed and raising children. The family is given about $70 a week. Yet the conversation in the tags is not about people with jobs. It's not about children. It's not about trying to feed a family on $70 a week or why so many jobs in America pay poverty wages. It's about those lazy (often black) people that feel entitled. American residents, thinking food is something due them. Thinking their kids should sleep with full bellies, or even simply not on empty ones.
Of course this is classism and racism converging. When faced with a specific person on food stamps most of these folks will say they don't mean that person, they mean the other persons. The underserving persons. You know, the food stamp people. Not this particular food stamp person. The mythical food stamp person they've created in their head. The one their unexamined biases would prefer to see turned away from food, shelter, and medical care. The grasshopper to their ant.
To me when you say food stamps, I think of myself as a hungry kid. I think of the child my brother told me about a year or so ago. The child who spilled their Salvation Army Thanksgiving dinner and burst into frantic tears at the loss of a meal. The child who kept crying when the meal was replaced, because getting two chances at hot food was so hard to believe. I heard that story at a table with more than my kids could possibly eat. I remembered being the kid who would have sobbed at the ruined turkey. When you say food stamps to me, I'm not thinking about a mythical person I made up in my head. I'm thinking about my life, the lives of my peers, the life of that child in that shelter sobbing over a ten cent roll.
Recently our area began offering free breakfast to all the children at all the schools. The hungry kids were hesitant to claim the free meal because of the scorn from the full kids. The hope is that with the principals taking their meals there, with the staff encouraging everyone to get a good start to their day, that the hungry kids will stop being afraid of someone knowing who they are. The idea has it's opposition. A number of parents are concerned that people will come to rely on the free breakfast. They might expect it. Kids who can eat at home may choose to eat at school. What kind of country would this be if people knew they could always have a meal waiting? How could we ever succeed if hunger didn't drive us? These are the thoughts of people who have always eaten. As Jacques Prevert wrote in La Grasse Matinee "que de barricades pour six malheureuses sardines..."
Saturday, October 20, 2012
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
This, this is why they call me opinionated and critical...
Ok so ... Kermit Roosevelt Jr.
This week saw much pain, stitches and medicated, ice-packed reading for me, which resulted in a convergence of things probably only kind of interesting to myself.
Plus, teh dot-edu internets is magic.
Paul Ryan wants 1950 back and wimmens makin' babies and mens deciding health stuffs for them because 1950's Daddy Knows Best. Conservative politics wants to steal your money and finish gutting the US economy. Democrats want to continue not doing anything much all that progressive or useful.
Friends of mine are still convinced that we went into Iraq because of the Terror, because Glenn Beck's deranged schizophrenic dysfunctions talked to him and said so. Nevermind that.
I mean when we hired Saddam Hussein to help the CIA organize a coup in 1963 and help us assassinate the Democratically elected Iraqi president, then set up the Ba'ath Party as the ruling power and then made Saddam head of their Secret Service - well all that was just in the name of spreading democracy and Light and Hope and shit like how we do - right? I'm sure it had nothing to do with US and Corporate interest.
Just like in 1953 when the US sent Kermit to head up the CIA action overthrowing the Democratic Leader of Iran and installed the Shah as ruling power. Nothing but Humanitarian interest there.I mean to be fair, we were busy anyway. We'd just come off of crushing an independence rebellion in Puerto Rico, we had that thing in Korea... Over the next four years we had Nuclear threats to or Military in Vietnam, Guatemala, Egypt, Lebanon, Iraq (we were warning them against invading Kuwait. Ironic, isn't it?), China, Panama, then a freaking war in Vietnam... It's like, why do they hate us for our Democracy imposed on them?
But I digress.We do good work. We kill a million people in Indonesia by way of CIA assisted Army coup in 1965, we invade the Dominican Republic the same year, the Army kills 43 POC in Detroit. I mean the American Freedom Train is really humming along.
Sure - we carpet bomb Cambodia and destroy the government for ten years, killing 2 Million people through explosions and starvation, but you have to break some eggs, right? Besides if we hadn't smoothed the road for Democracy and Freedom there, you never would have gotten that cool movie about Pol Pot with Sam Waterston. Dude won an Oscar for that. He was on Law & Order - he's legit.
Then there was that Wounded Knee siege against the Lakota in South Dakota in '73... but this is getting away from the point - Which is: The US... it does God's Work all the time with its Armed Services, defending the Nation, never putting them in harm's way for profit, making it safe for roasted hotdogs and black powder displays of the Nation's Moral Purity once a year.
Oh yeah and Chile. Don't forget we killed the President of Chile. Shit we had a lot going on.
ANYWAY MY POINT is how shocked I was to discover how the financial system works with regard to IMF/World Bank and Debt forgiveness.
See it works like this:A bunch of really well meaning people get together and they say, SURE third world developing country, we will loan you money via the World Bank to build infrastructure so your peeples can has electric if you hire say, Bechtel or Halliburton to do all the work. Nice deal.
Then the country has a shiny building or two in the square, maybe some electric grid, and the work is done by US or Multinational companies so they profit, maybe one half of one percent of the native population gets very rich and invests that money in international currency markets and Swiss bank accounts so it's completely out of the country. Good deal. Only one drawback, really, and its not a big thing, just... nobody can really afford the electric at the rates that Foreign company is charging, because none of the population got any work or learned any trade since Bechtel imported their own contractors. Oh and the debt. The dirt-poor people still have the debt... and no water treatment facilities, because most of the GDP goes to paying down the debt.So what's to be done?
