Donny Walnuts: I've discovered in the midst of writing this post that I have some A.D.D. and you will catch my random thoughts throughout this script of literature that I'm about to present to you, you'll catch the wafte of it in my parenthisis, I just wanted to prepare you.
So... I was perusing the wonderful world of Barnes and Noble yesterday. Some days that place is truely orgasmic if I'm in the right mood.
This particular visit was not.
It was the opposite. (what is the opposite of an orgasm????)
Amanda: The opposite of orgasm is everyday life... or surprise buttsex.
Donny Walnuts: ...and it wasn't because I didn't visit the dirty magazine section.
Upon my arrival there were numerous displays about it being black history month.
That's fine with me.
I'm down with brown.
Amanda: That sounds EXACTLY like surprise buttsex.
Donny Walnuts: Needless to say after January's inauguration, nearly every display black history month or not had some sort of Obama book or memorabilia on it.
(No one was going to get me to buy any of those books ...Unless of course it's about some sort of scandal he was involved in. Then I'd purchase it only to comb it over so I may quote it and use as further material to pad my daily anti-democrat facebook status update.)
I half expected streamers.
There were none.
Every year when it comes to this month I always wonder if it was accompanied by a parade and some sort of fanfare, I just showed up five minutes too late. They should have calendars that say "Black History month" as a subtitle to February on it, because invaribly I have incidents like in Barnes yesterday where I think to myself "oh... it's the 21st, I nearly missed it! (big whoop)".
But the point I'm getting at here... is why???
WHY?????
I accept that we need to study black history and learn from the mistakes of the past as well as study the motives, goals and personalities etc... of people like Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.
Why exactly though do we call it "BLACK history month"??? it's not as if anyone is claiming that the other 11 months of the year are white history months. Much less do we actually set aside a month and name it white history month. That would be deemed prejudice. (And that would be a whole 'nother blog post on its own if I went the direction of that last sentence.)
Amanda: It's reverse discrimination against the caucasian race. And it's absolute bullshit. So there can be a black music/entertainment channel, but there cannot be a while channel? And then you get the argument of "Well, EVERY station is caucasian"... and yet again, I call bullshit. Even on the MOST closeminded and backwards of channels (coughFOXNEWScough) there minority commentators, celebrities, random people...
If anything in my everyday life I'm swamped by what people of different cultures and of minority are doing around me.
This is the news in my day:
Cubans are floating across the gulf of Mexico towards the U.S.
Gays are protesting the results of proposition 8.
Mexicans are crossing the border into the U.S.
North Koreans are being persecuted whilst trying to develop atomic bombs.
Same for goes for Iranians.
A white congress passed a bill for -- guess what...? a black president to make a law.
Conflict between Muslims and Hindus.
Conflict between Palastinians and Jews.
How about the NFL?
Amanda: I hate the NFL.
Donny Walnuts: Try to name 5 guys off the top of your head in the NFL that aren't black and that don't play quarterback. If it's easier for you... name 5 guys in the NBA that aren't black.
(Auggghhh...
Rian Lindell - Kicker, Buffalo Bills
Troy Polamalu - Saftey, Pittsburgh Steelers
Anthony Gonzalez - Wide Receiver, Indianapolis Colts
Brian Moorman - Punter, Buffalo Bills
Nick Mangold - Center, New York Jets
...Damn that was harder than I thought and I had to use two players from the Buffalo bills...)
Amanda: Can I name five in MLB? David Wright, Ryan Church, Mike Pelfrey, Brian Schneider, John Maine... and that's only on the Mets!
Donny Walnuts: I'm not sure where I'm going with this black history month thing, but I don't feel like I'm alone in thinking about how confusing my role is within it in a holistic sense.
By no means am I here shouting out white surpremacy or to say that anyone shouldn't celebrate their heritage and learn about the history of "their people", can't we accept that it's part of OUR history. This happened in the history of OUR country.
If you don't want to, that's fine, but it's undeniable that whites are still the majority in this country. What is my role and moral responsibility for "black" history month?
(My Cynical Conservative Republican thought: Moral responsibility is bullshit.)
In any case two generations ago my family wasn't in the United States. My great grandfather came over on a boat from Poland and got a job so he could earn enough money to ship my great grandmother and my grandmother here.
It befuddles me to think that my great grandfather did that for my family. Yet we have the fourth generation minorities in ghettos that don't have a job to support the family that is already here. I guess it just shows a difference in character if not between my family and that one, then at least character of people then and people now.
Amanda: I don't think it's an inherent moral difference in race, honestly. There are plenty of white people who don't have a job to support their families and live off the system. I think it's an inherent difference in races believing something is OWED to them because of the wrongdoings of our forefathers (I'm not saying "ours" in a literal sense, I mean "ours" in the late white race). We "owe" the black race because our ancestors enslaved them; we "owe" the Asian race because we put them in internment camps in WWII. Fuck, if that's the case, the Germans owe the Jews a whole hell of a lot more than I owe anyone...
Donny Walnuts: Every year I was in high school I was forced to learn about slave trade and how things were in the deep south between plantation owning whites whom I have not even a distant relation to and black slaves whom I have even a further distance in relationship to.
I didn't ever ask to hear about the history of Poland.
Not that I didn't care.
It just wouldn't be on a government sanctioned standardized test at the end of the year.
Amanda: Nobody cares about us Polacks. It's very sad.
Donny Walnuts: Why is it limited to "black" history month though? Why not "minority" history month? It even rolls off the tongue better.
I don't even know how to address it and sound inappropriate!
If I were in mixed company and someone were to ask me to describe a person who was black I would get uncomfortable when it comes to skin color.... "He uhhh... was.... (black??? African american??? of color???)" -- not sure which would piss people off less.
Yes.
Less.
Why do I feel this way??? Is it because I'm prejudice or is it more likely that I've heard a million different scenarios where some black guy gets upset for being addressed inappropriately. Maybe it's all just inappropriate, it's just subjective depending on said persons mood whether or not it offends them.
Amanda: We'll probably get lambasted for using the word "blacks" in this post, but JFC, there's no politically correct way to address the black race. I'm sure plenty of people will think we're inherently immoral for even raising this discussion about race... c'mon Don, it's supposed to be OUR RESPONSIBILITY to be PC and all hunky-dory!
Donny Walnuts: I Just. Don't. Get. It.
Amanda: Word cotton.
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2 comments:
Ok, so now that its March 11th it seems a little late but I had to address one thing because it bugs me. People who have dark skin are black (I mean those who are "traditionally" or politically correctly deemed African-American). First of all, not all black people have African heritage and not all people from Africa are black. I personally know two black women that illustrate this point exactly. One is a woman who is from Haiti. Not from Africa, yet, someone might say she's African-American. I know another woman, from Ghana, in Africa, who is African-American. She is from Africa and she is now a citizen of the United States. African-American. I think that's enough... although it is common knowledge that Charlize Theron is from South Africa... and is white. If I was her, I would classify myself as African-American.
Should we add that not all black people are decedents of slaves? Yet most do not have qualms with in taking that credit? --as if they're owed something?
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