Paula Deen and the *N* word

[mykcob4]

Okay let's pass a law that every asshole that uses a racial slur has to do community SLAVE labor for a year. Repeat offenders get 3 years. Habitual offenders get life!

[Nonsensei]

I don't understand why we care about this woman or anything she says.

[rickcopeland648]

The Rick Copeland is with you. Hell, if they really wanted to The Rick Copeland wouldn't care if the Food Network kept her show on the air beyond next month. People can rad about the trial, read the transcript, then make their own conclusion as to whether they want their time and money going to her.

[BarkAtTheMoon]

Paula Deen, Danger Seeker.
[youtube:34688iz1]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqTpqIUWVrc[/youtube:34688iz1]

[Princess Megatron]

As always, I'm appalled at how people can be quite nonchalant about the racism, but outraged about people calling OUT the racism. Because that always seems to be where it gets hung up -- nothing's really all that racist anymore because we're not whipping blacks or giving them separate water fountains, and hell, you can always just ignore the person.

Anything to convince ourselves that we live in totally post-racial America and everything is hunky dory and, jeez, if you really want to get technical, it's white folks like Paula Deen who REALLY have it tough.

Sigh.

 :-|

[Nonsensei]

As always, I'm appalled at how people can be quite nonchalant about the racism, but outraged about people calling OUT the racism. Because that always seems to be where it gets hung up -- nothing's really all that racist anymore because we're not whipping blacks or giving them separate water fountains, and hell, you can always just ignore the person.

Anything to convince ourselves that we live in totally post-racial America and everything is hunky dory and, jeez, if you really want to get technical, it's white folks like Paula Deen who REALLY have it tough.

Sigh.

 :-|

I get what you're saying, but theres a couple elements of this situation that do bother me. The first, and lesser, one is that this is over the word nigger. It has stopped being a racial slur against black people and started being a word that only white people can't say. The word nigger is used countless times every day in conversations between black people and it isn't used as an insult but rather the same way the word "man" might be used.

i.e. man, I hate this
nigga, you crazy

Its used in this offhand sort of way. But if you're not black and you say it it doesn't matter how you intended it: you're a racist. It is diffucult to empathize with or respect the supposedly devastating racial implications of the word nigger when its been morphed into a casual word that black people say dozens of times a day to each other. If it was really that awful you would think black people wouldn't use it either. Its like native americans referring to each other as featherheads all the time.

My second issue and the more important one in my opinion is that this woman lost her job for saying the word. Thats pretty fucking crazy. She may be rich enough to be okay, but other people lose their jobs over this and similar relatively unimportant social blunders and their lives are wrecked. When did we become a society that demands the ruination of a person for saying the wrong word? If you live in a country where you're supposed to be allowed to say and think what you want, but if you say or think the wrong thing you get chewed up and spat out, then in what way do we actually have those freedoms?

[WitchSabrina]

I don't understand why we care about this woman or anything she says.

People who embrace and absorb a public persona should be/are/will always be held with more scrutiny.  It's part of what you sign up for when you accept celebrity.  If Paula Deen accepts the fame and fortune then the price tag for that is public scrutiny.  Public figures should be more accountable for their actions and deeds simply because most people look up to their celebrity.
Celebrity is also something that can be denied, avoided and stopped IF/When these public figures no longer wish to be in the lime light and under the microscope of public actions. Some have fleeting celebrity then take their fortunes made and vanish from public life.
I think as long as someone like Paula Deen accepts and enjoys her celebrity then she needs to live up to that and all the social pressures that will bring.  Easy? No.  Doable? Yes.   The choice was always hers.  Being from the south she should well know what that word Does in certain circumstances and herself, being all kinds of powdery white, should have to be careful with that word use.

At the end of the day - it is NOT a good word to use.  Period.  We can all try to play it off all we want like "meh - no biggie - it's just a slang word"  but the truth is...........  it's heritage is NOT funny nor slang.  
Using the word is simply bad taste.

it's not funny.
She should have known better.

I hope she gets battered and fried.


Point in case............. little white 7 yr old girl tried to use that word with my granddaughter who is half black - she was trying to sound 'all ghetto' is what she told her parents.
not funny........
not to anyone.   She sounded ignorant. Her parents were mortified.  The school staff had to buckle down and invent ways of dealing with this crap.  Kid had heard it on some reality TV show.
Did NOT fit HER, the situation, just completely inappropriate and left my grandchild in tears.