Le Sigh... The International Monetary Fund looks at them and says, "Silly goose! You ain't got no monies!" Well, they can approve a loan AGAIN but they can't do it with all that debt riding ... Instead we get some celebrities like Bono, and they do videos and stuff, and we all talk about how awesome cancelling that debt would be, because debt forgiveness sounds really super charitable... So that's what we do.Conditional Debt Forgiveness.
Conditional on Privatization of the water treatment (because honestly third world country, you already can't manage your electric grid) So a company like Halliburton or Bechtel comes in and uses up all the money building and then privately running the only water treatment facilities at something like three times the previous cost, but I mean, they have to make a profit, right? They don't do this stuff for free. They have kids to feed.
What else you got third world country? Besides life-threatening poverty for 80% of the country and crazy preventable disease and child mortality rates? You need roads? You got Oil? You got mining we could do? We could do this all day!
So election day comes, and the companies send in representatives and they meet the new guys after inauguration, and everyone shakes hands and says hey congratulations. Then the Company men reach in a pocket and say, "Hey yo - here's 200k to play ball. That's the left pocket. You don't want the right pocket because that's everything that could happen to you and your family when no one is looking." Now, imagine you're a president, and you're wondering if you really appreciate what's happening here. Maybe you even want to have some integrity, but besides being thrown out in a CIA backed coup, or dead along with the whole of your family, what's the guy after you going to do? It kind of sets a bad tone, getting murdered.
So now you're corrupt! Shame on you, Mister or Madam President! What your people say they needed was a strong leader to manage their resources in a sound way - not IMF/WB loans and debt to foreign companies siphoning natural resources! In fact that's what two generations of South American Presidents have been saying and they keep getting elected being socialist and anti-corporate and the US has to talk about what an enemy to Good, Clean, Pure US Interests they are.
And occasionally we kill people in the name of Democracy. It just happens.
So, at the end, what I found really disturbing is that we have this really clear history of Humanitarian Righteousness when it comes to US Foreign relations, yet for so long the US has been left out of it's own Democracy Parade.
We started out good in Iraq setting up a puppet dictatorship. Then they got mouthy and we flexed a bit. Then years later they acted like they didn't like our trade agreements and we sent in some CIA guys to... actually shit - we couldn't, because that crazy ass Saddam guy had tons of loyal guards and body doubles. So we had to invade... a little. because at the end of the day we figured he'd keep Iran in check, and play ball, and know who the top dog was because the US is WHAT!?!?!? His crazy ass was still not doing what we wanted... and we had to invade ALL OVER AGAIN. My God.
Now we had to fold that into our Afghanistan thing (which actually was really convenient because we had a closed meeting about how to design new currency for Iraq after wrapping up our plan for killing the leader in the first week of Bush's term, and then some crazy people blew up stuff and it was party time), and we sent troops and we privatized as much as we could with independent contractors and Halliburton built showers for our troops that had uninsulated wiring and electrocuted a few, and they built cisterns of stagnant water that made a bunch of troops sick, and ... well you get it right?
Why do they hate our Freedoms? Cheney got 34 Million out of the deal from Halliburton ... it's not like he had anything to gain from funneling them money.
Why do WE hate our Freedoms?
But wait - what is that Siren Song of Righteous freedoms I hear???
Now Conservative America wants to spread that Dream of Democracy to the shores of... that's right! AMERICA!!! It's finally our turn! We'll Privatize school, and prison for profit, and Social Security, and Medicaid, and just about everything that can bleed money.
I mean Social Security? That's a HUGE drain on the national budget - Paul Ryan just said so, while joking that he hoped the sixty-five year old dude he'd directed police to wrestle to the ground had taken his blood pressure medication (see because he was mad that Ryan was calling Medicaid and Social Security an entitlement program, which clearly it is, if you consider that paying for something out of your own pocket in the US entitles you to get it).
Just think it's money, right, that private people and their employers pay in over a lifetime that is also reinvested for a profit for the Government. Christ on a Cracker. Leaving money that people put themselves into an account that is ostensibly set up just for them, that the Government collects the interest on all alone? They pay in for fifty years and then take it out for ten? HELL YES that has got to be a drain on the economy, leaving all that money that's already theirs in their Government kept pockets. Let's get a Privatized company in here to empty that shit post haste!
Because stealing your money - hey that's Conservative.
Now if we could only focus on Iran, and it's human rights problems, and the horrible, sticky condition for women under the brutal dictatorship that we set up on purpose after killing their president in the 50's?
Or solve the corruption problems with these Banana Republics that we pay off or threaten with death if they don't get corrupt right quick? I mean, our politicians don't have a problem removing impediments to multinational Corporate interests donating the GDP of Brazil for an election. OUR politicians don't balk at the hard work of limiting human rights within our borders. OUR politicians are saying they're totally cool with stripping women of their rights (and presumably everything else).
Is this not the glorious One World the United Nations was conceived for?
The world would be a better place if they accepted the Dream of US Democracy and embraced us as Liberators instead of taking the money we buy them off with or dying from the bullets we put into them in the middle of the night. Or maybe all of the above.
Oh Shit! Maybe we get to shoot Senior Citizens now?
Women hanging from a crane in the public square for being raped...? Hey America, you swiped the credit card to rent that boom truck. That enemy is still us. Semper Fi.
