Maggie's Farm

The Anchoress is in high dudgeon today with a confectionery
piece on racism. In some ways it reminded me of the writings of Janet Cooke formerly of the WaPo and Little Jimmy.

The Anchoress: "Obama’s candidacy has, for better or worse, - I think probably for better - revealed the complicated and shaky state of race-relations in America . (where has the Anchoress been for the past fifty years?) Middle class “white” America had not realized just how touchy things were, ( we weren't?, even with black race riots in our cities, a black on white violent crime ration of 9:1?..we weren't aware..please) perhaps because we hadn’t “wanted” to see it, or perhaps because in our minds, with our kids rapping and adopting “street” clothes and lingo, (called the dumbing down of society) and the popular culture seeming fairly ingrained with a “multi-culti” mindset, it simply seemed like race had become a secondary or tertiary matter. Or we hoped it had."

Habu:
Obama did that? Sorry but race has, as I pointed out yesterday, been front and center in our politics and culture for this nation's entire history. Don't give credit to Obama for deeds he hasn't come close to initiating, discovering or uncovering. Prior to knowing The Anchoress was going to write in this fashion today I typed on this site these thoughts last evening.


"It is not difficult to hear people say every day that they "hate" this or that. They "hate" Rush, or they "hate" the President, or even they hate this country.

You get the picture.
Simple question.

Why is it off limits to "hate" the current (last fifty years or so ) black culture in America?
Yes, I realize the first words of response are the knee jerk of, "but it's racist, or because you're a racist" if you say you hate their culture, but what makes it so?
We discriminate all the time. Almost every decision we make requires a discrimination between a minimum of two choices. If one choses to discriminate between different socioeconomic groups or cultures where is the injury? After all the object of the hatred, unless acted upon, doesn't feel the hate at all. An N-person sitting in Peoria right this minute doesn't feel nor is hurt by me hating the N-culture he or she inhabits.

It seems most strange that such a cornucopia of hate can be easily filled with few if any questions asked, but if you include the black culture in that horn of plenty a firestorm engulfs the issue....why is hating the black culture off limits?
#6 Habu on 2008-03-22 00:26 (Reply)

...and yes I understand that there isn't simply one homogeneous black culture, that there are a multiplicity of subcultures within "the community", but when you get polling data that time and again gives every indication of a solidarity in the 80-90% range on a host of issues then I believe it is fair to characterize the black culture as more homogeneous than not.
I mean this is a culture that in the 80-90% range thought OJ was innocent of murdering two people in cold blood, one certainly premeditated. That believe in high percentages that HIV was invented by whites to force suffering and death on "the community" and that whitey is the devil........so why is white America condemned for hating the black culture?
#7 Habu on 2008-03-22 00:40 (Reply)


I would say there was ample reason not to invite the black woman to the wedding.

So you don't believe the countries history of race? Debated at the Constitutional Conventions, the three fifths compromise? What was that about if not race?

Segregation. Not about race?
Anthropology..studying different races?
Physiological and IQ differences ...any race involved there in the results?

BD. You are in denial. Different races exist. I have already addressed the sub culture issue within race and fully acknowledge their existence but I also believe I made the point of the solidarity, proved in poll after poll that blacks look at the facts and many times reach startling different conclusions than a prudent person would.

The abolitionist movement, roiling the country from your neck of the woods until forcing a civil war that no one wanted to fight over race, but that Lincoln made a war about race after denouncing it as a prime mover.

I mean BD the list of race based issues is endless, not just here in the USA but worldwide. And Barack Obama didn't uncover anything new to discuss that hasn't been talked about and written about ad nauseum.

I would take a wild guess and say you're Caucasian as far as race goes...unless you are substantially Iroquois, which I doubt.....what percentage of you is Indian? .But surly you asked that question in jest...I certainly hope so or you are in deep ,deep denial over race.
I mean haven't you ever filled out a job application before? What did you check?

there's a garden hose around back ..help yourself. and that would be.... Miztah Habu suh can I gits me sum watah? it's a Gullah thang.

Well I had to take time out for my workout.

While putting in some miles on the Airdyne a thought scampered across my brain.
How in the span of just one week can Barack Obama the putative Democratic Socialist nominee for the Presidency give a speech heralded by some in the MSM as "Lincolnesque" and I speak of race openly as he said he would do but didn't, and there is sudden confusion over why race is being discussed?

Now I haven't specifically addressed this to BD because there is an unwritten rule that the staff will perhaps guide but not engage in an extended colloquy, a good rule I endorse.

But others surly have opinions and yet the mere topic appears too radioactive for most to write about. Tis a pity.

Dr. Krauthammer wrote a brilliant dissection of Obamas' speech, ending with:

"But Obama was supposed to be new. He flatters himself as a man of the future transcending the anger of the past as represented by his beloved pastor. Obama then waxes rhapsodic about the hope brought by the new consciousness of the young people in his campaign. Then answer this, Senator: If Wright is a man of the past, why would you expose your children to his vitriolic divisiveness? This is a man who curses America and who proclaimed moral satisfaction in the deaths of 3,000 innocents at a time when their bodies were still being sought at Ground Zero. It is not just the older congregants who stand and cheer and roar in wild approval of Wright's rants, but young people as well. Why did you give $22,500 just two years ago to a church run by a man of the past who infects the younger generation with precisely the racial attitudes and animus you say you have come unto us to transcend ?

See race matters, even if you're a mulatto Senator who is a black liberation supporter and thus a hater of white people. Obama is simply too cowardly to speak as plainly as he says he will ...but aren't we learning daily that is his way with everything?

Krauthammers piece...http://tinyurl.com/2f42ea

Disconnect anxiety

I better get out the Mathew Lesko's grant writing material 'cause it looks like riches in them thar hills. With a twist here and a bit of turn there and I could create a study on Montana wheat farmers thresher disconnect anxiety.

Well, I scored a 2 on the test. Too many hours online and I IM'd my sister yesterday. I think I'm safe for now particularly that I have no motivation or need to move any further down the road of social disconnect or as Robert D. Putnam put it Bowling Alone. In it this Harvard professor sites the damage done to our society by our increasing isolation.
The trend has disturbing implications, as the link between social capital (the personal) and civic engagement (the political) is a strong one. The lesser known continuation of de Tocqueville's observation on Americans' habits of association is that "in democratic countries knowledge of how to combine is the mother of all other forms of knowledge; on its progress depends that of all the others."

We're now electronically isolated from social interaction while simultaneously engaging in an ether with what could conceivably be simply a machine on the other end. And now it's created a brand new anxiety ... and who says we're not progressive.

Disconnect Anxiety...where the hell is Carrie Nation when we need her?

Under the thread Liberty and restraint we find the age old argument on prostitution. Now I am sick and tired of constantly reading about prostitution. Our Congressmen and Senator, Governors and Hollywood stars like Charlie Sheen have all given the big thumbs up ( a big up anyway) to the worlds oldest profession so that should be the end of that .

I do wish we could get a position paper from the Obama camp clarifying where he comes down on the issue. Do I have a witness?