No.

it's not funny

There are lots of other slang-ish words to choose from.  Lots.

[Nonsensei]

People who embrace and absorb a public persona should be/are/will always be held with more scrutiny.  It's part of what you sign up for when you accept celebrity.  If Paula Deen accepts the fame and fortune then the price tag for that is public scrutiny.  Public figures should be more accountable for their actions and deeds simply because most people look up to their celebrity.
Celebrity is also something that can be denied, avoided and stopped IF/When these public figures no longer wish to be in the lime light and under the microscope of public actions. Some have fleeting celebrity then take their fortunes made and vanish from public life.
I think as long as someone like Paula Deen accepts and enjoys her celebrity then she needs to live up to that and all the social pressures that will bring.  Easy? No.  Doable? Yes.   The choice was always hers.  Being from the south she should well know what that word Does in certain circumstances and herself, being all kinds of powdery white, should have to be careful with that word use.

The problem is that this sort of social pressure, and the wanton bloodthirst that results from failing to live up to societies super sensitive demands, is NOT restricted to celebrities. You go to a bar after work and say something someone might find offensive. Oh shit your boss is at the bar too and he heard you. Don't bother coming in tomorrow. Or that whole donglegate thing. One guy saying a stupid joke to another, gets fired because third party eavesdropped on them and decided to be offended. Guy gets fired from his job of 13 years, has 3 kids and a wife to support.

To suggest that this happened to just because she is in the public eye is wrong.

Theres been a shift in the country away from being intolerant for particular reasons, and toward being intolerant towards intolerance. At face value that sounds awesome, but unfortunately we are all still human beings. That means all the ugly, nasty, repulsive aspects of racial/gender/creed intolerance have transferred directly to this new form of being intolerant towards the intolerant. Instead of just informing people that their beliefs are fucked up, or taking steps to change public perception we have also decided that the people who violate our sensibilities need to pay in fucking BLOOD. Society wants to see them suffer deeply. Society wants to see their lives destroyed and their worth as a human being completely denied. In the end, people have merely shifted from looking down at others for something like their skin color to looking down on people for their views. Its just a new way to exert power over those you feel justified in labeling inferior.

Until human beings learn how to avoid this trap, all the righteous rhetoric in the world is ashes from the mouths of hypocrites.

[hillbillyatheist]

Nonsensei has a good point.

Racism cannot go away with censorship. It will simply hide in the back alley and shadows.

The day a racist can express their views without thier lives being ruined, and people can then debate these ideas, Shining the light of knowledge on the stupidity, will do more to crush racism,  than any amount of censorship or persecution ever will.

I became an atheist because I openly expressed Christian views to atheists who argued with me and thier arguments made sense. I became a liberal after trying to defend my conservative views against a professor who let me express my ideas, then debated me.

I can honestly say if we lived in a society that outright CRUSHED anyone who dared express a Christian or conservative view, I would have been afraid to express my views except in private with other Christian conservatives, But I would still be a Christian conservative.

It was only by being allowed to openly express my views and then have them exposed to debate that I was able to change my mind.

I think this is  true for all views

[WitchSabrina]

People who embrace and absorb a public persona should be/are/will always be held with more scrutiny.  It's part of what you sign up for when you accept celebrity.  If Paula Deen accepts the fame and fortune then the price tag for that is public scrutiny.  Public figures should be more accountable for their actions and deeds simply because most people look up to their celebrity.
Celebrity is also something that can be denied, avoided and stopped IF/When these public figures no longer wish to be in the lime light and under the microscope of public actions. Some have fleeting celebrity then take their fortunes made and vanish from public life.
I think as long as someone like Paula Deen accepts and enjoys her celebrity then she needs to live up to that and all the social pressures that will bring.  Easy? No.  Doable? Yes.   The choice was always hers.  Being from the south she should well know what that word Does in certain circumstances and herself, being all kinds of powdery white, should have to be careful with that word use.

The problem is that this sort of social pressure, and the wanton bloodthirst that results from failing to live up to societies super sensitive demands, is NOT restricted to celebrities. You go to a bar after work and say something someone might find offensive. Oh shit your boss is at the bar too and he heard you. Don't bother coming in tomorrow. Or that whole donglegate thing. One guy saying a stupid joke to another, gets fired because third party eavesdropped on them and decided to be offended. Guy gets fired from his job of 13 years, has 3 kids and a wife to support.

