Dean's World

As soon as you read that headline you got an adrenaline rush.

No.

You were jolted, you were angry, and you were a little ashamed.

No. No. And no.

Moreover, you were mad at me. You weren't entirely sure why, but you were definitely mad at me.

No.

Sometimes, you just trust that the host has a point to make, so you don't judge until you know what the point is. And context and tone matter: this isn't some stand-up comedian's show, with the comic screaming vile epithets into the crowd; it's a sometimes-serious discussion forum, where we struggle with complex ideas and disputes. So I assume that when you start with a provocative headline, there's a reason.

Or maybe I'm too short of sleep to be provoked this morning.

Also by the way: don't black people annoy you sometimes? :-)

No more than anyone else. Stupid people annoy me, and no group has a monopoly on stupid.

(By the way... This is a gutsy headline. You once said the only reason you keep your profanity off the front page is because you worry that it might get the whole site ranked and filtered out by filtering systems. Don't you worry that might happen here?)

Sorry I didn't get the rush.

The premise that a few decades back the US was a latrine of racism where all whites had or would lynch a ? at least once is nonsense.

But it persists because it lets some today feel far superior to the unenlightened, morally inferior world of their grandfathers.

I am quite old and have mixed and lived among Blacks most of my life. (Probably more than 99.4% of the people who will read this.) And the past wasn't like that.

The ideal until about 1950 was to be colorblind. The term actually meant one was to ignore differences rather than to not be able to see them. The problem was that too many were 'colorblind' leaving a relatively few totally bigoted people in control.

An analogy is seen today when 10% of citizens vote and insiders usually control local elections. Most people simply don't care what others are doing until a threshold is reached.

When words evolve it causes more problems, not fewer. For then the listener has to guess about meaning and nuance. My parents used 'Colored', I grew up knowing 'Negro'. Then variations of the 'Afro' prefix for a decade or two. Then 'Black'.

MLK had no trouble with 'negro' or 'colored'. His concern was life.

The 'Whites' stayed 'White' except for excursions into Wasp, Gringo, Honky, Ofay (rare) used by one group or another.

All right, Ron... How much did Professor Reynolds pay you to spread the rumor that he has pictures of hot chicks on his site today? I sure couldn't find any!

No, not today. He's too stuffed with turkey and lamb. But cheesecake is one of his main topics, especially during "blog sweeps week."

I vacillate between using “the n word” and writing out “nigger”. Sometimes I do feel guilty about it.

And times change too. When I was growing up in the late 70’s, we had two boys named “Bill” on my little league baseball team. One was white, and one was black. To avoid confusion, one got tagged with the nickname “Nig”, and the other with “Honk”.

And nobody seemed to care. The coaches used the names too, even in front of the parents.

That went of for a few years until one day, a new teammate’s mother heard us calling out to Nig, and threw a fit. From there on out, it was “Will” and “Bill”, except for an occasional slip.

It wasn’t until my teenage years that I finally figured out why some folks might have found that offensive.

And, embarrassingly, it was a few more years until I learned that “Jew” was something other than a synonym for “frugal”…..

Sometimes I do feel guilty about it.

Now, see, there's a supposition Dean didn't make. Did his use of the term anger or upset me or make me feel ashamed? Nope, not in the least.

Could I use it -- even in an academic discussion of current and past impact of the term -- without feeling guilty about it? Nope, not a chance. In fact, the taboo is so great that I doubt I can use it at all.

K noted:

My parents used 'Colored', I grew up knowing 'Negro'. Then variations of the 'Afro' prefix for a decade or two. Then 'Black'.

MLK had no trouble with 'negro' or 'colored'. His concern was life.

And to back up his point, I'll note that three institutions still generally respected today (even though some people feel the groups have an axe to grind and are too partisan) are the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the United Negro College Fund, and the Congressional Black Caucus.

I mildly dislike the term African-American, because it leads to hyphenation and division, which can be unhealthy. I also think that when Rev. Jackson coined the term, he was indulging in a bit of racial gamesmanship that happens every generation or so (as K pointed out), demanding a self-chosen label as a way of claiming rebellion and independence, even though the old label was chosen by the prior generation for pretty much the same reasons. Frankly, I find the whole thing a little bit silly.

