This Is the "N"

I have to give credit to CNN's Don Lemon because when it comes to being who he is and stating his views, he really doesn't screw around or suffer fools lightly. He's out of the closet as a gay man and he has some very strong opinions on race relations and the way they should be covered by CNN and other news outlets. Personally, I agree with many of his beliefs and think that as a journalist with a wide forum he can be an invaluably powerful voice when it comes to challenging and changing the way racial issues are discussed by the media.

Tonight on CNN at 7pm ET, Lemon will be hosting a special called "The N-Word," which will supposedly debate the use of racial slurs like "nigger" and discuss whether slurs aimed at white people -- words like "cracker" and "honky" -- are comparable. To his credit, Lemon thinks that journalists or those referencing the word itself, minus any emotion or emphasis on using it to attack and demean, should be able to say the actual word "nigger" without having to self-censor. I think he's absolutely right. Way back in 2006, when Michael Richards had hell rain down on him -- fairly, I'd say, given the context of his rant, which happened as the result of his completely losing control of the audience at a comedy show and lashing out -- I wrote a lengthy piece on the dangers of not ever being willing to say out loud what we're talking about and instead trying to cheat in the name of glossing over the harshness of reality.

Here was the salient quote:

"The word 'nigger' holds an unparalleled level of ascendancy in our society. There's no better testament to the truth of this statement than the fact that otherwise educated, intelligent people -- the type who normally would rather step on a live land mine than be taken for an idiot -- will gladly allow themselves to be reduced to spouting the vernacular of a four-year-old to avoid speaking it.

No matter the alternative's power to offend and instigate, is there anything -- anything -- more painfully ridiculous than a grown man or woman saying, 'The N-word?' It's an absurd verbal tip-toe that not only proves that there is apparently no safe context in which the actual word can be uttered, but also that there exists an unspoken implication that those whom one would expect to be angered by the use of such a word are so stupid that they can't discern between the desire to dehumanize and subjugate and the need to openly discuss, and therefore should be protected from hearing the word altogether -- for the good of everyone. This latter possibility -- an indictment of an entire culture, whether out of condescension or outright fear -- is infinitely more offensive than the utterance of any one word."

I get that I'm a white guy talking about the use of an incredibly hurtful and derogatory term and I obviously haven't had to be on the receiving end of that word for decades upon decades. But when it comes to being willing to say "nigger" in a discussion instead of sanitizing it and, as Louie CK brilliantly said, forcing the other person to construct the ugly reality in his or her mind, I think we're basically being a bunch of chicken shits.

Don Lemon is trying to push an envelope that really shouldn't need to be pushed because, regardless of how offensive and oppressive a single word can be, we're all adults and I would hope can come to an agreement that there's a difference between discussion and dehumanization. No, I'm not looking for an excuse to say a "forbidden" word; I don't spend my day walking around being frustrated that the one thing somebody has asked me not to do as a white guy is an insurmountable personal crisis. I'm just not so sure we -- any of us -- should be talking like children in the name of submitting to language and a cultural reality that scares us.

Racial Gray (Complete)

The Full Text of the Piece That Appeared Yesterday at the Daily Banter

I didn’t want this to turn into a public back-and-forth, but when I wrote a piece last week for this site on the double-standard when it comes to how news outlets cover crimes which are racially motivated or have the potential to be racially motivated, I knew I might be opening a Pandora’s Box. So with that in mind, and after my good friend and podcast partner Bob Cesca penned a response to my original column here a few days ago, I feel like I want to clarify and expand on my views a little.

First of all, I really do hate the fact that even though my motives are much different and I have to believe more noble than theirs, my opinion gets to be lumped in with the likes of Bill O’Reilly and Bernie Goldberg. I don’t like that it looks like I’m defending them when I’m simply defending a point they’ve made — again, regardless of why they made that point. It should also go without saying that I hope I’m not labeled some kind of racist — or a latent racist, unaware of my own racist feelings, a charge that’s almost impossible to defend against — by those who disagree with me on this. I want to make it clear that while O’Reilly and Goldberg seemed to suggest an equivalence between the incident in Virginia and the Trayvon Martin shooting, I did nothing of the sort; they’re completely different cases and they should have been treated differently by the press.

The issue, though, is larger than an unfair comparison between two separate and distinctive events.