This week saw much pain, stitches and medicated, ice-packed reading for me, which resulted in a convergence of things probably only kind of interesting to myself.
Plus, teh dot-edu internets is magic.
Paul Ryan wants 1950 back and wimmens makin' babies and mens deciding health stuffs for them because 1950's Daddy Knows Best. Conservative politics wants to steal your money and finish gutting the US economy. Democrats want to continue not doing anything much all that progressive or useful.
Friends of mine are still convinced that we went into Iraq because of the Terror, because Glenn Beck's deranged schizophrenic dysfunctions talked to him and said so. Nevermind that.
I mean when we hired Saddam Hussein to help the CIA organize a coup in 1963 and help us assassinate the Democratically elected Iraqi president, then set up the Ba'ath Party as the ruling power and then made Saddam head of their Secret Service - well all that was just in the name of spreading democracy and Light and Hope and shit like how we do - right? I'm sure it had nothing to do with US and Corporate interest.
Just like in 1953 when the US sent Kermit to head up the CIA action overthrowing the Democratic Leader of Iran and installed the Shah as ruling power. Nothing but Humanitarian interest there.I mean to be fair, we were busy anyway. We'd just come off of crushing an independence rebellion in Puerto Rico, we had that thing in Korea... Over the next four years we had Nuclear threats to or Military in Vietnam, Guatemala, Egypt, Lebanon, Iraq (we were warning them against invading Kuwait. Ironic, isn't it?), China, Panama, then a freaking war in Vietnam... It's like, why do they hate us for our Democracy imposed on them?
But I digress.We do good work. We kill a million people in Indonesia by way of CIA assisted Army coup in 1965, we invade the Dominican Republic the same year, the Army kills 43 POC in Detroit. I mean the American Freedom Train is really humming along.
Sure - we carpet bomb Cambodia and destroy the government for ten years, killing 2 Million people through explosions and starvation, but you have to break some eggs, right? Besides if we hadn't smoothed the road for Democracy and Freedom there, you never would have gotten that cool movie about Pol Pot with Sam Waterston. Dude won an Oscar for that. He was on Law & Order - he's legit.
Then there was that Wounded Knee siege against the Lakota in South Dakota in '73... but this is getting away from the point - Which is: The US... it does God's Work all the time with its Armed Services, defending the Nation, never putting them in harm's way for profit, making it safe for roasted hotdogs and black powder displays of the Nation's Moral Purity once a year.
Oh yeah and Chile. Don't forget we killed the President of Chile. Shit we had a lot going on.
ANYWAY MY POINT is how shocked I was to discover how the financial system works with regard to IMF/World Bank and Debt forgiveness.
See it works like this:A bunch of really well meaning people get together and they say, SURE third world developing country, we will loan you money via the World Bank to build infrastructure so your peeples can has electric if you hire say, Bechtel or Halliburton to do all the work. Nice deal.
Then the country has a shiny building or two in the square, maybe some electric grid, and the work is done by US or Multinational companies so they profit, maybe one half of one percent of the native population gets very rich and invests that money in international currency markets and Swiss bank accounts so it's completely out of the country. Good deal. Only one drawback, really, and its not a big thing, just... nobody can really afford the electric at the rates that Foreign company is charging, because none of the population got any work or learned any trade since Bechtel imported their own contractors. Oh and the debt. The dirt-poor people still have the debt... and no water treatment facilities, because most of the GDP goes to paying down the debt.So what's to be done?
Le Sigh... The International Monetary Fund looks at them and says, "Silly goose! You ain't got no monies!" Well, they can approve a loan AGAIN but they can't do it with all that debt riding ... Instead we get some celebrities like Bono, and they do videos and stuff, and we all talk about how awesome cancelling that debt would be, because debt forgiveness sounds really super charitable... So that's what we do.Conditional Debt Forgiveness.
Conditional on Privatization of the water treatment (because honestly third world country, you already can't manage your electric grid) So a company like Halliburton or Bechtel comes in and uses up all the money building and then privately running the only water treatment facilities at something like three times the previous cost, but I mean, they have to make a profit, right? They don't do this stuff for free. They have kids to feed.
What else you got third world country? Besides life-threatening poverty for 80% of the country and crazy preventable disease and child mortality rates? You need roads? You got Oil? You got mining we could do? We could do this all day!
So election day comes, and the companies send in representatives and they meet the new guys after inauguration, and everyone shakes hands and says hey congratulations. Then the Company men reach in a pocket and say, "Hey yo - here's 200k to play ball. That's the left pocket. You don't want the right pocket because that's everything that could happen to you and your family when no one is looking." Now, imagine you're a president, and you're wondering if you really appreciate what's happening here. Maybe you even want to have some integrity, but besides being thrown out in a CIA backed coup, or dead along with the whole of your family, what's the guy after you going to do? It kind of sets a bad tone, getting murdered.
So now you're corrupt! Shame on you, Mister or Madam President! What your people say they needed was a strong leader to manage their resources in a sound way - not IMF/WB loans and debt to foreign companies siphoning natural resources! In fact that's what two generations of South American Presidents have been saying and they keep getting elected being socialist and anti-corporate and the US has to talk about what an enemy to Good, Clean, Pure US Interests they are.
And occasionally we kill people in the name of Democracy. It just happens.
So, at the end, what I found really disturbing is that we have this really clear history of Humanitarian Righteousness when it comes to US Foreign relations, yet for so long the US has been left out of it's own Democracy Parade.