To suggest that this happened to just because she is in the public eye is wrong.

Theres been a shift in the country away from being intolerant for particular reasons, and toward being intolerant towards intolerance. At face value that sounds awesome, but unfortunately we are all still human beings. That means all the ugly, nasty, repulsive aspects of racial/gender/creed intolerance have transferred directly to this new form of being intolerant towards the intolerant. Instead of just informing people that their beliefs are fucked up, or taking steps to change public perception we have also decided that the people who violate our sensibilities need to pay in fucking BLOOD. Society wants to see them suffer deeply. Society wants to see their lives destroyed and their worth as a human being completely denied. In the end, people have merely shifted from looking down at others for something like their skin color to looking down on people for their views. Its just a new way to exert power over those you feel justified in labeling inferior.

Until human beings learn how to avoid this trap, all the righteous rhetoric in the world is ashes from the mouths of hypocrites.

That's not what I said.  I said she has more scrutiny due to her celebrity.  And I think she SHOULD have more scrutiny.

THIS happened to her because she's fucking racist.

[WitchSabrina]

She's not in trouble because she "expressed herself".   She's in trouble for being fucking racist.

I think there's a Huge difference between being *allowed* to express one's views........... and that *someone* who expresses their views being an asshole racist.  


Big. Fuck. Difference.

[WitchSabrina]

http://eater.com/archives/2013/06/24/sm ... a-deen.php

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/2 ... 91210.html

just some updates

[WitchSabrina]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/2 ... ostpopular

"It's a free country," Patillo said. "We have freedom of speech, and you can say what you want. Our issue is whether that mindset has filtered into employment decisions."

Patillo said there are strong indications that Deen's operation mistreats and limits opportunities for black employees.

[WitchSabrina]

best way IMHO to view this whole matter:

Said Libby Middleson, of Mississippi, "I am sad that Ms. Deen has become a victim of her own behavior, but I am happy that we are at least discussing the part institutional racism still plays in our lives in America. It is my hope that we grow from this event."

[Princess Megatron]

I get what you're saying, but theres a couple elements of this situation that do bother me. The first, and lesser, one is that this is over the word nigger. It has stopped being a racial slur against black people and started being a word that only white people can't say. The word nigger is used countless times every day in conversations between black people and it isn't used as an insult but rather the same way the word "man" might be used.

i.e. man, I hate this
nigga, you crazy

Its used in this offhand sort of way. But if you're not black and you say it it doesn't matter how you intended it: you're a racist. It is diffucult to empathize with or respect the supposedly devastating racial implications of the word nigger when its been morphed into a casual word that black people say dozens of times a day to each other. If it was really that awful you would think black people wouldn't use it either. Its like native americans referring to each other as featherheads all the time.

My second issue and the more important one in my opinion is that this woman lost her job for saying the word. Thats pretty fucking crazy. She may be rich enough to be okay, but other people lose their jobs over this and similar relatively unimportant social blunders and their lives are wrecked. When did we become a society that demands the ruination of a person for saying the wrong word? If you live in a country where you're supposed to be allowed to say and think what you want, but if you say or think the wrong thing you get chewed up and spat out, then in what way do we actually have those freedoms?

But my issue is, do all of these "elements" bother you more than the racism? Because that certainly seems true of way too many people I've seen talking about this.

It becomes more about "Well, what am *I* allowed to say? What if I lose *my* job?" Is it really that precarious of a situation that you don't know how not to say racist things, really? People get all anxious when they see the "crucifixion" of Paula Deen and start drawing conclusions about their station in life -- seeing her as a direct cautionary tale (of course; if you're white and she's white, you must automatically have tons in common) -- than how her words in a public arena, around her black employees on a regular basis, affect them.

Well, I'd say first off, the N-word is out. It's just right out. Don't worry about who else can say it; it doesn't matter. You know what else I can't say? I can't say "Asshole!" really loud in my boss's face. I can't say "Quit being a total fucking dick" to my kid when he's acting out. There is an endless array of things I can't say, whether out of sheer civility or the threat of an unwanted consequence. I knew that when I was 16 years old, and yet we still have grown adults who seem . . . stricken by the fact that they aren't allowed to say a word. And it's not even that they're not allowed to say it, or can't physically force the word out; they just don't want to deal with the consequences of saying it.

