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Originally Posted by brianwspencer
Jackson and Sharpton are both deplorable (and don't worry Grits, I'm putting myself out there for an ass-handing, even though I'm as bleeding heart as it gets.)
They both act as if many of the words out of their mouth are not racist just the same as Imus's comments and any of the other non-Black people they go after. Someone needs to teach them a lesson in short order that racism comes from people of every color. Their being Black does not preclude them from being racists. Heck, there are Blacks out there who are racists when it comes to other Blacks. See the brown paper bag test.
From
http://www.sptimes.com/2003/08/31/Co...bag_test.shtml
In his 1996 book The Future of the Race, Henry Louis Gates Jr., chairman of the Afro-American studies department at Harvard, described his encounter with the brown paper bag when he came to Yale in the late 1960s, when skin-tone bias was brazenly practiced: "Some of the brothers who came from New Orleans held a "bag party.' As a classmate explained it to me, a bag party was a New Orleans custom wherein a brown paper bag was stuck on the door.
"Anyone darker than the bag was denied entrance. That was one cultural legacy that would be put to rest in a hurry - we all made sure of that. But in a manner of speaking, it was replaced by an opposite test whereby those who were deemed "not black enough' ideologically were to be shunned. I was not sure this was an improvement."
Gates was overly optimistic. The brown paper bag test remains in black culture in various incarnations, as the Applebee's case and the EEOC's statistics confirm. We separate ourselves by skin tone almost as much as we ever did. If, say, you check out the "desired" female beauties in rap videos, you will find redbones galore. |
If Sharpton and Jackson didn't do what they did, someone else would. Same goes for Henry Gates. They carve out a place for themselves and, like most people, achieve some good and some not so good.
And just because the 'high-tone' test is black/black doesn't mean it's correct and doesn't mean it's fair game for non-blacks to point the finger at. And, racism is very much active among Latinos. Cubans, Perto Ricans, Colombians, .... they do not all like each other universally.
I disagree with the premise of the thread. It may be well meant but it read to me like "discredit the messenger and screw the message."
Some things are really a matter of what you think is right and what you think is wrong. If my kids were not grown and gone, we'd have talked about this over dinner and would have gotten quickly past the 'Jesse's a pig and Sharpton's a thief' part and gotten them to think about and talk about the subject.
Personally I think it's fine not to like someone or a group of people. But if that person walks down a street alone and passes a group of 20 people just like me, he has the right to walk safely past, without comment. What Imus did didn't approach this but I don't think it's arguable that his actions were not harmful in some way.
If this Imus situation gets kids and young adults talking about race in modulated tones, it's a good thing it happened.