We started out good in Iraq setting up a puppet dictatorship. Then they got mouthy and we flexed a bit. Then years later they acted like they didn't like our trade agreements and we sent in some CIA guys to... actually shit - we couldn't, because that crazy ass Saddam guy had tons of loyal guards and body doubles. So we had to invade... a little. because at the end of the day we figured he'd keep Iran in check, and play ball, and know who the top dog was because the US is WHAT!?!?!? His crazy ass was still not doing what we wanted... and we had to invade ALL OVER AGAIN. My God.
Now we had to fold that into our Afghanistan thing (which actually was really convenient because we had a closed meeting about how to design new currency for Iraq after wrapping up our plan for killing the leader in the first week of Bush's term, and then some crazy people blew up stuff and it was party time), and we sent troops and we privatized as much as we could with independent contractors and Halliburton built showers for our troops that had uninsulated wiring and electrocuted a few, and they built cisterns of stagnant water that made a bunch of troops sick, and ... well you get it right?
Why do they hate our Freedoms? Cheney got 34 Million out of the deal from Halliburton ... it's not like he had anything to gain from funneling them money.
Why do WE hate our Freedoms?
But wait - what is that Siren Song of Righteous freedoms I hear???
Now Conservative America wants to spread that Dream of Democracy to the shores of... that's right! AMERICA!!! It's finally our turn! We'll Privatize school, and prison for profit, and Social Security, and Medicaid, and just about everything that can bleed money.
I mean Social Security? That's a HUGE drain on the national budget - Paul Ryan just said so, while joking that he hoped the sixty-five year old dude he'd directed police to wrestle to the ground had taken his blood pressure medication (see because he was mad that Ryan was calling Medicaid and Social Security an entitlement program, which clearly it is, if you consider that paying for something out of your own pocket in the US entitles you to get it).
Just think it's money, right, that private people and their employers pay in over a lifetime that is also reinvested for a profit for the Government. Christ on a Cracker. Leaving money that people put themselves into an account that is ostensibly set up just for them, that the Government collects the interest on all alone? They pay in for fifty years and then take it out for ten? HELL YES that has got to be a drain on the economy, leaving all that money that's already theirs in their Government kept pockets. Let's get a Privatized company in here to empty that shit post haste!
Because stealing your money - hey that's Conservative.
Now if we could only focus on Iran, and it's human rights problems, and the horrible, sticky condition for women under the brutal dictatorship that we set up on purpose after killing their president in the 50's?
Or solve the corruption problems with these Banana Republics that we pay off or threaten with death if they don't get corrupt right quick? I mean, our politicians don't have a problem removing impediments to multinational Corporate interests donating the GDP of Brazil for an election. OUR politicians don't balk at the hard work of limiting human rights within our borders. OUR politicians are saying they're totally cool with stripping women of their rights (and presumably everything else).
Is this not the glorious One World the United Nations was conceived for?
The world would be a better place if they accepted the Dream of US Democracy and embraced us as Liberators instead of taking the money we buy them off with or dying from the bullets we put into them in the middle of the night. Or maybe all of the above.
Oh Shit! Maybe we get to shoot Senior Citizens now?
Women hanging from a crane in the public square for being raped...? Hey America, you swiped the credit card to rent that boom truck. That enemy is still us. Semper Fi.
Friday, July 27, 2012
Quitting Goodreads
Finding The Exit.
What's the correct modern way of saying "A lot of ink has been spilled"? Anyway, Goodreads and me, we're trying to break up. By trying I mean I keep hitting Delete Account, Yes I Am Sure, Yes, Really Sure, STOP CALLING ME and Goodreads... keeps phoning. I've turned off all my notifications, shut it down, sworn I want all my content to go away forever - and the next day there are new comments on my reviews. It's sort of like trying to leave Facebook, but we will get it sorted out. Goodreads never really met my needs. It had a lot of author sockpuppeting (people complain about Amazon's review inflation?). The interface was clunky. I never really discovered books on Goodreads the way I do on blogs. But Goodreads worked for other people so I provided content there for the people that said "Wow, I wish you'd do something at Goodreads too."
Stalkers & Pedophiles, Oh My.
We all know what happened and we all know why and we all know how things are being rewritten on an hourly basis to try and justify unjustifiable events. I figured, after the utter fail of Huffington Post that Goodreads was taking their time to get things right. Then they came out for the stalkers. Of course, it's all coded and worded and finessed and blah blah blah but I don't care how sorry you are baby, when you hit me in the face I notice. People tell you who they are all damn day but are very careful when they show you. Once someone is stalking their points don't matter anymore. If they have them, if they don't have them, all the same. What matters is that stalking is wrong and feeding into it by offering cookies of any kind suggests that crazy stalking is a good tool to get things done. This way lies insanity and AOL.
Every Moral Has A Story.
I realize people believe in changing things from the inside. People don't like throwing babies out with bathwater. That's just not me. Screw me over and I'm done with you. I don't care if you're an author with so many sockpuppets you bought a prosthetic limb or a web site that is trying to service too many masters and pleasing none. I don't have time to guide you into the brighter lights. I pack my bag and go. It is a very big internet. There are many places to see. (Places that enjoy having free content to monetize. Trust me, I'm old. I've been giving it away for a long time.) So Huffington Post and Goodreads will carry on fine without me. But I'll carry on even better with them. The lovely thing about removing someone from your life is that they're gone. (I miss Netflix about zero times a day.) There is always another path, often leading unexpectedly beautiful places. To find it all you have to do is wander off.