But you know what? I'm glad there are consequences. I'd rather there be swift, severe consequences for saying it than none at all, or even the lukewarm sort that means absolutely nothing in a practical sense. To a degree, the latter is more representative of America. Sure, Michael Richards probably "destroyed" his career doing what he did (although, by my count, he's got four new credits in IMDB since his racist rant). But then you've got Charlie Sheen, who was a temporary internet HERO for his stream of gibberish over Twitter, this man who has beaten and harassed women, besides launching his own racist tirade. Dog the Bounty Hunter had his show for several more years after his incident, and I hear CMT just picked him up for a NEW series.

All the while, people seem to lament the highly public, visible nature of their jobs. "Oh, networks can fire them if they say something embarrassing or hurtful!" Well . . . yes, they CAN. If it's 2013 and you're still not aware that saying the N-word is hurtful and offensive to people, it's probably the best move any network can make.

That said, Paula Deen's career isn't over any more than Imus' and Sheen's and Richards' were. A lot of sponsors are dropping her while the news is hot; I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that there will eventually be some sort of conciliatory guest appearance on Oprah's new show, or The View. Time will pass and all will gradually be forgiven, especially if she goes on TV and talk about how much of a "struggle" she went through and how it was all a "hard learning experience" and how she managed to "persevere" and blah blah blah. Because that's generally how it works; celebrities rarely feel any fatal, long-lasting consequences for their actions if they're marketable enough. And then being WHITE celebrities on top of it? She'll be back. They all came back.

That is, of course, for people who lose sleep over multimillionaires who lose endorsement deals and find themselves temporarily jobless. I know there's a lot of us.

As for the rest of us -- what consequences are there really? Okay, a boss might fire you for saying the word (as they might also fire me for yelling "Fuck!", or insulting the company -- speech has consequences, unless you're proposing it shouldn't). You might lose a couple of friends in disgust. A few black people might think you're mean. And then what? All of that sounds like a paid vacation compared to the sort of society where saying the N-word willy nilly was completely fine because the people about whom it was said were looked upon as inherently worth less than whites.

Words can inform behavior; what we allow or even encourage in civilized conversation can very easily influence how we feel about a topic, an incident or even a group of people. That's why conservatives call social programs "entitlement programs" or "Welfare", and why progressives tend to call them "social programs" or "safety nets". Even if "entitlement program" is accurate and describes funds to which the public is entitled by paying into them via taxes, the word "entitlement" is a heavily negatively-biased word now, and people who dislike those programs know that. They're also very fond of dog-whistle racism and putting things in quite racist terms without being explicitly racist. Words can be incredibly powerful and very much do influence how we look at people. That's why there's a strong reaction to the N-word, and why no one in his right mind should be acting to try and lessen that effect instead of simply not saying it as a conscientious citizen.

No, none of this addresses any of the worst causes-and-effects of systemic racism in this country, not by a long shot. But not too many are addressing that, anyway. I personally try to vote in ways that will ameliorate it -- I wanted bankers in jail for stealing money from everyone and making subprime loans that affected a much larger percentage of African Americans than whites -- but that's just me, and yet I can still find the energy to say "fuck you" to anyone who imagines they should have every right to say the N-word with impunity. And that's what people are still arguing over, now. Not only are there are tons of shady, racist business practices and laws on the books right now, but then there are people upset because there's a racial epithet they can't say. That's where we are.  

Yet, people who do speak up and who do condemn its usage are told "Go complain about REAL racism!" It's never the lovers-of-all-things-N-word who are told, if they really DON'T want to be branded a racist, to stop using racist words and bickering about not being allowed to, and go tackle some of those more important racial causes themselves if they're so adamant about not appearing racist.

And by the way -- the N-word isn't a view. I'm actually pretty offended that anyone would compare liberal views or atheist thought (both things that apply to me) to a disgusting racial epithet. The N-word isn't an idea. It's not a concept. People are offended by liberal thought because they hate discourse and things which challenge their beliefs; same for atheism or secularism.

People are offended by the N-word because it was a word used by racists to degrade black people. They have ample CAUSE to find it offensive because that was its intention. Let's please lay off the WILD false equivalency.