House of Eratosthenes

The complete “racist rant” is here, for now, but I had a dickens of a time trying to find it. Better hit the play button while you can…with the understanding, which is obvious anyway, that the “N” word all spelled out is used repeatedly so it would not be appropriate for a delicate audience.

She’s being taken down by an essentially anonymous force here, which is winning only because it is anonymous. Consider the point she was making: If you take it upon yourself to use that word all spelled out, you’re in big trouble if you’re white but you can probably get away with it if you’re black, especially, if you’re a “black comic.” Then, after specifically lamenting this double-standard, she took the initiative — as a white person — and used the word when nobody else had.

Okay, so she’s toast. But you can’t toast her without proving her point. She used the word only as a phonetic repetition, directing it at absolutely nobody…and she’s not surviving this. There is not going to be a Shirley Sherrod event in which it is realized she was “taken out of context,” and we need to have a “national dialogue” and look “how far we still have to go” — none of that. She’s white, she used the word, she’s dead…right after she just got done saying what? That if you’re white, and you use the word, you’re dead.

This is not a defense. It was stupid to go there, when “The N-Word” works just fine for the point she was trying to make. And from the sounds of things, it seems “Jade” and her husband have a neighbor who repeatedly uses that word…although she didn’t come out and confirm this, I don’t think. I’d like to have known more about that. What kind of rube is on a first-name basis with a mixed-marriage couple, and regularly uses that word around them?

Well, here’s what Al Sharpton has to say about it, since everyone was wondering about that or something:

Immediately after the end of this footage, the host Mr. Cooper was heard to say “Hey waitaminnit, you faked a rape scandal! Get the hell off my show right now!”

No, that didn’t happen. That’s what would happen in a sane world. It didn’t happen here.

Sharpton says Schlessinger is wrong. The word is wrong no matter how it’s used or who is using it; her tangent about blacks voting for Obama, is something of which the Rev. specifically disapproves. And if Rev. Sharpton disapproves of something, of course, your career should come to a close.

All the smart people accept this. But if you accept it, of course, you have to support it. And who wants to live in a world like this, is my question.

Mayors do not have Sharpton’s power. Governors do not have his power. Presidents and Prime Ministers do not have his power. There is no finesse or delicacy to go with that power; none is needed, for it is the power to destroy, not to preserve or create. There is no accountability involved in this power either. There is no “Sharpton campaign” to drive Dr. Laura off the air. The situation is most adequately expressed in passive voice, with an object and not a subject: Dr. Laura is losing her place, because she said something dumb.

Which can only mean Dr. Laura was correct.

Sharpton says the word is wrong no matter where it’s used or how it’s used? I’d not be surprised at all to find out the good Rev. uses it in private. He’s certainly the last name on any list of mine, or very near the bottom of such a list, of people who perceive the world in any kind of color-neutral way. And I’d much rather have Dr. Schlessinger take my kid somewhere for a week, than Rev. Sharpton.

I’m speaking for myself, but I doubt like hell I’m alone in that.

We have built a code of cultural norms, in the mode of a collective, which would not find support in a single sane individual, ever. The first question a sane individual would ask, is “Are these cultural protocols working well and doing what they’re supposed to be doing?” Well, this doesn’t impress me as an effective way to banish racism or ease racial tension…and it doesn’t look to me like the code is having that kind of an effect.

But by all means, let us stand passively by as Wrecking-Ball-Al continues to demolish some more careers, while the rules about who can say what are written by those among us with the very lowest character. Let’s all allow it to happen, with my blessing, since we’re gonna do it anyway.

Nigger. I have noticed a number–I cannot not know how widespread this might be–of very high quality young white kids greeting friends with that term. Since I know some of these kids, I know they are diminishing the word and the power of people who would control them with it.

My own very excellent 21 year old daughter is not one of them. She advised me that these racial things are only for black people to settle among themselves, and I asked her how that has been working out for the last fifty years. If she’s like her old man, she’s starting to think about that.

I have not listened to the rant, but having once listened to Dr. Laura for several weeks, I am certain that were all white people of similar persuasion to her own there would be no black underclass and no victim class. Leaving the field to Al and Jessie is cowardly and cruel, which at least is something we know we can do well.
- jamzw | 08/18/2010 @ 10:17
You know what? I think I will defend her on these grounds. If you can’t even quote what it is you’re talking about, it gets very difficult to discuss. This wasn’t her using the word to call someone else by that name. She was telling the lady what she hears from black comics and rappers all the time.

This has gotten absolutely ridiculous. When you can’t even utter a particular word quoting someone else based soley on your skin color, things have gotten out of hand.

But you’re right. She’s white and conservative (same rules don’t necessarily apply if you’re a progressive liberal) — so she will be crucified.
- philmon | 08/18/2010 @ 14:18
I have another question. How do the people who want to see Dr. Slessenger’s career end feel about the Ground Zero Mosque debate? I mean, to quote America’s favorite pretentious ground squirrel — “This is America, Dammit!”

Does ANYBODY see the double standard?

It’s a situation that mocks itself!
- philmon | 08/18/2010 @ 14:24
Excellent point, Phil.

Whenever a liberal maintains some kind of a household name telling people what’s “right” and what’s “wrong”…Jackson, Sharpton, B. Clinton, E. Kennedy, Byrd, Leahy…I notice it’s someone I wouldn’t want any small child to be around, ever. And I get the feeling liberals wouldn’t want their kids around that guy either. It’s like an anti-matter universe of morality…only true moral reprobates have any business discussing what morality is.
- mkfreeberg | 08/18/2010 @ 14:31
Speaking as Whitey, Cracker, Honky, Wigger, you can make millions of dollars talking like Chris Rock, but exercising Free Speech, gets you a Scarlet Letter. And it reads, NAACP
- Kini | 08/20/2010 @ 00:16
[…] On the Scale of Evil, Where do Murderers Rate? “It Is Weakness That Starts Wars” Dr. Laura to End Her Show First Lady Rump Photo: Fake Butt Accurate? “Eager to See Those Sensibilities Assaulted” […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 08/22/2010 @ 09:33

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Dr. Laura to End Her ShowWednesday, August 18th, 2010

Dr. Laura to End Her Show
Wednesday, August 18th, 2010