TL:DR - Westboro Church showed up on Goodreads' front lawn and Goodreads signed over the property.
What's the correct modern way of saying "A lot of ink has been spilled"? Anyway, Goodreads and me, we're trying to break up. By trying I mean I keep hitting Delete Account, Yes I Am Sure, Yes, Really Sure, STOP CALLING ME and Goodreads... keeps phoning. I've turned off all my notifications, shut it down, sworn I want all my content to go away forever - and the next day there are new comments on my reviews. It's sort of like trying to leave Facebook, but we will get it sorted out. Goodreads never really met my needs. It had a lot of author sockpuppeting (people complain about Amazon's review inflation?). The interface was clunky. I never really discovered books on Goodreads the way I do on blogs. But Goodreads worked for other people so I provided content there for the people that said "Wow, I wish you'd do something at Goodreads too."
Stalkers & Pedophiles, Oh My.
We all know what happened and we all know why and we all know how things are being rewritten on an hourly basis to try and justify unjustifiable events. I figured, after the utter fail of Huffington Post that Goodreads was taking their time to get things right. Then they came out for the stalkers. Of course, it's all coded and worded and finessed and blah blah blah but I don't care how sorry you are baby, when you hit me in the face I notice. People tell you who they are all damn day but are very careful when they show you. Once someone is stalking their points don't matter anymore. If they have them, if they don't have them, all the same. What matters is that stalking is wrong and feeding into it by offering cookies of any kind suggests that crazy stalking is a good tool to get things done. This way lies insanity and AOL.
Every Moral Has A Story.
I realize people believe in changing things from the inside. People don't like throwing babies out with bathwater. That's just not me. Screw me over and I'm done with you. I don't care if you're an author with so many sockpuppets you bought a prosthetic limb or a web site that is trying to service too many masters and pleasing none. I don't have time to guide you into the brighter lights. I pack my bag and go. It is a very big internet. There are many places to see. (Places that enjoy having free content to monetize. Trust me, I'm old. I've been giving it away for a long time.) So Huffington Post and Goodreads will carry on fine without me. But I'll carry on even better with them. The lovely thing about removing someone from your life is that they're gone. (I miss Netflix about zero times a day.) There is always another path, often leading unexpectedly beautiful places. To find it all you have to do is wander off.
TL:DR - Westboro Church showed up on Goodreads' front lawn and Goodreads signed over the property.
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
When You Need A Doormat...
I don't have cats. Let's toss that out right now. Not all white chicks like cats. Something I especially dislike about cats is they way they show their love. I don't need some dead thing twitching on my doorstep. Somehow I've failed to convey this message to my friends and therefore they bring me things they found on the internet. Today is all about some dude named Officially Ice breaking out 10 Reasons To Date White Women. I had to laugh. I've been hearing this nonsense for years. Let me tell you from first hand experience, once you go black? You absolutely do go back. (If you're running into clowns who believe this list.)
10. This one is all about girls getting their hair wet. I know girls with closets full of hundred dollar swim suits that will never see a drop of water. They have absolutely no intention of ever getting in the pool, much less hitting the surf. Granted, a keratin treatment ($300 every two to three months) is cheaper than a weave, but if you're doing hair color as well it's another $150 - $250 and that splash in the pool becomes a hassle. Of course some white girls wear their hair natural or color and straighten it themselves. Same as black girls.
9. White girls can be verbally abused. This one is true. Many white girls, especially from the middle class, are surrounded by privilege. It is easier to lead them into an emotionally abusive relationship than a black girl who has struggled her way through life. Be careful you don't accidentally select a white girl who has been raised to know her value, not previously abused, or otherwise endowed with self worth. She will knock your head back. Unlike a black girl, she has the government on her side and can land your ass in jail for even minor events. You want to be certain you've selected a victim and not a women when you "put a little aggression in your voice." Remember too, her family can shoot you and the investigation is likely to go nowhere. White privilege can take away as easily as it gives.
8. White girls are unlikely to be named Shaniqua. Absolutely true. Alongside such white names as Katherine, Michelle, Janet, Paris, Halle, Nicole, Toni, Angela and Rose (or Rosa) are names like Krystal, Tiffany, Brandy, Brooklyn, and Candy. Way more classy. He's got us here.
7. White girls are freaky. Damn, I can never say that one with a straight face. Because it's so funny. Every time a black guy tells me white girls are up for anything, no matter how kinky I think he must date a lot of sex workers. The white girls I know sob at the table about the "sick" shit their man suggested. Demeaning things like oral sex, or taking photos, or in the shower, or on the couch, or sometimes even at lunch. Obviously, they sniffle, their man has mistaken them for a whore. If you want your sexual tastes to line up with your partner's sexual taste then just ask. For every white girl that won't turn the lights on there's one who already slept with all your friends. Just like black girls.
6. White girls do not ascribe to the stereotypes of black culture. Ok. But I hope you're ready to go mudding after the rodeo and maybe get some golf in at the country club. (Assuming you don't work there.) Because one thing white girls love to do is bring a black man somewhere they know he isn't allowed. There's no real danger to them and wow do their dads freak out. Who needs to keep the champagne flowing when you can spike the drama through the roof?