But on the other hand, I'm the one who insists on being listed as Martin L. Shoemaker in all my professional appearances and publications, even though probably no one outside my family knows or cares what the L. stands for. (Lee, by the way.) What the heck difference does it make? None, really, but that's how I see my identity. With the initial, it means me, the name I put on work that I'm proud of. I like the cadence; and when I first wanted to be an author, some authors I emulated used their middle initials, so I choose to use mine. Without the initial, it might be some other Martin Shoemaker, or it might be some faceless bureaucrat addressing me who doesn't know me as an individual. That initial is part of my identity.

So I do think the whole shifting racial labels thing is silly, but no sillier than my insistence on my initial. It's a preference, nothing more. But as long as there's no intent to defraud, I think it's right to describe a person's or a group's identity as they choose to identify themselves. It's respectful to acknowledge the identity they choose to present to the world; and unless they give me a reason to disrespect them, I try to follow their preference. So despite my misgivings, "African-American" seems to be the accepted term in the African-American community, so "African-American" is the term I'll try to use. I may slip up sometimes, and go back to "black", because "black is beautiful" is the thinking I grew up with; but my slip up is never meant as an offense.

Now don't even get me started on Peiping/Peking/Beijing...

That word (and spic, kike, wasp, hymie, et al) does not easily slip off my tongue. It does not make me angry to hear or see it, per se. It just makes me wince at the ignorance and potential hate it portrays, even when used in jest.

While I grew up in a very conservative farming community and heard other people use them, those kinds words were not heard in my home. It would have been tantamount to saying the "F" word, which I do use now--with ever increasing frequency in all of its wonderfully emotional variants.

There were only a couple of times, and those were in regards to "nigger toes" (Brazil nuts) and "nigger babies" (black baby dolls--some doubled with a white one on the other end). Both of those uses were made in passing by my grandmother who, along with my other grandparents on both sides, I would consider to be a "polite" racist. All of them mostly used the term "colored," but even that was rare and never with hate. They told me to be nice, helpful and friendly but not get "too close." Even as a little girl, thanks to my parents, I could see that they were wrong about the "too close" part. However, they were very polite to my husband's black Air Force friends attending and standing in our wedding.

Nope, sorry, I still can't say any of those kinds of words without a great deal of effort--even just to state them (nnnnniiig...). IMO, their use condemns an implied group of people, i.e., you're only like that because you are one of them. I prefer to use the more generic, yet individualized "bitch," "asshole," or "idiot."

I grew up in Detroit, but with TS, I've lost interest as well. And why does Dean bring it up ?

No mind, I do think, that MLK ennobled the use of the word negro which has fallen off due to the guardians of pc correctness. It's a proud word. Maybe one day it will return.

I like it too, so much that I named my politics after it.

Actually, I was just trying to be a smart-ass, and I was surprised that I never got a reaction out of anyone for it.

Of course, the fact that I have so few readers could have something to do with that... ;-)

Actually my first thought was "Dean's starting shit again." :)

Hehehe. I wish I had said that. Sums it up perfectly!

What Martin said in his first comment.

Now drivers in front of me on the entrance ramp who want to merge with a 70 mph+ freeway at 45 mph, they annoy me. And irritate, irk, frighten, etc....

I would feel uncomfortable saying it. Is it my age? I am 56 and remember when it was a bad thing to say. I really don't know why we have to color ourselves at all.

T, we could make it into a fashion statement: "Negro is the new black," or some such.

Can you imagine the conniption fits the politically correct crowd would have? Heh-heh-heh.

Is it just me or does the term 'Negro' sound more condescending than the term 'nigger'. Whenever I hear ‘nigger’ (used genuinely) I think an idiot is speaking because it sounds like a word a four year old would make up. But the term ‘Negro’ sounds like a deliberate attempt to segregate and insult the person. Some people find ‘black’ offensive, but that seems to be the one I hear most ‘African Americans’ in my area use. One such person actually told me “Just say ‘black’ ‘African American sounds so stupid.” Do the terms of offense vary from area to area? It would be interesting to study if I had lots of money and free time.