Racial honesty disorder
It happens every few years: a rash of politicians decide to let their guard down, get a little too relaxed, and start saying what they really think about race. Call it racial honesty disorder, or RHD.
Sometimes there's one grand, train-wreck case of RHD, like when a tipsy Trent Lott began to wax nostalgic for Jim Crow at a holiday party in 2002.
This week, it's exploded into an all-out epidemic.
First there was Virginia incumbent Sen. George Allen's macaca moment, a vocabulary lesson for us all when it became clear that he had called a 20-year old South Asian member of the audience a monkey. He apologized, in the usual political sort of way -- but didn't atone for also telling the native of Fairfax, Va., "welcome to America."
Perhaps it's better that Allen didn't apologize for offense #2, sometimes it only makes things worse. That was the case when Florida congressional candidate Tramm Hudson -- while apologizing for an earlier offensive statement -- only dug himself in deeper:
works worked for, Wal-Mart, and you can see what a problem RHD has become.
These RHD moments are usually brushed off as "slips," although -- as will be likely in Mr. Hudson's case -- they can also become scandals that sink careers. They might be better viewed inevitable and healthy glimpses into our nation's racial subconscious -- or consciousness, since these views seem to be rarely far below the surface.
It's also fascinating to see what's considered scandalous, and what's not. I was reminded of this while reading Diane Roberts' fantastic personal history of Florida, "Dream State" (new paperback version available!), in which she relates a flash of RHD experienced by Jeb Bush, when he first ran for governor of the state:
Sometimes there's one grand, train-wreck case of RHD, like when a tipsy Trent Lott began to wax nostalgic for Jim Crow at a holiday party in 2002.
This week, it's exploded into an all-out epidemic.
First there was Virginia incumbent Sen. George Allen's macaca moment, a vocabulary lesson for us all when it became clear that he had called a 20-year old South Asian member of the audience a monkey. He apologized, in the usual political sort of way -- but didn't atone for also telling the native of Fairfax, Va., "welcome to America."
Perhaps it's better that Allen didn't apologize for offense #2, sometimes it only makes things worse. That was the case when Florida congressional candidate Tramm Hudson -- while apologizing for an earlier offensive statement -- only dug himself in deeper:
I grew up in Alabama. I understand, uh, I know from experience, that blacks are not the greatest swimmers or may not even know how to swim.Throw in Andrew Young's comments yesterday, showing his civil rights credentials by celebrating the demise of mom-and-pop stores run by "Jews, Koreans and Arabs," especially at the hands of the company he
These RHD moments are usually brushed off as "slips," although -- as will be likely in Mr. Hudson's case -- they can also become scandals that sink careers. They might be better viewed inevitable and healthy glimpses into our nation's racial subconscious -- or consciousness, since these views seem to be rarely far below the surface.
It's also fascinating to see what's considered scandalous, and what's not. I was reminded of this while reading Diane Roberts' fantastic personal history of Florida, "Dream State" (new paperback version available!), in which she relates a flash of RHD experienced by Jeb Bush, when he first ran for governor of the state:
The governor's had enough trouble with African American voters, too, ever since the 1994 campaign, when some reporter asked him what he planned to do for black people, and he replied, "Nothing."And the band played on.
2 Comments:
I'm really concerned about the 'mom-and-pops' in that I have no idea how those 1000s of 'terrorist cell phones' are now to be distributed.
It just seems that anybody deemed as a "leader" and is highly respected could at least make comments based on solid fact.
I buy at all types of stores: minority-owned, majority-owned, whatever. An yes, I currently live an inner-city neighborhood. I've never been sold "bad meat" and the occasional stale loaf of bread is sold at every type of store.
Ethnicity just doesn't play into it.
As your blog points out, these savage comments are occuring with alarming frequency. Its no longer enough for these morons to apologize and/or 'step down'.
Arrest them. Charge them with inciting a riot, violence or something similar.
Yeah, yeah...Free Speech...its great. I love it. But is something like a bomb threat legal? No -- of course not.
So why is inflammatory hate speech legal? Arrest these idiots every time they do stuff like this.
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