5. White girls will blow their cash on you. There is a what's mine is yours ethic to many white relationships. Of course, what's yours is hers too. If you aren't bringing her the same caliber of gifts she's bringing you - well the door is that way. Most white girls insist on a man who can provide the lifestyle they expect. A man with a lower net worth is man who won't be around long. If you really want nice gifts pick a super old white lady. I know a few guys who picked up cars servicing the widows at Century Village.
4. White girls don't nag, hassle or expect fidelity. I suppose in the business relationship Officially Ice is describing that's true. If she's using you to get her Black Buck Fantasy on then what does she care about the rest of your life? On the other hand, many of these sheltered white girls (you know, the ones with self esteem low enough to put up with the abuse in item 9) can smother you like nobody's business. And those bitches can cry! Kleenex is not raking in the cash from the black community, that's for damn sure. Just look at Hallmark ads! White chicks cry like it's their job. Plus, instead of hassling you they just go crazy. There's a reason every other Lifetime movie is some girl going insane and leaving dead bunnies in your bed. White girls on a jealous rampage will fuck you up and spit on your bones. There's a whole genre of music about it. We call it Country.
3. White girls cater to their men. Can't argue. I know scores of white women who do not work outside the home because their focus is on their man. They hire a maid (or two) for the home, a nanny for the kids, a tennis instructor, a fitness instructor, a beautician, a spa service, a waxer and a host of other people to help them hone their body into their man's fantasy. They'll dump the takeout into the home china for your dinner and smoothly entertain your boss while the drinks flow. Of course these women are also sleeping with half the people they use your money to hire, but so what? It's all about looking good for you, baby. You're paying, we're all playing. Of course I also know struggling single mothers, hard working career women and ladies whose men wait on them. Black and white. You know, like people.
2. For many men the answer to "Have you ever received head from a white woman?" is no. Oral sex is a deeply debated topic in the white culture. Girls who preform oral sex are either whores or preserving their virginity or some combination in between. Men who ask for oral sex are either nasty, normal, or secretly gay. Really, it's a thing. It gets talked about. I know men who haven't had a blow job in ten, twenty, thirty years. They think black women give them up like little pez dispensers. I guess we all learned something with this one.
1. White girls are more fun. OMG yes. Here Officially Ice and I could not agree more. Need proof? CASEY ANTHONY! Did she let a dead kid get in the way of her party? Oh Hell No! Girl got herself a tattoo and went dancing. If you want to party till the body is found there are white girls right there with you. Marry one and you'll never have to worry about staying home!
On reflection I can see why these myths about white women have endured. I thought I was going to disagree with Officially Ice a lot more than I really did. All the uptight church girls, the hard working redneck girls, the obsessively jealous and the serial cheaters have one thing in common - black dudes who hate black women are willing to date them. Lucky, lucky us.
10. This one is all about girls getting their hair wet. I know girls with closets full of hundred dollar swim suits that will never see a drop of water. They have absolutely no intention of ever getting in the pool, much less hitting the surf. Granted, a keratin treatment ($300 every two to three months) is cheaper than a weave, but if you're doing hair color as well it's another $150 - $250 and that splash in the pool becomes a hassle. Of course some white girls wear their hair natural or color and straighten it themselves. Same as black girls.
9. White girls can be verbally abused. This one is true. Many white girls, especially from the middle class, are surrounded by privilege. It is easier to lead them into an emotionally abusive relationship than a black girl who has struggled her way through life. Be careful you don't accidentally select a white girl who has been raised to know her value, not previously abused, or otherwise endowed with self worth. She will knock your head back. Unlike a black girl, she has the government on her side and can land your ass in jail for even minor events. You want to be certain you've selected a victim and not a women when you "put a little aggression in your voice." Remember too, her family can shoot you and the investigation is likely to go nowhere. White privilege can take away as easily as it gives.
8. White girls are unlikely to be named Shaniqua. Absolutely true. Alongside such white names as Katherine, Michelle, Janet, Paris, Halle, Nicole, Toni, Angela and Rose (or Rosa) are names like Krystal, Tiffany, Brandy, Brooklyn, and Candy. Way more classy. He's got us here.
7. White girls are freaky. Damn, I can never say that one with a straight face. Because it's so funny. Every time a black guy tells me white girls are up for anything, no matter how kinky I think he must date a lot of sex workers. The white girls I know sob at the table about the "sick" shit their man suggested. Demeaning things like oral sex, or taking photos, or in the shower, or on the couch, or sometimes even at lunch. Obviously, they sniffle, their man has mistaken them for a whore. If you want your sexual tastes to line up with your partner's sexual taste then just ask. For every white girl that won't turn the lights on there's one who already slept with all your friends. Just like black girls.
6. White girls do not ascribe to the stereotypes of black culture. Ok. But I hope you're ready to go mudding after the rodeo and maybe get some golf in at the country club. (Assuming you don't work there.) Because one thing white girls love to do is bring a black man somewhere they know he isn't allowed. There's no real danger to them and wow do their dads freak out. Who needs to keep the champagne flowing when you can spike the drama through the roof?
5. White girls will blow their cash on you. There is a what's mine is yours ethic to many white relationships. Of course, what's yours is hers too. If you aren't bringing her the same caliber of gifts she's bringing you - well the door is that way. Most white girls insist on a man who can provide the lifestyle they expect. A man with a lower net worth is man who won't be around long. If you really want nice gifts pick a super old white lady. I know a few guys who picked up cars servicing the widows at Century Village.