I’m not saying that the media don’t report black-on-white crime. Of course they do. Jesus, in a lot of places — mostly local news markets — it’s almost all they do. The difference — the double-standard — occurs when it comes time to tag a crime as racially motivated or to acknowledge a racial component within a crime. When there’s a possibility of labeling a crime racially motivated, the burden of proof is much higher in a black-on-white crime than it is in one that’s white-on-black. I understand completely the history involved — which Bob outlined nicely — and how and why that can come into play, but I’m still not sure that makes it right from the standpoint of journalistic ethics. From what I’ve seen, it would take a person or a group literally shouting “I hate white people” while kicking somebody’s ass for many in the media to report that a black-on-white crime had racial overtones — and if it didn’t appear at first glance to have overt racial overtones they almost certainly wouldn’t go looking any deeper for them.

Again, I do understand the lengthy and incontrovertible history that deserves consideration, but a group of white people beating up on a black person is automatically very suspicious — as it damn well should be — while a group of black people beating up on someone of another race or ethnicity is deemed, what? Business as usual? Just the way things are? Doesn’t the refusal to even acknowledge the racial element in a story like that — particularly when the coverage would be far different were the roles reversed — speak to Goldberg’s claim that the media may be trying to play a paternal role in protecting a minority community from the bigots who’d automatically label them savages or criminals? If so, is it the media’s job to play that paternal role?

There’s no denying that a news organization can often be influenced, sometimes very quietly, by factors not related to the goal of practicing journalism. On my site I’ve written often about the subtle pressure exerted on news producers to be cognizant of any possible liberal bias within their work — a product of years of accusations and strong-arming by the right — and how that can often lead a news department to overcompensate. True objectivity goes out the window in an effort to ensure that conservative critics are appeased — in other words, in the pursuit of the appearance of objectivity. Likewise, there’s an interesting guideline in place in many newsrooms — occasionally unspoken but often discussed openly — that tips its cards to the incredibly delicate way the press handles the subject of race and minority crime. It works like this: If a crime has been committed and the only description you have of the suspect is, say, a black male, 5’11″, wearing a white t-shirt, you don’t air or publish the description. Why? Well, because obviously that would mean police are currently on the lookout for six thousand people; the description is worthless. But its vagueness and consequent lack of value isn’t really the reason the description wouldn’t be run; there have been quite a few times throughout my career where it’s been acknowledged in my presence, and admittedly even affirmed by me, that a non-specific description of an African-American suspect is unfair to the black community.

True, a sketch of a suspect that ambiguous would likely be left out of a story regardless of that suspect’s race or ethnicity, but special attention was always paid to those who were wanted by the police and who happened to be black, often in an effort to avoid inflaming racial tensions or giving fuel to bigots. Of course, again, there’s a history to be considered here, a history of black people being unfairly targeted as suspicious due to nothing more than the color of their skin — see, yes, Trayvon Martin — and maybe it does in fact show journalistic responsibility and an acquiescence to the realities of the world to take that into consideration when publishing or airing a news item. I think this is the argument Bob was making in his piece and he could very well be right. But from a perspective that I hope is as dispassionate as it can be, the question of fairness and paternalism again comes up: Is it the job of a journalistic organization to favor one group over another or to treat one group differently in their coverage — to show it special dispensation or handle it with kid gloves not applied when dealing with anyone else?

One final thing before we hopefully put what I think has been a healthy debate to rest: By talking about this issue I want to make it clear that I’m not at all personally outraged about the double-standard in black-vs.-white press coverage nor am I crying that I’m being racially persecuted, as O’Reilly and Goldberg most certainly were. I’m a white guy living in the United States of America — I’ve got it fucking great. I’m merely pointing out that the double-standard exists and that there’s a very strong argument to be made that it does actually defy the rules of a responsible and unbiased press. Am I hedging a little because of the sensitive nature of this subject — wearing those kid gloves, as it were? Sure am. Is it somewhat cowardly to allow any kind of potential pressure or backlash to influence what I say or the way I say it? Perhaps.

But that was sort of the point I was initially making. Or at the very least, the question I was asking.

Racial Gray

My latest piece for the Daily Banter is up and it continues the debate over the double-standard in how the media covers crime stories that may or may not feature a racial component.

