Secretary of Energy Steven Chu is one charming dude in this interview. He’s also just the second Chinese-American to hold a position in a Presidential cabinet.
This is a really thoughtful and articulate piece. You can follow him @gavinnewsom.
Newsweek writer Raina Kelley attempts to seal the large divide that seems to have been a result of our newfangled black President. No one seems to know what to do or say, and how to fess up when they cross a line. She swings in the right direction, but still falls prey to a glaring lack of empathy.
Just because the New York Post got into hot water for an editorial cartoon depicting cops shooting a chimp identified as the writer of the stimulus plan does not mean that all pictures of monkeys “inadvertently … conjure racial stereotypes,” as The Washington Post wrote in its apology to readers. Will The Washington Post now forgo pictures of chickens and basketballs in case it brings to mind unbidden racial stereotypes?
In case? Make sure the chicken is fried and the basketball players are apes coached by a white man, and I’m sure there won’t be many doubts left. My point is, this is too easy, and to dismiss the rabid watchdogs of racial injustice makes the cartoon no less offensive. If you can pick and choose the obvious examples of chickens and basketballs, there’s some merit to the outrage. And just to make it clear, if you seriously are going to look at that comic and the first thing you think about is the woman attacked by a chimpanzee, then you’ve got heavy blinders on. The responses are beyond frustrating, too.
How are we supposed to have a conversation about race, when we can’t even have a conversation about monkeys?
Or, in conjunction with that daft little one-liner, a comment so off that it’s ironically on point.
Coming next week: the Post regrets using the phrases “attacked and badly mauled woman” and “conjure racial stereotypes” in the same paragraph.
(cartoon of a monkey carrying a white woman away from a white man)
Yeah, cuz when I see “monkey carrying white woman over his shoulder,” I totally think “black dude”!
Maybe she’s never heard of jungle fever. Another sad but oft example of White privilege. When it’s funny, laugh. When it’s wrong, feign ignorance. If you dismiss it, we’ll just shut up and stop talking about that chip on our shoulder.
Undercover Black Man has a lengthy but informative post on where the possible origins of the monkey as a symbol for black men came to exist.
Southern whites didn’t have to bother defining Negroes as animals while they were enslaved. But once the Negro was free – and politically empowered during Reconstruction – that’s when the defeated white Southerner felt the need (psychologically, not just politically) to put forth this ugly idea.
And guess what? When white Southerners reclaimed their political dominance and disenfranchised black people, the monkey thing stuck.
It’s a real eye-opening post, and written a little ways back in 2007, but still very relevant to the today. Despite this misstep, the article by Raina Kelley does transition into a bigger and, thankfully, better idea.
Meanwhile, nobody’s having the kinds of discussions African-Americans would like to have—like whether increased diversity in the newsroom can prevent the negative racial stereotyping we saw during Hurricane Katrina, when black people were reported as “looting” while white people were said to be “foraging.” Why can’t we debate why, according to “The Black Image in the White Mind” written by Robert Entman and Andrew Rojecki, a mug shot of a black defendant is four times more likely to appear in a local television news report than one of a white defendant?
Ultimately, we want to get to the deeper issues that plague our country, but it’s hard to root for the good guys if they don’t field any of the dirty punches. And while I’m all for lightening up the mood a bit, many people are, sadly, not on the same page.
This is just another roadblock, pandering to our inability to communicate certain inalienable truths.
China has rolled out a fleet of death vans, sentencing and executing locally tried criminals closer to their hometowns to create a larger impact on the criminal community at large.
Chinese prisoners condemned to death are not offered a choice of injection over gunshot, but Qiu and others suspect wealth and connections can buy the newer method.
“It is a real phenomenon that gangsters and corrupt officials are killed by injection more than gunshot, so their bodies are intact, and death is less painful,” Liu says. “But I doubt it is government policy. These criminals are usually held in cities, where the injection is used. Common criminals are held in county-level facilities, where shooting is more common.”
Via gongblog.
Looks like Obama’s gonna get the full scrutiny of the masses from his campaign of change. With this easy tracker, you can keep track of initiatives and bills from the new (ahem) White House administration. Oh, I’m tired of the anti-Obama one-liners like “so that’s change we can believe in?” I think it’s worn out its welcome.
John Chattman of Huffington Post writes about the proposal to forgive student debts and loans.
One-time tax rebates and meager tax cuts do nothing to stimulate the economy. A recession is as much a psychological phenomenon as anything else. Knowing I’d have an extra $500 per month in my pocket will get me spending again. Multiply that across the country and the economy will start to move again.
I’m in full support for something that will help all the kids (like me) who have all this potential wasted on paying back those silly federal and private loans. Tuition is a bitch, but give me a rebate and I’ll promise to take it and do lots of shopping.
Barack the grifter