4. White girls don't nag, hassle or expect fidelity. I suppose in the business relationship Officially Ice is describing that's true. If she's using you to get her Black Buck Fantasy on then what does she care about the rest of your life? On the other hand, many of these sheltered white girls (you know, the ones with self esteem low enough to put up with the abuse in item 9) can smother you like nobody's business. And those bitches can cry! Kleenex is not raking in the cash from the black community, that's for damn sure. Just look at Hallmark ads! White chicks cry like it's their job. Plus, instead of hassling you they just go crazy. There's a reason every other Lifetime movie is some girl going insane and leaving dead bunnies in your bed. White girls on a jealous rampage will fuck you up and spit on your bones. There's a whole genre of music about it. We call it Country.
3. White girls cater to their men. Can't argue. I know scores of white women who do not work outside the home because their focus is on their man. They hire a maid (or two) for the home, a nanny for the kids, a tennis instructor, a fitness instructor, a beautician, a spa service, a waxer and a host of other people to help them hone their body into their man's fantasy. They'll dump the takeout into the home china for your dinner and smoothly entertain your boss while the drinks flow. Of course these women are also sleeping with half the people they use your money to hire, but so what? It's all about looking good for you, baby. You're paying, we're all playing. Of course I also know struggling single mothers, hard working career women and ladies whose men wait on them. Black and white. You know, like people.
2. For many men the answer to "Have you ever received head from a white woman?" is no. Oral sex is a deeply debated topic in the white culture. Girls who preform oral sex are either whores or preserving their virginity or some combination in between. Men who ask for oral sex are either nasty, normal, or secretly gay. Really, it's a thing. It gets talked about. I know men who haven't had a blow job in ten, twenty, thirty years. They think black women give them up like little pez dispensers. I guess we all learned something with this one.
1. White girls are more fun. OMG yes. Here Officially Ice and I could not agree more. Need proof? CASEY ANTHONY! Did she let a dead kid get in the way of her party? Oh Hell No! Girl got herself a tattoo and went dancing. If you want to party till the body is found there are white girls right there with you. Marry one and you'll never have to worry about staying home!
On reflection I can see why these myths about white women have endured. I thought I was going to disagree with Officially Ice a lot more than I really did. All the uptight church girls, the hard working redneck girls, the obsessively jealous and the serial cheaters have one thing in common - black dudes who hate black women are willing to date them. Lucky, lucky us.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
So, just to keep score so far...
One is cast as a "suspect"
for being innocent and getting shot, the other is cast as a "victim of the system" for shooting innocents.
One is dead and his report card comes under attack, the other kills people and the media fetishizes his "good grades."
One is undeserving of life because he got some gold teeth, the other deserves leniency because he dyed his hair.
One is "propagandist," because his posthumous photos aren't "scary enough," the other commits mass murder and photos are circulated of "when he was happier."
One is a "future criminal" for being shot with candy, the other kills 12 people and "was such a nice boy."
Have I missed anything? Beyond nostalgia for the journalist's souls?
One is dead and his report card comes under attack, the other kills people and the media fetishizes his "good grades."
One is undeserving of life because he got some gold teeth, the other deserves leniency because he dyed his hair.
One is "propagandist," because his posthumous photos aren't "scary enough," the other commits mass murder and photos are circulated of "when he was happier."
One is a "future criminal" for being shot with candy, the other kills 12 people and "was such a nice boy."
Have I missed anything? Beyond nostalgia for the journalist's souls?
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
10 Frisk Commandments
Normality is part of the immense divide between what we know as white Americans and what we know as black or brown Americans. We base our assumptions in how things are. As a white American who has traveled between multiple class and economic levels I know that the way things are looks completely different based on where you are standing. I have had the honor of multiple perspectives. One I will never have is being a multi-generational non-white American. I don't have to teach my children how to minimize opportunities for the police to kill them. I don't have to worry that my child, if missing, will not be important. The experiences of Trayvon Martin's parents in the terrible hours between missing and murdered will not be mine. There are many experiences I am grateful that my privilege shields me from. One of those is being unable to walk in my own neighborhood without police inspection. While stop and frisk does happen in poor white communities it is not official policy. Because we have the social power not to stand for it. The rest of America does not. Celebrate your privilege by watching the 10 Frisk Commandments. Get a new perspective.
Monday, July 16, 2012
From 1966 to 2012
Booker's Place had excerpts from the 1966 film Mississippi: A Self Portrait.
It's an hour you should watch. (There is a flaw in the upload, stick with the black commercial here space and the rest of the film is intact.) Many of the people in this film are alive. Their children are alive. Pay particular attention to the last third, where fear is used to control the poor white population. As white people, we talk in coded language we don't really understand. What struck me most during Booker's Place was how little the difference is between things my neighbors say and things the 1966 Mississippian said. To some extent, this makes sense. After all, we were all alive in 1966 and we still are today. Race in America is an ongoing struggle. The current election is bringing a conversation about fear. People are afraid, without explanation of what they fear. They need to Take America Back, but to what? Which America? Racism is hereditary. It is something handed down in the things we know, the things we believe and the things we say. The myths we perpetuate in the white community are simply untrue. They are lies we tell ourselves and our children, lies we prop up with our collective reaffirmation that none of us are bad people. We are good people. We are fair minded people.
When you open the door to a conversation about race reality in America you ask your fellow white person to consider they they are not good or fair minded people. The challenge is to undertake revelation without blame. Booker talks about always smiling. He's not wrong. I have found the only effective way to bring people to the table is to agree with their major racisms while undermining the minor ones. With the murder of Trayvon Martin there is a previously unavailable opportunity for me to discuss race with the whites around me. While one of the workers on our property was murdered without much attention being paid to him, they do care about the innocence of George Zimmerman. Like Booker Wright, I have to keep that smile. I have to Yassir my way through the conversation. I've given up on those over 55. (Get called N'rlover enough times, and you get cynical.) It's easy to pretend this is due to my living in the South but 90% of my neighborhood is Northern transplants. Talking to the residents in their 20's, 30's, and 40's the same racism is present, the same arguments are made. Only the words change.
"The greatest trick the Devil ever played" is a common phrase used in the South. I think the greatest trick he ever played was the deliberate destruction of the black economy. Through the murder of successful black businessmen and the burning of black infrastructure, the black main street is largely gone. Black America is subject to a lack of eduction, human trafficking and exploitation in a way white America largely is not. We make the same arguments about black America we ever did. We have the deserving blacks and the underserving. If I make the argument to to my neighbors that George Zimmerman was mistaken in his assumptions about Trayvon Martin, the conversation continues. If I make the argument that Trayvon had a right to self defense, the conversation ends. Trayvon does not have the basic human rights (in the minds of my white neighbors) that George Zimmerman does. In fact (without fail) when I begin to make ground with them about Zimmerman's murder of Martin, the claim is quickly made. "Zimmerman isn't white you know." Because the conversation is getting too close to what we cannot acknowledge. Black Americans are still not counted as full humans. They are not considered worthy of the same rights as white Americans. Transgressions against them are always justified, by the mere fact of their being black.
Of course, your white neighbors will tell you, racism is wrong. Of course it's wrong that the income, education and employment disparity between whites and blacks is so deep. But... There is not a lot of difference between what the whites of 1966 say and the whites of 2012. We word it differently, we speak less openly, we are less self aware, but the roots of racism run deep and are not gone. We have it in all of us. The challenge is to find it and discuss it without triggering the kill switches of guilt or blame. Like Booker Wright said, you've got to keep smiling.
It's an hour you should watch. (There is a flaw in the upload, stick with the black commercial here space and the rest of the film is intact.) Many of the people in this film are alive. Their children are alive. Pay particular attention to the last third, where fear is used to control the poor white population. As white people, we talk in coded language we don't really understand. What struck me most during Booker's Place was how little the difference is between things my neighbors say and things the 1966 Mississippian said. To some extent, this makes sense. After all, we were all alive in 1966 and we still are today. Race in America is an ongoing struggle. The current election is bringing a conversation about fear. People are afraid, without explanation of what they fear. They need to Take America Back, but to what? Which America? Racism is hereditary. It is something handed down in the things we know, the things we believe and the things we say. The myths we perpetuate in the white community are simply untrue. They are lies we tell ourselves and our children, lies we prop up with our collective reaffirmation that none of us are bad people. We are good people. We are fair minded people.
When you open the door to a conversation about race reality in America you ask your fellow white person to consider they they are not good or fair minded people. The challenge is to undertake revelation without blame. Booker talks about always smiling. He's not wrong. I have found the only effective way to bring people to the table is to agree with their major racisms while undermining the minor ones. With the murder of Trayvon Martin there is a previously unavailable opportunity for me to discuss race with the whites around me. While one of the workers on our property was murdered without much attention being paid to him, they do care about the innocence of George Zimmerman. Like Booker Wright, I have to keep that smile. I have to Yassir my way through the conversation. I've given up on those over 55. (Get called N'rlover enough times, and you get cynical.) It's easy to pretend this is due to my living in the South but 90% of my neighborhood is Northern transplants. Talking to the residents in their 20's, 30's, and 40's the same racism is present, the same arguments are made. Only the words change.
"The greatest trick the Devil ever played" is a common phrase used in the South. I think the greatest trick he ever played was the deliberate destruction of the black economy. Through the murder of successful black businessmen and the burning of black infrastructure, the black main street is largely gone. Black America is subject to a lack of eduction, human trafficking and exploitation in a way white America largely is not. We make the same arguments about black America we ever did. We have the deserving blacks and the underserving. If I make the argument to to my neighbors that George Zimmerman was mistaken in his assumptions about Trayvon Martin, the conversation continues. If I make the argument that Trayvon had a right to self defense, the conversation ends. Trayvon does not have the basic human rights (in the minds of my white neighbors) that George Zimmerman does. In fact (without fail) when I begin to make ground with them about Zimmerman's murder of Martin, the claim is quickly made. "Zimmerman isn't white you know." Because the conversation is getting too close to what we cannot acknowledge. Black Americans are still not counted as full humans. They are not considered worthy of the same rights as white Americans. Transgressions against them are always justified, by the mere fact of their being black.
Of course, your white neighbors will tell you, racism is wrong. Of course it's wrong that the income, education and employment disparity between whites and blacks is so deep. But... There is not a lot of difference between what the whites of 1966 say and the whites of 2012. We word it differently, we speak less openly, we are less self aware, but the roots of racism run deep and are not gone. We have it in all of us. The challenge is to find it and discuss it without triggering the kill switches of guilt or blame. Like Booker Wright said, you've got to keep smiling.
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