Here's the opening shot:

"I didn’t want this to turn into a public back-and-forth, but when I wrote a piece last week for this site on the double-standard when it comes to how news outlets cover crimes which are racially motivated or have the potential to be racially motivated, I knew I might be opening a Pandora’s Box. So with that in mind, and after my good friend and podcast partner Bob Cesca penned a response to my original column here a few days ago, I feel like I want to clarify and expand on my views a little."

Read the Rest Here

Quote of the Day

"I’m here as the modern-day Harriet Tubman to kind of lead people on the underground railroad away from that plantation into a sense of sensibility."

-- Congressman Allen West (R-Sociopath) comparing himself to a civil rights legend and Democratic politics to a "plantation" that black Americans need to escape from, during an interview with Bill O'Reilly last night

I'll give Allen West this: I'm not sure he's capable of just saying something benign. Remember the days before Jesse Ventura became a professional conspiracy theorist, when he was simply famous for being the one politician always guaranteed to spout indiscriminate nonsense the second anyone put a microphone in front of him (the streets in St. Paul were designed by drunken Irishmen, he was a Navy SEAL, midgets should be kept as pets, etc.)? Well West is like that, cranked to 11. I truly believe he has no idea how thoroughly offensive a good 80% of his rhetoric is, which, as I've alluded to before, is kind of the definition of a narcissist.

While comparing himself to Harriet Tubman is patently ridiculous no matter how you slice it -- and I can think of another widely referenced slavery-era character many African-Americans would call a black guy who obsequiously aligns himself with the largely white ruling-class of the Republican party -- I do actually agree with him on the point he goes on to make about the current model of black "leaders" in this country. "White liberals have turned over to certain leaders -- ‘perceived leaders’ -- in the black community like a Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, a Maxine Waters or Barbara Lee, and said, ‘pacify and keep the black community firmly behind us regardless of the failures of our social welfare policies,'" he argues. He's correct to say that we're past the point where those who subscribe to the traditional model of the perpetually aggrieved and self-appointed representative of all of black America -- a few of whom he cited by name -- should be allowed to be the only, or at least most deafening and powerful, black voices out there. But the idea that a Jesse Jackson or a Maxine Waters is a tool of the white, liberal establishment -- and that an Allen West, who's a member of a party that generally doesn't give a crap about minorities, is some sort of hero come to free black America from bondage -- is flat-out nuts. Preaching the gospel of personal responsibility is one thing; a refusal to accept that there's a very real economic and social disparity between a vast swath of white and black in this country that needs to be taken into consideration is something else entirely.

Regardless, Allen West -- a guy who says that women exist primarily in service to their warrior men, bullets and ballots essentially accomplish the same thing, and those who are currently suffering under the strain of the economic policies his party enacted have to simply pull themselves up by their bootstraps -- isn't the guy to lead this fight. The fact that he honestly puts himself on a pedestal beside Harriet Tubman, who risked her life fighting the oppression that many in the modern GOP still look back on with fondness and nostalgia, tells you exactly why.

Quote of the Day

"Like the novel on which it’s based, the movie adaptation of 'The Help' will likely be a huge hit with white audiences. But for black viewers it is condescending and frequently insulting, despite admirable performances by Davis and Spencer, who bring a measure of complexity -- actual flesh and blood -- to the characters of Aibileen and Minny. It speaks volumes about the ongoing racial chasm in this country that a feel-good movie for white people will leave many black filmgoers feeling sad -- and pessimistic that America can ever become anything more than 'a nation of cowards.'"

-- From Valerie Boyd's review of The Help, titled "A Feel-Good Movie for White People," in ArtsCriticATL.com

By the way, if you feel like reading a firmly contrasting review -- in other words, one dripping with effusive praise and almost certainly written by a white guy or girl -- this one's pretty amusing.

Quote of the Day

"'oh I loves me some fried chicken' this line was just uttered in #TheHelpMovie #Seriously"

-- Melissa Harris-Perry, who's live-Tweeting as she screens The Help for an upcoming critique

Her take on the latest fling in Hollywood and pop culture's longtime love affair with "magical negro" and "white savior" storylines is both hysterical and unbelievably sad.

I just keep thinking about Chuck D, Ice Cube and Big Daddy Kane's reaction to Driving Miss Daisy in Public Enemy's Burn, Hollywood, Burn.

Update: Turns out the critique was for O'Donnell's show on MSNBC. This was her on-air appearance tonight: